NBA

5 NBA FanDuel Value Plays to Target on Wednesday 3/29/23

Austan Kas  —  @AustanKas Mar 29th, 2023

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 one of these lower-salaried options into your lineup.

Let's take a look at some players who can help fill in the gaps in your lineup on FanDuel tonight, using numberFire's daily fantasy basketball projections as a guide.

Bennedict Mathurin, SG/SF, Pacers ($5,400)

Tyrese Haliburton and Chris Duarte are out for the Indiana Pacers while Myles Turner is questionable. The absence of Haliburton makes Bennedict Mathurin one of the night's top values.

With Haliburton and Duarte out, Mathurin sports a team-best 27.8% usage rate and puts up 32.5 FanDuel points per 36 minutes, according to CourtIQ. That usage rate leads the team by 5.1 percentage points.

Indiana draws a difficult matchup today against the Milwaukee Bucks. There's blowout risk with Milwaukee an 11.5-point road favorite. Adding to that, Mathurin can be volatile in DFS because he gets most of his FanDuel points via real-life points.

But the rookie's situation is too good to ignore tonight, and our model pegs Mathurin to score 29.8 FanDuel points -- 5.53 per $1,000.

Nassir Little, SF, Blazers ($4,700)
Drew Eubanks, PF/C, Blazers ($5,600)
Kevin Knox, SF/PF, Blazers ($4,300)

The Portland Trail Blazers continue to be a great source of value. They've already shut down Damian Lillard for the year while Jusuf Nurkic, Anfernee Simons and Jerami Grant are set to miss Wednesday's game. Trendon Watford and Cam Reddish are also listed as doubtful.

So, yeah, the Blazers will be a chalk value spot.

I want to hone in on Nassir Little, Drew Eubanks and Kevin Knox.

A lthough the sample size is fairly small, in tonight's floor condition, Little boasts a 26.1% usage rate and generates 28.9 FanDuel points per 36 minutes, according to CourtIQ. Eubanks has scored 39.5 FanDuel points per 36 in the split while Knox is at 35.0 FanDuel points per 36.

The Blazers are 13.0-point home 'dogs to the Sacramento Kings, but the Kings rank 28th in defensive rating over the last 15 games. Plus, even if this game is a blowout, these guys might stay on the court due to the lack of bodies in uniforms for Portland.

Keita Bates-Diop, PF, Spurs ($5,100)

One of the premier fantasy environments of the slate is the clash between the San Antonio Spurs and Utah Jazz, a game with a 234.5-point total and 5.0-point spread.

We could end up with value on both sides if Lauri Markkanen ends up sitting for Utah, but as things stand early in the day, the Spurs look like the better side for low-salary plays as Keldon Johnson, Devin Vassell and Jeremy Sochan will be out.

In tonight's expected floor condition, Keita Bates-Diop has tallied 32.0 FanDuel points per 36 minutes, per CourtIQ.

He's not always a lock for big minutes as the Spurs' rotation can be wonky even when they're short-handed, but Bates-Diop can thrive with however much run he receives as Utah has allowed the eighth-most FanDuel points per night to power forwards over the last 30 games (45.9).