This is going to be short and sweet today because our resident Pro Keith Hall’s wife just gave birth to their first child last night. He is otherwise occupied to put it mildly. I will be also tackling the player write up here shortly and also avoiding being sacked by my wife on a weekend full of honey-do’s. Let’s dive in so I can knock all this out and get you guys set up for success on this shorter Saturday slate……..all the while wishing my buddy Keith a collective Army congratulations as he attempts to tackle this next, and perhaps most challenging, phase in this game of life. Good luck, buddy! Many of us know what you are about to take on and it’s not nearly as bad as we will have you believe. OO-rah! (Just for you Marines out there. I’d also never desecrate SemperFi with a joking tone.)
Fall in, soldiers!! This process isn’t intended to take long. It’s a skim, if you will. You are starting your research by quickly glancing over the day’s slate and gathering your early intel. Our goal is to give you a head start on today’s action. Keith and I will be back later with picks and analysis for the slate for our VIP Insiders, as well as provide answers to questions as much as possible in the VIP Slack channels.
Daily Fantasy Players are priced by many factors. Some of the key factors are the teams’ seasonal averages in points scored and the pace at which they play. We can assume if a team is expected to score more points than they usually do, players from that team are in a better than usual spot to succeed. We can also assume if a team is expected to play at a faster pace than usual, their players are in a better than usual spot to succeed.
VEGAS LINES – It honestly all starts here. 200 is the standard for a game in which we can expect fantasy goodness to appear. But, a lot more factors come into play, too. We don’t try to predict blowouts, but red spreads indicate the possibility. I will also add the NBA is changing. Last season, there may have been one game total over 230. This season, we have already seen more than ever. 190 totals are becoming more uncommon than common. We may revisit the magical 200 someday and call it 215. Either way, I am targeting the highest few games on any slate, regardless of the totals. I use this graphic as a guide.
| Road Team | Home Team | Favorite | Spread | Total | Tip-Off | |
| Indiana Pacers (39-36) | at | Philadelphia 76ers (9-66) | IND | -11 | 203 | 7:30 PM |
| Detroit Pistons (40-35) | at | Chicago Bulls (38-37) | TBD | TBD | TBD | 8:00 PM |
| Toronto Raptors (50-24) | at | San Antonio Spurs (63-12) | TBD | TBD | TBD | 8:30 PM |
| Sacramento Kings (30-45) | at | Denver Nuggets (32-45) | TBD | TBD | TBD | 9:00 PM |
| Miami Heat (43-31) | at | Portland Trail Blazers (40-36) | POR | -4.5 | 209.5 | 10:00 PM |
Here is where I typically hear the chatter about how the whole page is useless because of one incomplete graphic. That’s simply NOT the case. Drop down below and glean what you can from it. Vegas got lazy last night and didn’t give me any lines and totals this morning for most of their games. That doesn’t mean we can’t anticipate being able to attack CHI’s front court for rebounds, assume the Spurs game will be defensive if their starters play, or that the DEN/SAC game might be filled with fantasy gold when two poor teams face off against each other with nothing to gain and nothing to play for. Common sense always should prevail.
POINTED UP! – The teams with green numbers for +/- PPG (Points Per Game) are expected to outperform their seasonal scoring averages per Vegas. Teams with red are expected to under-perform.
| Team Offense | Opponent | Team Total | PPG | Team +/- |
| San Antonio Spurs | TOR | TBD | 104.2 | TBD |
| Denver Nuggets | SAC | TBD | 102.1 | TBD |
| Chicago Bulls | DET | TBD | 101.5 | TBD |
| Detroit Pistons | CHI | TBD | 102.2 | TBD |
| Sacramento Kings | DEN | TBD | 106.9 | TBD |
| Toronto Raptors | SA | TBD | 102.9 | TBD |
| Indiana Pacers | PHI | 107 | 101.6 | 5.4 |
| Miami Heat | POR | 102.5 | 99.6 | 2.9 |
| Portland Trail Blazers | MIA | 107 | 104.7 | 2.3 |
| Philadelphia 76ers | IND | 96 | 97 | -1 |
PACED UP! – Similar to being pointed up, the teams in green should be playing faster than normal while the teams in red should be playing slower. More possessions might mean more opportunity to score points.
| Team Offense | Opponent | Pace | Proj. Pace | Pace +/- |
| Denver Nuggets | SAC | 98.1 | 102.3 | 4.2 |
| Indiana Pacers | PHI | 99.1 | 101.4 | 2.3 |
| Philadelphia 76ers | IND | 100.4 | 101.4 | 1 |
| Detroit Pistons | CHI | 97.6 | 98.1 | 0.5 |
| Miami Heat | POR | 95.7 | 95.8 | 0.1 |
| Sacramento Kings | DEN | 102.3 | 102.3 | 0 |
| Chicago Bulls | DET | 98.6 | 98.1 | -0.5 |
| Toronto Raptors | SA | 95.5 | 93.5 | -2 |
| Portland Trail Blazers | MIA | 98.2 | 95.8 | -2.4 |
| San Antonio Spurs | TOR | 96.1 | 93.5 | -2.6 |
TOTAL FANTASY POINTS ALLOWED & DvP RANKINGS – This graphic provides a quick glance at how strong or weak a defensive team plays overall, as well as against a specific position. We are looking for green numbers and trying to avoid red numbers, and we are looking to roster a player from the OPPONENT’s team in the 2nd column. Example, the WAS SG is, theoretically, in great spot.
| Team Defense | Opponent | TotalFPA | vs. PG | vs. SG | vs. SF | vs. PF | vs. C |
| Philadelphia 76ers | Indiana | 29 | 28 | 19 | 29 | 28 | 30 |
| Sacramento Kings | Denver | 28 | 23 | 29 | 21 | 30 | 18 |
| Chicago Bulls | Detroit | 25 | 27 | 15 | 25 | 26 | 24 |
| Denver Nuggets | Sacramento | 23 | 21 | 27 | 19 | 24 | 11 |
| Portland Trail Blazers | Miami | 17 | 22 | 18 | 5 | 22 | 25 |
| Detroit Pistons | Chicago | 9 | 12 | 7 | 4 | 13 | 10 |
| Indiana Pacers | Philadelphia | 8 | 9 | 11 | 6 | 9 | 15 |
| Toronto Raptors | San Antonio | 5 | 3 | 14 | 7 | 5 | 8 |
| Miami Heat | Portland | 4 | 2 | 3 | 15 | 4 | 6 |
| San Antonio Spurs | Toronto | 1 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 3 |
With incomplete Vegas info, this becomes BY FAR the most important graphic of the day. There is a LOT of gold up in those there hills at the top of this graphic. If you are a VIP Insider member, you will get more analysis later in the player picks of the day with more detail as to why we are attacking specific spots on this graphic.
BACK 2 BACKS! – Graphics containing teams we should watch for limited minutes and/or rest days. Maybe hard to see the colors, but yellow is caution, orange is a little more caution, and red is just crazy.
| Team | B2B | 2of3 | 3of4 | 4of5 |
| Atlanta | ||||
| Boston | Yes | |||
| Brooklyn | Yes | |||
| Charlotte | ||||
| Chicago | Yes | |||
| Cleveland | Yes | |||
| Dallas | ||||
| Denver | Yes | Yes | ||
| Detroit | Yes | |||
| Golden State | ||||
| Houston | ||||
| Indiana | Yes | |||
| L.A. Clippers | ||||
| L.A. Lakers | ||||
| Memphis | ||||
| Miami | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Milwaukee | ||||
| Minnesota | ||||
| New Orleans | ||||
| New York | ||||
| Oklahoma City | ||||
| Orlando | Yes | |||
| Philadelphia | Yes | |||
| Phoenix | ||||
| Portland | Yes | |||
| Sacramento | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| San Antonio | ||||
| Toronto | Yes | Yes | Yes | |
| Utah | ||||
| Washington |
If you made it this far and appreciate the tips and snippits of advice you are getting, you might want to see/learn more. For information on joining the VIP Insiders, click HERE! You will gain access to:
- Private Slack channel exclusively for VIP Insiders, where you find DFS NBA pro Keith Hall actively answering questions and offering strategy advice.
- Daily player picks on slates with 5 or more games, only excluding Sundays.
- Daily cheatsheets for both FanDuel and DraftKings to help build your lineups.
- Early access to any and all semi-private freerolls on FanDuel or DraftKings offered to the DFS Army.
This Morning Briefing article, again, is not the end-all be-all when it comes to analyzing a slate. This is a first glance to identify targets we may want to dive deeper into. You may, in fact, choose a player in a poor DvP matchup due to other indicators, especially on a short slate night. Don’t overthink this stuff. The concept is to put your players in the best spots to be successful and roll them out. Keith and I will be back later to provide the VIP Insiders with more in-depth player analysis and specific picks for tonight. And, of course, the cheatsheets…… (Remembering, of course, cheatsheets come out on slates 5 games and larger.)
