3 NBA FanDuel Studs to Target on Tuesday 5/11/21

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 a heavy salary to roster someone. Even with strong value plays in your lineup, getting a dud from a stud is likely going to leave your lineup lacking.

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

All injury updates are via the NBA's official injury report or numberFire's player news.

Stephen Curry, PG, Golden State Warriors

FanDuel Salary: $10,300

There's red hot, and there's whatever the hell Stephen Curry is right now -- to say that he's scorching might be the understatement of the century.

Over his last 20 games, Curry is averaging 37.5 points, 5.2 rebounds, 4.8 assists, and 1.3 steals plus blocks all while shooting 50.5% from the field, 45.1% from downtown, and 89.5% from the charity stripe. That's resulted in him averaging 51.2 FanDuel points per contest during that stretch. The Chef has recorded 49 or more fantasy points in 16 of his last 22 outings, and he's had fewer than 42.5 just twice during that stretch. That gives Curry one of the best floors in all of DFS.

Tonight, Curry and the Golden State Warriors will be going up against the Phoenix Suns in a matchup that currently sports an over/under of 230.0, which is tied for third-highest on the massive 11-game slate. The 5.0-point spread in favor of Phoenix also implies that this game should be relatively close, which makes this an excellent fantasy environment.

numberFire's algorithm projects the two-time MVP to amass 53.1 FanDuel points, which is good for third-most on the slate and tops among point guards. Among the 10 floor generals with salaries above $6,700, none are predicted to return better point-per-dollar output than Curry, per our model.

Michael Porter Jr., SF, Denver Nuggets

FanDuel Salary: $7,100

Whether or not you consider him to be a "stud," Michael Porter Jr. is a core play on tonight's slate.

The 22-year-old enters this matchup versus the Charlotte Hornets with his lowest salary in nearly six weeks, and that's an opportunity we should be eager to take advantage of.

At a salary of $7,100, MPJ would need just 35.5 FanDuel points to accrue five-times value (or 5.0 fantasy points for every $1,000 in salary), and that's a number he can easily eclipse. As a matter of fact, throughout his last 10 contests, Porter has put up at least 38.9 fantasy points eight times, including outputs of 42.5, 43.1, 44.7. 46.4, and 57.2. Yeah, that'll do just fine.

Of course, tonight's matchup is as mouth-watering as it gets. According to numberFire's DvP tool, the Hornets are surrendering the third-most fantasy points per 48 minutes to small forwards in 2020-21.

With a projection of 39.6 FanDuel points for MPJ, our model has him as the top point-per-dollar pick among all players salary higher than $6,400. Sign me up.

Domantas Sabonis, PF, Indiana Pacers

FanDuel Salary: $10,200

If it feels like Domantas Sabonis is featured in this column every other slate, it's probably because he is.

Recently, the Indiana Pacers have been taking the court with many key players inactive -- including but not limited to Malcolm Brogdon, Myles Turner, JaKarr Sampson, and Jeremy Lamb -- and the status of each of those guys is once again in doubt tonight. In other words, the increased volume that we've seen from Sabonis is not about to go anywhere.

Since returning from an injury six games ago, the big man has averaged a whopping 63.7 FanDuel points per night, including at least 52.1 in five of those six outings, with four outputs of 67.8 or more. That combination of consistency and upside is usually impossible to attain at a salary under $11,000 -- and Sabonis is only $10,200 tonight.

Power forwards have had their fair share of success against the Philadelphia 76ers recently. In their last 15 games, Philly has given up the fourth-most fantasy points to the position, according to FantasyPros. The possible absence of Joel Embiid (currently questionable) is an added bonus.