This article is part of our DraftKings NBA series.
We get our first single-game slate for Saturday's playoff action, with the Clippers and Nuggets tipping off at 4:30 p.m. ET. I'll dive into DraftKings' Showdown format and reveal my favorite builds for the afternoon below.
SLATE OVERVIEW
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We encounter a lot of single-game scenarios during the playoffs, and the Saturday slate gives us our first opportunity to try our luck with this format. First, let's run down DraftKings' single-game (Showdown) structure.
DraftKings' Showdown roster has five slots, consisting of four UTILITY spots and one CAPTAIN spot, which is identified by a crown at the top of the roster. The player selected in the Captain spot will generate 1.5x times their fantasy-point value. You will also notice that the player selected will see their salary increase with a corresponding 1.5x multiplier as well, which adds a noticeable strategy wrinkle when approaching the contest. While conventional wisdom suggests that a static list of five players should be the ideal choice, the salary multiplier introduces several scenarios where the highest-scoring player may not be the best avenue for success. Let's use today's game as an example. Taking Nikola Jokic may seem like the ideal move for the multiplier, but the exorbitant $20,400 multiplied salary could deny you value elsewhere. While 1.5x is a significant increase, achieving balance in the standard UTIL slots is imperative, and Jokic's salary could foil your chances to achieve that.
INJURIES
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CAPTAIN SELECTIONS
DEN Nikola Jokic ($20,400, UTIL $13,600)
LAC James Harden ($16,200, UTIL $10,800)
LAC Ivica Zubac ($13,800, UTIL $9,200)
LAC Kawhi Leonard ($15,300, UTIL $10,200)
The salary allotment for the contest is $50,000, which allows an average of $8,333 per slot. Some playoff teams take a more ensemble approach, but the marquee names are going to be unavoidable tonight. We already mentioned Jokic, and there certainly are some builds where the superstar can fit, but the salary decreases from Harden, Leonard and Zubac allow for one or two utility upgrades. I am fine with Jokic's $13,600 salary as a utility because using him in the multiplier only leaves you with an average of $5,920 per slot, and there are only four or five players that I would consider lower than that benchmark. On the high end, Harden would allow $6,760 per spot, and Zubac would allow $7,240 on the low end. The major question to ponder when approaching this selection is quantifying each player's potential point-per-dollar valuation and estimating the differential between players you could acquire with the extra cash. For example, if I can make up the 35 points generated by a 70-DKFP Jokic multiplier with a more expensive utility elsewhere, Jokic becomes an ideal play, but if someone like Zubac can erase that difference, we could place him as Captain but still have Jokic involved elsewhere.
It's impossible to look at the Captain candidates by themselves when determining the best selection, and you'll notice that an interesting salary gap exists as you scroll down the player pool, making someone like Jokic more viable.
UTILITY CANDIDATES
DEN Michael Porter ($6,000, CPTN $9,000)
DEN Russell Westbrook ($5,600, CPTN $8,400)
LAC Nicolas Batum ($4,200, CPTN $6,300)
DEN Aaron Gordon ($7,400, CPTN $11,100)
DEN Christian Braun ($6,800, CPTN $10,200)
LAC Norman Powell ($7,200, CPTN $10.800)
Do you see the opportunity here? Porter, Westbrook and Batum are all at or below the slot average we mentioned for Jokic. Porter's decreased salary makes him an incredible value for this format, and Batum's sharpshooting and shot blocking have propelled him into viability.
If we give Batum a utility spot and move Zubac to captain, we can get Jokic at the utility and still have an average of $6,133 to work with. You could get a higher average by substituting Harden or Leonard, but switching him out only allows us to get someone like Norman Powell or Aaron Gordon in a utility spot. It all comes back to the concept we discussed above -- how valuable is the differential? Lower options like Porter, Westbrook or Batum have shown the potential of mimicking Powell and Gordon's production, so moving off Jokic makes less sense.
A build of Zubac/Jokic/Porter/Westbrook/Batum/Braun appears to be a very safe cash combo, but some alternate builds involve less likely captain candidates that allow for more exposure from Harden and Leonard.
ALTERNATE BUIlLDS
Westbrook/Jokic/Leonard/Batum/Gordon/Porter
I used Leonard over Harden because the slight salary decrease allowed us to add Gordon instead of Braun. This build is viable based on Westbrook's most recent 37-DKFP result. If we can trust another big night from Westbrook, I really like what this build allows you to get away with, especially with the Jokic/Leonard combo. The build leaves $200 on the table, but that's not necessarily a bad thing, especially in this format. You might view the Westbrook selection as a little too cute, but extra tinkering will reveal that a Jokic/Leonard build isn't possible by taking an alternate captain like Powell, Porter or Gordon. I'm not interested in risking cash on Bogdanovic, Dunn or Derrick Jones, and we'd have to settle on one of them to get the same kind of value. The one variation for this build would be Harden over Westbrook, which would downgrade Gordon to Braun. I don't like excluding Zubac, but I think there's some personal bias afoot with that feeling. His overall numbers make him less viable on paper.
The wildcard to consider is Jamal Murray ($9,800, CPTN $14,700). He could easily outdo Harden and Leonard, and I would not rule him out as a utility build today.
