Ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, the NBA is back… almost! After a four-month hiatus, I wanted to get some gears turning and get back to the grind that is the NBA. We have a long month ahead of us before opening night on July 30th, but our NBA staff is lurking in the brush salivating at the chance to put a stranglehold on the DFS industry. Now that the eight-game seeding schedule is out, I wanted to get a little preview of things to expect in Orlando along with what DFSArmy has up our sleeve for what should be a wild ride.

Even with major sports on a break, DFSArmy hasn’t slowed down for a second. ESports, KBO, NASCAR, PGA, and MMA are all stronger than ever. Come check out all the VIP tools we have to offer on these contests – winning is simple if you you’re using the right content!

Background:

As many of you know, the 2019-2020 NBA season will begin again on July 30th in the Orlando bubble at Disney World. Teams will begin by playing an eight-game schedule for playoff seeding purposes and will then branch off into playoffs.  Below is a list of the 22 teams that were invited to the NBA restart along with their current title odds:

• Milwaukee Bucks (53-12); +250
• Los Angeles Lakers (49-14); +240
• Toronto Raptors (46-18); +2200
• Los Angeles Clippers (44-20); +333
• Boston Celtics (43-21); +2000
• Denver Nuggets (43-22); +2500
• Utah Jazz (41-23); +3300
• Miami Heat (41-24); +3000
• Oklahoma City Thunder (40-24); +10000
• Houston Rockets (40-24); +1300
• Indiana Pacers (39-26); +10000
• Philadelphia 76ers (39-26); +2800
• Dallas Mavericks (40-27); +4000
• Memphis Grizzlies (32-33); +25000
• Brooklyn Nets (30-34); +30000
• Orlando Magic (30-35); +30000
• Portland Trailblazers (29-37); +15000
• New Orleans Pelicans (28-36); +12500
• Sacramento Kings (28-36); +50000
• San Antonio Spurs (27-36); +50000
• Phoenix Suns (26-39); +50000
• Washington Wizards (24-40); +30000

The eight-game schedules have been released and it looks like we are going to have some beautiful looking slates, we open up with a two-gamer on night one but after that, we are blessed with a bunch of “Christmas” slates, as Keg called them. These will be slates that consist of 4-6 games per day, starting mid-day and finishing up at night. I mean… really, what more could we have asked for?

Roster Changes:

The teams have until July 1st to submit their official roster for the restart, but we already know of some key additions and subtractions that will change the way we view rotations amongst the teams.

Lakers – The Lakers will be without Avery Bradley for the rest of the season as he as decided to sit out due to Coronavirus concerns. He was playing 24.2 minutes per game this season and played 27.6 minutes per game over their last ten games. He was a key part of their rotation and will open up minutes for the ancillary pieces. One of those guys being J.R. Smith who is expected to sign with the team for the rest of the year. I do not expect him to be all that effective but could make for an interesting punt option for showdown slates. There isn’t a huge winner with Bradley being off the court, the biggest winner would be LeBron James who sees a +1.5% usage rate with him off the court this season, but what else would we expect from playoff LeBron?

Clippers – The Clippers signed Joakim Noah to a 10-day deal; this is nothing more than a defensive depth move for them. He’s not useable in DFS.

Jazz – Bojan Bogdanovic will miss the rest of the season after having wrist surgery during the shutdown. He was a staple of their rotation and will open up a good amount of minutes and a ton of shots as well. I would expect the rest of the starters to benefit from this, in particular Joe Ingles, Jordan Clarkson, and Royce O’Neale who should all see more minutes/opportunities with Bojan out.

Pacers – Victor Oladipo came out last week and said he was unsure if he’ll rejoin the team this season. This is news to monitor, with him out of the lineup some key pieces will see upgrades. As this news comes out, we will have the impacts laid out in our VIP Coaching Forums.

76ers – The Sixers signed Ryan Broekhoff to their bubble roster, this is nothing more than a depth move that gets them a three-pointer once in a while.

Mavericks – The Mavs will be without Willie Cauley-Stein for the rest of the season, as he is expecting a child. Before you frantically run to DraftKings to get Boban in your lineups, let’s take a deeper look. Boban does see a nice usage rate at 27.5% and 1.37 fantasy points per minute with Cauley-Stein and Powell (injury) off the court this season. But you need to remember he’s only averaging 9 minutes per game this season, so if you want 12 fantasy points, be my guest, but this is a situation to monitor. The Mavs also signed Trey Burke to a deal, this is a depth move to me in an already deep backcourt.

Nets – No, we won’t see the return of Kevin Durant even with the extended break. However, the Nets are a mess at the moment, Kyrie Irving, DeAndre Jordan, and Wilson Chandler have all stated they won’t be rejoining the team. While Spencer Dinwiddie remains closer to doubtful after being diagnosed with Coronavirus earlier this week. This is another case where you will want to check out the VIP Coaching Forums, the Nets rotations will look dramatically different and there is an edge to be had if you know who the correct value guys are along with who will benefit most with all these guys out.

Trailblazers – Trevor Ariza has stated he won’t rejoin the Blazers this season and with Rodney Hood already out for them, this opens up a ton of minutes at the wing. I think we might have a diamond in the rough here and if you follow me on Twitter (@MadnessDFS), I dropped a subtle hint a few weeks back on this. I’ll dig deeper into it in the VIP Coaching Forums as we get closer to basketball and we have pricing out.

Spurs – The Spurs will be without LaMarcus Aldridge when the season resumes play, which will open up some good minutes in that San Antonio frontcourt. DeMar DeRozan sees the biggest usage bump at +3%, but big men like Trey Lyles, Jakob Poeltl, Drew Eubanks, and newly signed Tyler Zeller (some of these options are turds by the way).

Suns – Kelly Oubre Jr. will miss the rest of the season with a knee injury. This is one of the bigger noteworthy topics as it pertains to DFS as Oubre was playing 34.5 minutes per game this season. Devin Booker should see a ton of usage here along with Ricky Rubio and DeAndre Ayton, while Cam Johnson could see some extended run at the wing.

Wizards – Davis Bertans has announced he won’t be rejoining the team, opening up a bunch of shots for the rest of this team. I would expect Rui Hachimura and Mo Wagner to see the biggest benefit here in terms of production.

While we wait for the NBA season to restart, why not check out what the rest of DFSArmy has to offer? There is a huge PGA event starting on Thursday, we’ve got you covered with Cheat Sheets, Research Station, Domination Station, and much more! You can now play any sport competitively just by reading our cheatsheets and using our optimizer.  Maybe a tweak or two of your own, and you might wind up a big winner like ccanelho!  Can you imagine the feeling of winning $100,000 with minimal research?  It’s definitely possible here.  See our Track Record of over 20 winners of $100,000+ and even an NFL $1,000,000 winner in BClinks last season!!

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What to Expect:

As I’m sure we’re all well aware, NBA DFS is full of late scratches almost nightly… I’m not expecting this to change all that much. There will still be injuries, ailments, and if anyone feels the slightest bit sick they will be yanked right off the court. With the slates locking earlier due to the “Christmas day” type formatting, late swap will be HUGE. I cannot stress this enough. This is where becoming a VIP member is a NECESSITY. If you want to win on late swap sites this postseason, you’re going to need to be able to hang with the field and update as needed. Keg, Mutt, and myself along with the other NBA staff members will be in those VIP Coaching Forums and the Breaking News Feed all day long making sure you guys have all the information needed to be competitive. If you haven’t already, now would be a good time to brush up on your strategy videos, especially the DraftKings MME video, so you’re ready to adjust as news breaks.

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Not only will there be late scratches, but if a player tests positive for Covid-19, they will need to be isolated for 14 days. If any of these rotational guys are forced to miss two weeks of action, there will be vast amounts of minutes and usage up for grabs. The Research Station is a great place to see who benefits from players being off the court, while also looking at major trends and game flow. We’ve got some massive NBA wins on the year, we’re not stopping now. As I said if you haven’t already joined as a VIP member… now is the time to do so. You will have access to all sports as they come back for one low price. We do not charge per sport, meaning you’re not just getting an NBA membership, you’re getting MLB cheatsheets, NASCAR articles, NFL analysis, etc. it simply can’t be beaten. Below are just a few of our biggest wins on the year, more can be found on our Wall of Wins.

8-Game Seeding Games:

Most of these games will be competitive especially amongst the teams that truly need to win, such as the bottom tier Western Conference teams that need to win to make the playoffs. Some teams don’t have a lot to play for and may use some bigger rotations just to get their guys back up to speed.

Teams that NEED to win include:

New Orleans Pelicans

Washington Wizards

Phoenix Suns

San Antonio Spurs

Sacramento Kings

Portland Trailblazers

Memphis Grizzlies

Teams with little incentive to win include:

Milwaukee Bucks

Los Angeles Lakers

Brooklyn Nets

Any team not listed above should be playing to win, but don’t need to win in order to make the playoffs baring a tragic losing streak. I don’t see the Wizards catching the eight seed in the Eastern Conference or the Suns and Spurs in the West so I’m not sure how hard they’ll push it, but the rest of teams have a significant chance at making the playoffs. The rest of the teams will be fighting for playoff position, the only two that are pretty much locked up are the Lakers and Bucks. It will be interesting to see how they play these first eight games, I imagine they won’t push Giannis, AD, or LeBron too hard, but with these guys being off for so long they still need to see some run. The Magic would love to get out of that eight seed to avoid the Bucks and with the Nets missing so many players it is very viable, so there is some incentive there. The same goes for the Mavericks who will try and get out of that seven seed and avoid the Clippers if possible. Also with the Nets, if they make the playoffs, their 2020 first-round pick goes to the Timberwolves, if they miss the playoffs they get to keep it… so uhhhhh yeahhhhh they’re going to tank in the most obvious way possible. We will likely see seeds 4-6 be a fun race in the Eastern Conference while 3-6 in the West are all within a few games of each other.

The only thing you are missing at this point is the key to unlock the next level of your game.  Come inside and check us out!!  We have experts sharing their secrets and experience on a daily basis.  Combine that with the actual ability to ask them questions and get quick answers in return, and you have a recipe for success that puts our army hats on leaderboards all over the face of DFS. Finally, be sure to follow me on Twitter @MadnessDFS along with the rest of our NBA staff for constant updates regarding the NBA season.

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