Saturday's NBA showdown is a single game, DEN @ IND, on a $50,000 cap with a captain slot that scores 1.5x points at 1.5x salary. The slate locks Sat 11/7 at 5:00 p.m. ET (2:00 p.m. PT).
At the top of our model's ranking is Nikola Jokic at $13,400, with a ceiling of 81.2 and a DraftKings average of 54.5. That is the highest ceiling on the board by a wide margin. Jamal Murray follows at $9,800 with a 57.7 ceiling and a 40.3 DraftKings average. DeMar DeRozan sits at $6,000 with a ceiling of 45.2, well above his 14.6 average, which makes him the mid-priced upside option on the DEN side.
The value plays are where this slate gets interesting. Spencer Jones is $1,000 with a 27.4 ceiling, and Jalen Slawson costs $2,200 with a 34.5 ceiling. Braden Smith is $2,600 with a 37.0 ceiling and a 10.0 average, the best ceiling of the three. Marvin Bagley III at $2,800 matches Slawson's 34.5 ceiling, and Quenton Jackson at $4,800 offers a 41.4 ceiling for IND. Tyrese Haliburton, Julian Strawther, Ben Sheppard and Johnny Furphy all carry an OUT tag from DraftKings, so keep that in mind when building around either roster.
The fact sheet does not include ownership figures, so we can't say where the crowd will land.
Our model's top lineup uses $49,900 of the $50,000 cap. It puts Jokic in the captain slot at $20,100, then fills the UTIL spots with Braden Smith at $2,600, Andrew Nembhard at $8,600, Jamal Murray at $9,800, Jay Huff at $4,000 and Quenton Jackson at $4,800. The build pairs the slate's biggest ceiling with cheap IND pieces to make the salary work.
Lineups lock Sat 11/7 at 5:00 p.m. ET.
Follow @numeric_dfs on X.