NBA DFS Expert Survey: Thursday, January 4th
Our panel of experts is here to give you their NBA DFS picks for the upcoming slate by answering a handful of questions to help you make crucial lineup-building decisions. Want to know squirrelpatrol’s favorite tournament play? Or Noto’s favorite salary saver? Find out below!
NBA DFS Picks: DraftKings & FanDuel Expert Survey for Thursday, January 4
Which useful trend or statistic stuck out most during your research?
Notorious: Oh boy, we have quite the slate on tap this evening. It ultimately comes down to whether or not you are playing Giannis Antetokounmpo. If you do, you need to hit the right combination of punts. If you don’t, you need to avoid a big game from Giannis. As far as matchups go, there is only one difficult matchup on the slate. Every team except the Warriros has an implied team total that is higher than their season average.
squirrelpatrol: Looking at projected ownership, players from the MIL/SAS game make up 6 of the 8 highest-owned players on FanDuel and 7 of the 9 highest-owned players on DraftKings. Stacks of that game will be common, so going overweight the late game is an interesting contrarian strategy.
headChopper: Warriors’ splits with Draymond Green active and out are interesting. These numbers are DraftKings (FanDuel is not that much different): Trayce Jackson-Davis gets a 9+ point bump. Jonathan Kuminga, Brandin Podziemski, and Chris Paul see a ~5-point bump. The most surprising to me is that in 14 games with Draymond this season, Stephen Curry has scored 46.6 DK points per game. In 17 games without Draymond, Curry drops down to 40.5 DK points per game.
TheLuuch: Maybe we’re finally seeing a real change of the guard. Jonathan Kuminga played 34 minutes against Orlando, while Andrew Wiggins only played 21. Wiggins was not in foul trouble and played mid-to-high 20s in the previous handful of games. I know it’s still a bit of a fluid situation while Steve Kerr figures things out, but it was a season-high in minutes for Kuminga in a competitive game.
tcsmith031: Khris Middleton has topped 32 minutes in each of his last 6 games, and he’s now expected to suit up on the second half of the back-to-back. He’s quietly having an excellent season, averaging a healthy 1.16 DK FP/minute on 23% usage since the beginning of December.
Who is your top overall play (when considering price, matchup, roster construction, etc.) on the board and why?
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