Daily Fantasy NBA Basketball Picks for FanDuel and DraftKings - 4/20/16 Opening Round Wednesday’s three game slate brings us increased options compared to the two played on Tuesday. Technically that’s 50% more, a great example of Mark Twain’s explanation of the increasing magnitude of falsehoods: lies, damn lies, and statistics. Just because there are more options doesn’t translate to many options, so there's still not a lot of margin for error. Even in cash games, lineups will be similar. This is when playing late-night cash games with reduced slates during the regular season pays off. As usual in the first round of the playoffs, the biggest concern is court time. Examining blowout risk is a major theme below. Note that this article’s format changed when the playoffs started. Additionally, there won’t be a separate update article. Come back to this article throughout the day Wednesday and review the discussion in the comments below for updated information. Good luck all, though the plan is that you’ll need less, armed with DFSR’s projections and analysis.   Now’s your chance to get DFSR Pro with NBA Optimal Lineups, Projections, Player Cards and Google Chrome extension that auto-populates your lineups into FanDuel. Or try a free trial of our base package with projections for every player. While the seasons overlap, you'll get access to our tools for the NBA and NHL (and MLB when the time comes)! Get started for free by clicking the button below. START YOUR FREE TRIAL NOW! First time with NBA? Be sure to read our free NBA Ebook on building lineups, general strategy and more. We've got you completely covered. We've also launched a Stats and Research Page, which includes a lot of the individual statistics that we use to make our projections. It's free! Enjoy.   Charlotte Hornets at Miami Heat Analysis The series began with a 32-point rout for the Heat, and the game wasn’t even that close. The real issue here is whether Steve Clifford and the Hornets can make the necessary adjustments to be competitive, given the opportunity to dig in and focus on one team. Our friends offshore upped the line just a point to 5 ½. For DFS players, that suggests a closer game and tighter rotations. Reviewing both teams’ minutes shows a pattern fairly close to what we saw in the regular season. In turn, it's reasonable to expect typical fantasy production from each of the clubs' usual suspects. Top Value Plays Nicolas Batum - FD 6900 DK 6600 Opponent - MIA FD Proj. Pts - 35.61 DK Proj. Pts - 37.73 Nic Batum is the top SF on FanDuel (FD) and DraftKings (DK) on a Pts/$ basis. In a game...

Daily Fantasy NBA Basketball Picks for FanDuel and DraftKings - 4/19/16 Opening Round A painfully short slate today, and one game is almost certainly going to be a blowout. The other one has tons of minutes uncertainty thanks to a 37 minute player going down in game 1. It's the NBA playoffs, DFS edition! Let's do work.   Now’s your chance to get DFSR Pro with NBA Optimal Lineups, Projections, Player Cards and Google Chrome extension that auto-populates your lineups into FanDuel. Or try a free trial of our base package with projections for every player. While the seasons overlap, you'll get access to our tools for the NBA and NHL (and MLB when the time comes)! Get started for free by clicking the button below. START YOUR FREE TRIAL NOW! First time with NBA? Be sure to read our free NBA Ebook on building lineups, general strategy and more. We've got you completely covered. We've also launched a Stats and Research Page, which includes a lot of the individual statistics that we use to make our projections. It's free! Enjoy.   Boston Celtics at the Atlanta Hawks Analysis After an incredibly tight game 1, the Celtics lose the guy who plays the most minutes for them in close games. With Avery Bradley on the bench, the Celtics will need to need to replace his defense primariy, and his offense secondarily. This should mean more minutes for Marcus Smart, Evan Turner, and Jae Crowder - all of whom will be chalk plays today. There is uncertainty around exactly how it will shake out, though, because the last time Bradley sat the Celtics were in a gimme against the Lakers. With more on the line, it's tough to predict exactly how all of this will shake out. With the incredible blowout potential of the only other game on the slate, my guess is that our lineup optimizer is going to be spitting out a lot of BOS/ATL stacks with a sprinkling of cheap dudes from SAS/MEM. Top Plays Marcus Smart - FD 5600 DK 4500 Opponent - ATL FD Proj. Pts - 26.27 DK Proj. Pts - 28.01 Evan Turner - FD 6000 DK 5800 Opponent - ATL FD Proj. Pts - 27.76 DK Proj. Pts - 28.59 The only two guys on the slate who will have an almost guaranteed uptick in minutes today, leading to slightly off prices. Both paid better than 5x on these FanDuel prices in game one, and both should see an expanded role out of the shooting guard position today. There's not really a whole lot else to break down, here - there are minutes available in what ought to be a close game,...

Daily Fantasy NBA Basketball Picks for FanDuel and DraftKings - 4/18/16 Opening Round Game 1 of each series is in the books! A few blowouts, a few upsets, and a lot of what we expected. Let's break down game two for the four series going today. In case it isn't obvious, a lot of these picks will remind you of Saturday's picks - but there will be some changes! Keep your pens moving - this will be on the test.   Now’s your chance to get DFSR Pro with NBA Optimal Lineups, Projections, Player Cards and Google Chrome extension that auto-populates your lineups into FanDuel. Or try a free trial of our base package with projections for every player. While the seasons overlap, you'll get access to our tools for the NBA and NHL (and MLB when the time comes)! Get started for free by clicking the button below. START YOUR FREE TRIAL NOW! First time with NBA? Be sure to read our free NBA Ebook on building lineups, general strategy and more. We've got you completely covered. We've also launched a Stats and Research Page, which includes a lot of the individual statistics that we use to make our projections. It's free! Enjoy.   Indiana Pacers at Toronto Raptors Analysis The Pacers "upset" Toronto in game one, but frankly, it looked pretty sustainable to me. They got a little lucky from three (going 11-21), but were pretty cold from two, and even dealt with a little Ian Mahinmi foul trouble. Now it doesn't matter a ton for our fantasy purposes who will win the series, but on a day that features two other series that did contain blowouts, it's worth noting that this is the game most likely to see starters hit their projected minutes totals. It's also worth noting that this is easily the slowest game on the slate. It has the lowest over/under on this small three game slate by far, and as Doug wrote when he previewed the series last Friday - these are two defensively minded teams. Indiana comes in as the third best team in defensive efficiency this season. Meanwhile Toronto was 11th and played at the second slowest pace in the league this year. Top Plays Paul George - FD 9000 DK 8700 Opponent - TOR FD Proj. Pts - 42.29 DK Proj. Pts - 44.89 As we predicted, PG13 played his biggest minutes in ages in game 1, and did so admirably. With Demarre Carroll clearly not physically ready to chase him around, Toronto was left with a mismatched crew of guys either too small or too slow to cover him. George stuffed the sheet, going for 33/4/6/4/2, and it sure...

Daily Fantasy NBA Basketball Picks for FanDuel and DraftKings - 4/17/16 Opening Round Hey all! James here, with our 2nd breakdown of the first round of the NBA playoffs - daily fantasy basketball edition. If you're a regular DFSR reader, you're going to notice that our daily playoff basketball articles are a bit different than our regular season articles. There are a few reasons for this. First of all, we're going to see a LOT of repeat picks here. If Jonas Valanciunas was a good play against the Pacers in game 1 (and he was - booya!). Second, it probably makes sense to go a little deeper on these short (but consistent) slates - so we'll go game by game instead of position by position. Another quick note - we probably won't do updates articles unless there actually ARE updates on a given day. So if you want to talk hoops, comment on this article! Enjoy!   Now’s your chance to get DFSR Pro with NBA Optimal Lineups, Projections, Player Cards and Google Chrome extension that auto-populates your lineups into FanDuel. Or try a free trial of our base package with projections for every player. While the seasons overlap, you'll get access to our tools for the NBA and NHL (and MLB when the time comes)! Get started for free by clicking the button below. START YOUR FREE TRIAL NOW! First time with NBA? Be sure to read our free NBA Ebook on building lineups, general strategy and more. We've got you completely covered.   Detroit Pistons at Cleveland Cavaliers Analysis On the surface, we'd like to be pretty cautious about recommending players from 1-8 match-ups in the playoffs. With a lot of teams going that are pretty evenly matched, why bother? I'm going to suggest this one is an exception. The Pistons took 3 of 4 from the Cavs this season (though the last one was without the starters), and should have the ability to at least stay in this one. Our lineup optimizer projects all starters on both sides of this game to get more than their season totals of minutes, making it one of the more stackable games on the slate. Top Plays LeBron James - FD 10500 DK 10000 Opponent - DET FD Proj. Pts - 50.2 DK Proj. Pts - 52.2 Early returns on the optimizer have LeBron basically everywhere, and it makes sense. It's a day without many expensive plays, and there's a significant chance that we see LeBron in God mode today. In the interest of full disclosure, though, LeBron was less than amazing in his three games against the Pistons this season. It's a small sample, but he turned the ball...

Daily Fantasy NBA Basketball Picks for FanDuel and DraftKings - 4/16/16 Opening Round   Now’s your chance to get DFSR Pro with NBA Optimal Lineups, Projections, Player Cards and Google Chrome extension that auto-populates your lineups into FanDuel. Or try a free trial of our base package with projections for every player. While the seasons overlap, you'll get access to our tools for the NBA and NHL (and MLB when the time comes)! Get started for free by clicking the button below. START YOUR FREE TRIAL NOW! First time with NBA? Be sure to read our free NBA Ebook on building lineups, general strategy and more. We've got you completely covered. A quick heads up - we post an updates article every day in the early afternoon, EST, to catch everyone up on how things are changing as a result of whatever news has come through. We also have great talks in the comments of that article. Hope to see you there! We've also launched a Stats and Research Page, which includes a lot of the individual statistics that we use to make our projections. It's free! Enjoy.   Indiana Pacers at Toronto Raptors Analysis The Pacers come into Toronto a little beat up but there's a chance the four days off for most of their guys gets them back to about 100%.  Toronto on the other hand was able to rest a bunch of their key guys down the stretch and should be firing on all cylinders coming into this series. This first game (and the series in general) projects to be much lower scoring than any other matchup. The opening over/under at 195 is about ten points lower than the next lowest matchup. It makes sense. Indiana comes in as the third best team in defensive efficiency this season. Meanwhile Toronto was 11th and played at the second slowest pace in the league this year. It's going to be a grind it out series for sure. The Raptors are favorites to win, but not as much as a typical 2-7 matchup. Top Plays Paul George - FD 8800 DK 8400 Opponent - TOR FD Proj. Pts - 42.24 DK Proj. Pts - 44.84 It stands to reason that we'll see big minutes out of PG13 in this series. He's played limited run leading into the playoffs as he nursed some ailments. But dude should be good to go in this one. I suspect you see most of the offense run through him and the Pacers will need it. My only concern with him is that among the guys in his price range, he can pull disappearing acts from time-to-time and the Raptors defense is tough. Kyle Lowry...