3 NBA FanDuel Studs to Target on Monday 3/21/22
Basketball is the most consistent sport for daily fantasy purposes.
A top slugger in baseball will have his fair share of 0-for-4 days, and an elite fantasy football player is at risk of having games where his team's offense as a whole is shut down. A high-salaried NBA stud is generally going to get his, though. With so many possessions in a game providing opportunities to produce, top fantasy basketball options will be posting high scores just about every night.
While this consistency puts us in a good position to identify top plays, it also means you can't afford to miss when you're paying up for someone. Even with strong value plays in your lineup, paying up and getting a dud is likely going to leave your lineup drawing pretty close to dead.
Which top players should be the focal points of your lineups today?
Kevin Durant, SF/PF, Brooklyn Nets ($10,800)
Another Brooklyn Nets home game means another clear stage for Kevin Durant.
As is basically known across the entire country at this point, Kyrie Irving still can't play home games due to a New York mandate. As such, Durant's role at home has been stellar this month.
K.D. has turned a whopping 36.2% usage rate into 1.44 FanDuel points per minute this month during floor situations without Kyrie. Friday's 38-point scoring outing was spoiled by eight turnovers, but Durant averages just 3.15 turnovers per 36 minutes when Kyrie is off the floor this season. It was uncharacteristically sloppy.
Monday's environment against Utah should be a great one. It holds a 232.0-point total, and the Nets are just a 1.5-point home underdog to the visiting Jazz.
Durant may be somewhat overlooked for the under-salaried Boston duo at small forward, but he deserves some FanDuel consideration -- even if he's not always considerate himself.
Luka Doncic, PG/SG, Dallas Mavericks ($10,600)
Daily fantasy players might be asking what's wrong with Luka Doncic after two so-so outings.
The answer? Nothing, really.
Doncic was contained in a matchup with the outlierishly-good Philadelphia defense, and then Doncic scored 37 points in three periods of work against Charlotte but was unable to pad his totals due to a blowout.
Still, since the trade deadline, Doncic has had the best role in all of fantasy basketball. He's turned a 40.5% usage rate -- almost unfathomable for a stretch of time longer than a month -- into 1.60 FanDuel points per minute. Long-term, Luka should be just fine.
The road to regression likely starts in earnest Monday. Dallas (29th in pace) is going to see a gigantic lift in possessions versus the top-paced Timberwolves. The Mavs are 3.5-point home favorites in a game with a 229.5 total.
Karl-Anthony Towns, C, Minnesota Timberwolves ($9,900)
Why leave Big D when we can just grab a pair of stars in that close affair?
The universe can be cruel. Joel Embiid is indeed on a slate without Nikola Jokic, but it's in a really stiff matchup with Miami's Bam Adebayo. Embiid's floor also hasn't been nearly as solid since James Harden came to town.
Therefore, I prefer Karl-Anthony Towns at the top of Monday's pool of pivots. It's worth noting that Towns is questionable with an arm contusion, but since it is an arm contusion, he's likely unrestricted if he can play.
The Mavs have had issues finding a big to play inside with Doncic, Jalen Brunson, and Spencer Dinwiddie as a trio of guards in the backcourt. That lack of size has killed them on the glass. The stout Dallas defense has the seventh-worst defensive rebounding percentage (70.1%) in March.
Really, the glass is the more volatile source of Towns' production at present. He's taken a giant leap in usage rate this month (32.3%) beyond Anthony Edwards (23.4%) and D'Angelo Russell (23.1%) when the three had otherwise evenly split most of the season.
As a result, he's Minnesota's leading scorer (34.4 points per 36 minutes in March) entering this great game environment with Dallas. That's a tremendous starting point for stacking the contest.
