Tonight’s Official NBA Injury Report is longer than War and Peace. I’m barely exaggerating. We’ve got all 30 teams on the schedule for Friday and that IR is yet to include the 10 that are on the second night of a back-to-back. It’s a mess.
Still, we’ve got lineups to make on DraftKings. Let’s sort through the madness to try and find a couple value picks on the hardcourt.
Set your DraftKings fantasy basketball lineups here: NBA $100K Fadeaway [$20K to 1st]
PG/SG A.J. Lawson, Toronto Raptors at Dallas Mavericks, $4,400
It’s the biggest return to Dallas the Mavericks have seen all week. Obviously that’s a joke. The part about it being the biggest, not the part about the return. Lawson did play 56 games for Dallas across two seasons, so the young wing might indeed have some extra motivation for this evening’s contest. However, that shouldn’t be your motivation for using him in lineups. Instead, you should be focusing on Toronto’s complete lack of depth. RJ Barrett (rest), Immanuel Quickley (rest), Jakob Poeltl (hand) and Ja’Kobe Walter (hip) have already been ruled out for Friday’s contest, while the Raptors technically waived Orlando Robinson ($4,900) and Cole Swider ($4,200) on Thursday — I’d expect the team re-signs Robinson before tip-off, though. That doesn’t leave many available bodies. Expect Lawson to see a similar role to the one he played Wednesday versus the Hornets, where he racked up 14 points, seven assists, six rebounds and 35.0 FPTS in 27.5 minutes. The Canadian might even have a chance to crack the 30 minute plateau.
C Drew Timme, Brooklyn Nets at Minnesota Timberwolves, $4,600
Timme isn’t starting for the Nets, yet he is logging a majority of the minutes for a team that has little interest in winning games at this point in the season. As long as the big man’s salary stays below $5,000, he should be viable on most slates. In his last three contests, Timme is averaging 14.0 points, 9.0 rebounds and 30.9 FPTS. That includes a 37.75 FPTS performance his last time out against the Hawks — the Gonzaga product’s highest output in 2024-25. Minnesota is still trying to work it’s way to the safety of the six-seed in the West, so it’ll be going all-out in terms of effort on Friday night. That said, even in a difficult matchup, Timme’s raw volume should be enough to carry him to a fourth straight viable game for DFS purposes.
PG Anthony Black, Orlando Magic at Indiana Pacers, $4,400
My tomfoolery meter is going off the charts for this game. The Magic are one of very few teams that enter this final weekend of the regular season with their fate set-in-stone. They are the seven seed in the East. That can not change. As such, Orlando has the option to get its key players some rest, which it seems like they might do on Friday. The team has listed the entire starting five as questionable, including Paolo Banchero ($10,100; ankle), Franz Wagner ($8,600; knee) and Wendell Carter Jr. ($5,200; hip). This feels like an all-or-nothing situation, so if all five sit, the Magic are going to have some serious holes to fill in an uptempo matchup with the Pacers. I’d expect Black to have a massive role in that scenario. The former sixth-overall pick logged a team-high 33.2 minutes in Wednesday’s lopsided victory over the Celtics, and has exceeded 20 FPTS in three of his last four contests. Goga Bitadze ($3,400) and Tristan Da Silva ($3,000) are other names to keep an eye on.
