Last night we had a beautiful nine-game NBA DFS slate with plenty of news leading up to lock and the return of Willie Cauley-Stein to a starting lineup for $3,100. Among the landmines that needed to be avoided were Saddiq Bey (3.4x for $3,900 at 37.1%), Richaun Holmes (1.7x for $5,600 at 26.3%) and Delon Wright (2.3x for $4,000 at 14.9%). Luka Doncic had his first big game of the year (6.9x for $10,300 at 14.7%). The main DraftKings GPP was the NBA $400K Fadeaway ($100,000 to first). Let’s get right into the NBA DraftKings Lineup review.
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DFS Rewind: NBA DraftKings Lineup Review | Jan. 4
The main DraftKings NBA GPP was the NBA $1M Shootaround Special ($200,000 to first). There were 57,142 entries entered by 23,806 unique players ($1,142,840). Of those, 4,314 (18.1%) made a profit.
The Winner
Congratulations to 150-maxer mazwa, who won this GPP by 7 points with a 362.25. This is not mazwa’s first win in the main GPP; he is a great player who parlayed outlier games from 10%-owned Kelly Olynyk and 1.4%-owned Wayne Ellington (24.5 fantasy points for $3,000) into a $200,000 payday. This lineup used all $50,000 team salary and had a cumulative team ownership of 133.6%.
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Salary and Ownership
Nine of the top 50 finishers used $49,700 team salary or less. Here are the top salaries used last night:
- $50,000 | 48%
- $49,900 | 24%
- $49,800 | 12%
- $49,700 | 7%
- $49,600 | 4%
Cumulative team ownership on the top 50 was wide, but the 100-150% range was the sweet spot for the majority. The most popular lineups played came in at 241% cumulative team ownership. These lineups are optimal median projected lineups and have about the same chance of winning the GPP as the players that reserve entries but don’t enter any lineups. Two hundred and ninety-eight users entered this lineup, which did not cash:
That is passable for a cash game but has a 0% chance of winning the GPP and not good odds to cash either.
The 150-Maxers
Ninety 150-maxers invested a combined $270,000, entering 13,500 lineups and making up 23.6% of entries in this tournament. Seventeen made a profit while placing first, third, fifth, seventh and eighth twice. The top four 150-maxers profited a combined $298,000. This is the second main slate in a row won by 150-maxers. Thirty-six 150-maxers cashed 30 lineups or fewer, including a user whose name I do not recognize, who reserved 150 lineups for $3,000 … and then entered no lineups.
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Miscellaneous
Boom of the slate easily goes to Payton Pritchard, who provided 37 fantasy points (10x) for $3,700 at 31.4% ownership. For bust of the slate, I will drop down from Bey and highlight Holmes, who rewarded the 26.3% of players that rostered him with 9.25 fantasy points for $5,600.
Two hundred and ninety-two lineups were reserved and not played. The lowest-owned lineup that cashed (min-cashed) featured a cumulative team ownership of 21.3%:
The lowest salary team that cashed (min-cashed) used $46,800 team salary:
The best possible lineup you could have played last night scored 393 while using a team salary of $49,900. This lineup would have won by 30.75 fantasy points:
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