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Hope everyone had a great weekend. We have some incredible NBA Playoff Series going on with a few potential upsets brewing (Minnesota and New Orleans). Tonight we get another 3 game slate with a ton of spend-up options to choose from for only having three games on the slate. We have two teams facing elimination tonight in Brooklyn and Toronto, so it should be a fun slate with some very important basketball games.
INJURIES
- Fred VanVleet – O
We received the news early that Fred VanVleet will be out this evening so we really aren’t waiting on any news. Keep an eye on the Toronto starting line-up but I’m expecting they start Trent, OG, Barnes, Siakam and Precious for what it’s worth.
GUARDS
My favorite play at Guard comes in the mid-range. Gary Trent Jr. is priced at $5,700 and takes on an increased role with Fred VanVleet out tonight. Trent on the year is at .95 fantasy points per minute with a 25% usage rate when VanVleet is off the court. We also can expect close to 40 minutes in an elimination game for Toronto. The match-up isn’t great but the price tag makes up for it. I’ll be playing Trent in cash games and getting overweight in tournaments tonight. For tournaments I love Donovan Mitchell tonight. Mitchell is priced at $8,800 and goes on the road to face Dallas in a pivotal Game 5. DMitch has averaged 1.18 fantasy points per minute this series but has yet to have a hot shooting night. He’s still getting 45+ fantasy points a night and if he gets hot from three he can break the slate. I’m expecting sub 20% ownership tonight on Mitchell and I plan on getting well overweight in GPPs and like pairing him with Luca on some correlated line-ups.
FORWARDS
Forward is tricky as we have some great spend-ups and questionable value. Thaddeus Young is extremely hard to predict on a nightly basis but he did see 30 minutes last game and is priced at $3,700 with PF/C eligibility on Draftkings. I looked at the game flow tracker and Toronto played some really big line-ups in the last game and it seemed to work out. I’m expecting a similar strategy from Nick Nurse tonight. Thad had a plus/minus rating of +14 in his minutes on the court last game so I do expect him to see 20+ minutes and he’s a solid fantasy point producer (around 1 fantasy point per minute with VanVleet off the floor). He’s my favorite sub $4,000 value option on the slate and I just hope he doesn’t get too chalky. As for spending up at Forward it’s really tough to decipher between Kevin Durant and Jayson Tatum. Since Tatum is $500 cheaper I’m going to roll with him in cash games as my recommended play. He also sees the easier match-up with Durant having to go up against this really good Boston defense. However, in tournaments I don’t mind getting to a lower owned Kevin Durant who’s expected to play mid 40’s minutes tonight in an elimination game.
CENTER
Embiid should be extremely chalky tonight and is probably where you want to look for cash games at a $10,200 price tag on DK. However, I do have some concerns in tournaments with Embiid not having the greatest match-up (Toronto has done well against Embiid this season and he has yet to top 54 fantasy points in this series). He’s also playing with an injured thumb that will require surgery after the playoffs, so I see some red flags for a player that will be one of the chalkiest plays on the slate. For tournaments and even cash games I love Rudy Gobert tonight. The price tag sticks out at $7,100 on Draftkings. Gobert has seen reduced minutes the last couple games mainly due to foul trouble. I’m expecting a normal rotation tonight of around 35 minutes and at a 1.2 fantasy point per minute rate he projects very well for his price tag. I’m also expecting somewhat low ownership on Rudy tonight so I like getting overweight in GPPs.
It should be a fun Monday night sweat. I did notice that Draftkings seems to have increased some of their second tier GPPs tonight which is a good sign that they are getting a lot of action on these playoff slates. I’ll be putting up my GPP cores before lock so stay tuned for that, although I don’t anticipate much changing with very little news we are waiting on.
Cash Plays: Gary Trent Jr., Thad Young, Precious Achiuwa, Jayson Tatum, Joel Embiid, Rudy Gobert
GPP Plays: Donovan Mitchell, Rudy Gobert, Thad Young, Kevin Durant, Jordan Clarkson, Luca Doncic
Max
