Saturday, Dec. 14 provides a nine-game main slate for all the big daily fantasy sites. Before you lock in your NBA DFS lineups and NBA DFS picks on DraftKings, FanDuel, Yahoo and FantasyDraft, make sure to check out check out Awesemo’s NBA DFS rankings and projections. Let’s dig into some NBA DFS Picks, including James Harden, Paul George,  and more.
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Don’t forget to check out the NBA Strategy Show featuring Josh Engleman and Your Ol’ Pal EMac as they break down the NBA DFS slate and give out their thoughts on James Harden, Luka Doncic, Ja Morant, injury news and analysis.
NBA DFS Picks: Prime Time Players
James Harden: Houston Rockets vs. Detroit Pistons
DraftKings $12,900, FanDuel $12,400, Yahoo $58 Ownership Rating (preliminary run): DraftKings 12.3%, FanDuel 40.1% Yahoo Fantasy 40.4%
Yes, he is the most expensive option today and I essentially did not play him at all last night at the same price. That makes for a good point highlighting that things are ever evolving with the daily fantasy sports player pool.
It is all but assured that Kawhi Leonard will be out tonight as he has not played in a back-to-back since his days in San Antonio. There is a decent chance that Giannis Antetokounmpo is not needed against the Cavaliers, so we should have plenty of options in the mid-t0-low pricing tiers to make this play work.
With Russell Westbrook having sat the other two Houston back-to-back sets, he is unlikely to play tonight. That means some insane opportunity for James Harden who has a one-in-four chance to exceed 65 fantasy points and a 10-12% chance to reach 80 tonight. This is also why Luka Doncic is likely to be the odd man out for me tonight, much like Harden was last night.
Paul George: Los Angeles Clippers at Chicago Bulls
DraftKings $8,300, FanDuel $10,600, Yahoo $38 Ownership Rating (preliminary run): DraftKings 28.2%, FanDuel 5.1% Yahoo Fantasy 27.4%
FanDuel got ahead on the pricing with Kawhi Leonard likely out. The other sites… well not so much. This is a gimme and it is very feasible to work in both Harden and George on the same lineup.
Kendrick Nunn: Miami Heat at Dallas Mavericks
DraftKings $6,400, FanDuel $5,100, Yahoo $21 Ownership Rating (preliminary run): DraftKings 1.2%, FanDuel 33.6% Yahoo Fantasy 2.2%
FanDuel in turn missed the boat on Kendrick Nunn and he is a near lock option with Goran Dragic and Justise Winslow out once again.
NBA DFS Picks: Good Value
Troy Brown Jr: Washington Wizards at Memphis Grizzlies
DraftKings $5,000, FanDuel $4,700, Yahoo $12 Ownership Rating (preliminary run): DraftKings 33.4%, FanDuel 10.0% Yahoo Fantasy 31.8%
For a reasonable price we can get in on the game with the highest projected total with Troy Brown Jr. If Isaiah Thomas (questionable to doubtful depending on the source) returns, we should still roll with Brown in while hoping The Masses falter in their fervor.
This game has a 236.0 projected point total and both Washington and Memphis are within one possession per 48 minutes of playing at the league’s fastest pace. The Wizards have the worst defensive efficiency allowing 122.1 points per game with the Grizzlies fifth allowing 116.4 points per game. Moritz Wagner (ankle) is out so there should be 8-10 extra shots to go around for everyone who is healthy.
NBA DFS Picks: Risky Value
Jaren Jackson Jr: Memphis Grizzlies vs. Washington Wizards
DraftKings $6,500, FanDuel $7,300, Yahoo $24 Ownership Rating (preliminary run): DraftKings 23.5%, FanDuel 32.5% Yahoo Fantasy 44.6%
On the season, Jaren Jackson Jr is living up to his nickname of Hackson Jackson. Looking at players with at least 325 minutes of court time, he has the fifth highest foul rate at 5.6 per 36 minutes. Fortunately the Wizards literally do not have anyone in the front court worth fouling, however, that is no guarantee that Jackson will keep his hands to himself. He will end up on nearly a third of all rosters and while he should flirt with the fifty fantasy point plateau tonight, he could also torpedo lineups if he gathers fouls early.
FantasyCruncher Tip of the Day
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With the incredibly user-friendly FantasyCruncher, we can take our lineup construction to the next level.
Today we will look at how to use the “group” feature within FantasyCruncher to facilitate a game stack.
For this example we will be focusing on the 236.0 total of the Washington Wizards at Memphis Grizzlies game.
Going to the Advanced Options >>> Groups will allow us to set up the players we want to include. For this example I have named my group WAS at MEM Game Stack and requested that at least five players from this group are used in every lineup.
The reason I named this group is to easily find it because I do not want to make all of my lineups focused on this game, we can use the “enable/disable” function to turn this rule on and off.
When creating a group in this manner, we will want to do a few runs to see what type of lineups are created. Our individual player exposure %s will be applied and then FantasyCruncher will choose the best five on a point per dollar basis.
In this case, that is bringing in more of the Washington players than I would like to see.
So I am using the General setting tab to set a minimum number of players from each team. In this instance I am using a minimum of two from each team for some balance.
Final Thoughts
There is quite a bit of news still up in the air as of this posting, so be sure to tune in to Live Before Lock at 6:30pm ET with Fast Eddie Fear.
As always, you can reach out to me in Awesemo.com Premium Slack or on Twitter @EMacDFS if you have any NBA DFS questions about DraftKings, FanDuel, Yahoo or FantasyDraft.
Good Luck NBA DFS Gamers! ~ EMac
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