NBA Starting 5: Saturday, March 11th
The Starting 5 Series will provide Grinders with a quick look at the day’s top positional plays, analyzed through the lens of our Daily Research Tools.
Today, we’ll take a closer look at the Ceiling and Consistency tool. I’ll sort by the last four weeks to see what players are performing well in relation to their FanDuel salary.
The Ceiling and Consistency tool shows you how often each player has hit their value based on that day’s salary. The percentage columns (%3x, %4x, etc) show the percentage of the time that particular player has hit that value multiplier. For example, if a player has a salary of $5,000, the %3x column will show the percentage of games in which he has scored at least 15 fantasy points ($5,000 divided by 1000, then multiplied by 3).
Point Guard: Ricky Rubio, Minnesota Timberwolves
Rubio has been crushing it lately, with three straight games of over 40 FanDuel points. The T-Wolves are making a push for the eighth seed in the western conference, so Rubio will be locked into heavy minutes again in this tight spread with the Bucks. The high-30s expected minutes alone are enough for me to pay this price for Rubio with his recent upside. There was also a recent story about how the coaching staff has been pushing Rubio to look for his shot more. It looks like he is listening, as he’s taking double-digit shots in his last three games. The point guard position is fairly stacked tonight, so ownership should be spread out, making Rubio a decent GPP play.
Shooting Guard: Bradley Beal, Washington Wizards
The Real Deal Beal has been on fire. He has scored 31 or more FanDuel points in nine straight games. Over his last five games, he is averaging 29 points with 20 shot attempts per game while shooting over 50 percent from the field. Regression is sure to come, but he’s still too cheap, and the matchup with the Blazers it too good. Beal will have a size advantage over C.J. McCollum, and Allen Crabbe is not a good defender. Also, the over/under for this game is currently at 224, and it should be the highest of the night by a significant margin. I like Beal for all formats tonight.
Small Forward: Maurice Harkless, Portland Trail Blazers
Harkless has been playing well, with double-digit scoring efforts in six of his last nine games. This has led to at least 4.3x his salary in every game. This is exactly the type of game where Harkless can excel and reach his 7-8x ceiling. He gets a bump in production at home, averaging over 11 points per game at the Moda Center, with all of his peripherals making a slight jump, as well. I’m comfortable with Harkless in cash and GPPs tonight.
Power Forward: Willie Cauley-Stein, Sacramento Kings
Willie just had a huge game last night, so his ownership will be inflated tonight. I would also keep your eye on starting lineup news, as the Kings have been doing some shuffling around lately. The benefit that we do have is the Kings just played the Nuggets two games ago and WCS got the start. He didn’t have the greatest game, with only 20 FanDuel points, but that’s not going to totally kill your lineup at his price. He did post a monster 29-10 double-double against the Nuggets towards the end of February, so we’ve seen both outcomes for WCS in this matchup. I could roll WCS out in cash if he starts, but he will be GPP only if coming off the bench.
Center: Jusuf Nurkic, Portland Trail Blazers
Nurkic was 40 percent owned a few nights ago when he put up his massive line, meaning you more than likely weren’t going to win without him. The center position has more options tonight but Nurkic is still too cheap for the type of ceiling that he possess, especially in this matchup. I wouldn’t be surprised if he is as high as 30-40 percent owned tonight, as well. The game theory part of my brain says to look elsewhere at the position for tournaments, but Nurkic should be 100 percent owned in cash. Don’t get too cute with this one.
Starting your FanDuel lineup with these five guys will leave you with an average of $7,125 left per player.
Hopefully this information helps you with your roster construction today and leads you to a nice score. As always, feel free to leave a comment or reach out to me on Twitter, @Socky21.