NBA

3 NBA FanDuel Value Plays to Target on Thursday 1/13/22

One of the keys to finding success in daily fantasy basketball is uncovering potential value plays. If you're looking to roster a stud player or two, you need to consider squeezing in one of these lower-salaried options into your lineup.

Let's take a look at three players who can help fill in the gaps in your lineup.

Dennis Smith, PG, Portland Trail Blazers ($4,400)

The Portland Trail Blazers are very shorthanded tonight, and that opens up plenty of value in their lineup.

Damian Lillard, C.J. McCollum, Larry Nance Jr., Norman Powell, and Anfernee Simons are all listed as out for Portland tonight. Yikes. This means we will almost certainly be seeing Dennis Smith as the Blazers' starting point guard and likely one of the chalkiest players on the slate.

When all those players are off the court this season, Smith is holding a 23.9% usage rate while producing 1.09 FanDuel points per minute.

Smith's best ability tonight is his availability, and he is projected for 33.96 minutes and 36.1 FanDuel points, making him the top overall point-per-dollar value option on the slate (as of Thursday afternoon), according to our model. This is a clear "minutes equals money" situation in NBA DFS, and eating the chalk is worth it.

Kessler Edwards, SF, Brooklyn Nets ($3,600)

The Brooklyn Nets are on a back-to-back and going to be missing a few players.

Kevin Durant, LaMarcus Aldridge, Patrick Mills, and Nicolas Claxton won't be in action tonight, giving the Nets another brand new starting lineup. Yes, we should see James Harden as a super popular option, but he's not a value play. This is where we can turn to Kessler Edwards, who was mainly a bench player for the Nets but found his way into the starting lineup last night. He went for 28 minutes and 22.7 FanDuel points in that one, which is a level of production he could easily surpass tonight versus the Oklahoma City Thunder.

Not only is tonight's matchup against the Thunder easier compared to last night's versus the Chicago Bulls, but with Durant being out, it opens up extra offensive usage for the rest of the lineup. Edwards is projected for 29.38 minutes and 24.9 FanDuel points, making him the third-best value option on the slate.

Ivica Zubac, C, Los Angeles Clippers ($4,500)

Ivica Zubac has a soft matchup against the New Orleans Pelicans and makes for a good value play at center.

While most people might be looking to pay up at center for Nikola Jokic or Karl-Anthony Towns, if you want to differentiate, use Zubac. He's going up against the Pelicans, ao team that is allowing the 10th-most (54.77) FanDuel points per game to centers. The 215.0-point over/under isn't the highest on the slate, but we have a solid 3.5-point spread, which should benefit Zubac.

Since the Clippers have so many players out, Zubac has been producing 1.19 FanDuel points per minute on a modest 12.9% usage rate. He doesn't need to have the ball in his hands a ton to be able to post plenty of fantasy points. He is projected for 25.01 minutes and 26.8 FanDuel points, making him the top value center on the slate.