Daily Fantasy Basketball Injury News and Updates for FanDuel and DraftKings - 3/8/16

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!

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Now let’s look at some news that’s come in throughout the day to see if anything’s changed in our minds or in the NBA landscape. It's a shorter slate and a light news day, but we'll be updating as stuff rolls in. Also throw out some ideas in the comments and we can take it from there.

What We Know

Tony Parker, Manu Ginobili, and Tim Duncan are taking a game off
The big fantasy here, of course, is not that these guys aren't playing - it's who will get their minutes. Patty Mills is probably the biggest winner of the group - he's been playing low 20s minutes as is, and while Pop has kept him a part of the 2nd unit in games where Parker has sat in the past, Mills has still seen both a usage and minutes increase. I also suspect we'll see 30+ minutes of Danny Green, and high 20s minutes for David West, both of whom have been solid daily fantasy basketball options when their respective starters have sat in the recent past.

Kristaps Porzingis will play
But there's almost no chance he sees his full run. Unfortunately, Porzingis' minutes have been spread rather evenly among fantasy irrelevant options like Kyle O'Quinn and Lance Thomas, leaving guys with a chance to be relevant like Derrick Williams still under-funded in the opportunity department.

Bradley Beal is out
He's not even with the team at the moment, so we can try and figure out who is going to get his minutes. The team hasn't released anything publicly as of this writing, but I'd guess we'll see a healthy dose of the daily fantasy irrelevant Garrett Temple (whom I guess can still be called an interesting punt play on minimum prices if he starts), and likely some more Alan Anderson, who's been considerably better on a points per minute basis than Temple. I'd actually be interested in Anderson if he were starting. Likewise with Ramon Sessions, though I think they'll leave him in the backup point guard role.

What We're Waiting to Know

Kobe Bryant's status
As of now he's "50/50 to play," according to Byron Scott. Kobe sitting would topple a number of fantasy dominoes - D'Angelo Russell's usage goes way up with him off the floor, for instance, and we'd see a lot more Marcelo Huertas, who's frankly been great on these prices in his last 3 games.

Nikola Vucevic's status
He missed the Warriors game with this groin strain, and that opened up a few extra minutes for Aaron Gordon. It also secured Jason Smith 23 minutes, which he didn't do a whole lot with. Still, Vucevic is an active member of the offense, and losing him would mean more opportunities for some already solid plays like Oladipo and Fournier as well.

The "Every Lineup" Guys

These are the guys that show up in all of the top 10 of the lineups generated by our lineup optimizer. It doesn't mean they're safe, mind you, just that they have a great spot in winning daily fantasy basketball lineups for tonight's slates.

Kawhi Leonard - FD 8600 DK 8200
Opponent - MIN
FD Proj. Pts - 41.01 DK Proj. Pts - 42.71
The "old 3" are out, and Kawhi was a great play before that news even came in. Yes, even the Spurs B-team should destroy the Wolves, but the points will have to come from somewhere. And that somewhere looks to be Mr. Leonard, if our projection system is to be believed.

Carmelo Anthony - FD 9100 DK 8400
Opponent - DEN
FD Proj. Pts - 42.68 DK Proj. Pts - 44.78
A day to spend up on small forwards, according to our lineup optimizer. It makes sense - it's a lousy position today, and Melo has been a beacon of consistency recently, putting up 44-47 fantasy points in each of his last 3 games. He'll be up against the Nuggets tonight, who have been slightly worse than league average against opposing small forwards this season, but there's more to it than that. They've been rolling out these combinations of guys like Jakarr Sampson and Will Barton at the 3, neither of whom are equipped with the right skills to track Melo. I think he has a monster here, and that our projections are too conservative.

Victor Oladipo - FD 6600 DK 7100
Opponent - LAL
FD Proj. Pts - 33.5 DK Proj. Pts - 35.12
Dipo went right back to playing huge minutes against the Warriors, and put up 40 FanDuel fantasy points. He'll have the abysmal Lakers in this one, and Vucevic is still questionable for tonight's game. He gets dinged a little if Vuc comes back, but he looks like a terrific play regardless.

Good luck out there today! If you want access to all of our numbers, get started with a free trial below - on us! You can also get started with DFSR pro - our brand new lineup optimizer!