RADIO
After a successful slate last night, I have no choice but to keep churning out preseason NBA DFS content! Even if we only have three games tonight, I'm back anyway with another NBA DFS article and my favorite plays and teams to target.
We have a lot of injury info to monitor and a lot of coaching sound bytes to dissect as the day goes along. I highly encourage you to follow me on Twitter and check out the list of beat writers that I follow to keep informed on the latest up-to-date information about each team and their plans for minutes and rotations. The only two teams making their preseason debuts today are Philadelphia and Boston, while the other four teams in action have all played at least one game (Sacramento and Houston have already played two).
I really hope you consider our NBA DFS Premium membership this season. We will be covering every regular season and postseason slate with our all-inclusive NBA Cheat Sheet and you'll have access to tools such as our NBA Research Station, Matchup Ratings, and Optimizer! Our NBA team brings years of DFS experience and knowledge to the table every day and all premium members have access to our slack chat where we have live Q + A sessions every slate an hour before lineups lock! Use promo code THUNDERDAN to save 10% off your membership!
In this article, I will be providing you with my daily fantasy basketball lineup picks for FanDuel and DraftKings on 12/15/20. You can find me in the RotoBaller Premium NBA Chat Room or @ThunderDanDFS on Twitter.
Preseason NBA Overview
The first thing you need to know is that building lineups on FanDuel and DraftKings this preseason is going to be very different. FanDuel has decided to keep their prices low (no one priced over 6,000) and therefore, you can build a lineup with any nine players you want as long as you roster two PG, SG, SF, PF, and one C. We can leverage that on FanDuel by rostering some lesser-known players since we should expect the well-known players to be more highly-rostered, especially amongst more casual players and fans. All prices listed in the article are DraftKings prices since the FD prices simply don't matter.
DraftKings has priced guys as they would on a normal slate for the most part, but we do get discounts on superstars if we want to cram some into lineups. I like to use a balance of younger players with some veterans that we can project for solid minutes and, honestly, every slate is different to some degree. With only a few days of practice before the first preseason games, I would expect we don't see any big minutes for starters in the first few games with most teams easing their guys into action.
Preseason NBA DFS Injuries/Rest
Knowing who is playing on any NBA slate is half the battle. Getting injury info on preseason slates is a tad harder than in the regular season but here's what we know right (as of Thursday night).
ALREADY RULED OUT:
Kemba Walker, Tristan Thompson, Draymond Green, Romeo Langford, Quinndary Weatherspoon, Keita Bates-Diop, Derrick White, Keldon Johnson, Christian Wood, Marvin Bagley III, James Wiseman
DOUBTFUL:
Jabari Parker, Hassan Whiteside
QUESTIONABLE:
Daniel Theis, Terrance Ferguson, Sterling Brown, Cory Joseph, Daquan Jeffries
TEAMS (or rather COACHES) THAT I DON'T TRUST:
Unless we get word on minutes the teams I trust the least to give guys regular minutes are Golden State and San Antonio. Steve Kerr was quoted earlier in the preseason as saying that he won't push guys into minutes early in the year and played 20 guys in their first game. Popovich is also a guy who doesn't believe in extending guys' minutes often and went 15 deep in the Spurs' first game with only three players getting 24 minutes or more.
Preseason NBA DFS Core Plays
James Harden - SG ($8,500)
Harden returns to the court today to make his preseason debut. Westbrook is gone and has been replaced with John Wall, who isn't likely to siphon off as much usage from Harden as Westy did. Harden is too cheap for his potential output, even if he is limited in his first game back. Will he be out of shape, maybe, but we know he's going to put up a huge volume of shots and get the free-throw line. Eat the chalk, and play him in your lineups.
Joel Embiid - C ($7,900)
It's funny seeing these superstars at these prices, but don't get used to it. Embiid is a 9.5k to 10k player during the regular season. He's posted some big lines against the Celtics in the past and they simply don't have the size to match up with him inside, especially since Tristan Thompson is out and Theis could miss, too. I think the Process gets his and it's pretty easy to fit him, Harden, and this next guy into builds together, too.
Jayson Tatum - PF ($8,300)
Tatum took a leap into stardom last season and is still developing as a player as he enters his third year. Kemba Walker is out and Gordon Hayward is now in Charlotte, meaning Tatum should eat first in this offense and carry the load offensively tonight (and probably in the regular season, too.) He's young and should be fresh so I'm guessing we don't see a hard minutes cap on him, though we should definitely wait and see if Coach Brad Stevens tips his hand before the game tips off.
Preseason NBA DFS Top Plays
Dejounte Murray - PG ($6,400)
Jaylen Brown - SG/SF ($6,900)
De'Aaron Fox - PG ($7,100)
Tobias Harris - SF ($7,000)
I don't know how much I trust the Spurs, but we only have so many options on this slate and Murray is one of the younger players in their core who I can see having some more minutes security. He played a team-high 24 minutes in the opener and shot 2-11 from the field, but is always a solid contributor in boards, assists, and steals.
Like Tatum, Brown gets a nice bump when Kemba is out and is a nice mid-range target here if you want to pivot off Tatum or even stack that game up.
Fox hasn't had a big game yet, but the minutes have been there with 25 and 26 minutes played in the first two Sacto games. He has to be considered one of the stronger plays in the second tier as well.
Tobias has played well against Boston in the past and is a bit of a matchup problem for the Celtics. He should fly a little under the radar with Embiid and possibly Simmons garnering more ownership on this slate.
Preseason NBA DFS Value Plays
Listed in the order of my preference (favorites first).
Richaun Holmes - C ($4,800)
Tyrese Haliburton - PG/SG ($5,000)
Robert Williams - PF/C ($4,700)
Rudy Gay - SF/PF ($5,000)
Seth Curry - SG ($4,900)
Devin Vassell - SF/PF ($4,700)
Carsen Edwards - PG ($4,000)
