NBA DFS Lineup Optimizer Picks Today DraftKings & FanDuel Fantasy Basketball

Monday starts the NBA DFS week with an interesting four-game slate that has some fascinating site-to-site price differences. With only four games and a limited set of options, plus the anticipation of a number of bargain bin value options once again, FanDuel proactively priced several secondary stars into the $10,000 tier, while DraftKings was less attentive at the top-end. The slate features four games starting with one of the lowest totals Vegas has thrown at us recently, with the Knicks vs Cavaliers game coming at just 202.5. The final game of the night, a game between the Jazz and Suns that would be interesting with both teams at full strength, comes in with a 221-point total that may come down if center Rudy Gobert is unable to play. Gobert is on a long list of questionable players on this slate, including several of his Jazz teammates, monitoring the news before and after lock will be a key factor in winning NBA DFS tournaments tonight.

This space will always focus on the factors mentioned above, but at times we will call out plays that are over-owned, taking the opportunity to discuss the potential pivots. With four games on the slate, this article will focus on several of the top leverage plays on the Boom/Bust Tool. As always, the goal is to find players who are under-appreciated for the frequency with which they land in the optimal lineup in DraftKings and FanDuel NBA DFS projections and simulations.

NBA DFS Optimizer Picks for DraftKings & FanDuel Lineups

These picks are made utilizing the Boom/Bust Tool, specifically analyzing the optimal lineup rate, leverage score and boom probability. The optimal lineup rate represents the frequency at which a player appears in the optimal lineup in Awesemo’s simulated DraftKings NBA and FanDuel NBA slates. The leverage score is the difference between the optimal lineup rate and projected ownership, while the boom probability indicates a player’s likelihood of hitting a ceiling score. It is important to remember that not all of these NBA DFS picks are highlights, at times we will discuss plays that are outright bad or come at such aggressively negative leverage that they are rendered bad in this space, so be sure to read the analysis and not just the headlines.

Goga Bitadze: DraftKings — $6,200 — C | FanDuel –$6,200 — C

The depleted Pacers are another team with a key question mark coming into Monday afternoon. The team may or may not have guard Caris LeVert, but they will definitely be missing starting point guard Malcolm Brogdon as well as big men Myles Turner and Domantas Sabonis once again. The team has played in this configuration for several games with one of the primary beneficiaries being backup big man Goga Bitadze who looks like a solid option from the mid-range across the industry tonight. The center is not a bottom-rung value play, but his price is fair for the 1.04 fantasy points per minute he has posted across all situations this season. Bitadze has seen 23 minutes per game over the team’s three most recent outings, putting up a 1.08 per-minute mark in the process. In the Pacers’ most recent game, the center played 35 minutes and put up a 34.2-point night on FanDuel. He is projected for 30.1 minutes again this evening, which should land him in the range of 30 fantasy points or more, with positive leverage on both sites.

On the FanDuel slate, Bitadze slots in as a $6,200 option at the singular center spot. He has a 20.5% optimal lineup appearance rate that stands 21st overall on the slate but falls in behind only two other center-only players. Those options Jonas Valanciunas and Nikola Vucevic, both look like quality choices despite expected popularity and negative leverage. FanDuel’s positioning gives gamers the ability to book Bitadze for a cheaper price and similar upside while rostering several of the other premium players on the slate at power forward, including Cavaliers big men Jarret Allen or Evan Mobley from the top of the optimal lineup appearance rankings. Bitadze’s cheap price and 33.43-point median projection have him pushed up to a 30.58% boom score probability, the second-highest mark at any position on the blue site tonight, behind only Valanciunas and once spot ahead of a fellow backup center value play, JaVale McGee. The Suns’ backup is another story on this slate. He is projected for a limited 21.6-minutes and just a 7.6% optimal lineup appearance rate, given the other major upside plays at the position. With a 5.0 leverage score and just 15.5% ownership projected, Bitadze is a clear option from the middle of the field. He has a strong chance of providing an upside score for his salary.

The Pacers center costs the same $6,200 against a lower salary cap on the DraftKings slate, but he has a better optimal lineup rate with the ability to use him in the utility spot. Bitadze lands in the optimal lineup in 27% of Awesemo’s simulated DraftKings slates, the seventh-highest rate on the board at any position and the second highest among centers behind Valanciunas. Bitadze has a 32.6-point median projection and a 32.81% boom score probability on the site, placing him again behind Valanciunas, but ranking him near the top of the board on the slate overall. Adding shares of the positively leveraged Pacers center is a strong approach. He is an excellent upside option with a relatively stable projection of minutes and fantasy scoring. On the DraftKings NBA DFS slate, Bitadze has a 3.4 leverage score, with 23.6% of the public including him in their lineups, exceeding the field’s exposure is an acceptable approach to this slate.

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Darius Garland DraftKings — $9,300 — PG | FanDuel — $8,700 — SG/PG

The Cavaliers are offering several options at the top of the optimal lineup board for this evening’s slate. There is a bit of a logjam in the Cleveland frontcourt, with all of Mobley, Allen, and Kevin Love ranking among the top handful of players on both sites. Allen and Mobley are far more expensive on DraftKings than FanDuel, they land in the optimal lineup in around 18% of lineup simulations on the former site but 42% on the latter. With Love pulling in an optimal rate between 24 and 27% across the industry, it is difficult to decide between the forward options, but Cleveland guard Darius Garland also stands out on this slate. Garland will be popular on both sites, but he is slightly undervalued, and he should have utility across the industry. The guard has produced 1.05 fantasy points per minute across all situations this season, and he has been at 1.07 over the team’s three most recent games while seeing a significant 38.3-minute average. Garland put up 35.7 FanDuel points in a 39-minute outing in the team’s most recent game, and he projects for similar expectations tonight.

Garland’s boom score probability reflects his fair pricing on both sites. At $9,300 with eligibility only at point guard on the DraftKings slate, he comes in with a 9.41% probability of hitting a ceiling off of his 37.7-point median projection. While that rate of hitting a top score is not overly enticing, Garland lands in the optimal lineup in 23.7% of simulated DraftKings slates, making him the 10th-most frequently optimal player at any position and the third-highest point guard available. With the more frequently optimal point guard options coming from the value tier, Garland provides a place to spend salary savings from other positions and an option that allows gamers to differentiate lineups by spending salary on a quality player. Garland is carrying just a 21.1% ownership projection, leaving him at a targetable 2.6 leverage score on the slate. While he seems most likely to deliver around his median projection, Garland is still a strong piece of lineup constructions tonight, it is difficult to access a number of top constructions without his foundation of raw point-scoring in the guard spot.

On the blue site, Garland is an $8,700 option at either guard position, but he has just a 5.14% boom score probability. The guard is more frequently optimal than he is a ceiling player. He lands in the top lineup in 39.9% of simulated FanDuel slates, the fourth player from the top of the board. Garland also has a solid 5.0 leverage score — not enough of the public is getting to the dynamic scorer on this slate. The guard has a 34.83-point median projection with 34.9% of the field projected to include him in lineups tonight. At that rate of popularity and the low probability of hitting a true ceiling score, there are reasons to consider other options but based on the frequency with which we find Garland in the top lineup, and his lack of ownership appropriate to that rate, it seems that the right approach is to exceed the field’s exposure on this site as well.

New Orleans Pelicans

The top of the optimal lineup appearance rate board on the DraftKings slate belongs to Phoenix forward Cameron Johnson. After Johnson comes a list of four Pelicans players in a row, ranging from Garrett Temple at a 34.7% optimal lineup appearance rate to Devonte’ Graham at 29.1%. Center Jonas Valanciunas lands between the two at a 32.8% rate, the top center-only play on both sites, as does guard Nickeil Alexander-Walker, who is a $3,800 value play at either guard position who lands in the optimal lineup in 29.7% of simulated slates. With Josh Hart and Herbert Jones not far behind on the board, it seems that the question is not if a Pelicans player will land in the optimal lineup tonight, but more how many and which ones will they be? The situation is similar on FanDuel, where Graham and Hart are the two leading Pelicans options, with optimal lineup rates in the mid-30s, while Valanciunas and Alexander-Walker slide further down the board.

Graham is currently questionable to play. He is projected very low in ownership at the moment, which gives him a massive leverage score, but if he plays that situation will seemingly change quickly. Hart, meanwhile, comes in with a 1.6 leverage score on FanDuel and 4.3 mark on DraftKings, making him an interesting target for lineup shares. Among the most frequently optimal players on DraftKings, Alexander-Walker is projected at a 0.0 leverage score, with Temple dropping to -3.0 and Valanciunas at -4.5. The big center is a quality target regardless of the leverage or public popularity. He could easily dominate the position tonight with his 1.21 fantasy points per minute for the season. Either of the value guards would gain even more value if Graham does not play, but they are not typically highly productive players. Alexander-Walker comes in at a 0.84 per-minute mark while Temple checks in at just 0.70. Alexander-Walker or Temple will be as difficult a decision as which of the Cavaliers frontcourt options to use in a roster. A mix of all sides of that equation seems like a sound approach to lineup building across both sites tonight.

The lowest raw FanDuel ownership among players currently projected for more than 30 minutes in the Pelicans rotation tonight comes on Jones, who is carrying a 19.2% projection on the blue site, where he pulls up a -2.2 leverage score and a 27.7% ownership mark on DraftKings, giving him a -5.8 leverage score. On that site, Hart is projected for less raw ownership and Jones is a tricky play who has a cheap price and multi-position eligibility. Backup big man Jaxson Hayes is drawing minimal attention as a $3,200 option projected for 17 minutes of action at 1 fantasy point per minute. Hayes is not an option to chase aggressively, but he does project to land in the optimal lineup in 9.4% of simulated slates and he has a 21.25% boom score probability on DraftKings. For $3,900 at power forward on FanDuel, he is slightly less optimal at 8.1%. Backup point guard Jose Alvarado has seen a few flashes in recent games as well, but he is projected for just 15.8 minutes at this point in the afternoon. In 20 minutes in the team’s most recent game, Alvarado posted 31 FanDuel points, and he has been a 1.12 player over the team’s three most recent contests, despite seeing just 17 minutes per game. In a situation where his minutes increase while his ownership lags behind, Alvarado could become a bit more interesting. Overall, it is very difficult to envision a winning lineup that lacks Pelicans players on either site this evening.

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Author

Terry McBride

Terry used to do other things, now he writes words on the internet. He hopes his more than 20 years’ experience in season-long and daily fantasy sports and his custom models for MLB, NBA, and NFL don't steer you too wrong when he writes columns and makes picks on Awesemo.com. A lifetime of experience keeping odd hours make Terry ideal to cover KBO baseball overnight until the world returns to normal. Most of those late night hours have been spent on the couch watching sports, T.V., and movies; just try to shut him up about any of the above. You can find his pop-culture ramblings and more on Sideaction.