Monday, Nov. 22, starts off the holiday week with a 10-game main slate. Keep in mind that the NBA is taking Thursday off, so there will be 13 games on Wednesday. Let’s look at the player pool and discuss the top NBA DFS picks for DraftKings, FanDuel and Yahoo lineups. Do not forget to head over to the Awesemo NBA DFS home page for more great written daily fantasy basketball content.
NBA DFS Picks: Building Blocks, Monday, Nov. 22
Yahoo Play of the Day — Clint Capela: Atlanta Hawks vs. Oklahoma City Thunder
- Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 36.21 | DraftKings: 35.74
- Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 10% | FanDuel 9.2% | DraftKings 5.9%
- DFS Salary: Yahoo $30 | FanDuel $7,500 | DraftKings $7,600
Tonight is an intriguing matchup for Clint Capela, who is not the traditional Yahoo Play of the Day for such a large slate. The Yahoo salary algorithm tends to assign favorable cap hits to the centers more often than not. This also self-regulates because only play two centers are available per lineup, and often times giving up the utility slot for a second big man can hamstring flexibility to late-swap to better options with post-lock news. If the second center is in one of the later games, that is not as much of an issue, but it is a delicate balance.
Even though Atlanta is a double-digit favorite at home tonight against Oklahoma City, prior to their current four-game winning streak they had gone through a dismal stretch, losing eight of nine games. It is unlikely that they will take their foot off the pedal early in this one. In 1,870 minutes alongside John Collins since the start of last year, Capela is averaging 1.22 Yahoo points per minute. Without Collins he is averaging 1.24 fantasy points per minute. The takeaway from this should be that Collins does not dampen the efficiency of Capela. On the flipside, his presence dampens the likelihood that Capela will fulfill his upside potential, but that is baked into Monday’s salary. Tonight a 15-point, 15-rebound performance is very much in play, and there is an outside chance that Capela could reach the 20/20 plateau for the first time this season.
Dejounte Murray: San Antonio Spurs vs. Phoenix Suns
- Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 43.94 | DraftKings: 44.86
- Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 22.8% | FanDuel 5.3% | DraftKings 10.3%
- DFS Salary: Yahoo $38 | FanDuel $9,700 | DraftKings $9,200
While this is a back-to-back for Phoenix, they easily dispatched a short-handed Denver squad last night, and their starters aside from Mikal Bridges did not have to play more than 28 minutes. In their last game San Antonio was getting crushed by Minnesota, so coach Gregg Popovich pulled Dejounte Murray with seven minutes to go in the final frame and Derrick White did not even make his fourth quarter rotation. In his two prior games, Murray had a triple-double in Los Angeles against the Lakers, and he missed notching a second one by a single assist two nights later against the Clippers. Murray is posting career highs of 18.1 points, 8.1 rebounds, 7.8 assists, two steals and half a block. The ability to stuff the stat sheet gives Murray a safe fantasy floor while also granting him access to 50-fantasy-point upside.
LaMelo Ball: Charlotte Hornets at Washington Wizards
- Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 42.05 | DraftKings: 43.73
- Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 3.6% | FanDuel 17.1% | DraftKings 1.5%
- DFS Salary: Yahoo $42 | FanDuel $9,000 | DraftKings $10,200
This is an interesting slate to consider LaMelo Ball. Currently he is not even in the 30 most popular plays on Yahoo and DraftKings, and he is just inside the top 20 on FanDuel. It is important to remember that this iteration of the Wizards has a much-improved defense and rebounding rate than in prior seasons. While they are still only league average, this is a far cry from languishing in the bottom five. They are also not playing as fast under new coach Wes Unseld Jr., and under his guidance they have the third-best record in the Eastern Conference.
That said, Ball is still an outstanding option tonight. He is coming off back-to-back 50-fantasy-point games, and he has reached that mark in three of his last five and four of his last seven games. Even better, in his last dozen games, Ball has fallen below 40 Yahoo points only once. That was still 36.8 fantasy points, which would not have torpedoed any lineups. Washington is only favored by 4.5 points, so this should be a closely contested battle, which is key for Ball seeing 35 to 38 minutes.
Yahoo Daily Fantasy Basketball Discount Dandies
Orlando Magic at Milwaukee Bucks
Cole Anthony(ankle) missed Saturday’s game, and he is already listed out for tonight. Gary Harris (hand) started for the second time this season, but he is also not available. That means R.J. Hampton, Jalen Suggs and Franz Wagner should see more minutes. Terrence Ross and Chuma Okeke are also at the Yahoo minimum salary, though there should be better options available for the main slate, and they are best left for the 8:00 p.m. ET contests.
Philadelphia 76ers at Sacramento Kings
Tobias Harris (hip) is not expected to play, and with Joel Embiid and Danny Green still out and Ben Simmons away from the team, they would need his help to beat Sacramento. In an odd twist, the Kings are 3.5-point favorites and will be led by interim coach Alvin Gentry after Luke Walton was fired over the weekend. Georges Niang and Shake Milton are fine punt options now, and they will quickly rise to the top of the bargain list if Harris is unavailable. This is the last game of the night, so this news is unlikely to come out early. If Harris is out, then Furkan Korkmaz and Matisse Thybulle become interesting, and Tyrese Maxey would once again approach 40 minutes and 15 to 18 field goal attempts.
Zach Brunner has pinpointed Harris as one of the top options on tonight’s slate, and you can find out more about what makes him such a great play in his NBA DFS Grades & Value Picks Today.
Final Thoughts on NBA DFS picks for the Monday, Nov. 22 Slate
There should be a fair amount of news coming out with the 5:30 p.m. ET injury report, which will reveal tonight’s value options. Keep in mind that salaries and scoring formats differ across the various fantasy sites, and a slam-dunk play on Yahoo may be a below-average NBA DFS pick on DraftKings or FanDuel.
