FanDuel Daily Fantasy Basketball Helper: Thursday 1/19/23

Since it's much simpler to predict than baseball or football, daily fantasy basketball would get plenty of votes as the best sport to play on FanDuel. Players usually stick to the same minutes and produce at roughly the same rate. Sounds easy, right?

As a result, NBA daily fantasy is highly reliant on a player's opportunity, so you'll need to ensure that you're up-to-date with key injuries. Our projections update up until tip-off to reflect current news, we have player news updates, and the FanDuel Scout app will send push notifications for pressing updates regarding your players.

With so much changing so quickly, we're here with plenty of tools to help you. We have daily projections, a matchup heat map, a lineup optimizer, and a bunch of other great resources to help give you an edge.

We'll also come at you with this primer daily, breaking down a few of the day's top plays at each position.

Let's break down today's main slate on FanDuel.

The Slate and Key Injuries

It's an NBA Finals rematch tonight in Boston, and major injury report activity looms over that contest.

Jaylen Brown is questionable to return against the Warriors tonight after having missed three games with a groin issue. As we saw with Rudy Gobert and Devin Booker, that's not one to rush back from, though. Jonathan Kuminga (foot) remains out for Golden State.

Speaking of Gobert, we'll watch his status after he sat last night for the Timberwolves with that groin injury. They're on a back-to-back hosting Toronto, so they could announce resting players this afternoon, as well.

The marquee injury news of Tuesday was Kyrie Irving (calf) sitting out for the Nets, but he's probable tonight in Phoenix. The Suns are still down Booker (groin), Cameron Payne (foot), and Landry Shamet (hip), but they'll get Cameron Johnson (knee) back tonight. There's also a chance Chris Paul (hip), who is questionable, returns.

Philadelphia and Portland are mostly healthy entering the nightcap, but we'll watch Jusuf Nurkic (calf) and Gary Payton II (hip), who are both probable.

Guards

Returning to the scene of this past summer's crime, Stephen Curry ($9,500) is an interesting top option at guard today.

Boston's stingy defense (112.1 defensive rating) is the lone drawback to a fair salary for Curry given his production this year (49.9 FanDuel points per 36). Plus, this will be just the second time in the past 30 days that Jordan Poole (and his sizable 30.2% usage rate) is moved to the bench, freeing Curry (30.7% usage) for a few extra looks with the starters.

Of course, the headliner here is Kyrie Irving ($9,300) returning from injury. After I wrote him up favorably entering the San Antonio matchup, he -- of course -- sat with a calf issue. His 34.9% usage rate with Kevin Durant still blows out all members of a muddy Brooklyn rotation behind him, and we're buying low on his cold shooting (36.3%) since K.D. exited the lineup.

The roller-coaster-like salary of Fred VanVleet ($7,900) keeps gyrating, but more nights like his 39 real-life points on Tuesday will be ahead. He's taken the Raptors' struggles into his own hands with a heightened 23.4% usage rate since January 1st.

On the other side of that one, D'Angelo Russell ($6,400) remains a top-shelf value based on his season-long production rate (35.1 FanDuel points per 36), but he took just eight shots last night. He's been deferring to teammates often of late.

Anfernee Simons ($6,600), Tyrese Maxey ($6,500), and Marcus Smart ($6,300) are three others projecting well at the moment, but this position doesn't have punt-level value as of now.

Wings

It does sound like there is optimism around Jaylen Brown ($8,300) playing tonight, which would squash Jayson Tatum ($11,000) at his elevated mark in Brown's absence.

There's obvious reinjury risk given Brown's groin issue, but he's a value at his suppressed salary after three games on the shelf. Up until it happened, J.B. and J.T. were near-even players offensively. Since December 1st, Tatum has posted 47.8 FanDuel points per 36 minutes on a 33.4% usage rate, and Brown has nearly matched him with 44.8 FanDuel points per 36 minutes on a 31.9% rate. The salary gap is too wide if they're both healthy.

Without much salary adjustment, we can stay with the status quo for Toronto. Scottie Barnes ($8,200) and Gary Trent Jr. ($7,000) both eclipsed 42 FanDuel points in successful evenings on Tuesday, but OG Anunoby ($6,900) struggled to just 14.6 FanDuel points in 34 minutes due to 15.4% shooting. They're all getting playoff-level minutes and are viable, but buying low on Anunoby is my favorite approach today.

Both Royce O'Neale ($5,600) and Joe Harris ($4,100) fell victim to Brooklyn's lack of playmaking on Tuesday. The shooters were benched in favor of T.J. Warren and Edmond Sumner, who could create their own shots. O'Neale and Harris should be back on the menu with Kyrie returning, but Royce's salary is still so high for someone with a putrid 13.5% usage rate. You're praying to the blocks-and-steals gods with him.

Punt-level value is also nonexistent here, but the model can stomach Tobias Harris ($6,900), Andrew Wiggins ($6,700), Kyle Anderson ($6,500), and Jaden McDaniels ($5,700) at the moment.

Bigs

To me, there are really just two options at center today in every lineup. You can spend up in salary with Joel Embiid ($11,500), or you can spend down with Naz Reid ($5,000).

Embiid, because of his position, will probably be overlooked despite being the clear favorite to lead the slate in scoring. The Blazers allow the fourth-most FanDuel points to centers, and since December 1st, Embiid leads the NBA in usage rate (39.2%). Plenty of other Sixers can carry the offensive load any night, though. That's his path to failure.

As for Reid, Rudy Gobert sat last night in Denver. It's been just three days since he reaggravated his groin injury. I doubt he's playing tonight, which would loft Reid to the top value on the slate by a mile. He averages 44.5 FanDuel points per 36 with Gobert off the floor, and his "off night" in 25 minutes last night was still 29.2 FanDuel points.

We're filling in forward spots around them. Pascal Siakam ($9,300) is certainly enticing in a Reid build considering Minnesota's defensive rating balloons to 117.9 without Rudy. Jerami Grant ($6,700) is also my favorite Portland target of the day. Posting over 32 FanDuel points in 9 of his last 14 games, it's hard to knock Grant's floor while also dodging the Embiid defensive matchup.

This is the best place for value on the slate -- even beyond Reid. Draymond Green ($6,600), Robert Williams ($5,900), and Al Horford ($5,200) are all showing well through our projections.