Fantasy Basketball Value Picks: Top DraftKings NBA DFS Bargain Plays for Tuesday 4/1/25

With the calendar turning to April, it’s officially the final month of the NBA regular season, which will conclude in less than two weeks. There are plenty of value options to be found this time of year, as tanking teams sit their stars in pursuit of lottery odds and playoff teams rest theirs so they’re fresh for the first round.

Here are my favorite three with salaries under $5,000:

Set your DraftKings fantasy basketball lineups here: NBA $200K Fadeaway [$50K to 1st].

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PG Jamal Shead, Toronto Raptors at Chicago Bulls, $4,600

This Raptors team isn’t trying to win, even though they’re the only non-playoff team in the Eastern Conference that technically hasn’t been eliminated yet. That means more playing time for Shead, Toronto’s 45th overall pick in 2024. Although Shead has been up-and-down, as you might expect from a rookie guard, he’s averaged 13.2 points, 6.0 assists, and 1.8 steals (30.6 FPTS) per game over his last five games, attempting 30 total shots in his last two contests and making 11. With RJ Barrett ($7,800) and Immanuel Quickley ($7,100) seemingly alternating rest days, Shead should get plenty of playing time for the rest of the season, and while he won’t start today with Quickley active, he can be expected to take over much of Barrett’s role.

With its fifth straight win, the Raptors would hand Chicago its third straight loss and climb within four games of the East’s final Play-In Tournament spot. While the Bulls were mostly hot throughout March — posting a 9-6 record throughout the month — their defense still allowed plenty of production, thanks to the fact that they play at the league’s fastest pace. Throughout the month, Chicago allowed the 10th-most points, 15th-most rebounds, and fifth-most assists, and for the season, it has conceded the third-most fantasy points to opposing point guards. Toronto also plays faster than the league average, so there should be plenty of possessions for Shead to fill the box score.

PG Tyler Kolek, New York Knicks vs. Philadelphia 76ers, $3,500

Kolek has flashed his playmaking chops in limited minutes with Jalen Brunson ($8,900), Miles McBride ($5,600), and Cameron Payne ($4,800) all out. Over his last five games, he’s averaged 2.2 points and 6.4 assists (15.0 FPTS) per game in just 17 minutes per game of action, certainly not terrible production for a player with such a cheap salary. His emergence as a deep bench option has helped to keep New York afloat in the month of action that Brunson has missed, as the Knicks have outscored opponents by 0.7 points per 100 possessions with him on the floor. His usage rate is low enough that he’ll never be a scoring option, but he can certainly pass, and the rest of New York’s supporting cast is healthy, unless Karl-Anthony Towns ($10,400) sits because of his sore knee.

Kolek is primarily a target because he’s going against a 76ers team that has gone just 3-18 since the All-Star break with the league’s worst defensive rating. In addition to Joel Embiid, Paul George, and Jared McCain being out for the season, Philadelphia has also been without Tyrese Maxey ($10,000) for the last 16 games, and he still has no timeline for a return to action. Since the All-Star break, the 76ers have allowed the most points, third-most rebounds, and most assists in the league, so this new iteration really has no strengths either. To add injury to injury, Guerschon Yabusele ($5,600) might miss his second straight game with knee soreness.

PF Georges Niang, Atlanta Hawks vs. Portland Trail Blazers, $4,000

Niang has played a fairly important role off the bench for a Hawks team that looks to be in relatively strong form entering the postseason — although certainly not good enough to manufacture an upset over the second-seeded Boston Celtics. Since being dealt to Atlanta at the trade deadline, he has averaged 13.1 points, 3.4 rebounds, and 1.7 assists (22.4 FPTS) per game while shooting nearly 43% from beyond the arc. Both he and starting power forward Zaccharie Risacher ($4,500) have fluctuated in their production, and given that Risacher scored a career-high 36 points in Sunday’s game, I’m convinced that tonight will be a Niang game.

Portland did have a stretch in which it had one of the league’s best defenses, but it fell back to earth in March, posting merely the 16th-best defensive rating. The Trail Blazers still roster one of the game’s most talented individual perimeter defenders in Toumani Camara ($5,800), as well as Matisse Thybulle ($3,800), who’s finally healthy, but they’ll likely spend most of his game marking one of the Hawks’ more potent offensive threats, whether that’s Trae Young ($9,800), Dyson Daniels ($7,500), or Risacher. Niang is mostly a three-point specialist — 66.7% of his shot attempts in Atlanta have come from beyond the arc — and in March, Portland allowed opponents to convert triples at the league’s eighth-best accuracy.