🏀 Slate Starter: NBA DFS Picks for DraftKings + FanDuel | Tuesday, February 2

Who’s excited to move on after last night’s debacle? Everyone? Great, because that’s what the Slate Starter is here to do. Although major props have to be handed out to every fantasy site for taking care of its players through a difficult situation. I can remember a time not too long ago when unavoidable disasters such as this would’ve been chalked up as tough luck and nothing more. But times have changed, and it’s easier to stomach a day like Monday regardless of what could’ve been from possible great looking lineups. Anyhow, let’s get right to the NBA DFS picks for Tuesday’s main slates on DraftKings and FanDuel.

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NBA DFS Slate Starter: Picks & Strategy | Feb. 2

At Last, Another Proper Late Swap Slate

I’m torn when it comes to these slates where every game tips off within 90 minutes like we’ve had for the past couple days. On one hand, it’s nice to have limited work to do when it comes to adjusting your lineups on the fly. It’s hard to know just how well/horrendously you’re doing when there’s less than a half of basketball played in the early games. Therefore, you don’t have enough information (nor enough time) to appropriately decide whether to stay on chalk or deviate to try and salvage your night.

Fortunately for the late-swap truthers such as myself who use it for way more than just adjusting to injury news, Tuesday is not one of those slates. With Raptors – Magic leading the night off at 7 p.m. EST, then three subsequent games tipping off within the hour before a two-game 10 p.m. EST nightcap, proper late-swap opportunities will finally be available to us again. That means if you think you’re live to win, you’ll have plenty of information available to you in order to stay on good chalk or pivot to lesser-owned options to sneak to the top. And if you have complete garbage for lineups, get off the likes of Rudy Gobert on DraftKings or Delon Wright on FanDuel in order to salvage in case that chalk busts.

Again, I know it’s not sexy to grind out lineups that have no shot of winning. But min cashing is still profiting, and I’m in the business of profiting. So be sure to utilize the Late Swaptimizer feature in Fantasy Cruncher during that two-hour window before the late slate. And if you’re looking for one quick-and-easy way to weed out chalk from dead lineups, put exposure caps on popular plays (or remove them altogether) and re-crunch. Give yourself enough time to hand edit here and there, but this alone can save you money in the long term.


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Wait, Nassir Little Did What?!

One of my favorite things about making the Slate Starter podcast with my good friend Rayen Patnaik every day is the mad dash to catch up on the ongoing slate as soon as we wrap. Unless one of us has a sick sweat that must be addressed live (usually him), we usually go dark for 30-ish minutes while recording until immediately trying to catch up on what we missed. We talk about how our lineups are doing, Rynpak paces to-and-fro in front of his sick projector watching whatever late game is on, and we’ll casually comb through box scores to see if anything noteworthy went down.

Consider this noteworthy from Nassir Little:

I mean, what in the world is this?! Little got his second career start and promptly posted one of the more unexpected lines I can recall this season. And before you start giving me the “yeah, but it was all in garbage time” spiel, no it was not:

NBA DFS Picks DraftKings FanDUel Daily Fantasy Basketball

NBA DFS Picks DraftKings FanDUel Daily Fantasy BasketballNBA DFS Picks DraftKings FanDUel Daily Fantasy Basketball

With the help of PopcornMachine.net here, we can see that Little did a lot during his first three stints on the floor. Did he go completely nuclear in the last 9 minutes of a completely out-of-hand game to make this line look infinitely better? Certainly, but at just $3,100 on DraftKings and the stone minimum on FanDuel tomorrow, you would still gladly take his first three rotations’ worth of production and run to the bank.

So now comes the fun part: Is he now a lock versus this putrid Wizards defense, or is this the literal definition of point chasing? Well, first off, Derrick Jones Jr. is questionable to play Tuesday after missing out on Monday’s beatdown by the Bucks. His return would surely revert Little to a reserve role and create enough uncertainty here for me to probably step away. But then again, maybe not.

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After all, this Blazers team has been starving to an offensive spark since the loss of C.J. McCollum. And if it weren’t for a miracle buzzer beater by Damian Lillard in Chicago on Saturday, Portland would be coming off four consecutive losses and would be in even more dire straits than they already are. That leads me to believe they could give Little another crack at rotation no matter what after Monday’s performance, and certainly he could get another start if Jones were to miss again.

So while “Nassir Little Chalk Day” was the very last thing on Earth Rynpak and I could’ve planned to talk about at the time of our recording, it’s certainly a conversation piece of this slate now. Be sure to tune into the Deeper Dive and Live Before Lock shows on the Awesemo YouTube Channel tomorrow, as they’ll keep you updated on all the big (and Little) news to help craft your NBA DFS lineups.

Final Thoughts for Your NBA DFS Lineups

  • I’m expecting the totals for the Clippers – Nets and Blazers – Wizards games to be sitting around 245 for Tuesday. The 2020s NBA is basically the 1970s ABA reincarnated.
  • Speaking of the Nets, I have no idea what to do with their version of the big three on FanDuel. Obviously Kyrie Irving feels like the odd man out, but his ownership should reflect that. Kevin Durant I had gotten in the habit of jamming in at small forward, but that $11,200 price tag is a hefty one to pony up for. And James Harden had shown a tendency to be overly passive before consecutive massive outings, but I don’t trust that being the norm with all three stars active. I’m leaning towards Durant again, but we’ll see how ownership shakes out. Just let it be known that in a primetime date with the Clippers that I think at least one is going to pop.
  • Russell Westbrook went nuts last time out and now draws Lillard defense. As bad as I don’t want to chase the big outing, the matchup might be too good to resist.
  • Just play Myles Turner.

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Eric Lindquist hails from Sioux Falls, South Dakota (yes, that’s the one with Mount Rushmore). A steady diet of three SportsCenters a day at an early age led to his obsession with sports, one that 30 years later is paying dividends for him as a successful DFS player and sports bettor. Despite over half a million dollars in net career earnings, he’s most passionate about helping others achieve their financial goals, an energy you can witness on the daily in his current role as a host and analyst at Stokastic. He’s a former Division I golfer at Iowa State, wishes he was a former Minnesota sports fan, and is a proud father to a 100-pound Bernese Mountain dog named Duke that wishes he could just eat people food instead of the crap he and his wife feed him on the daily.

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