NBA

NBA Market Share Report: Don't Forget About Jabari Parker

Shae Cronin  —  @shaelson Dec 16th, 2016
It's easy to be overlooked when your teammate is Giannis Antetokounmpo, but we can't forget about Jabari Parker and his routine daily fantasy value.

Welcome back for another edition of the weekly NBA Market Share Report. If you happened to miss last week's installment, be sure to step back and take a peek. We talked about the Freak in Milwaukee, a surprisingly good bench unit, and some daily fantasy bargains in Boston.

We have some spinoffs this week, including more FanDuel shopping tips during the holiday hoops season, as well as an early heads-up on what could be something or possibly nothing in Washington.

Let us hoop.

Sweet Lou Williams

Pardon the apparent obsession with the Los Angeles Lakers as of late, but there’s more to talk about thanks to a shooter with a fun nickname who’s having a career year at the age of 30.

And nope, it’s not Swaggy P.


As mentioned last week, if the awards were being handed out today, Louis Williams is making a strong case for Sixth Man of the Year. Playing in all 28 of the Lakers' games this season and playing 25 minutes a night off the bench, Sweet Lou is averaging a career-high in points (19.2), field goal attempts (13.2), three-point shooting (39 percent), and PER (24.2).

Because Luke Walton does such a good job managing his roster, the fact that Williams isn’t labeled a starter is hardly an issue when it comes to building your FanDuel lineups. Williams is a key piece of this Lakers team, including the engine of one of the league’s most productive bench units.

He’s a bargain when his salary is $6,000 or below, and still a decent value when it creeps up the way we’ve seen it over the past few games.

Washington’s Slightly Death-ish Lineup, Maybe

Things in Washington still aren’t great, specifically as it relates to the underwhelming and unproductive bench unit that the seemingly immortal general manager Ernie Grunfeld has assembled.

However, as of late, there’s a lineup brewing for the Washington Wizards that seems to look better and better each time it rolls out. The cast of John Wall and Bradley Beal in their normal spots, alongside Kelly Oubre at the three, sliding Otto Porter to the four, and keeping Marcin Gortat at center totes the highest net rating (35.8) of any five-man lineup in the league with at least 60 minutes played.


There’s two questions/concerns/shrugs regarding this specific crew:

1) Where are we with Oubre?

2) Can Porter routinely hang with power forwards on the defensive end?

Oubre is still a developing young’n, but there’s a nice trade-off from hanging out with the starters. Not only does it help the 21-year-old develop his offensive game alongside the team’s best passers and organizers, but it also allows the starting unit to benefit from Oubre’s harassing and aggressive defensive effort.

As for Porter, that answer generally falls on head coach Scott Brooks, who will have to choose his spots on when to roll out his best lineup, and when it seems like a better idea to stick with his starters and keep a bigger Markieff Morris at the four.

But then again, without many bright spots, I’m not sure you’d find many arguing that overfilling on a good thing and taking whatever comes with it is a bad idea.

It’s still early in the Eastern Conference, so no one’s expecting Brooks to throw everything out the window and rely solely on this group. This is a stretchy lineup for the Wiz, and one that’s pretty fun to watch. It’ll be interesting to keep an eye on moving forward.

Don’t Forget About Jabari

Mention anything about the Milwaukee Bucks and the conversation immediately shifts to Giannis Antetokounmpo, and for good reason. But in doing so, we need to make sure we’re not missing out on the other other top dog in Jason Kidd’s crew.

He may not be stuffing the stat sheet anywhere near the extent to which Antetokounmpo is (because that’s disgustingly crazy), but Jabari Parker has cemented himself as a top-50 fantasy scorer, averaging 30 FanDuel points per game, and doing so at a very reasonable salary.


Despite seeing the same number of minutes per game as last season, the increase in production has come by way of more offensive volume. In addition to Giannis, Parker is the only other Bucks player averaging double-digit field goal attempts (16), including three attempts from long range at a 36-percent clip, which is a nice addition after averaging less than one attempt per game over his first two seasons.

It seems easy to get overlooked when your teammate is a freakish mutant child like Giannis, but we shouldn’t forget about Jabari Parker, who’s having himself a nice season and turning in routine value in his mid-$6,000 price range.

That'll do it for this week. Remember to try and keep a smile on during this ridiculously hectic time of year, because despite the massive crowds, terrible traffic, and pretty awful attitudes, we're supposed to actually enjoy this whole winter holiday thing.