NBA DFS Picks & Building Blocks Today: Does Indy Have a Chance?! (June 5)

The NBA Finals get started today with the underdog Pacers in Oklahoma City to take on the Thunder. Let’s break down the top NBA DFS picks and key lineup building blocks on FanDuel and DraftKings. These plays reflect the most up-to-date data — and for live updates, check out our NBA DFS Starting Lineups Page.

NBA DFS Picks Today – Building Blocks: Thursday, June 5

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NBA DFS Picks Today: Building Blocks

Tyrese Haliburton is coming in with nearly identical tournament representation on both of the main sites, ranking third overall on DraftKings and fourth on FanDuel. Thinking about the matchups facing the Pacers is also pretty daunting. Luguentz Dort was First Team All-Defense this season, and Jalen Williams made the Second Team. Alex Caruso was on the First Team in 2022-23, and the reserve guard made the Second Team last year. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander won the MVP this year and was second last year while also finishing with the seventh-most votes for Defensive Player of the Year.

This is a hellacious matchup for Haliburton, who is going to be meeting a plus, stellar or ace defensive player at every turn and switch. He is going to be the key to the entire hope of the Pacers. Nobody other than the former Iowa State Cyclone has a chance to drive and potentially score at the rim against the best defensive team in the league with any consistency. Sadly, he will be met there by some combination of Chet Holmgren and Isaiah Hartenstein.

OKC is going to put up a wall in the paint, centered on protecting the rim. The Thunder will encourage corner 3’s on perimeter reversals, which usually means lesser players getting a chance if the ball can get ahead of the pursuit or via feints and drive-and-dish situations, though with this lengthy defense, the closeouts are frequent and fierce.

Haliburton has to keep his team moving in transition and get to the rim himself or find a way to get the defense to collapse on him at the high post and hit a cutter. However, with Holmgren roaming free on help defense, that is asking Indy to get two things right for the opportunity to get a likely contested shot.

Should Haliburton slide into poor habits as a tentative facilitator, who himself settles for 3-pointers, this series will be over almost before it starts. Seeing all of this written down, it should be abundantly clear why this is such an uphill climb for Indiana.

There is a reasonable chance that the Pacers will eke out a gentleman’s sweep, though it will be on the back of positive 3-point shooting variance. Aside from an injury to SGA, it is hard to see many paths to a Pacers championship.

Pascal Siakam and Myles Turner are, of course, in play, though quality offensive opportunities are going to be few and far between against what may go down as the best defense in the history of the Association. Fortunately, Siakam can pick up the peripheral stats, though they will be limited, and Turner can hold his own in the various defensive categories. Just a little luck could have Siakam going for 40 fantasy points and Turner for 30-plus, though that also includes each hitting mid-30s minutes.

The other wrinkle in the finals is that there are two off days between each tilt, so the main reason to pull starters for the losing team is to avoid injuries, as regrouping is sort of built in at this point. At least, it is as much as it can be for two teams that have been playing contested games for several weeks now.

Rounding out the first five, Aaron Nesmith was outstanding with his defense against Jalen Brunson, making the heart of the New York offense work for everything, despite Nesmith’s sprained ankle. While he will have had another five days of treatment and recovery, sadly, it will not turn him into a lockdown defender against the recently named MVP who was the runner-up last year. Still, getting on the court is half the battle, so Nesmith will need to drop in some uncontested treys.

Andrew Nembhard has been a nice complementary asset for the Pacers, but in a game of this magnitude, he is pretty much outclassed by the OKC top 7. In turn, that does not bode well for the ancillary pieces for Indy, so apologies to the fans in the Heartland. The Canadian is steady, though on this stage it will be tough for him to return a DFS profit of any significance.

Turning to the reserves, T.J. McConnell is going to find a tough row to hoe, so expect him to slide back to only playing when Haliburton is on the bench. It may take a game or two to get there, but he is a subpar option from 3-point range, having attempted only 14 in the 16 postseason games thus far. The Thunder limit turnovers, and, of course, the 33-year-old is not going to be successful on many dribble drives or backdoor cuts against this defense.

Bennedict Mathurin needs to get offensive opportunities to have any DFS relevance, though he can create his own shot, so he should be able to flirt with double-digit fantasy points, even without blowout run. Ben Sheppard is the inverse with a better path to minutes through his defense, but his only hope as a DFS contributor is a couple of fortuitous corner-threes.

Obi Toppin is a one-way player who should get some shots off, but rebounds are going to be contested at every turn. Journeyman Thomas Bryant can at least contribute a troika now and then, though he is a turnstile on defense, which has contributed to him playing for five franchises in his seven seasons. This is not a series for Tony Bradley, who at least brought defense against the Knicks, though as an offensive zero, he has no value in this matchup aside from mop-up duty.

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Jalen Williams has had a nice trajectory over his three seasons in the league, finishing second in the Rookie of the Year race then coming in 12th last year for the Clutch Player of the Year. This season he made his first All-Star team was named Second Team All-Defense. The 23-year-old averaged 21.6 points, 5.3 rebounds, 5.1 assists and 2.6 “stocks” (combined steals and blocks) in the regular season.

The Denver series was tougher for him on offense, where he averaged 17.6 points per game, but he recovered in the Western Conference Finals with 22.2 points per performance. He can bring the ball up, run the offense and create his own shot, which makes him a perfect complementary companion for keeping the attention away from Gilgeous-Alexander.

Holmgren also stepped up in the Conference Finals, posting 21-plus points in three of the five games while averaging 2.2 stocks and holding his own on the boards. Expect Hartenstein to be more of a presence in this series, which will further allow Holmgren to roam as weakside help, boosting his potential for blocks.

Hartenstein is no stranger to facing Siakam and Turner, having averaged 32.9 minutes in the second round last year, when he was playing for New York. Despite playing fewer postseason minutes for the Thunder, Hartenstein is more active on offense than he was with the Knicks. While a double-double is unlikely, 20 PRA (points + rebounds + assists) are in play with a little luck and if he can play 24 to 25 minutes. Currently, he is projected for 21.5 minutes, and most sports books have him with 16.5 PRA.

Caruso and Cason Wallace are good mid-tier plays, as each is expected to be on the court for around half the game. Gamers still are not enthralled with reserves, even though we know that Caruso has a locked-in role with his ace defensive skills. The added appeal for Wallace is that he has a path towards mop-up duty as someone who can keep the offense running if SGA and Jalen are on the bench.

Finishing up the first five, Dort is going to be on the court for around 30 minutes tonight, though he understands his defense-first role and has no problem settling for a couple of long-range field goal attempts as his only offense. He is an adequate scorer but usually the fifth option whenever he is on the court with this deep roster.

Now we get to the wild cards. First up is veteran Kenrich Williams, who played in two games in each of the first two series before getting action in all five games against Minnesota. In three of the games, he was on the court in the first quarter, and he had second quarter run in four of the five. For reserves, getting in the game in the first half is key since it means they have a purpose. We do not know if this is going to continue, but in his favor, Williams is malleable on defense, a good rebounder and adequate on offense.

Jaylin Williams saw first quarter action in six of the seven games against Denver before being relegated to mop-up duty at the end of Game 7. He did not see the court in the first two games against Minnesota while getting run in the final frame of the last three games. The only outlier was in Game 3, when Williams started the second quarter with both Holmgren and Hartenstein on the bench. More gamers will recall that was also when rookie Terrence Shannon Jr. entered the series for the first time for the Timberwolves. Currently, the Stokastic NBA DFS Projections have Jaylin for 4.8 minutes and Kenrich for 8.1, though that could end up being zero for either or double for both.

Aaron Wiggins is slated for 13.3 minutes as a median workload, and he has had a regular first half role for most of the postseason — well, of course, except for Game 4 of the Western Conference Finals, when he never left the bench. That is the risk of OKC having such a deep bench, but it also provides the variance to make the giant contests in the single-game format have more strategy and nuance — along with frustration.

Isaiah Joe usually gets early run in the opening frame and again in the third quarter for his offense. That gives him a likely floor of four or so minutes, with upside reaching the low teens. He too is a good bet for mop-up duty, giving him a few paths to upside while being the most likely to avoid a DNP-CD of all the bench players.

Today’s Top Sports Betting Picks

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Take Aaron Nesmith under 16.5 points + rebounds + assists (PRA), for example. It’s a +EV bet, meaning it has positive expected value when compared to the best odds available across the market. But the real strength of Portfolio EV isn’t about finding just one good bet — it’s about consistently finding dozens. With the Mass Entry tool, you can scale up, place a high volume of +EV bets, and let the math do the heavy lifting.

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While Nesmith projects for 18.43 PRA and 28.4 minutes of run, this does not account for a wide range of actual outcomes. Additionally, we can see that this wager is on ProphetX, where users can post their own odds. The +146 well exceeds the “true odds” of +125, with most sportsbooks posting 17.5 PRA, though pushing anywhere from -105 to -120 odds. The math is very favorable for this opportunity, even though the probability is that Nesmith will reach 17 PRA to sink this under.