FanDuel Single-Game Daily Fantasy Basketball Helper: Lakers at Nuggets (Game 2)

In a traditional FanDuel NBA lineup, you have a $60,000 salary cap to roster nine players. The salary cap is the same in the single-game setup, but the lineup requirements are different.

You select five players of any position. One of your players will be your MVP, whose FanDuel points are multiplied by two. You also choose a STAR player (whose production is multiplied by 1.5) and a PRO (multiplied by 1.2). Two UTIL players round out the roster, and they don't receive a multiplier for their production.

This makes the five players you select essential in more than one way; you need to focus on slotting in the best plays in the multiplier slots rather than just nailing the best overall plays of the game.

Read this piece by Brandon Gdula for some excellent in-depth analysis on how to attack a single-game slate in NBA DFS.

Lakers-Nuggets Overview

After a tremendous Game 1, let's take a moment to appreciate this series is basically unimpacted by injury.

Anthony Davis (foot) and LeBron James (foot) are probable on today's injury report but have been for weeks. Mohamed Bamba (ankle) is out of the rotation, so his impact is negligible, and the Nuggets don't have a single person listed for Game 2.

Player Breakdowns

At The Top

Did the Lakers find something late to slow down Nikola Jokic ($17,500)?

That's the primary question to ask today as Jokic mauled all challengers on FanDuel with 81.2 FanDuel points. However, he was held to just two points in the fourth quarter as the Lakers turned to Rui Hachimura ($8,000) as his primary defender. L.A. had a 100.3 defensive rating when Hachimura was on the floor. It's at least a potential path to failure when most will assume none and lock Jokic into the MVP slot.

It'll be a game of adjustments in Game 2 because Anthony Davis ($16,000) and LeBron James ($15,500) were pretty dominant, too. Davis posted 71.5 FanDuel points, and James posted 53.9 FanDuel points, falling one assist shy of a triple-double of his own.

Personally, I'm warier of a 38-year-old James for a second straight game logging 40 minutes at altitude, but Davis' 60.9% shooting wasn't even that hot when he's at 53.9% for the playoffs, and Denver ceded an 80.0% field-goal rate at the rim in Game 1.

As Jokic cooled in the fourth quarter, Jamal Murray ($13,500) led the Nuggets in scoring. He outscored Jokic in raw FanDuel points in the first two games of the playoffs but hasn't since, so he's a wild, contrarian option at MVP. I'm just not expecting his production to stick when it was buoyed by four stocks (steals plus blocks). He's only averaged 1.61 per 36 minutes in the playoffs.

In The Middle

It was a tale of two halves for Austin Reaves ($12,000), who posted 18 of his 23 points after the break in Game 1.

Reaves appears to be comfortably ahead of D'Angelo Russell ($10,000) on the Lakers' late-game priority list. He logged 42 minutes as Russell took a seat for Hachimura. That said, Russell still started and played 26 minutes, and he'll be the least popular square in this tier by a mile. This was a good matchup for point guards in the regular season, too.

Michael Porter Jr. ($11,000) was one of several Nuggets hot from the field in Game 1, but the story for him in fantasy was hauling in 10 boards and 2 blocks. Averaging just 0.73 swats per 36, the defensive contribution could have been an outlier, but his board activity could increase even further if Aaron Gordon ($9,500) sees reduced minutes.

That's because I'm not sure the Nuggets keep Gordon on the floor. Gordon's lack of shooting allowed for the Hachimura-Davis doubles on Jokic that stifled him late. Plus, from a DFS perspective or real-life perspective, he's just not doing much. He's fallen short of 25 FanDuel points in four of his last five with a tiny 15.6% usage rate in that span.

At The Bottom

After 28 effective minutes where his size was noticeably crucial, Hachimura is the control value option with all other alternatives as variables.

Rui has been productive, too. He's posted 30.2 FanDuel points per 36 in the playoffs but sat the bulk of the Golden State series as they sized down. The Lakers also closed with Dennis Schroder ($7,500), who played 32 minutes in a starting role. Schroder played ahead of Russell late, so while he may start Game 2 on the bench, it's not a death knell.

This player pool sets up for a stars-and-scrubs approach with Kentavious Caldwell-Pope ($9,000) also lurking down here. Against my own expectations, KCP did indeed match his 21 points from his last game against Phoenix in his first against L.A. He'll be enormously popular for Game 2, but the guy averaging just 21.8 FanDuel points per 36 in the first 10 playoff games is in there somewhere.

Bruce Brown ($8,500), Lonnie Walker ($7,000), and Jeff Green ($6,000) also eclipsed 12 minutes in Game 1. Brown would likely be the beneficiary of a potential Gordon demotion, and he's topped 23 FanDuel points in three straight as is, sporting a healthy 19.7% usage rate for the playoffs.

Green is the best minimum-salary punt if you want to load up on studs, but don't expect much. He's surpassed 15 FanDuel points just once in the playoffs, and it came with 26 minutes played compared to 17 on Tuesday.