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Daily Fantasy Basketball Injury News and Updates for FanDuel and DraftKings - 3/19/16
Welcome to the daily updates and injury news article. We'll try and update it right up to line-up locks with as much information as comes across our desks. Let's get to it!
Last night's picks can be found here, so you can wrap your mind around what you need to be looking at before lineups lock tonight.
By the way - we keep our projection system updated with all of the changes as they occur throughout the day right up until lineup lock. Every day. If you want access to that system so you can cut out a lot of the research element, click the button below!
What We Know
Pau Gasol is out
He's sat the last three games and I wish I could tell you it's directly translated to other players on the Bulls seeing a boost in expectation. But it hasn't. Taj Gibson seems like the most obvious beneficiary but he's playing hobbled right now so it's tough to throw 34 or so minutes his way. Nikola Mirotic also seemed like he'd get some front court run, but he's been hit or miss. We can give Bobby Portis a few minutes uptick but I get worried about guys coming off the bench. It also doesn't help that this matchup against the Jazz is a real tough one for big men.
Ian Mahinmi will play
Mahinmi sat out last game with a back issue but it looks like he will suit up and play tonight against Oklahoma City. This will send Jordan Hill back to the bench and really neither guy is in play any more because of the lower minutes expectation on both. I suppose there's some chance Mahinmi sees enough minutes in this game which could boost him into tournament consideration. But I probably won't go there.
What We're Waiting to Know
Will Matt Barnes get suspended
There's been some Twitter rumblings that Barnes could get suspended after his altercation with John Henson on Wednesday. Barnes followed Henson to the locker room in true psycho fashion. If Barnes were to sit it's hard to know exactly how it plays out for the Grizzlies. Z-Bo is looking doubtful and Memphis is already really shorthanded. I suspect we would see just tons of Tony Allen, more JaMychal Green and a bunch of minutes distributed to random bench guys.
Will Gordon Hayward play?
He went through shootaround this morning and I suspect he plays tonight but is still listed as questionable. Joe Ingles has drawn the start in the last two games Hayward missed and has played enough minutes to consider at a low end salary if Gordo can't go. Derrick Favors, Rodney Hood and Shelvin Mack all see expected usage bumps is Hayward isn't on the court. All three would be in play tonight against Chicago if they were more focal points on offense, but I think everyone trends back to the middle some if Hayward plays.
Will Kenneth Faried play?
Man the Nuggets are just a DFS nightmare. They are nearly impossible to forecast because there's no real rhyme or reason to how Mike Malone deploys minutes on a game-to-game basis. Last game Darrell Arthur drew the start but only played 18 minutes in the blowout to the Hawks. Joffrey Lauvergne and Jusuf Nurkic both got heavy run off the bench and if you could project either in the 24-27 minute range they'd be prime values at their position. But you can't project them for that run and everyone falls into a weird in between state.
Will Kent Bazemore play?
He sat out last game with a knee issue though is considered probable to play tonight. If for some reason this news turns then look for Tim Hardaway Jr. to get the start again.
The "Every Lineup" Guys
Russell Westbrook - FD 10600 DK 10500
Opponent - IND
FD Proj. Pts - 54.71 DK Proj. Pts - 56.61
Every lineup both sites and I don't really see that changing at all. Indiana is well below average this season against opposing point guards and this game is projected to stay close. I think Westbrook is the safest play on this slate by a fair amount in this price tier. He will be in every cash game lineup I run tonight.
Michael Beasley - FD 4100 DK 4400
Opponent - ATL
FD Proj. Pts - 24.9 DK Proj. Pts - 26.12
Oof, do you trust this? Me neither, but based on what Beasley's doing with the Rockets right now, even at a moderate minutes expectation he is showing up nearly everywhere because the price is still so low. In his last four games Beasley is averaging 22 minutes and a 15/6 line. The big thing with him is when he comes on the court with the second unit he just pumps up shots early and often. He's a ridiculous usage guy for his time on the court. He's probably running a little hot from the field, but still is in consideration today. I don't feel like he's safe, but the system's giving him a green light on the price.
Kentavious Caldwell-Pope - FD 5300 DK 5700
Opponent - BKN
FD Proj. Pts - 27.1 DK Proj. Pts - 29.68
Lance Stephenson - FD 7200 DK 6100
Opponent - LAC
FD Proj. Pts - 34.63 DK Proj. Pts - 36.16
Right now this is a bit site dependent. KCP is coming into every FanDuel lineup while it's Stephenson on DraftKings. This will happen from time to time considering the nature of pricing differences. It's also a good example of why playing different sites on the same slate creates a natural hedging possibility.
These are players that show up in each of the top 10 lineups as produced by our lineup optimizer. This doesn't necessarily mean that they're "safe," it just means that their projected weighted-mean point total is a solid building block for a great lineup foundation today.
Good luck out there today! If you want access to all of our numbers, get started with a free trial below of our lineup optimizer, on us!
image sources
- Russell Westbrook: (AP Photo/Jeff Haynes)
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Who do you think is the best replacement for J Hill on Dk that’s 4300 or cheaper in the F position?
I love wall tonite and saves me money for other spots over Westbrook
LOL. I know it seems that way and I totally feel ya! That said the truth is the plays are the plays whether they play at 7pm EST or 10:30pm EST. I know this to be fact. But I really understand what you’re saying man. Many a night I am in the money and look at guys with PMR and if Curry or Boogie are in their LU’s it makes for a very sweaty night!!!
the one thing i really need to try and figure out is who should i roster in the last game of the night usually but not all the time the winners of the tourneys/GPP’s have that last guy in that last game that pushes them to that #1 Spot
@Roc i hate picking wall on the road he’s a totally different player when on the road vs when at home
Wall IS Home tonight…
Ibaka needs to be listed .
Tonights game is in Washington Alonzo…
Carmelo or Leonard that’s my tough decision leaning towards Leonard just think he gonna wanna win this game on primtime any thoughts ty
You really can almost never go wrong with Westbrook. That said tho I prefer Curry tonight. In a sorta must win game for both teams looks like a very high 30’s to mid 40’s (depending on score and flow) game for Curry. Curry at 38 mins is freakin scary opportunity IMO.
Curry, Parker, kawhi are all pretty much must plays IMO. I even Like Duncan. Dunc is a fairly solid PPM guy he just so rarely gets the minutes. Tonight all the stops will be pulled leaving the Spurs guys to have heavy run.
Love Wall tonight. He is playing at home tonight but his splits really aren’t like they were in years past. He’s good everywhere now!
Westbrook is going to have a monster game tonight.
Look at Duncan. He is a solid point per minute guy who is priced way way down due to the fact he so rarely gets the minutes. Tonight Pop will roll him as long as he can or until the wheels come off. Parker and Kawhi are must starts for me. Duncan not quite but is a serious value play IMO.
Yup good call. We were a little low on his minutes for this game considering the projected script. Updated now, and he’s looking like a great play.
Agreed
That stinks that mahinmi is playing now. Got some lineup reworking to do to get hill out
I think tonight we all gotta seriously look at a couple of Spurs besides Kawhi and LA. Tonight is one of the rarest of nights where the Spurs and Popvich will have ZERO choice in rolling guys big minutes. That is if they want to even have a chance.
Parker and Duncan at 30 mins + feels awfully safe to me. When they get their minutes they exceed value more often than not. And Tony P in an up tempo game playing 30-34 minutes at less than 5K seems like DFS gold. Same thing for Dunc’ tho I like Parker better since he has his hands on the ball.
But at their respective salaries in a quasi must win game at home versus a very fast playing team seems too good to be true.
I’m fading the Spurs/GS game. Hope everyone who plays those guys gets good points but big picture I don’t like the game so taking some other “safe” options. Assuming no one rests love the OKC/IND game and some other players in great spots. Best of luck to everyone tonight.
do you roll with parker-westbrook or parker-curry on fd?
Stephenson or wade ? Wade has the playing lebron aspect lance is going back to lac
Better combo….robin Lopez and lou Deng or Drummond and Bobby portis
Assuming I try to play AS MANY guys from the write-up as possible and try to have the elast amount of $$$ left over, I get this…
Curry/Parker
Harden/KCP
Morris/Beasley
Millsap/Harris
Robin Lopez
Interesting…
Arthur starting.
DK GPP L/U for tonight…focusing on the 3 guys who are huge upside triple-double threats with guys that could/should go 5x. Thoughts?
PG R. Westbrook
SG James Harden
SF Sergey Karasev
PF Channing Frye
C M. Speights
G John Wall
F Doug McDermott
UTIL Tony Parker
Thoughts on Bojan vs Detriot? Solid play or better options?
Bogut doubtful for game, and Ezeli also out. The last time both these guys were our was Feb 20 against the clippers, where Green started at C and Igoudala picked up 30 mins. With Iggy out as well, who gets the mins, Speights?
Beal is starting. Your writeup on Porter like that he was doubtful. I have Porter i numerous lineups- does your stance change now?
Yes, I think it takes Porter down some
Darn. Hayward playing and starting.
Darn part 2… Zbo and Vince Carter warming up and will try and play…
First Hayward and now this and the punt plays are vanishing right before lock 🙁
If teams continue to announce late lineup decisions at 7:01pm at some point it needs to be looked into. Just fishy that Brooke Lopez wasn’t mentioned anywhere today and then at 7:01pm they announce he’s out. Didn’t play him but I’m sure some people did and their fanduel lineups are crushed before tip even happens.
The optimizer let us down once again
I think it’s time you guys update your optimizer tonight it chose to go cheap at SF on fanduel and the top points of the night came from the upper tier SF guys 3days in a row it’s put out horrible lineups
Problem with any optimizer is it can’t adjust to really late news. Duncan didn’t start for the Spurs and ZBO start was announced really late which completely changed the MEM value plays. Those two bits of news doomed the optimal lineup.
Sure. These things happen in DFS. Nature of things and disappointing for sure. But the core elements of projections remain tight. Tonight a bunch of unforeseen things. Love foul trouble, Duncan not starting, Curry career worst shooting night, etc. . The SF thing is merely noise, has no real effect on any key piece of projections.
Just saying it chose to go big at PG when over the last 3 years curry has never had a good game against the Spurs in San Antonio he only averages about 35.5 fantasy points in that building and has never hit over 40.0 fantasy points in that building do you guys factor in performances in certain arenas because some guys just don’t do good in certain surroundings//buildings just a thought on bettering the optimizer
We don’t factor in player in stadium or player past performance v team because the sample sizes are so small as to be irrelevant.
And just for the record I love you guys picks you helped me win 1st place in 2 tournaments last year and win over 30k I just think the optimizer needs a lil more tweaking
This optimizer has been wasting my money the last 3 nights. All I’m saying
Sorry for the frustration. Plenty of wonkiness over the last couple of days. Frustrating for sure and definitely some odd factors at play.
Glad I avoided the dubs tonight, well all except sleights that is. Beasley was huge for me.
Even if you picked the okc/ind game and any other one game, the optimizer refused to put KD or Paul George in an optimal lineup….that’s tough to stomach…but overall that’s what fantasy is but it is just hard to pay the $30 when that’s what the optimizer is suggesting
and yes I understand to win $$ you don’t just click an optimizer button but when you filter it to include one key game and any other game, you would think that it would put at least one of the stud SF’s in an optimal lineup….just hard to stomach I guess
Sure. Some of that is that Indiana and OKC are among the best in the league at defending small forward. System assumed KD and PG would work each other hard. Didn’t happen, but some metric suggested it would go that route.
If you like KD and George lock them in and then optimize , I spent 200 today going the Warriors Spurs heavy and last minute put 2 on KD and George and won 50 if I only would have flipped my bets lol guess that’s why I only ever win enough to keep playing
Yep I understand …. if I knew that KD and George would light it up then I would have locked them in. However, if it’s up to me I am mainly gonna just look at over/under, the spread, and then DvP. Maybe I put too much weight to DvP, but like Doug said, I would’ve avoided them based on that factor. Now when I use an optimized that costs $30/ month, I’m assuming that it takes more into account than just DvP and I know that this optimizer does! So my comment is more based on how surprised/shocked I am when KD and George are the stud plays of the night and you literally couldn’t make the optimizer put them in an optimal lineup without literally locking them in. If it came down to locking all the players you want in then you wouldn’t have a use for the optimizer! I love this site, Doug has always been great, and I love looking at everyone’s comments. Just wandering how optimizer can be improved so it helps more in the non-obvious situations – like someone mentioned earlier – curry playing in San Antonio etc….