Underdog Fantasy has become wildly popular due to their massive Best Ball contests as well as their Pick ‘em games, but their daily snake drafts are another incredibly fun option for fantasy drafters. Their NBA drafts (or Battle Royale as they call it format) are incredibly simple, and they give you a shot at 4 or 5 figure winnings every single day.
All you have to do is draft 6 players from the games taking place that night in the NBA in a traditional snake draft against 5 other users. No positional requirements. No salary cap. Your team of 6 players competes against every other team of 6 drafted that day in that tournament for your share of the prize pool, which typically pays out approximately 20% of the field with 20-25% going to first place.
If you haven’t yet signed up for Underdog Fantasy, you can use Promo Code ‘SPIKE’ to receive a 100% Deposit Match on any deposit up to $100.
Underdog offers a variety of options each day with single entry, double entry and multi entry contests available. Their player scoring is also incredibly simple:
Below are the additional details and rules provided by Underdog for their general Battle Royale contests, as well as their Daily NBA specific contests:
Let’s dive into the strategy for today’s contests. Much of the strategy for today is driven by the incredible Daily NBA Projections from the RotoGrinders team. If you’d like to subscribe to the full set of projections for every player and team, head to RotoGrinders NBA Premium , which includes fantasy point projections and daily fantasy ownership projections for sites like DraftKings, Fanduel, and Yahoo, as well as LineupHQ Optimizer access and much, much more.
Underdog Fantasy Daily NBA Battle Royale Contest Strategy for February 11th, 2022
Top Options
The trade deadline has come and gone, and boy do we have some major shakeups across the NBA, including teams in action tonight. At the top, Joel Embiid and Nikola Jokic are a clear 1-2, but it will at least be something to watch with James Harden’s status. Embiid will be perfectly fine once Harden gets into the lineup, but he could take the ball out of Joel’s hands enough to make Jokic a bit more of a clear favorite for the top spot. There’s a drop off after those two, but Dejounte Murray continues to be the undervalued player of the elite tier, while LaMelo Ball has risen up near the top of the second tier with his role of late. The team trading Ish Smith and another injury to Gordon Hayward should only cement LaMelo.
Undervalued and Overvalued Players
D’Angelo Russell – Russell has been an under the radar, extremely strong fantasy asset this year. He hasn’t shot the ball well, but he’s the point guard of the Minnesota 3 headed monster of KAT, Ant and DLO. He has a big usage rate and a 34% assist rate, and he showed his ceiling last game with a 55 point explosion.
Jakob Poeltl – With the return of Zack Collins and the Spurs not looking to win now, I think Poeltl likely gets dinged a few minutes per game down the stretch. However, he’s such a strong per minute producer that his current draft cost is criminally low. He’s averaged just shy of 1.2 fantasy points per minute this year, and the matchup with the Hawks is a strong one.
Josh Giddey – With Shai Gilgeous-Alexander out, it feels like Giddey would get a big bump, but he has proven to not be the kind of player that can take on the type of usage role SGA has. On top of that, he simply isn’t a particularly high ceiling fantasy player. He hovers most nights between 30 and 40 fantasy points with very little exception. He’s an exiting, young real life player, but he shouldn’t be drafted as high as he is in our snake drafts.
Injuries and Situations to Monitor
James Harden – As mentioned above, Harden’s status both with injury and trade is unknown. I don’t expect him to play, but if he does, it remains to be seen how the roles shake out on this team, and I suspect everyone involved would take a small ding.
Rudy Gobert – Gobert has been out for a while, and he’s questionable to return to action tonight. It was a calf injury, so it’s hard to assume he’ll jump right back into full minutes when he returns, but at his current cost he’s definitely worth taking some shots on.
Anthony Edwards / D’Angelo Russell – Both are questionable, but I’d honestly be stunned if they missed. They both played last game with these tags, and Russell put up a monster performance, while Edwards mentioned after the game that this is the best he’s felt in a long time.
Malcolm Brogdon – Brogdon last played on January 19th, and the Pacers are tanking, so I don’t expect him to be rushed back into real minutes even when he does return. On top of that, Tyrese Haliburton and Buddy Hield are set to make their Pacers debut tonight, and there’s a lot of uncertainty around the roles of all these guys when (if) healthy.
Good luck!
