NBA
5 Daily Fantasy Basketball Players Trending Up for 3/28/16
Who joins a trio of familiar faces as the hottest plays for tonight's slate of games?

If you're a frequenter of our site, you've probably noticed our commitment to providing you with as much daily fantasy content as possible, especially when it comes to daily fantasy basketball as of late.

With the latest addition to our DFS coverage, our new daily fantasy basketball tools, we're able to provide you with an ever-widening catalog of content.

Our new trends tab shows you a variety of player stats over the last five or 10 games. Feel free to check it out for yourself. But, if you don't have the time today, I'm here to provide you with five of the hottest players from the last five games -- and ones in good spots going into tonight's slate of games.

D.J. Augustin, PG, Denver Nuggets

FanDuel Price: $4,900

FanDuel Season Avg. L5 Avg. % Above
D.J. Augustin 13.4 28.7 114.18


This isn't D.J. Augustin's first go around as a trending DFS play. As a result of an increase in minutes and the production that comes with it, the Denver guard has been more than doubling his season average output per game over his last five games (and beyond). Even with a gradually climbing salary -- from $4,000 to $4,900 over the last 15 days -- Augustin has been outplaying his price tag, averaging 6.14 FanDuel points per $1,000. With date in Dallas with the Mavericks, it's not the best of matchups, but Augustin has hit his current value of 24.5 points six times over the past 10 contests.

Devin Booker, SG, Phoenix Suns

FanDuel Price: $6,600

FanDuel Season Avg. L5 Avg. % Above
Devin Booker 19.26 34.44 78.83


Another frequenter of this piece, the young Devin Booker hasn't given us many reasons to doubt his ability to sustain runs of great play. In nine of his 14 games this month, Booker has either racked up 30 FanDuel points or hit his salary-implied value. And with the consistency of his playing time (35.5 minutes over last five), it's easy to see how Booker has been such a consistent producer in daily fantasy. He's averaged nearly a point per minute while scoring 22.8 points on 18.8 shots and 1.4 three-point makes a game. Tonight, the 19-year-old gets the Timberwolves, who are 14th of the 20 teams on tonight's slate in defending his position.

Shelvin Mack, PG, Utah Jazz

FanDuel Price: $5,900

FanDuel Season Avg. L5 Avg. % Above
Shelvin Mack 14.83 24.1 62.45


This is the second straight installment in which Shelvin Mack has been featured in the article. I don't feel bad or repetitive about it at all, either. Up until very recently, Mack has been a hot commodity in NBA DFS as well as a really solid player for his Utah Jazz squad. He's averaging a lackluster 18.6 FanDuel points per game over his last three matchups. However, in the five games prior, Mack had at least 31 fantasy points as Utah's starting point guard. Outside of an off performance against Oklahoma City, Mack has still been getting the minutes, seeing 32.6 minutes of floor time in the past five games. His salary has decreased by $400 over the past five days ,so Mack is definitely in a good spot to return value against a porous Lakers defense.

Jusuf Nurkic, C, Denver Nuggets

FanDuel Price: $4,300

FanDuel Season Avg. L5 Avg. % Above
Jusuf Nurkic 17.86 25.84 44.65


The Denver frontcourt has been a pile-up of talent for the wide majority of this season. Nurkic, as well Nikola JokicDarrell Arthur, J.J. Hickson and Kenneth Faried have all split minutes across the power forward and center positions throughout the year. As of late, though, injuries have helped to free up some long runs for guys like Jokic and Nurkic. As long as Faried is out with a back injury once again, I'd expect this to be the same case tonight. In his last five games, Nurkic has taken advantage of his 22 minutes per game by producing 12.6 points, 5.2 rebounds and 2.2 blocks for a total 4.34 FanDuel points above his salary-implied price for tonight's slate. Just make sure Faried is out before dialing up Nurkic against the Mavericks.

Karl-Anthony Towns, C, Minnesota Timberwolves

FanDuel Price: $8,900

FanDuel Season Avg. L5 Avg. % Above
Karl-Anthony Towns 35.88 43.86 22.23


Now, it's not usual for the hottest players -- those exceeding their season averages and salary-implied totals -- to be low- to mid-priced options. They have a lot of room for upside, especially when they see an uptick in Usage Rate or minutes. Noticing that the previous four were exactly those types of players, I had to put Karl-Anthony Towns in here despite his high price. He's exceeding his already spectacular season average as of late while also spitting out 4.97 FanDuel points per $1,000 over his last five. He's a solid cash option and could be a sneaky tournament play as he's the second-most costly center on tonight's FanDuel slate. And a slight bump in Usage Rate over his season average could lead Towns to his fifth 20-point game in six contests.

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