The NBA Yahoo Cup Post Up Presented by BetMGM | Round 17

Welcome to Round 17 of the NBA Yahoo Cup! This free, multi-round, single-entry contest runs every Friday throughout the rest of the NBA DFS season. Scoring is cumulative for the year-long points race, with your five lowest scores dropped. At the end of the season, a $50,000 prize pool is shared amongst the top 7,950 competitors, with a whopping $10,000 going to first. But even if you’re late to the game, the top 15 finishers in tonight’s freeroll earn entry to the BetMGM Final Round, where multiple Las Vegas trips will be up for grabs. Click here to get in on the action!

Let’s focus on three plays to slot into your NBA DFS lineups for tonight’s Yahoo Cup contest.

Don’t forget to head over to the Awesemo NBA DFS HOME PAGE for more great written daily fantasy baseball content, including FREE daily article series: The Deep Dive, NBA Buildings Blocks and NBA Cheat Sheets for all the major DFS sites.

NBA DFS Pick No. 1: Stephen Curry — $47

Without fail, large slates such as tonight’s nine-gamer tend to have tons of unexpected injury news break throughout the day. So while no substantial value has emerged as of yet to go fully stars and scrubs with lineup builds, know that it’s coming. And with a whopping 13 players $40 and above on Yahoo today, there are certainly options in that top tier of talent to pay up for.

That said, Curry at home against a woeful Wizards defense is a cut above the rest. The total for this game opened at 241 at the Bet MGM sportsbook, which makes plenty of sense considering the Wizards and Warriors rank first and second in pace this season, respectively. That is a full 13 points higher than the next opening total on the board, making this by far the best game environment of the night.

Curry has been simply sublime of late, posting four consecutive games of 30-plus real points and 47-plus Yahoo fantasy points. There is no question who the Warriors offense plays through, and his 31.5% usage on the season goes to prove it. And as an extra bonus to rostering Curry, gamers save a few dollars from the five studs sitting in the $50 range and get essentially the same ceiling. So make Curry a mainstay of Yahoo Cup lineup tonight, as it is unlikely he will disappoint in this spot.

NBA DFS Pick No. 2: Joel Embiid — $50

While Curry is the preferred spend-up option, the assumption here is that there will be enough value as the day goes on to comfortably play more than one. That’s where Joel Embiid comes in, who will be rostered significantly less than he should be against a Pelicans team with the third-worst defensive efficiency in the NBA. In fact, according to projections made by the World’s No. 1 DFS player Alex Baker, Embiid is only expected to be rostered by 2.6% of the field tonight.

While some might have minutes concerns for Embiid considering this is only his third game back from a three-week injury layoff, he got up to 33 minutes against the Celtics on Tuesday. That lends credence that there could be even more court time in store than others might expect. Embiid also stepped right back into his alpha role his first two games back, posting outrageous usage rates of 38.6% and 44.8% in those outings despite mediocre fantasy outputs. He has also gotten to the free-throw line a whopping 37 times since his return, where he’s been converting at an 84.9% clip on the year. That’s helps create a built-in floor for Embiid, by far the best contrarian play on the board for Yahoo lineups tonight.

NBA DFS Pick No. 3: Miles Bridges — $16

Hopefully there will be viable plays closer to the $10 minimum salary range before lock tonight. But even if there are, Bridges makes for an excellent source of savings on this slate. With the absences of LaMelo Ball, Gordon Hayward and Malik Monk for the foreseeable future, there is a lot of usage and production up for grabs in Charlotte. And Bridges, who was slotted into the starting lineup the Hornets’ past two games, has been taking full advantage.

Over Bridges’ past four games, he has produced right around 0.90 fantasy points per minute while receiving over 30 minutes every time out. That’s decent production and a whole lot of court time to be locking in for just $16 on Yahoo, making him the best available piece of value on the board right now. Double-check that he’s in the starting lineup before the Hornets’ 9 p.m. ET tip-off against the Bucks. But so long as he’s in it, consider Bridges a must-have in the Yahoo Cup tonight.

Eric Lindquist hails from Sioux Falls, South Dakota (yes, that’s the one with Mount Rushmore). A steady diet of three SportsCenters a day at an early age led to his obsession with sports, one that 30 years later is paying dividends for him as a successful DFS player and sports bettor. Despite over half a million dollars in net career earnings, he’s most passionate about helping others achieve their financial goals, an energy you can witness on the daily in his current role as a host and analyst at Stokastic. He’s a former Division I golfer at Iowa State, wishes he was a former Minnesota sports fan, and is a proud father to a 100-pound Bernese Mountain dog named Duke that wishes he could just eat people food instead of the crap he and his wife feed him on the daily.

Stokastic +

Premium Data and Tools
PREMIUM TOOLS
Lineup Generator
Stokastic Sims MLB
PREMIUM DATA
Projections
Top Stack %s
MLB Data Central
FREE DATA
SoRare MLB Rankings
DraftKings Night Owl
FANTASY CRUNCHER (ADD-ON)
MLB Lineup Study
COMMUNITY
MLB Discord Server
PREMIUM DATA
Projections
Ownership Projections
PREMIUM TOOLS
Fantasy Cruncher (ADD-ON)
NHL Lineup Study
COMMUNITY
NHL Discord Server
PREMIUM TOOLS
Lineup Generator
Stokastic Sims PGA
PREMIUM DATA
Ownership Projections
Top Golfers Tool
PGA Tournament Models
FANTASY CRUNCHER (ADD-ON)
PGA Lineup Study
COMMUNITY
PGA Discord Server
Ownership Projections
Top Drivers Tool
NASCAR Discord Server
NASCAR Fantasy Cruncher
USFL Projections
USFL Discord Server
Ownership Projections
Top Fighters Tool
MMA Discord Server
MMA Fantasy Cruncher
NFL Betting Tools
Stokastic Discord Server
Best Ball
Best Ball Rankings
Best Ball Stat Projections
Stokastic Discord Server
Season Long Fantasy (Coming Soon)

Premium Data

MLB DFS Top Stack % for Yahoo

NBA DFS Projections

NBA DFS Boom/Bust Probability

NBA DFS Ownership: Night Slate

NBA DFS Ownership – Express Slates

Yahoo! NBA Ownership

FanDuel NBA DFS Ownership

DFS Winners from the Stokastic Community

Subscribe to the Stokastic newsletter

DFS advice, exciting promos, and the best bets straight to your inbox

Stokastic.com - Daily Fantasy Sports and Sports Betting Data, Tools, & Analytics

Please play responsibly. Only customers 21 and over are permitted to play. If you or someone you know has a gambling problem and wants help, call 1-800-GAMBLER.