3 NBA FanDuel Studs to Target on 3/3/20

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-priced 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.

Let's get right into it and look at which top players should be the focal points of your lineups tonight.

LeBron James, SF, Los Angeles Lakers ($10,500)

This slate isn't exactly loaded with top-end stud plays, but LeBron James is priced nice and reasonably, even for his tough matchup.

He's averaging 52.2 FanDuel points per game over his last 10 and 51.9 — marks that fall just shy of 5.0 per $1,000 of salary today (52.5).

Making this even sweeter, Anthony Davis is being listed as questionable after sitting out Sunday with a knee ailment. The King went off for 67.9 fantasy points in that one. In seven games played without AD, LeBron has averaged 1.59 FanDuel points per minute with a 34.6% usage rate — up from 1.47 per minute on 31.3% usage with Davis.

A matchup with the Philadelphia 76ers' tough defense isn't ideal, but the Sixers are also playing without Joel Embiid and Ben Simmons. putting LeBron in play regardless of Davis' status.

Zion Williamson, PF, New Orleans Pelicans ($8,100)

Being priced at $8.1k may seem a little steep for Zion Williamson, considering he's only scored at least 41 fantasy points (5.0 per $1,000) in two of his last seven games. He's come within half a point of that mark two additional times though, and is averaging 40.1 per game over those seven.

The consistency of his workload continues to improve as well. He's played at least 32.9 minutes in three of his last four, after hitting that mark just once in his first 11 games of the year. Over those last four he's put up an average of 17.5 field goal attempts, notching 29.0 points, 5.8 boards and 1.8 assists per game.

He brings all of that into a sweet matchup tonight against the Minnesota Timberwolves, who are still playing without Karl-Anthony Towns. With KAT off the court, the Wolves have a rebound rate of just 47.3%, which would rank dead-last in the NBA on the year. This is also a team that ranks just 20th in defensive rating while playing at the NBA's third-fastest pace, and the New Orleans Pelicans have a huge 129.5-point implied total.

Tobias Harris, SF, Philadelphia 76ers ($7,300)

Back to Embiid and Simmons being out, Tobias Harris disappointed with 37.8 FanDuel points while those two were on the shelf on Sunday. His salary has stayed nice and low though, and 37.8 fantasy points is still better than 5-times value on $7.3k. He's now scored at least that much in seven of his last 10 games.

He also got up 21 field goal attempts on Sunday (up from 15.9 per game on the year), and he's averaging 1.15 FanDuel points per minute on 25.6% usage in minutes played with that duo off the floor this season. That's up from just 0.79 per minute on 19.5% usage in 612 minutes with them on.

Even against the Los Angeles Lakers' stingy defense, Harris should be significantly more expensive than this, and he's a steal on Tuesday.

Jason Schandl is not a FanDuel employee. In addition to providing DFS gameplay advice, Jason Schandl also participates in DFS contests on FanDuel using his personal account, username Jaymun. While the strategies and player selections recommended in his articles are his personal views, he may deploy different strategies and player selections when entering contests with his personal account. The views expressed in his articles are the author's alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of FanDuel.