NBA Starting 5: Wednesday, February 15th
Tonight we have a monster 14-game slate to attack. It’s the last full slate before the NBA All-Star break, and I may be forced to play NHL, a sport I dislike. Maybe I will give eSports a try! We have four teams (Cleveland, Toronto, L.A. Lakers, and Minnesota) on the second half of a back-to-back and there are plenty of injury situations to monitor, so I envision another mad scramble before lineups lock.
Today, I’m going to continue to discuss how I can quickly glance at two of the Research Tools available to identify good situations for my starting five. First, I always browse the Salary Charts tool to see if I can identify some players that DraftKings has priced lower than FanDuel so I can take advantage of the better pricing — this is especially important with pricing becoming more dynamic on each site. I will then click the Advanced Player Stats tool and focus on their USG%. It’s also nice to glance the peripheral stat percentages available to see if I can expect peripheral points.
Point Guard: T.J. McConnell, Philadelphia 76ers, $5,100
McConnell’s price is just too low on DK, where we get a $500 discount tonight. I really like this game to go overlooked on such a large slate with its sneaky 219-point total. I not only have played plenty of Isaiah Thomas (who I also like tonight) lately, but also the point guards he defends against, as it’s well known that he is a liability on defense. McConnell has been getting it done lately, averaging 28.5 DK points per game over his last five. He’s also predictably done better in plus matchups and the Celtics rank 23rd in DVP vs. the point guard position, but it’s actually even worse tonight if you factor in their tendency to guard stud point guards with better defenders such as Marcus Smart or Jaylen Brown, which will not be the case tonight. I expect a big game facilitating from TJ at a bargain price.
Shooting Guard: Klay Thompson, Golden State Warriors, $6,500
Klay against Sacramento is definitely a thing and tonight we get a $400 discount on DK. He’s currently questionable, but all reports indicate he should be ready to go tonight. The Warriors should be fired up after getting embarrassed in Denver and also losing to the Kings last week, when Klay went for 36.25 DK points on 25 field goal attempts with 11 from three. This game has a hefty 225-point total and the matchup is solid, as Sacramento currently ranks 23rd in DVP vs. the shooting guard position and gets killed by the three ball, ranking 29th in opponent threes allowed per game. Oh yeah, Klay also shoots a ridiculous 48.9% from three at home.
Small Forward: Kawhi Leonard, San Antonio Spurs, $8,900
The biggest discount on the night belongs to Kawhi, as we get a $1,000 discount on DK. He’s also been playing some great ball lately, averaging 50 DK points over his last five games. He also gets a great matchup against Orlando, currently ranked 19th in DVP vs. the small forward position, and he is an extremely positive situation whether he matches up with Aaron Gordon, Jeff Green, or newly acquired Terrence Ross. The Magic rank in the bottom half of the league in allowing threes, free throws, rebounds, assists, and steals to opposing small forwards and I now expect their rim protection to take a hit with the loss of Ibaka. He has a great 29.06 Usage % and high POW stats for all peripheral categories across the board. All metrics point to a big game from Leonard tonight.
Power Forward: Juancho Hernangomez, Denver Nuggets, $4,600
UPDATE: Wilson Chandler has now been upgraded to questionable.
Since we already received word that Wilson Chandler is out for the Nuggets tonight, I’m going back to the well with Juancho. Even though he is priced higher on DK, he is still too low at a projection for over 30 minutes. He will certainly be popular after his monster game against Golden State where he played 43 minutes and put up 50 DK points while going 6-for-9 from three, but rightfully so, as he should be able to keep the momentum going with another home game. The matchup is not the greatest, but Minnesota struggles with allowing threes to small forwards, so I suspect another big game is in play, but I would temper my expectations in comparison to last game.
Center: Nikola Jokic, Denver Nuggets, $10,300
As stated above, Wilson Chandler is out and with all the injuries in Denver you can expect another dose of huge minutes for the Joker tonight. The Nuggets will have Mason Plumlee available, but will probably play him some with Jokic. There’s not much to say about Nikola that you don’t already know. He’s basically matchup proof and can get it done on all aspects of the floor. He’s always a triple-double threat and presents a matchup nightmare for both KAT and Dieng. The only real risk I see is foul trouble, which held him back in the last matchup between these two teams on January 22nd when he put up 41 DK points in 28 minutes with five fouls. He’s only been getting better and averaging over 60 DK points and close to 37 minutes per game over his last three games. Take advantage of his increased minutes and over 3% usage increase when Chandler, Mudiay, and Arthur are not on the floor, which is actually a very large increase for the center position since usage does not factor rebounding into consideration.