NBA DFS Picks: Building Blocks for Friday, January 29th | Trae Young

NBA DFS action on Friday, Jan. 29, locks at 7:00 p.m. EST with a hefty 10-game main slate. Before you lock in your lineups on DraftKings, FanDuel, Yahoo and SuperDraft, make sure to check out Awesemo’s daily fantasy basketball rankings and projections. Let’s dig into some NBA DFS picks, including Trae Young, Fred VanVleet, De’Aaron Fox and more.

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Awesemo’s NBA DFS Picks: Building Blocks

Yahoo Play of the Day – Trae Young: Atlanta Hawks at Washington Wizards

  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 45.78 | DraftKings: 48.75
  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 19.6% | FanDuel 1.4% | DraftKings 13.6%
  • DFS Salary: Yahoo $40 | FanDuel $10,600 | DraftKings $9,100

Washington will be getting Davis Bertans, Rui Hachimura and Moritz Wagner back from the health and safety protocol. However, that should not impact the Hawks, who are early 4.5-point road favorites. The Wizards are playing at the fastest pace this season with 106.9 possessions per 48 minutes. They also sport the second-worst defensive efficiency, allowing 112.5 points per 100 possessions.

Trae Young has been excellent this season from a fantasy perspective. On the year he is averaging 1.27 Yahoo fantasy points per minute. He is 12th in the league with 26.2 points per game and fourth with 8.8 assists. One overlooked aspect of his game is that he is getting to the charity stripe 10.3 times per game, which is behind only the 10.9 of Joel Embiid. Young is sinking his freebies at an 88.0 percent clip, which helps secure a steady baseline level of production.

Two of the Hawks last five games have gone to overtime, so do not get too caught up with Young’s game logs. However, just know that he definitely is live for 50 fantasy points, and anything less than 40 fantasy points is going to be a disappointment.

Fred VanVleet: Toronto Raptors vs. Sacramento Kings

  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 39.08 | DraftKings: 40.39
  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 14.4% | FanDuel 8.7% | DraftKings 16.6%
  • DFS Salary: Yahoo $34 | FanDuel $8,300 | DraftKings $7,500

Toronto gets a cherry matchup tonight against the Kings. On the season, Sacramento is allowing 116.1 points per 100 possessions, which is nearly 4 points more than Washington, who has the second-worst defensive efficiency. Both of these teams are in the top third of the league in pace, and we can see this manifest in the 229.0 projected game total.

Fred VanVleet is once again playing heavy minutes, and his 36.2 per game is the second most in the league. He is averaging career highs across the board with 18.9 points, 4.5 rebounds, 6.6 assists and 2.3 combined blocks/steals. The one knock is that his shooting has slipped a little, though that can be attributed to a career-high 8.9 3-point attempts per game. Make no mistake: VanVleet is an excellent building block for our Friday night lineups.

De’Aaron Fox: Sacramento Kings at Toronto Raptors

  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 36.80 | DraftKings: 36.81
  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 8.2% | FanDuel 16.8% | DraftKings 1.1%
  • DFS Salary: Yahoo $34 | FanDuel $7,900 | DraftKings $8,500

While this game is on the road, keep in mind that the Raptors are playing their home games this season in Amalie Arena, which is also the home of the NHL Tampa Bay Lightning. De’Aaron Fox has been playing heavy minutes, and we should see that continue. This will be only the second game in the last week for the Kings, who had their two-game set with the Grizzles postponed for health-and-safety reasons.

Over his last seven games, Fox is averaging 35.3 minutes with an astounding 18.6 field-goal attempts. This is culminating in 24.3 points, 4.4 rebounds, 7.9 assists and 1.6 combined blocks/steals for just over 40 fantasy points per game. There are 20 teams in action tonight, which will facilitate a stars-and-scrubs roster construction. Fox is the sort of player who is not quite in the studs category, and he will likely be overlooked by most gamers.


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Good Value

Cody Zeller: Charlotte Hornets vs. Indiana Pacers

  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 26.03 | DraftKings: 26.34
  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 31.0% | FanDuel 13.9% | DraftKings 33.5%
  • DFS Salary: Yahoo $11 | FanDuel $4,600 | DraftKings $4,000

After missing a month with a fractured right hand, Cody Zeller has seen his minutes ramped up in the four games since his return. He played 11, 15 and 18 minutes of the bench in the first three back, and he started and saw a season-high 30 minutes on Wednesday against the Pacers. A reasonable expectation is something in the 25-minute range tonight which has Zeller looking like an appealing option on Yahoo and DraftKings. On FanDuel I would prefer a center with more upside, as we are limited to only one per lineup. There are plenty of discount dandies at the other positions who offer more potential upside than Zeller.

Reggie Jackson: Los Angeles Clippers at Orlando Magic

  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 30.54 | DraftKings: 32.20
  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 49.6% | FanDuel 32.8% | DraftKings 5.5%
  • DFS Salary: Yahoo $17 | FanDuel $5,800 | DraftKings $6,700

Kawhi Leonard, Paul George and Patrick Beverley are still not with the Clippers on this road trip. That should have Reggie Jackson in line for another 36-38 minutes tonight purely out of necessity. The price is not particularly enticing on DraftKings, but on Yahoo and FanDuel, Jackson makes for a fine play. In his two starts he has averaged 38.0 minutes with 15.5 field-goal attempts, culminating in 18.0 points, 7.5 rebounds, 7.0 assists and 2.0 combined blocks and steals.

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Risky Value

Theo Maledon: Oklahoma City Thunder vs. Brooklyn Nets

  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 18.02 | DraftKings: 19.33
  • Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 0.1% | FanDuel 12.0% | DraftKings 23.7%
  • DFS Salary: Yahoo $10 | FanDuel $3,600 | DraftKings $3,400

Theo Maledon is not a bad play at the near minimum salary on every site. However, there is some opportunity cost here on a 10-game slate. George Hill is once again out, so Maledon will likely draw a third straight start. In his first two he averaged 26.0 minutes with 0.7 fantasy points per minute. Even if he sees 30 minutes like he did on Wednesday, he will be hard-pressed to produce much more than a low-20s fantasy stat line. That is fine in cash games (aka head-to-heads, double-ups, 50/50s), but that is not going to be particularly useful when trying to construct a tournament-winning roster.

 Yahoo Daily Fantasy Basketball Discount Dandies

  1. Luke Kennard: LAC at ORL – $10
  2. Cody Zeller: CHA vs. IND – $11
  3. Ricky Rubio: MIN vs. PHI – $11

SuperDraft Daily Fantasy Basketball Picks

  1. Shai Gilgeous-Alexander: OKC vs. BKN – 1.45x multiplier
  2. Chris Boucher: TOR vs. SAC – 1.60x multiplier
  3. Reggie Jackson: LAC at ORL – 1.90x multiplier

Final Thoughts on the Friday, Jan. 29 NBA DFS Slate

This is shaping up to be a fun slate. Twenty teams are in action, so we will have plenty of value plays to facilitate a stars-and-scrubs roster construction. Keep in mind that salaries and scoring formats differ across the various fantasy sites. A slam dunk play on Yahoo may be a below-average option on DraftKings or FanDuel.

Looking for more NBA DFS picks content? We have loads of articles, data, cheat sheets and more on the Awesemo NBA home page. Just click HERE.


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Eric "EMac" MacPherson won the 2007 Fantasy Baseball grand prize (trip for two to the MLB All-Star game) in the Roto format on ESPN. He won again in 2008, this time in the H2H format. As one of the early adopters of daily fantasy sports, EMac has been providing content for baseball and basketball as well as both professional and college football since 2012 for a variety of websites including DraftKings Playbook, FanVice, RotoWorld, Daily Fantasy Bootcamp, and RotoGrinders. He is well into his third decade of fantasy sports and has a wealth of knowledge and experience. Follow him on Twitter @EMacDFS or contact EMac by emailing [email protected].

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