The NBA is back! With a kickoff to the season a couple weeks earlier than normal, we’re off to the races. As always, this is the place to look for a recap of each day’s expert selections. Apologies for getting this one up a bit late this week as I was travelling for my day job earlier in the week. Enjoy!
In this article, I will give a brief recap of each day we gathered and graded the experts, including how the Industry Consensus picks performed, highlighting which experts were at the top for the day and which players were only called out by one expert, but produced an “A+” grade. I also list the top DraftKings Points per $1000 experts for each day. Finally, I will also review the overall standings and highlight the top experts so far this season. You can view the full NBA Overall Standings here.
As a reminder, we are currently gathering selections and publishing the NBA Industry Consensus articles on all weekdays that feature at least four games during the NBA season, so be sure to check back about an hour or so before the first game tips off to get a look at the industry expert’s consensus picks for the day.
On to the grades!
Week in Review
Wednesday (October 17th)
Industry Consensus Picks
DO Score – 4.41 (12th of 21)
Total Plays – 39
A+ – Eleven of the 39 plays scored an “A+” grade.
F – Kelly Olynyk, Frank Mason III, Kyle Anderson
Top Experts of the Day
#1) DFS Army (Score: 6.83) scored “A” or better with eight of their 12 plays including seven “A+” selections.
#2) DailyFantasyNerd (Score: 6.50) hit an “A+” score with half of their eight plays.
Top DK Pts/$1000 Expert of the Day
DailyFantasyNerd (6.17 DKPts/$1000)
Sleepers of the Day
A+ – Elfrid Payton (DailyRoto)
A+ – Noah Vonleh (Scout)
A+ – Alec Burks (FantasyPros)
A+ – Nemanja Bjelica (FantasyPros)
A+ – Kemba Walker (FantasyLabs)
Friday (October 19th)
Industry Consensus Picks
DO Score – 5.11 (8th of 20)
Total Plays – 35
A+ – Thirteen of the 35 plays scored an “A+” grade.
F – Dennis Schroder, Ersan Ilyasova, Nemanja Bjelica
Top Experts of the Day
#1) DFS Army (Score: 6.36) topped the list for the 2nd grading day in a row. Seven of their 11 plays scored “A” or better including six “A+” grades.
#2) RG 6-Pack (Score: 6.33) scored an “A+” grade with half of his six plays.
Top DK Pts/$1000 Expert of the Day
RG 6-Pack (5.98 DKPts/$1000)
Sleepers of the Day
A+ – Fred VanVleet (DailyRoto)
A+ – Jae Crowder (Fantasy Alarm)
A+ – Garrett Temple (DailyOverlay – Hot Sheet)
A+ – Serge Ibaka (Rotowire)
A+ – Michael Kidd-Gilchrist (FantasyPros)
Monday (October 22nd)
Industry Consensus Picks
DO Score – 4.90 (7th of 18)
Total Plays – 30
A+ – Ten of the 30 picks scored an “A+” grade.
F – There were no failing grades from the Consensus on Monday.
Top Experts of the Day
#1) Sportsline (Score: 6.88) topped the list as six of their eight selections scored “A” or better including four “A+” scores.
#2) DailyFantasySportsRankings (Score: 6.62) hauled in eight scores of “A” or better with their 13 plays. Seven of those were “A+” grades.
Top DK Pts/$1000 Expert of the Day
Sportsline (6.91 DKPts/$1000)
Sleepers of the Day
A+ – Marc Gasol (RG Grind Down)
A+ – Jusuf Nurkic (Scout)
A+ – Daymeon Dotson (FantasyPros)
Wednesday (October 24th)
Industry Consensus Picks
DO Score – 3.90 (7th of 22)
Total Plays – 40
A+ – LeBron James, JaVale McGee, Steph Curry, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Cameron Payne, Kawhi Leonard, Kevin Durant, Joel Embiid
F – TJ McConnell, Dorian Finney-Smith, Robert Covington
Top Experts of the Day
#1) FantasyLabs (Score: 5.67) put together a solid day when other experts struggled. Seven of the 12 plays scored “A” or better including five “A+” scores.
#2) FantasyTeamAdvice (Score: 4.10) hauled in three “A+” grades with their ten plays. They found the top-2 despite scoring “D” or worse with four plays.
Top DK Pts/$1000 Expert of the Day
FantasyLabs (5.32 DKPts/$1000)
Sleepers of the Day
A+ – Rodney McGruder (RG Grind Down)
A+ – Ben Simmons (RG Grind Down)
A+ – Donovan Mitchell (FantasyCPR)
A+ – Tyson Chandler (FantasyPros)
A+ – De’Aaron Fox (DailyFantasyNerd)
A+ – Jimmy Butler (DFS Army)
Thursday (October 25th)
Industry Consensus Picks
DO Score – 5.67 (2nd of 15)
Total Plays – 24
A+ – Ten of the 24 plays scored an “A+” grade.
F – Gordon Hayward
Top Experts of the Day
#1) FantasyLabs (Score: 6.50) put up some fantastic picks for Thursday. Nine of their 12 plays scored “A” or better with six “A+” grades. They were the lone expert site to recommend Zach Collins and his “A+” score.
#2) Daily Overlay Consensus (Score: 5.67) found the top-2 for possibly the first time ever. Ten of the 24 Consensus plays scored an “A+” for the day.
Top DK Pts/$1000 Expert of the Day
FantasyGuruElite (5.35 DKPts/$1000)
Sleepers of the Day
A+ – Collin Sexton (FantasyPros)
A+ – Zach Collins (FantasyLabs)
Friday (October 26th)
Industry Consensus Picks
DO Score – 5.00 (11th of 20)
Total Plays – 33
A+ – Ten of the 33 plays scored an “A+” grade.
F – There were no failing grades from the Consensus on Friday.
Top Experts of the Day
#1) DFS Army (Score: 6.50) found the top spot again to cap the week. Eight of their 10 plays scored “A” or better with four “A+” scores. Their lowest score for the day was a “C” grade.
#2A) RG Lineup Builder (Score: 5.88) was one of two optimizers to tie for 2nd on Friday. Five of their eight plays scored an “A” grade or better.
#2B) Sportsline (Score: 5.88) scored the exact same grades as the RG Lineup Builder.
Top DK Pts/$1000 Expert of the Day
Sportsline (6.04 DKPts/$1000)
Sleepers of the Day
A+ – PJ Tucker (RG Consensus)
A+ – John Henson (Scout)
A+ – Miles Bridges (FantasyPros)
A+ – Michael Kidd-Gilchrist (FantasyPros)
Overall Leaderboard
A couple of experts got off to a fast start. You can view the full NBA Overall Standings here.
#1) DFS Army (Score: 5.71) started off on the right foot in their first year as an NBA expert.
#2) DailyFantasySportsRankings (Score: 5.14) is clinging to the 2nd spot by a slim margin.
#3) RG Consensus (Score: 5.12) finds itself in 3rd place after our first couple weeks of grading.
#4A) FantasyLabs (Score: 5.10) is among the group that is in a tight jam for 2nd place.
#4B) Sportsline (Score: 5.10) sits in a 4th place tie after two weeks.
The Daily Overlay Industry Consensus picks (Score: 4.75) had a nice start to the season. The Consensus sits in an 8th place tie.
Ownership Percentage Tracking
A part of daily fantasy sports strategy is understanding ownership percentages and being able to predict ownership percentages prior to entering contests especially for GPP tournaments where you might want to be contrarian by selecting lower owned players or fading highly owned players depending on the payout structure and size of the contest.
Below are the tables showing the actual data collected so far this season. Results are using a DraftKings Double-Up for Cash and single entry tournament for GPP. The Count column shows the number of times a player was selected by the experts for a given day. The salary columns show the average ownership percentages for all players that were recommended by the given number of experts for the salary range provided.
Cash
| Count | $9k+ | $7k – $9k | $5k – $7k | $3k – $5k |
| 16 | ||||
| 15 | ||||
| 14 | ||||
| 13 | 37.60% | 45.65% | ||
| 12 | 41.90% | 27.50% | 70.30% | 59.40% |
| 11 | 47.60% | 43.70% | 34.30% | 61.60% |
| 10 | 26.46% | 30.20% | 48.77% | 54.10% |
| 9 | 1.70% | 20.42% | 30.30% | 44.10% |
| 8 | 17.92% | 17.98% | 39.64% | 32.10% |
| 7 | 9.44% | 17.90% | 19.28% | 21.20% |
| 6 | 5.27% | 16.40% | 26.10% | 17.27% |
| 5 | 3.83% | 6.00% | 16.08% | 13.91% |
| 4 | 3.73% | 7.96% | 7.94% | 10.14% |
| 3 | 0.90% | 2.65% | 4.19% | 6.60% |
| 2 | 3.85% | 4.00% | 5.12% | |
| 1 | 0.00% | 2.03% | 1.77% | 1.35% |
GPP
| Count | $9k+ | $7k – $9k | $5k – $7k | $3k – $5k |
| 16 | ||||
| 15 | ||||
| 14 | ||||
| 13 | 23.70% | 29.00% | ||
| 12 | 34.00% | 23.45% | 41.80% | 35.50% |
| 11 | 31.00% | 32.90% | 22.10% | 33.70% |
| 10 | 23.66% | 22.35% | 31.70% | 24.70% |
| 9 | 6.50% | 18.56% | 20.52% | 32.30% |
| 8 | 18.00% | 17.55% | 29.76% | 20.65% |
| 7 | 14.68% | 11.83% | 15.54% | 21.65% |
| 6 | 7.97% | 13.97% | 18.80% | 12.64% |
| 5 | 6.23% | 8.35% | 13.32% | 10.93% |
| 4 | 7.38% | 9.20% | 8.52% | 7.29% |
| 3 | 3.00% | 5.65% | 5.96% | 8.30% |
| 2 | 4.91% | 5.81% | 5.47% | |
| 1 | 0.60% | 2.85% | 3.29% | 2.13% |
We continue to track this over the course of the season as we provide projected ownership percentages for players on each slate in our NBA Weighted Consensus article.
