NBA DFS Picks DraftKings + FanDuel Expert Lineup Building Strategy 3/22

What a brutal weekend of basketball this was. I am not even talking about the bracket-busting bonanza that was the NCAA tournament. And I’m not talking about my NBA DFS picks either, as Saturday was the first day I took completely off this entire season. The sole reason I say that is because of the two devastating injuries for LeBron James and LaMelo Ball. If you speculate in the futures markets, you’re probably aware those two were the two massive favorites for NBA MVP and Rookie of the Year, respectively. I have very little money tied up to either of those awards, but I’m just bummed we won’t get to watch them play anytime in the near future (and that I didn’t pull the trigger on the Nikola Jokic odds earlier). Anyways, pour one out for all the James/Ball best ball teams, and let’s get to work. This is the NBA Slate Starter for Monday’s eight-game slate on DraftKings and FanDuel.

Be sure to check out the Slate Starter podcast, featuring yours truly and Rynpak, to get the first look at the slate and make NBA DFS picks for DraftKings and FanDuel!

NBA DFS Slate Starter: Picks & Strategy | March 22

Making Bucks With Bucks

Just like there is seemingly every day, there will be tons of news to break between now and the start of Monday’s slate. But no matter which other individual player might get ruled out in the hours leading up to lock, it’s literally impossible for it to carry more weight than if Giannis Antetokounmpo is ruled out. He is currently listed as doubtful, so all signs points towards the Bucks being the most important team to get right on the slate.

Of course, when Giannis misses, Khris Middleton becomes the easiest play to target. In 382 minutes with Giannis off the floor this season, Middleton averages 1.37 DraftKings points per minute, accompanied by a dramatic usage rate bump to 31.9% (21.6% with Giannis on the floor). That is like getting an entirely different player to roster at $7,600 at DraftKings and just $7,000 on FanDuel. I expect him to garner crazy ownership, but rightfully so.

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While Middleton is the most obvious beneficiary should Giannis miss, Jrue Holiday certainly comes in as a close second. After missing three weeks at the start of February, Holiday’s minutes and consistency have ramped up of late; he has eclipsed the 32-minute mark in each of the last four games, averaging 34.9 DraftKings points per contest. His usage also climbs to 27.1% in Giannis’ absence, and he averages 1.28 DraftKings points per minute (0.97 with Giannis on the floor). At $6,800 on both sites, he should be the highest-owned point guard on the slate.

But neither Middleton nor Holiday are direct replacements for Antetokounmpo’s position, which is what gets really crazy about this situation. I assume either P.J. Tucker or Bobby Portis will start, and those two could not possibly have more different fantasy profiles. Tucker was a recent addition from the Rockets, but if you have played NBA DFS long enough, you know how bad he can be despite huge minutes. Furthermore, he only saw 13 minutes of run to the tune of a 3.3% usage rate. In other words, I wouldn’t even roster him if he were free tomorrow.

Portis, however, would automatically become my highest-owned player on the slate should he get the starting nod. At $4,100 on DraftKings and $3,700 at a subpar power forward position, he’s simply too cheap to fail at his 1.11 FanDuel points per minute. Projecting him for even 20 minutes makes him leap off the page, so the minutes security in the mid-20s I’d project him for by seeing his name in the starting lineup would cause me to hit the lock button. Of course, we haven’t had some quality Mike Budenholzer tomfoolery in quite some time, so this feels like the optimal spot for that to come to fruition. Stay hyper alert to our guy Newzgod‘s updates at the @AwesemoNBA Twitter handle whenever that starting lineup drops. And for the love of all that is holy, let’s hope Portis is in it.

Lastly, there are still multiple other Bucks we should be having interest in for tomorrow. We are talking about an insane amount of production leftover in the wake of any Giannis absence, so at least two players Bucks sneaking into the optimal feels like a safe bet. But which ones I’ll take the most shots on between Donte DiVincenzo, Pat Connaughton and Brook Lopez will be purely based on ownership and Awesemo’s boom/bust probability tool. We have seen DiVincenzo eclipse 40 DraftKings points in three of his past 10, which might give him the upside edge on the other two. But at $6,100 on DraftKings and $5,700 on FanDuel, he is certainly not the cheap one of the bunch.

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Houston, We’ve Got a Lot of Problems

You will not believe this, but I guess when a team trades away its best player (James Harden) and the franchise’s future misses a month and a half (Christian Wood), it’s a bad thing. Houston was once 11-10 this season, riding the momentum of a seemingly resurgent John Wall and a trade that reaped a decent reward in Victor Oladipo. Well, 20 losses in a row later, the new lease on life they were looking for by shipping off Harden turned out to be a death certificate instead.

But NBA DFS cares not what record a team is, so long as player salaries are advantageous and the game environment isn’t garbage. Both of those boxes should be checked in the event that Wall sits on the second leg of a back-to-back versus the Raptors, a disappointing team in their own right. At 17-25 on the year and 11th in the East, they are currently on the outside looking in at the play-in tournament. They are bottom 10 in defensive efficiency (22nd) and should give ample opportunity for whoever is active for the Rockets to at the very least accumulate fantasy points.

One Rocket to keep your eye on is, of course, Kevin Porter Jr., the one bright spot in an otherwise bleak stretch of games for the Rockets. There is no path to playing him in your NBA DFS lineups at $6,500 on DraftKings or $7,000 on FanDuel without Wall out. But as soon as that news comes out, firing up him and Oladipo is a path I’ll be taking. I could just copy/paste the section about keeping track of all the slate’s happenings by following Newzgod at the bottom line of my articles, but you already know that by now.

Final Thoughts for Your NBA DFS Lineups

The Cavaliers get the Kings boost we know and love on Monday. Unfortunately, Larry Nance Jr. got a boost in the salary department as well, as he’s now $6,100 on DraftKings and $5,600 on FanDuel. So if you don’t want to go his direction at small forward on FanDuel anymore, his teammates Cedi Osman and Isaac Okoro make for cheaper alternatives at the same position.
Assuming Giannis is out, there will astoundingly be no $10,000 players on this slate to pay up for on either site. I’m actually excited for a slate that isn’t purely stars and scrubs, as we’ll all be building balanced lineups by default on Monday.
Just play Middleton.

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Author

Eric Lindquist

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.