Happy Wednesday everyone! Surely this is the top Wednesday of the year. Hopefully day one of a mini vacay filled with turkey and pumpkin pie and family. And football. Lots and lots of football, both professional and collegiate (Hotty Toddy). But in ceding Turkey day to the lords of the gridiron, the NBA has created a pre-Thanksgiving feast - a whopping 13 games for us to monch1 into tonight.
The one drawback to this b-ball extravaganza? A whole hell of a lot of injuries and playing time situations to monitor. Lineups lock at 6PM CT2 but ten of the games start later than that, and for the two 9PM CT games, we are unlikely to have any certainty on who will or will not be out through injury. But is this a drawback? Or is it an opportunity? We have three significant situations to monitor after lock which I will outline below, and with some preparation, we can be in a position to take advantage should the news turn in a different way than expected. Lets take a look.
Late Lock Questionables
Jaylen Brown, Boston vs Brooklyn, 6:30 PM CT lock - While Jaylen has just recently returned from injury, its the year 2021 and teams are smart enough to know even a 23 year old NBA player shouldn’t sit injured for two weeks and just jump right back into a full time NBA playing schedule. Thats a long winded way of saying he is questionable for “injury management” this evening. If he plays, all the recently priced up players will become far less attractive: Jayson Tatum, Al Horford, and Dennis Schroder should all get downgrades. If he does sit, many will jump back on these guys, but remember, their prices still reflect the recent uptick in playing time, usage, rebounds, everything. You aren’t getting a discount in price. And my real fear is you will be really overpaying on ownership.
Nikola Vucevic, Chicago vs Houston, 7PM CT lock - The other Nikola has been on the shelf with Covid for the past two weeks or so, but has finally cleared the necessary protocols to return. But as we said above teams don’t just toss a player in, and as of now, Vucevic is questionable, with an update on his conditioning and therefore his playing status, to come sometime today. My thought is we’ll get the worst possible outcome fantasy wise, which is he will be available, but on a 20-24 minute limit. The rest of the Bulls would be about unplayable at their current prices on DK, but FD might actually offer some opportunity. If he does play, expect ownership to actually get too low there - Lavine and DeRozan would be particularly attractive against a disastrous Rockets team.
Tobias Harris, Philly vs Golden State, 9PM CT lock - Tobi is questionable for tonight against the league’s best defense, along with Seth Curry, and Danny Green. This situation presents the best opportunity of the three. Imagine we find out 8pm CT that all three are out - We’d have access to Tyrese Maxey, Shake Milton, Furkan Korkmaz, and Georges Niang in absolute smash spots with single digit ownership. Make sure your lineups3 (every one) has players with late starts so you can take advantage of this potential opportunity, that includes the ability to swap in Dame or Curry to pair with our new value guys.
FanDuel Favorites
Mo Bamba, $6800, pOwn: 26%, Target Rate: 18%, Value Rate: 47% - Mo Bamba should be a familiar name by now. And for more than having a cool name. As we’ve said countless times, he has the kind of multi-category game that gives him a strong floor and ceiling. The target rate is a little low, yes, but its a huge slate, and the rates reflect the fact that it will be harder to “smash.”
Jordan Poole, $6100, pOwn: 1%, Target Rate: 7%, Value Rate: 27% - This is a pure tourney play, but it solves a few problems for us. First it gives us leverage on the field even if everyone plays. Poole is a scoring dependent player, but the Warriors have a big total, and Poole should be number two to the trough tonight (and likely eager to take advantage of that position with Klay Thompson getting nearer to his return). Second, its a possible swap spot for some of the high end guys we get to add if Tobias Harris and the Sixers do sit.
Nassir Little, $4200, pOwn: 3%, Target Rate: 14%, Value Rate: 34% - Portland is playing in the last game of the night, against Team Debacle (the Kings) who might have looked worse the other night against the Sixers with Alvin Gentry replacing Luke Walton. We should love love love CJ McCollum and Damian Lillard, even off a B2B, but they might not need to play the 4th quarter. Little bridges that gap. He benefits whether its blowout or not.
DraftKings Favorites
RJ Hampton, $4900, pOwn: >1%, Target Rate: 10%, Value Rate: 43% - Before you think I’ve gone crazy I have two numbers for you: 28, and 31. These are the minutes Hampton has played over the last two games in Cole Anthony’s absence. Anthony has already been ruled out tonight. While those last two games came against an average defense in Milwaukee, tonight he gets the positively porous Charlotte Hornets to go after. The field, and industry figures, appear to prefer rookie Jalen Suggs, but RJ was a first round pick just a year ago, traded from an impossible situation in Denver to Orlando last season where he immediately perked up. The chance to get an 8X guy at sub 1% ownership is a real reason to give thanks.
Alex Caruso, $5400, pOwn: 6%, Target Rate: 13%, Value Rate: 55% - I just looked up the single game steal record. Kendall Gill got 11 for the Nets in April ‘94. It might be in jeopardy tonight if Caruso, who is currently questionable, suits up. The Rockets are currently making the mid-process Sixers look positively competent. Caruso is a ball hawking defense first guard who could get 10 or 12 points just from post steal run-outs.
Cory Joseph, $4400, pOwn: 5%, Target Rate: 21%, Value Rate: 57% - Since Killian Hayes went down for the Pistons, Cory Joseph has stepped in to replace those minutes. And while his performances have been a bit up and down, against the Bucks tonight he gets a decent matchup, and a better than decent chance to crack 30 points in 35 minutes or so tonight at single digit ownership.
Thats all I have for now. Be sure to check out the daily thread for the updates this afternoon. That can be found here:
And of course please subscribe and share!
Enjoy your holiday and see you all Friday!
monch - verb - Weezie-speak for eating. Eg: I monch you.
aka 7pm ET, aaka 4PM PT, and if you live in MT, my guess is you know how to figure this out.
I’ll post an example lineup later this afternoon in the thread that explains how we can take advantage.