NBA DFS Picks: Building Blocks for Thursday, January 28th | Damian Lillard

NBA DFS action on Thursday, Jan. 28, locks at 7:30 p.m. EST with a fun four-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 Damian Lillard, Anthony Davis, Enes Kanter and more.

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Awesemo’s Key NBA DFS Picks: Building Blocks

Yahoo Play of the Day – Damian Lillard: Portland Trail Blazers at Houston Rockets

Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 51.95 | DraftKings: 54.95

Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 42.4% | FanDuel 53.9% | DraftKings 32.1%

DFS Salary: Yahoo $48 | FanDuel $9,700 | DraftKings $10,600

Five of today’s eight teams are on the second leg of a back-to-back (Lakers, Pistons, Heat, Warriors, Suns), and the Clippers are on the front end of one. Only the Trail Blazers and Rockets are on an island game tonight. It will have been 72 hours between games for Damian Lillard, who should be raring to go. Jusuf Nurkic and C.J. McCollum are out for a while, Robert Covington is slated to miss two more games, and Rodney Hood (quad) is expected to return.

In his last four games, all without Nurkic and three without McCollum, Lillard has been sublime. In this span he is averaging 38 minutes per game with 21.5 field-goal attempts, including 11.0 3-point attempts. This has resulted in 34.0 points per game with 5.3 rebounds, 7.8 assists and 1.0 combined blocks/steals, culminating in 51.4 Yahoo fantasy points.

Anthony Davis: Los Angeles Lakers at Detroit Pistons

Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 49.18 | DraftKings: 50.78

Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 27.4% | FanDuel 32.4% | DraftKings 28.5%

DFS Salary: Yahoo $46 | FanDuel $10,200 | DraftKings $8,900

The Lakers lost their first road game last night, 107-106, to the 76ers in Philadelphia. LeBron James played 38.5 minutes and Anthony Davis played 34.5. Los Angeles plays again in Boston on Saturday. LeBron has yet to miss a game and Davis has missed just two. Interestingly enough, Davis has only played in one of three back-to-back situations, though it was actually injuries that kept him from going rather than designated load management. The last back-to-back opportunity was two weeks ago when Davis played 28.9 minutes in Houston and then 24.6 minutes the next night in Oklahoma City.

This year Davis is averaging 32.8 minutes per game, which is the least since his rookie season and 1.4 minutes per game less than last year. James is averaging 33.0 minutes per game, which is 1.6 less than last season and also the fewest of his 18 seasons. I bring this up for a few reasons. One, while the salaries for this duo have come down, it is because the algorithms are catching up with their current levels of fantasy production. Secondly, the Lakers have a much deeper team this season with the addition of Dennis Schroder, Montrezl Harrell, Wesley Matthews and Marc Gasol.

Tonight the Lakers are double-digit favorites, which would seem to indicate both Davis and James are playing. If either is out, by all means make the other a priority play. Otherwise I am comfortable landing with Davis, as I just do not see Jerami Grant, Mason Plumlee or Blake Griffin doing anything to slow him down.

Enes Kanter: Portland Trail Blazers at Houston Rockets

Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 36.80 | DraftKings: 36.81

Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 25.6% | FanDuel 31.5% | DraftKings 17.0%

DFS Salary: Yahoo $24 | FanDuel $6,500 | DraftKings $7,100

The wild card with Enes Kanter is always how many minutes will he play. Over the last several years, he has been one of the best offensive rebounders and an elite scorer inside the paint. It is his defensive deficiencies that tend to cap his playing time, which in turn dramatically impacts his fantasy production. Over the four games since moving into the starting lineup as the Nurkic replacement, Kanter has topped 50 Yahoo points twice and been below 27.1 fantasy points twice. In the 50-point games, he averaged just over 30 minutes; in the games below 27.1 it was 25.3 minutes. In these four games he is averaging a phenomenal 1.43 Yahoo points per minute.

Good Value

Terance Mann: Los Angeles Clippers at Miami Heat

Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 25.68 | DraftKings: 26.06

Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 14.2% | FanDuel 43.4% | DraftKings 15.7%

DFS Salary: Yahoo $14 | FanDuel $4,500 | DraftKings $5,400

After spending four years at Florida State University, Terance Mann was the 48th overall selection in the 2019 NBA Draft. He was a full-time starter for his final three years in college and did a little bit of everything on the court. That made him intriguing enough to be drafted, and he has been a decent back-of-the-bench player in his first two seasons. He has shown glimpses of talent in the Summer League and in limited action for the Clippers. While he is not a spectacular player, he should see upwards of 30 minutes tonight, and in his career he is averaging 0.76 fantasy points per minute. In his four career games with at least 30 minutes, he has topped 30 fantasy points in each. This is not a dazzling play, but he should be a solid value in our eight-team player pool.

Reggie Jackson: Los Angeles Clippers at Miami Heat

Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 31.05 | DraftKings: 32.58

Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 30.2% | FanDuel 36.0% | DraftKings 15.8%

DFS Salary: Yahoo $17 | FanDuel $5,000 | DraftKings $7,000

On the short slate we are going to be looking at the short-handed Clippers for some value plays. Reggie Jackson had one of his best games in a couple seasons on Tuesday in Atlanta. This was in large part due to the 39 minutes he played as well as being basically the only true point guard for the Clippers. When he was off the court, it was a combination of Mann, Luke Kennard and Nicolas Batum who helped facilitate the offense for those nine minutes. DraftKings is making things tough with the aggressive salary. While Yahoo and FanDuel have not been as quick to adjust the salary for Jackson.

At this point in his career, Jackson is a capable third or fourth guard who can run the offense when called upon. Over the last two seasons, he has played 46 games, 14 with Detroit and 32 with the Clippers. During this stretch he is averaging around 0.82 fantasy points per minute. Even missing several key players, Miami still plays good team defense, which may cap the upside potential for Jackson.

Risky Value

Wayne Ellington: Detroit Pistons vs. Los Angeles Lakers

Awesemo’s Preliminary Point Projections: Yahoo and FanDuel: 15.33 | DraftKings: 16.45

Awesemo’s Preliminary Rostered Projections: Yahoo 9.2% | FanDuel 11.8% | DraftKings 8.3%

DFS Salary: Yahoo $11 | FanDuel $4,600 | DraftKings $5,100

Currently it looks like most gamers will be smart and will not roll out much Wayne Ellington in their lineups. Ellington has been in the league for a dozen years and played for 10 different teams. Three-point shooting is his main calling card, with a 38.2 percent success rate on 4.0 attempts per game in his career. Outside of that he does not contribute many peripherals. Do not get caught up in his game logs, as this season he is knocking down over half of his triples. Across his last seven games, he is 34-for-58 from behind the arc, which is completely unsustainable. The music is going to stop soon, and Ellington is going to be left without a chair.

 Yahoo Daily Fantasy Basketball Discount Dandies

  1. Luke Kennard: LAC at MIA – $10
  2. Cameron Johnson: PHX vs. GSW – $11
  3. Jae Crowder: PHX vs. GSW – $14

SuperDraft Daily Fantasy Basketball Picks

  1. Enes Kanter: POR at HOU – 1.85x multiplier
  2. Jerami Grant: DET vs. LAL – 1.60x multiplier
  3. Reggie Jackson: LAC at MIA – 1.90x multiplier

Final Thoughts on the Thursday, Jan. 28 NBA DFS Slate

There are only eight teams in our player pool tonight, but that is still enough moving parts for something unexpected to happen. In the event there is no surprise information, we are going to end up utilizing some players we are not comfortable with. Be careful with your bankroll, and know that tomorrow and Saturday we have 10 and eight games on the main slate.

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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