It’s an NBA Cup slate today, so there will be way too much pigment on the courts and the players should be taking a random Tuesday night very seriously. That’s good for us since leverage is largely coming from guys who are also highly owned. Winning big in NBA DFS tournaments requires more than just picking the most popular plays — it’s about setting yourself apart from the field. Incorporating low-ownership, contrarian picks into your lineups can give you a critical edge. Using Stokastic’s NBA DFS Sims and NBA DFS projections, we’ll get into the best use of NBA DFS contrarian strategy for two picks on this Tuesday, Nov. 19 slate.
NBA DFS Contrarian Picks & Ownership Strategy Today
The NBA Lineup Generator is a powerful yet easy-to-use tool that takes the hassle out of building DFS lineups. Simply choose your DFS platform and slate, set your desired ownership profile (chalky, contrarian, balanced, or all), and lock in any players you want to feature. From there, the Lineup Generator creates high-ROI lineups while providing valuable insights to refine your strategy.
Check out the screenshot for an example of a slightly contrarian lineup we crafted for today’s DraftKings main slate, featuring LeBron James as a locked-in play. For additional tips, explore our comprehensive NBA Lineup Generator guide.
Stud Play: C Jalen Williams (OKC) – $8,500
Define stud for me. Also, define “contrarian” for me. I get that it’s my job, but this slate is such a cluster of highly owned players that are somehow not owned enough. Like, LeBron James has positive leverage, but he’s projecting for over 40% ownership. I can’t in good conscience call him “contrarian.”
And now that Nikola Jokic is out, much of the value at the top of pricing has gone out the window.
By any salary measure, Jalen Williams qualifies as a stud. He’s in the same range as your average Devin Booker or Donovan Mitchell slate, and few would question them getting the stud moniker. But he’s also the ultimate role player on steroids, so it feels weird calling him a stud. Alas, he is only projecting for 17.6% ownership, so I’ll take it tonight:
The 20.3% exposure in top-300 lineups (according to Sims ROI) is pretty good. Here’s my problem with DraftKings: Why on earth is Williams center-only? I get that he is the nominal center in a Chet Holmgren-less world, but Williams is 6-foot-6. I don’t recall P.J. Tucker ever being center-only when he was playing the position for the small-ball Rockets years back.
Regardless, that designation makes Williams semi-tough to roster, even on a Jokic-less slate, but it also reduces his ownership. As it stands, he does offer positive leverage as a non-chalk piece, which is nearly impossible to find for high-priced players tonight.
Mid-Priced Play: SG Devin Vassell (SAS) – $5,600
Here’s what I mean when I say leverage is largely concentrated on chalk plays: Of the top 5 players with the most leverage, four of them are slated for at least 23% in Stokastic’s NBA DFS ownership projections.
In other words, they are not even remotely contrarian despite popping up in far more top-300 lineups than their projected ownership suggests they will end up. The one guy in that top 5 who is at least slightly against the grain is Devin Vassell.
The downside to Vassell is that he is exclusively a shooting guard, thus limiting roster flexibility on a slate that’s hurting a bit in that area: The top 9 centers in top-300 lineup exposure are all center-only, for example. There is also the matter of him providing slightly less leverage than two other shooting guards, Jordan Clarkson and Luguentz Dort. But Dort has small forward eligibility, and Clarkson is projected to be rostered at 43%.
Vassell, on the other hand, appears in nearly 30% of top-300 lineups and projects for only 11.7% ownership. Plus, Victor Wembanyama is out tonight, which vacates 17.6 shots and a whole bunch of peripheral stats. Stokastic now projects Vassell for the most points on the team (6 more than any other Spur) in only the sixth-most minutes, so if he gets any more time than those projections, he has a lot of upside.
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