Beaver’s Mid-Season NBA DFS Starter Pack
Hello friends, family, and complete and utter dumbshits. This is Josh, writing to you guys to introduce Beaver’s mid-season NBA DFS Starter Pack. With the NFL season finishing up, many of you may be considering getting your feet wet in NBA daily fantasy. But if you’re like me, you don’t have a damn clue what’s happening in the NBA. That’s where Beaver comes in.
He’s put together a few things he thinks will help the average Joe transition from NFL DFS to NBA DFS. It’s broken into three sections: NBA Draft Review, Most Notable NBA Changes, and Major Differences Between NFL DFS & NBA DFS. We hope you enjoy it.
In the meantime, keep an eye out for the upcoming launch of Beaver’s Tiktok account, where he’ll be… well, who the hell knows what he’ll be doing. But if you like fantasy sports, you’ll probably want to check it out. Okay, here’s the Beaver…
Mid-Season NBA Draft Review
Anthony Edwards, #1 pick (T-wolves)
WHAT HAPPENED??? I was confused on draft night and I’m even more confused now. The Wolves already have like 17 guys that are the same size with similar skill sets and they took another one that plays the same position as Beasley and Russell, the team's only legitimate NBA players outside of KAT. So far, he’s been the NBA’s version of the weird kid from elementary school that sits in the corner by himself and does nothing for half an hour (I was that kid).
Fantasy Impact: I’m admittedly biased as I’ve been burnt badly on Edwards of late. The play was on the basis of some coach speak implying 30+ minutes for him moving forward. I assure you these “extended runs” will be nothing but cardio workouts as Edwards has yet to show any ability, nor interest in piling up ancillary stats. He’s nothing more than a spot up shooter at this point in his career. Stay away until the price comes down as it seems he's had the #1 overall treatment in pricing and ownership thus far.
**UPDATE: since the time of writing this, the minutes have not gone up at all but the production has slightly. He also entered the starting lineup for the first time last game so that’s certainly something to keep an eye on.
James Wiseman, #2 pick (Warriors)
Bob Myers should be sending KAT a lifetime supply of Omaha Steaks for staying in Minnesota. Like KAT, Wiseman is a true NBA center, one of maybe 10-15 in existence. The 7 footer who already has a 7’6” wingspan is only 19 and clearly still growing. For real, if you look closely you can see him getting bigger. His post game is surprisingly polished and he’s got a sweet stroke from the outside. The perfect fit for the Warrior offense.
Fantasy Impact: It’s all about foul trouble for the wise man. If he’s not matched up with a talented, ball dominant center, then it’s all systems go. I’ve hit the lock button on this guy a couple times already as his price seems to stay in check because of the foul trouble. The cherry on top is that he does not get pulled early with the rest of the starters when the game blows out. We saw this last week when he was 4.4k on FD:check, matched up with MitchRob (great fantasy guy, but low usage):check, and the game blew out: check. He racked up 12 of his 33 fpts in garbage time where he was by far the best player on the court.
Lamelo Ball, #3 pick (Hornets)
WOW. This dude is the bigger, faster, better shooting, better looking version of his brother and he is going to be a superstar. He's incredibly smooth and savvy on the court. Playing overseas not only expedited his path to the league but also his preparation for it. European basketball is known for its physical style of play. He’s a skinny fella but he’s willing to bang. He and Wiseman are in a class of their own and so is there all pro upside. T-Wolves fans will be talking about who they could’ve had for a loooooong time.
Fantasy Impact: If God sculpted the perfect fantasy basketball player, I think it would look something like this. He does EVERYTHING on the court (except play defense (according to James Berrago). What really stands out is his energy. He’s insanely active. Got a motor like Westbrook. And for some reason the public has been slow to catch on. Perhaps it’s his “bench role” they can't get past, as I’ve yet to see him be “chalk” on any slate so far. I told everybody when he was 4k to play him til he’s 7. He’s 7 now. Play him til he's 8.
UPDATE: He dropped a 60 patty last night so he could realistically be 8k on the next slate and I’d probably still play him.
Patrick Williams, #4 pick (Bulls)
Solid pick. Solid player. But nothing to get excited about. The Bulls needed a role player that could come in and contribute right away and that's exactly what they got in Williams.
Fantasy Impact: Nothing to see here. Like the Bulls, I’ve plugged him in a few times when there was a shortage of talent and money and it was not fun, but he was serviceable.
Isaac Okoro, #5 pick (Cavs)
Following the theme of recent Cleveland drafts, Okoro was a solid pick but again, nothing to write home about just yet. However, Okoro brings an element of defense and athleticism that my Cavvies needed desperately.
Fantasy Impact: He’s yet to make much of one but his price has stayed low and that, combined with his vast skill set and ability to rack up stocks (steals and blocks) in a hurry on Fanduel where they’re worth 3 points each, can give way to a pretty big ceiling.
Other Notable Draft Picks
Obi Toppin, #8 pick (Knicks)
There was a lot of excitement coming in for Obi after his polarizing year with the Flyers of Dayton, but so far, he's yet to reach the daily step goal on his Apple watch. My guy, Thibs is known for giving his starters all the minutes they can handle and he's done just that in New York. It also doesn't help that he's playing behind 2020 breakout Julius Randel who's been taking the souls of his opponents on a nightly basis. Let's keep an eye on Obi and be early to the party, as he is just one injury away from being catapulted into major fantasy relevance.
Tyrese Haliburton, #12 pick (Kings)
Total fuckin baller. Dude just gets in and crushes. Looks like a 10 year vet. Always smooth and under control. Scoring dependent, yet great for fantasy as he can heat up like a microwave. Bye bye Buddy.
Payton Pritchard, # 26 pick (Celtics)
Ya know how sometimes you can just spot a hooper without seeing them play? The gym rats that were trying to get buckets instead of impressing the opposite sex in high school. Normal people who actually became successful. That's Pritchard. Guy just knows what he’s doing. Always in the right place at the right time and rarely ever makes a mistake. Oh, and he can shoot like Bradley Cooper in that movie. The perfect fit for another Celtic playoff run.
UPDATE: torn ACL :(
Biggest Changes In The NBA
Russ is a Wizard. Harden’s a Net. Kyrie’s parading around maskless at birthday parties during games. You live on this planet and therefore know these things. But let's take a closer look at some changes that you may not have realized this year and their impact on daily fantasy.
Pace of Play
Pace of play is among the most integral elements of fantasy hoops. We’ll constantly be looking for “pace-up” spots as even a few extra possessions can go a long way toward a player’s nightly fantasy output. Though it may feel like it sometimes, DFS is not life or death. It is a game played on a computer by a buncha nerds sitting in their underwear. However we often apply some of the same basic survival skills that we would if we were alone in the wilderness fighting for our life.
We search for weakness. Once we’ve established weakness we attack it. ATTACK, ATTACK, ATTACK. Sorry, that got weird. I’ve been taking too much deer antler spray. The point is that when we're latching onto these same teams night in and night out throughout the course of a season, we subconsciously develop stigmas of them in our head as spots to fade or spots to attack.
But things change and it can happen very quickly in the NBA. Changes in things such as personnel or coaching can shoot a team up or down the rankings in a hurry. We need to be on top of these things. It’s crucial to not only be aware of where teams rank in pace, but where they rank of late so we're able to spot developing trends and utilize them before becoming obvious. Teamrankings.com is an excellent site where you can see these rankings and sort them in different increments of time. 2-3 weeks is a good baseline for recent performance.
To get us up to speed, I’ve listed some of the biggest changes in where teams are ranked in pace of play from last year to this year. (Note that the league average is up almost 3 extra possessions from where we saw it last year.)
Biggest drops: Clippers -19 spots (-4.6 possessions), Pelicans -18 spots (-4.9 possessions), Suns -16 spots (-2.7 possessions)
What were among some of the finest spots to attack in fantasy last year have now evolved into stayaways due primarily to a change in philosophy. All these teams are playing better defense which leads to longer, tougher, and ultimately less possessions for both sides. This creates a suboptimal environment for fantasy production.
Biggest rises: 76ers +17 spots (+3.1 possessions), Bulls +16 spots (+4.2 possessions), Pacers +11 spots (1.4 possessions), and Warriors +11 spots (+2.5 possessions)
There are different reasons for it (less efficient defense being played, coaching and personnel changes, etc.) but they’ve all led to the same outcome for these teams: more possessions. These are the environments we want to be living in. Do realize that it's the difference in pace between opposing teams that's more important than the pace itself. We want to be looking for teams that are playing up in pace, projecting for more possessions.
More Blowouts
When looking at what's changed the most from last year, the margin of victory jumps off the page. It's near all-time peak levels and so is the number of spreads covered in Vegas by the home team.
The strangest thing about this is the way it's happening. Usually the efficiency of the team playing with the lead drops significantly (killing the clock, taking their foot off the gas, whatever it may be) and the team trailing picks it up more often than not, allowing the game to stay somewhat competitive throughout. This year we’ve seen the exact opposite. The team with the lead has gotten stronger and the efficiency of the team trailing has fallen off a cliff. How could this be that it just flips after many years of consistently being the inverse? I’ve got a few hypotheses but they’re nothing more than that.
One revolves around the shortened offseason. Players just aren't in as good of shape as they usually are. Unconditioned players lead to sloppy play that can lead to a shitshow in the blink of an eye. Another reason for it could be the lack of fans in attendance. If you’ve ever played a competitive game of hoops you know how emotionally deflating it can be to get boat raced early and have to play from behind. The roar of the crowd is what gives some players the energy to keep fighting. As the stadium gets louder and louder each time the lead is cut, you can feel the momentum shifting, and it can fuel a comeback.
So what does this mean for fantasy? First and foremost we need to be more aware of potential blowouts that could cut starters minutes significantly as a result of not having to check back in the game for their usual 4th quarter runs. I start my preparation for every slate by looking at the point spreads. If it's roughly 7 or higher I mark that game as a blowout threat and temper expectations of those players slightly. The old adage is ya never project for a blowout but this season has rendered that a thing of the past. Almost any legitimate projection system will dock at least a few minutes in these scenarios.
However, there's more to it than that. Blowouts have varying effects on different types of players. Typically, it’s the role players that suffer the most. When the stars are doing the bulk of the scoring, it's the ancillary stats role players need to produce and those rarely come without minutes.
The opposite holds true as well. Sometimes stars can get there in a blowout because it's their increased scoring that caused it. It doesn’t matter how many quarters it takes to get there as long as they get there, but I should note that the more equity you have invested in a player, the higher the risk you’re taking on. So it goes both ways. I’m actually far more likely to play a cheap piece from a potential blowout even if they are a starter because the damage incurred in a total debacle will be far less substantial. We always aim for upside, even in cash games where it's all about floor.
We still want there to be potential for upside. So if we choose to invest in a stud or two from the team favored in a potential blowout, we should consider some options on the other side of that game. Because in order for those studs from the favorite to reach their minutes and production upside they have to be pushed by somebody on the opposing side. This is where it can be beneficial to play into a potential blowout by stacking/correlating it. If it stays close you get production from both sides at inherently lower ownership stemming from the risky nature of the plays.
Another thing to be mindful of with blowouts is the specific rotations of players. Popcornmachine.net is an epic website that depicts these rotations using bar graphs. It’s not uncommon to find a certain player that consistently runs the entire first quarter of each half then checks back in late in the second and 4th quarters.
These players would obviously have much less minutes volatility tied to them, as they would only be missing out on a handful of minutes at the end. The opposite, and more common, rotation would be to check out midway through the 1st and 3rd quarters then play almost the entire 2nd and 4th. In this instance you would theoretically be losing ⅓ of that player's minutes in a blowout scenario where the game is in hand before the start of the 4th.
I know that it's not practical for the average player looking for a little sweat and entertainment to be reviewing multiple charts and looking for trends and all this crazy stuff hours before lock. But you're not going to get swallowed whole if you don't do these things. They’re just things to understand and keep in mind that can offer a solid edge when the time comes. In fact, most of this is already baked into most projections which leads me to my final change…
The field is getting sharper
There are SO many resources available to us now. People are selling picks, projection systems, optimal lineups, it’s insane. Some of them aren't even selling them they’re handing them out like Halloween candy in exchange for clicks.
It's become easy for fish to create strong lineups in a matter of minutes. But as I dug a little deeper into this trend, I began to realize that all it's really doing is consolidating the “chalk.” This is because the vast majority of projection systems are conducted through very similar algorithms that tend to push the same players to the top. This is bad for cash games. I'm not gonna sit here and lie to you: It's been a tough scene in the 2021 cash streets. We're talkin 90+ ownership on the best plays. But if you’re willing to incur just a little bit more volatility it can pay dividends.
The average site is going to publish a list of the best plays at each position, let’s say 5. More often than not they are nothing more than the 5 guys at the top of their projections in that order. These copycat numbskulls are going to try to jam in as many of the number 1 and 2 ranked players at each position that they can fit then venture further down the list to fill it out. I know this because I used to be one.
This is why we see so much ownership at the top, but what you need to know is that these projections are fragile. The difference in the 1st and 5th ranked player could be fractions of a point but will also come at fractions of the ownership. If you added just 1 or 2 minutes to a player’s projection they would shoot up the rankings and perhaps be the top play on paper. This presents a golden opportunity in tournaments and has created a tournament environment more fruitful than ever before.
It's as simple as this: If you choose to piggyback these sites, select the players appearing a little further down these lists. As I said before, they are very similar plays. You’re sacrificing a miniscule amount of safety for a massive ownership discount. This strategy can not only be implemented in tournaments but in cash games as well. Admittedly it doesn't fare nearly as well in 50/50s and double ups but it can be gold in head to heads when 90% of your opponents go with the number one ranked player and the number 3 ranked player you roll with outscores him (or her, if you’re so hardcore that you’re diving into WNBA DFS. I’ve been there). It's important to take all of this in context. You don't want to just be jamming in the number 4 and 5 guys on the list at every position.
Chalk is chalk for a reason and there are going to be a few plays each night that are just too good to pass up. It's actually sharp to eat the chalk on the ones you feel best about. I would suggest going through your projection system position by position searching for guys in the top spot that are clearly in a tier of their own on paper. These are going to be your locks, the building blocks of your lineup. From there you can differentiate. Now go get all the fuckin money n send me a screenshot.
Differences in NFL DFS & NBA DFS
Now I want to shed some light on the major differences in the way DFS is played between the two sports. If you’ve played DFS hoops in years past this should be a nice refresher for you to gloss over, but if your only DFS experience is in NFL and you’re preparing to take your first crack at hoops, welcome. You’ve come to the right place. Without this information you would have been chewed up n spit out next to the freeway begging for a satellite ticket.
Nah, it's not that bad. I got your back. But for real, it's a different monster.
Time to react to the news
This is the big one. With NFL only playing one game per week it allows ample time to not only prepare for the slate, but to plan accordingly for injuries that would impact it. Even on gameday, NFL teams have to submit their final injury report well before the game starts and it's rare to have a true game time decision to account for.
NBA’s the polar opposite. We’ve got multiple games at different times each night. Only 1 day of prep time instead of an entire week. I love this aspect of it because we get a new slate each day so when my spend-up snaps his ankle in the first quarter, I only have to be in a state of severe depression for a few hours as opposed to football where I have to eat taco bell in my pajamas and ruin the lives of my loved ones for 4 days until the next weeks projections come out.
It presents a nice edge for the grinders because there's less content available and less time to consume it. As a player, I like that. As a landscaper that basically takes the entire winter off work to play DFS, I assure you, nobody’s beating me in this category.
Not only do you need to be monitoring news all the way up to tipoff, but you need to be monitoring it all the way through the start of the last game. Fanduel implemented a late swap during the bubble and stuck with it so the days of set it and forget it are over.
*Disclaimer: If you have a family, friends, any sort of social life, you will need to be innovative in the ways you monitor your team. Long shits being taken every half hour (your stomachs acting up you dont know whats wrong) purposely forget to get the mail that day. There's a couple minutes. Have your buddy call and pretend it's your boss. You’ll figure it out. Everybody’s listed as “questionable” and SHIT GETS WILD. Oftentimes right before the slate locks. With start times happening in half hour increments from each other and teams having to post their starting lineup 35 minutes before tip, you will regularly find yourself in a situation where news (starting lineup) breaks for the 7:30 game 5 minutes before the slate locks at 7. Here’s what you do: 1.) Lay off the caffeine during prep. Busch Light makes for a great pivot. You’ll need full functionality in your fingers in order to efficiently tap all the buttons required to adjust 57 lineups in 5 minutes. So maybe Busch Light’s not the call. Go with Gatorade. 2.) Minutes = production in the league and 9 times outta 10 starting = more minutes. When a player unexpectedly gets the starting nod they usually become a good play, and depending on the quality of the player and the timing of the news, sometimes an elite play. The less time there is to react, the lower the player’s ownership will be. People need that little tap on the ass from the analysts letting them know it's ok to play somebody. You’re not going to get that when it breaks late and most people simply won’t have the balls to make the proper adjustment.
3.) Don’t play too many different lineups. Last week, Christian Wood got scratched after warmups resulting in Boogie Cousins, a notorious crusher, getting the start at near min salary. I had 5 lineups in play and only had time to get him onto 2 of them. He dropped a 50 burger rendering the other 3 other lineups dead before the games even started. 4.) Have a plan coming in. When certain news is paramount to the slate, be prepared for both verdicts so you can move swiftly when it breaks. 5.) Stay calm. It’s a game, not a surgery. Things aren't always gonna go smoothly. We’re all in the same sinking boat. EMBRACE THE CHAOS.
How fantasy points are accrued
In NFL, a single play can represent the majority of a player's fantasy output for that game. A cheap wide receiver could do nothing for an entire game then catch a long touchdown at the end that not only elevates them to a great fantasy performance, but breaks the entire slate. This widens the distribution of outcomes whereas, in NBA, the scoring is incremental making it much less volatile and easier to project. This is what makes NBA less profitable for the casual player. In the long run of NBA DFS, you will be paid much more according to the amount of work you put in than in any other sport. I’ve been on record saying my 6 year old cousin could construct a tournament winning NFL lineup on Fanduel. This would never happen in NBA where the expectations of players are met more frequently.
This also makes necessary swaps much clearer. There’s nothing worse than thinking you're sunk in a tournament or blocked in a head-to-head toward the end of the 1pm NFL games and swapping to something in the afternoon that's much less optimal. Then having to watch the guy you thought killed your lineup score a long touchdown at the end of the 1pm game after the afternoon swap has already been cemented. In NBA, if a guy that was projected for 55 has 10 at halftime you can safely operate under the assumption that he’s not going to get there and know ahead of time that you need to swap.
If you don’t know what I’m talking about feel free to fax me or leave a message on my home phone and I’ll be sure to get back to you in several weeks. Or just google search “late swap in DFS.”
The “relevance” of individual matchups
DVP (defense vs. position) matchup data is much more useful in projecting NBA plays than it is NFL, but we’re still not going to discuss it because it’s so abused throughout the industry that I’m to the point of thinking it might even be an edge to not utilize it at all. Don’t quote me on that. Just trust me that it doesn't need to be part of your process. Defenses switch on every screen and It’s already baked into the projections. We don't want to be double counting.
The way players interact
Similar concept to the second topic. In football, stacking is almost required. If a receiver’s going to hit his ceiling then we can assume his quarterback will probably do the same. The correlation between certain players is much tighter. We can get a sizable chunk of our overall production for that team on one play. Full game stacks can be incredibly valuable. You don't really get scenarios like this in NBA. Stacking can still be valuable, just not as much. You’re really just looking for the Yahtzee of the game going to overtime giving all of your players 5 more minutes of production. (NBA games go to OT roughly 7% of the time and full game stacks are only utilized in roughly 3% of tournament lineups) so there's definitely still some upside to stacking but it's better used on a short slate where you think a lot of the other games could blowout.
