5 Stats to Know: NBA DFS March 30

Welcome to “5 Stats to Know.” This NBA DFS article will appear every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, provided by yours truly, to help you gain a quantitative edge on the rest of the field when identifying core plays.

The format of this article is simple. I will provide five stats that stuck out to me when diving into the day’s NBA slate. These could be derived from FTN’s suite of tools (Advanced DvP, NBA On/Off Splits) or from the NBA’s extensive library of statistics.

Make sure to check out all of the great FTN NBA offerings and fantastic NBA Tools, including our FTN NBA Odds Tracker and daily FTN NBA DFS cheat sheets!

Now, onto the noteworthy numbers for the slate at hand.

Josh Christopher, SG/SF, Houston Rockets (vs. SAC)

With Dennis Schroder, Eric Gordon and Christian Wood off the floor this season, Josh Christopher has posted a 24.5% usage rate and 0.97 DraftKings points per minute.

With the Rockets officially shutting down key rotational players for the remainder of the season, we should continue to see players like Christopher accumulate significant minutes in the coming weeks. Christopher saw 30 minutes against the Spurs last game, scoring 20 points with six rebounds, six assists and a trio of stocks. His per-minute rates of 0.50 points, 0.14 rebounds and 0.12 assists with that trio off the court illustrate his upside, especially in this matchup. If you extrapolate those rates over a conservative projection of, say, 27 minutes, you’re looking at 13.5 points, 3.78 rebounds and 3.24 assists. While this doesn’t feel like much, this gets you to a baseline of roughly 20 DK points before accounting for any stock production. Factoring in the fast-paced matchup, a potential minutes ceiling and more vacated usage if Alperen Sengun is out and Christopher suddenly becomes one of the best value plays on the board.

Kevin Love, PF/C, Cleveland Cavaliers (vs. DAL)

With both Evan Mobley and Jarrett Allen off the court this season, Kevin Love has averaged 1.34 DraftKings points per minute

The Cavs continue to get ravaged by injuries at the worst possible time, but this presents an opportunity for Love to flirt with his ceiling that we’ve seen on multiple occasions this season. With both star big men off the floor this season, Love has posted a 27.3% usage rate (second highest on the team), 22.7% assist rate and 19.0% rebounding rate. Turning these rates into 23.39 points, 12.04 rebounds and 4.3 assists per 36 minutes, Love has been nothing short of outstanding. The Mavericks are a stout defensive unit, but they come in on the second leg of a back-to-back and Love should be forced into heavy minutes given the depleted frontcourt. He’ll be chalky and while there is a level of volatility, the ceiling is nearly impossible to ignore.

Davion Mitchell, PG/SG, Sacramento Kings (@ HOU)

Over his last four games, Davion Mitchell has averaged 24.0 points, 8.5 assists and 3.3 rebounds on 91.0 touches per game

In the absence of both De’Aaron Fox and Domantas Sabonis, Mitchell has been performing at nothing short of an All-Star level of play. His 91 touches per game rank him fifth in the entire NBA over this span, behind only Nikola Jokic, Darius Garland, LaMelo Ball and Jordan Poole. He’s produced against both poor defensive units (Indiana) and stout ones (post-ASB Orlando, Miami, Phoenix), giving him a massive amount of momentum ahead of what should be the DFS gold mine of the slate against the Rockets. His $7,600 could instill some sticker shock around the industry. Don’t be a fish. This is an elite game environment with a player producing at a level that warrants a price tag of $1,000 more than where he’s priced at. Mitchell clocks in as one of my favorite overall plays on the slate on Wednesday.

LaMelo Ball, PG, Charlotte Hornets (@ NYK)

Over the last five games, only Nikola Jokic (99.2), Darius Garland (98.0) and Jordan Poole (94.2) have averaged more touches per game than LaMelo Ball (91.6).

This feat wouldn’t be incredibly surprising if you had predicted it in the preseason, but with all of the volatility in Ball’s playing time and the tendency to defer offensively to his teammates, it’s actually more than a 5% uptick over his season-long rate of 86.8 touches per game. His minutes volatility is nearly an afterthought, as he hasn’t dropped below 30 minutes since March 9, and that was due to foul trouble and more recently, having played at least 34 minutes in four consecutive contests. The Knicks’ defense has been in shambles for the majority of the season and defending a backcourt has never been their strong suit this season, as they rank 29th against primary ball-handlers. Ball dropped 32 points, nine rebounds and five assists on the Knicks at home last week while shooting 56.5% from the field and 42.9% from three. Taking his blistering recent form into the Mecca of basketball could make for one of the best shows on the hardwood for only $9,200 on DraftKings Wednesday.

Jonas Valanciunas, C, New Orleans Pelicans (@ POR)

Since Feb. 17, the Portland Trail Blazers have allowed the third-most made shots in the restricted area (20.6) per game

The absence of Jusuf Nurkic and the trade of Robert Covington have been two massive blows to Portland’s interior defense and teams have been making a living against them in the paint. Teams are shooting 68.6% (fifth-highest mark in the NBA) against them in the restricted area on the third-most shot attempts and, as stated above, the third-most makes. This bodes incredibly well for the prospects of Jonas Valanciunas, someone who should come in overlooked with Brandon Ingram back in the fold and his price over $8,000. Minutes volatility has still been somewhat of a hindrance, but given Valanciunas’ per-minute capabilities, this matchup is as good as any for him to simply dominate for 28-plus minutes. He has GPP-winning upside on this slate and if this game miraculously stays close, watch out.