Daily Fantasy NBA Basketball Picks for FanDuel and DraftKings - 3/5/16

Last night I recommended sixteen total guys for all of the positions. It's nuts but something like seven of those guys are going to be the same tonight. We've been writing these picks for a long time (3 years and counting) and I can't remember another time with this kind of overlap between slates. Baseball? Of course. That sport has so much overlap on a day-to-day basis that I want to invent some partial AI to write the picks for me. But NBA? Almost never. Here we go. Enjoy last night's picks again. Smiley emoji.

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POINT GUARD

Patrick Beverley - FD 4900 DK 4700
Opponent - CHI
FD Proj. Pts - 24.49 DK Proj. Pts - 27.25
With Ty Lawson exiting stage left it leaves a lot of point guard minutes to Beverley who's a natural fit for Harden in the backcourt. He's a bulldog on D and can hit just enough threes to compliment Beard's drive and (sometimes) kick game. Beverley's racked up major minutes in the last two games and he needs all of it. Because he isn't a big scorer and is a well-off ball guard, dude has to garner major run at these prices. But I think you'll see it as the Rockets will need his D and stability.

Ricky Rubio - FD 6700 DK 6300
Opponent - BKN
FD Proj. Pts - 34.47 DK Proj. Pts - 35.51
I'm writing this during the Minnesota/ Bucks games so I could end up rewriting if something happens to Rubio here (which you'll never know thanks to the other-worldly power of the delete button). Update: You know what? I didn't delete it even though he was trash. I stick by the system. Rubio is one of those higher floor/ lower ceiling guys our system can latch on to in the right situation. Part of this is that he doesn't rely a ton on scoring to hit value. But that can also work against him because he'll rarely get you there in a tournament. Good matchup against a weak Brooklyn squad. And yes I know he was a turnover machine last night and Wolves got rolled. It's fine to look past small samples like that and into the big picture. The Nets are a horrible defensive team and this is the time to buy on a guy like Ricky.

Kyrie Irving - FD 7000 DK 7500
Opponent - BOS
FD Proj. Pts - 33.02 DK Proj. Pts - 34.83
There's a slight case for all three of the Cavs money guys in cash games on this slate. While that's a bit of robbing Peter to pay Paul (did I get that analogy right or is it more like Tragedy of the Commons? Or neither?) I think you cover your bases quite well in anything other than a blowout. Boston's pace allows for opposing volume and all three guys (Kyrie, Lebron, Love) rate out higher in the system. I'd say Kyrie is the first one to go if you're choosing but it's not a terrible strategy.

Strongly consider Shelvin Mack. Oof. Smoke 'em if you got 'em with this guy, but he put up an awesome performance last night in a game where he only wasn't an "every lineup" guy because I got spooked on his minutes.
 

SHOOTING GUARD

Zach LaVine - FD 5300 DK 5700
Opponent - BKN
FD Proj. Pts - 27.92 DK Proj. Pts - 29.22
Shooting guard is no great shakes in the upper tier tonight and I'm not totally incentivized to pay all the way up for Harden who I think is starting to reach maximum pricing unless you're assuming he plays minutes in the mid 40's. That leaves us with some mid-tier price guys like Lavine who's taken over a bunch of minutes in Minny. Lavine doesn't have oodles of upside mostly because he's so dependent on scoring, but Sam Mitchell appears to like having him out there rotating between the one and two. That kind of flexibility gives him a higher floor and this is a good matchup.

Monta Ellis - FD 6300 DK 5800
Opponent - WAS
FD Proj. Pts - 30.29 DK Proj. Pts - 31.57
Another guy in the mid tier who our system likes at his pricing. Ellis can go variable on you depending on the shot volume but this is a solid matchup against Washington who plays at a fast pace and allows well above average fantasy production to opposing shooting guards. With some of the other options out there I think you can get nice separation with a guy like Monta who tends to fly under the radar on many a slate. But he won't completely kill you and does have upside if the shot's falling.

If you think that Solomon Hill's minutes are for real after last night's start in the place of Myles Turner then he's close to a must play at the minimums. But I don't totally trust it.

SMALL FORWARD

Small forward is just stacked today.

Paul George - FD 8500 DK 8100
Opponent - WAS
FD Proj. Pts - 42.21 DK Proj. Pts - 45.05
I wrote him up last night somewhat as a throw in as I thought you could make a case to play him simply on the raw points in a weakly-priced slate of games. Back pats all around because PG just dominated. He put up a 37/7/7/5/1/ line (don't you love all those slashes?) that made him one of the overall plays of the night. You can't always count on those defensive stats buoying the overall line. But you can count on this being a dream matchup for a small forward. Washington gets blitzed by opposing threes and George could be in line for another high floor game thanks to the volume.

LeBron James - FD 9800 DK 9800
Opponent - BOS
FD Proj. Pts - 47.91 DK Proj. Pts - 49.92
While some out there will allocate big bucks Harden's way tonight, I don't mind the roughly 10% discount on Lebron even if he doesn't have the same kind of upside. Lebron's floor is higher in this matchup against a Boston team playing the third fastest pace in the league. They do allow above average scoring and rebounding to opposing small forwards thanks in large part to the volume created by pushing the ball up and down the court. With Love back the wealth gets spread on offense just a little bit more, making Lebron's ceiling somewhat lower than a guy like Harden. But I like saving here and the matchup is solid.

Kent Bazemore - FD 4800 DK 5300
Opponent - LAC
FD Proj. Pts - 24.18 DK Proj. Pts - 25.57
If you think he's going to play big minutes in a high leverage matchup then Bazemore will make things interesting at small forward. He's got double-double potential and has seen a price dip over the last couple of weeks when the minutes stagnated some. The Clips struggle some against SF's on the rebounding end and you are getting a discount on Baze thanks to said minutes situation.

Strongly, strongly (that's two "strongly"s !) consider Tobias Harris who would have gotten a write up on almost any other slate.

POWER FORWARD

Kevin Love - FD 7000 DK 7000
Opponent - BOS
FD Proj. Pts - 36.75 DK Proj. Pts - 39.45
Hey, remember when I wrote about Love as a fantastic play last night and then he didn't play because of rest? Me too. He's back again tonight and little has changed except that I'm even more confident about him seeing the minutes tonight. This is a great matchup for Love's game as Boston will often go very small allowing him to stay on the court through crunch time. He's clearly a different player in terms of usage with Coach Lue at the helm and he'll be a cash game mainstay for me.

Paul Millsap - FD 7900 DK 8000
Opponent - LAC
FD Proj. Pts - 39.35 DK Proj. Pts - 40.89
Power forward is interesting tonight as the two highest points/$ plays in our system (as of this writing) were two of the more expensive plays. And Millsap isn't a guy I've targeted a ton this season. I often joke he's one of my "never on the right night" kind of guys. That's part of how DFS can suck you in to illogical and non-metric based thinking. Tonight the numbers clearly say to play Millsap against a Clipper team playing undersized without Blake in the lineup. LAC is a good defense team all around, but this should be a high-scoring affair and I like Millsap to see minutes in the high 30's. That's the key for him as his salary's dipped some in the short term.

Markieff Morris - FD 5200 DK 5400
Opponent - IND
FD Proj. Pts - 25.07 DK Proj. Pts - 25.91
I think Markieff is a tournament play like you read about. Is he safe? No chance. But he was in line for minutes last night until the game turned into a blowout. Last night the Pacers went even smaller than usual starting Hill over Turner and it went well for them. If this is the case and Wiz want to play faster then a mid 30's minutes run for Markieff isn't out of the question. I'm not locking it in, but he's a guy I'll be all over in tournaments for the upside.

CENTER

Al Horford - FD 7800 DK 7400
Opponent - LAC
FD Proj. Pts - 39.18 DK Proj. Pts - 39.87
While DeAndre Jordan may be an exciting off weak side defender with blocks and whatnot, the Clippers have still been killed by opposing centers this season. Horford, much like Millsap, is a guy who shows up in our system thanks to a depressed price thanks to some variable minutes and performance. But this is a big matchup in a game he projects out nicely for in terms of run. I really like his chances as a somewhat off board play. He scares people off because the performances are all over the map. But if you think the Hawks stay close then I think they're incentivized to keep him on the court in what will be an obvious mismatch for the Clips.

Karl-Anthony Towns - FD 8900 DK 8200
Opponent - BKN
FD Proj. Pts - 42.65 DK Proj. Pts - 43.41
Minny looked terrible last night against the Bucks, falling behind in a big way and leaving a lot of minutes on the table. Fine by me. I'm all systems go on them again for tonight against a Brooklyn team ranked 27th in the league in defensive efficiency. It's a great time to buy on a bunch of guys who burned people last night or whose game logs looked flawed. Shouldn't be the case here as they run up against the Nets. KAT has big time upside against Bro-Lo and look for the minutes to bounce back.

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