Saturday, Dec. 7 presents an interesting 10-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 Clint Capela, Donovan Mitchell and more.
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Don’t forget to check out the NBA DFS Strategy Show featuring Adam “ShipMyMoney” Scherer and Your Ol’ Pal EMac as they break down the NBA DFS slate and give out their thoughts on James Harden, Rudy Gobert, Joel Embiid resting, injury news and analysis.
NBA DFS Picks: Prime Time Players
Clint Capela: Houston Rockets vs. Phoenix Suns
DraftKings $7,800, FanDuel $9,100, Yahoo $35 Ownership Rating (preliminary run): DraftKings 46.1%, FanDuel 30.6% Yahoo Fantasy 40.8%
While it would be nice to get all the way up to James Harden, that entails taking on some risk of the unknown using the ‘Sixers value plays. Let’s consider a reasonable compromise with Harden’s teammate who has his own stellar matchup against the ill equipped Phoenix front court.
Clint Capela has flashed his immense upside with 20/20 games in three of his last six appearances. We know that the Suns struggle as a bottom ten team with points in the paint and that is where Capela does his best work. He is solid as a finisher and a fierce rebounder as well. The price combined with roster flexibility have him as one of the best options for DraftKings, FantasyDraft and Yahoo. On FanDuel we are giving up our center slot, but this will also help us differentiate our lineups against gamers rolling out Rudy Gobert who is also in an excellent environment.
NBA DFS Picks: Good Value
D’Anthony Melton: Memphis Grizzlies at Utah Jazz
DraftKings $5,200, FanDuel $5,500, Yahoo $12 Ownership Rating (preliminary run): DraftKings 2.1%, FanDuel 12.2% Yahoo Fantasy 17.4%
For me, the combination of upside and suppressed popularity with his price ticking up has me giving strong consideration to D’Anthony Melton in all formats today. Saturday brings with it a limited player pool. This in turn means there will likely be some heavy overlap in “cash” games. Plays like Melton can help us find differentiation.
In a bit of a surprise, Melton has outplayed veteran Tyus Jones as the Grizzlies look to replace rookie Ja Morant who will be out for at least the next fortnight. If we focus on the four games where he has surpassed 20 minutes, including the last three we see some interesting production. He is averaging 24.4 minutes with 11.0 points, 6.0 rebounds, 5.3 assists and 2.0 combined blocks/steals for 29 fantasy points. These are sustainable numbers with Morant sidelined, even in a difficult matchup against the Jazz. The upside will be accessible with Melton approaching 30 minutes of court time.
NBA DFS Picks: Risky Value
Philadelphia 76er Cheapies vs. Cleveland Cavaliers
Currently we are seeing Furkan Korkmaz, Matisse Thybulle, James Ennis and Kyle O’Quinn popping as “value” plays across various projection systems. For starters, I would prefer not to have more than two in any one lineup. We will likely get additional news with regards to increased roles and responsibilities, but in the meantime here are my thoughts:
Furkan Korkmaz: my preferred option among this quartet as he is likely to be in the starting lineup. Additionally, while he is reliant on his scoring for his fantasy production, this is a fortuitous matchup.
James Ennis: it was a surprise that he did not close out the Wizards game on Thursday as he had the prior three games. It was a tightly contested matchup where the coach Brett Brown chose to go with Matisse Thybulle instead for his perimeter defense. Ennis has a more complete skill set than our next two ‘Sixers, so he gets the second nod from me.
Matisse Thybulle: in his four years with the University of Washington, he was an adequate scorer with a career 42.9 FG%, 35.8 3pt% and 78.2 FT%. He has taken nine field goal attempts in his past two games, but he still has topped five only once this season. His fantasy production is heavily reliant on steels and blocks which can be fickle.
Kyle O’Quinn:Â he has not seen the court in the last six games. I would want to know he is starting, which he has not yet this season or be assured by coach Brown that he is going to get a few turns in the rotation. In the last two “blowout” victories for Philadelphia, the veteran saw 9.4 minutes against Miami and 6.4 minutes against these same Cavs.
FantasyCruncher Tip of the Day
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With the incredibly user-friendly and flexible rules creation feature on FantasyCruncher, we can take our lineup construction to the next level.
There are a lot of nifty hidden features within FantasyCruncher. Here is a sorting trick that you may not be aware of.
If you right click on a check mark at the top of a roster, the following command menu will appear.
This can be helpful if you are sorting lineups in FantasyCruncher. You can choose or eliminate those at the top or bottom quickly based on projected ownership, points, etc.
Final Thoughts
On four game slates, there are not always a lot of “edges” to be found. The premium tools can be helpful in identifying some of the potentially overlooked plays and/or strategies. Of course, overlooked is a relative term based on slate size.
Be sure to tune into Live Before Lock tonight at 6;30p.m. EST featuring 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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