NBA DFS Core Plays LIVE: Sunday, January 7th
A daily fantasy sports OG, Notorious has been roaming the DFS streets ever since they were invented. He has racked up multiple live final seats and several six-figure tournament wins in his DFS career, and Noto will mix it up in all different types of contests. On weekends, Taylor Smith takes the reins. So, who better to walk you through the madness of an NBA DFS slate? Core Plays LIVE will zoom out on the slate as a whole, zoom in on the best NBA DFS picks, and constantly update as news breaks. Whether you are diving into the slate 5 hours before it starts or 5 minutes before it starts, you’ve come to the right place.
Today’s the last day of the NFL regular season, but we’ve also got a full schedule of hoops action on tap for Sunday. DraftKings and FanDuel are doing things differently for their main slates. Both sites start their main slates at 6 PM ET, but FanDuel included the late-night Lakers-Clippers clash starting at 9:30 ET. DK did not, so we’ve only got 6 games to consider over there. There’s still a lot to consider, and we’ll see how injury news breaks throughout the afternoon.
NBA DFS Top Picks: Core Plays LIVE for Sunday, January 7th
Slate Overview
- 7-game slate
- 6:00 PM ET – Atlanta Hawks at Orlando Magic
- 6:00 PM ET – New Orleans Pelicans at Sacramento Kings
- 7:30 PM ET – Minnesota Timberwolves at Dallas Mavericks
- 8:00 PM ET – Detroit Pistons at Denver Nuggets
- 8:00 PM ET – Memphis Grizzlies at Phoenix Suns
- 8:30 PM ET – Toronto Raptors at Golden State Warriors
- 9:30 PM ET – Los Angeles Clippers at Los Angeles Lakers
- Teams on the front end of a back-to-back: Suns, Clippers
- Teams on the back end of a back-to-back: None
- NBA DFS Injury Report: The Situation Room
- Scroll to FanDuel and DraftKings Rankings & Core Plays
News Updates
Here’s where I’ll provide news updates.
Team Previews
Atlanta Hawks (at ORL): The Hawks got shellacked on Friday night in Indiana, and tonight they’ll get an even tougher on-paper matchup against a stingy Orlando defense. The Hawks are actually 1-point favorites on the road here with the Magic dealing with some injuries, and the 239.5 total in this game is the highest on the day. There really isn’t much standing out on the Atlanta side with this team being close to full strength. Trae Young grades out a bit better on DK ($9,900) than he does on FanDuel given the site’s bonuses for 3-pointers and double-doubles, so I don’t mind a dusting of Trae in tournaments at what should be reasonable ownership.
Orlando Magic (vs. ATL): The Magic are rather banged up these days, yet they did go into Denver and win with a short deck in their last game. Franz Wagner, Gary Harris, Joe Ingles, and Jonathan Isaac are out, while all of Goga Bitadze, Markelle Fultz, Anthony Black, and Wendell Carter are questionable after missing the last game. Late swappers got to enjoy a GPP-winning effort out of Moe Wagner on Friday night, as he started and logged 38 minutes with the team’s other 2 centers down. He’d again be a phenomenal play at $5,600 on DK and $5,400 on FD if Goga and WCJ sit, so we’ll see. The bigger news is the absence of the younger Wagner, which opens up tons of usage (35.4%) for Paolo Banchero. Paolo is up over $9,000 around the industry, but that’s still too cheap for a glorious matchup against the Hawks’ woeful defense.
New Orleans Pelicans (at SAC): Zion Williamson is questionable for the Pels tonight ahead of a trip to Sacramento. If he sits, we’re looking at major usage boosts for Brandon Ingram (+4.8%) and CJ McCollum (+3.3%) most of all. Neither player grades out all that well with Zion projected in, but they’ll be popular if he’s out. Jonas Valanciunas had some big games without Zion earlier in the year, but that was with Larry Nance also out. Nance is now back and cutting severely into Valanciunas’ minutes. Trey Murphy and Naji Marshall are value candidates that could see some extra playing time without Williamson as well. Fortunately, this is 1 of the 2 games starting right at the 6 PM lock time.
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