NBA DFS Core Plays LIVE: Tuesday, January 17th
Andy Means (meansy53), a former Duke basketball walk-on, will be bringing Premium subscribers his top NBA DFS plays to build around on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. Everyone’s favorite, Notorious, will be guiding you on Tuesdays and Thursdays. And on weekends, the GPP maestro you all know and love, STLCards, takes the reins.
GENERAL SLATE THOUGHTS
11:00 AM ET: Good morning, my friends. We have a much more straightforward slate on our hands today. There are only four games on the schedule and the two teams that are playing in the second half of a back-to-back (Raptors & Bucks) are squaring off against each other in Milwaukee.
I’d love nothing more than to sit here and write about the historic comeback win of the (my) Jaguars, but I’ll save that for my NFL content. With so few games on the schedule, let’s take a quick team-by-team look at the slate.
Toronto: The Raptors are coming off of a win in overtime against the Knicks on Monday. They have a quick turnaround, but are at least expected to be at full strength. We know Nick Nurse likes to play his starters a lot of minutes, but all five played at least 39 minutes yesterday and three of them (Pascal Siakam, Scottie Barnes, Fred VanVleet) played at least 44 minutes. To make matters worse, the Bucks are third in defensive rating this season.
Milwaukee: The Bucks are coming off of a win against the Pacers on Monday and while they won with ease, the starters still played a full complement of minutes. Giannis Antetokounmpo and Khris Middleton did not play in the contest due to injuries, while Joe Ingles was rested in the first game of the back-to-back. It goes without saying, but the entire slate hinges on the availability of Giannis in this one.
Brooklyn: The Nets have played two games since Kevin Durant went down with an injury and they have lost to the Celtics and Thunder. One of the cures to righting the ship has been to face the Spurs, who are ranked eighth in pace and dead last in defensive rating. It’s clearly a great matchup and the absence of Durant makes the Nets that much more appealing. Here’s what has happened with Durant off the floor this season:
San Antonio: The Spurs have been a tough team to trust in DFS this season. They have an inconsistent rotation and they have the worst point differential (-9.1) in the NBA. They are always live to get blown out, but come into this game as only 6.5-point underdogs. If the game is competitive, this could be a good spot to target the Spurs at home. They are still without Devin Vassell.
Portland: The Blazers have dealt with a lot of injuries this season, but come into this game in great health. The only player on the injury report is “(player-popup #gary-payton-ii)Gary Payton II and he’s listed as probable. They haven’t been in the best of form, but the team has been competitive on the road (10-14). A matchup against the Nuggets is about as mediocre as you’ll find, as Denver is ranked 20th in pace and 18th in defensive rating.
Denver: The Nuggets have the best record in the Western Conference and depending on what happens over the next few games, they could have the best record in basketball. They don’t have the best point differential, but they do have an elite record at home (19-3). The Blazers are very similar to the Nuggets in terms of pace (23rd) and defensive rating (21st). The question is can we can trust anyone outside of Nikola Jokic?
Philadelphia: The Sixers are another team that is at full strength right now, which is extremely rare in this day and age in the NBA. They have won seven of their last 10 games and have a winning record on the road, but draw a tough matchup against the Clippers. Both of these teams play at a slow pace and the Clippers are fifth in defensive rating.
Los Angeles: The Clippers haven’t had many games with all of their key players active, but their recent slide (3-7 in their last 10) is a little surprising. They’ll look to bounce-back tonight against the Sixers, who are ranked 24th in pace and fourth in defensive rating. The big question here is the status of Paul George, who has missed the last five games with a hamstring injury.
I covered most of the injuries in the team previews above, but here’s a full list of the current injuries for tonight’s slate:
Out
Serge Ibaka
Kevin Durant
Devin Vassell
Luke Kennard
Doubtful
Questionable
Giannis Antetokounmpo
Bones Hyland
Paul George
I’ll have the first set of rankings up in by 2:00 PM ET. Let’s have a day.
NOTE: The closer we get to the slate locking, the less likely it is that I will have the necessary time to update the tables below. For the most up-to-date information, make sure you are watching Crunch Time and monitoring LineupHQ for my Core Play tags and our Premium NBA Projections.