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Who’s up for some late-night tennis DFS? We’re into the quarterfinals at the Vienna Open in Austria and the Astana Open in Nur-Sultan, Kazakhstan with some huge names on the slate. We’ve got the likes of Novak Djokovic ($11,200), Dominic Thiem ($8,000) and Daniil Medvedev ($10,400) taking center court. With some exciting options to choose from, let’s look at who you should consider for your fantasy tennis rosters on DraftKings.
Set your DraftKings fantasy tennis lineups here: TEN $40K Line Painter [$10K to 1st]
High-priced Options
Novak Djokovic ($11,200)
This is yet another no-sweat spot for Djokovic. Lorenzo Sonego ($4,300) really just has his serve going for him — and against perhaps the greatest returner of all time, his power should be easily diffused. Sonego can hit a big ball, but he simply does not have the rally tolerance to hang with the best in the world and also still has not put together an impressive body of work off of clay. Djokovic rolls in two.
Adrian Mannarino ($9,500)
I really want to fade Daniil Medvedev ($10,400) on this slate — who has looked like a shell of the player who wowed us with extraordinary play in the summer of 2019 — so this is the next-highest-priced guy. Mannarino often goes overlooked when it comes to players who could excel on an indoor hardcourt due to his lack of a big powerful weapon. Often times, we look at people with huge serves as the people who flourish here most, but Mannarino’s extremely flat groundstrokes play up incredibly well too. Mackenzie McDonald ($6,000) is over-performing at this tournament, and I expect him to fall back to Earth against a bit more of a consistent opponent. He got away with falling behind by a break numerous times in his two matches. The Frenchman, who just gave Alexander Zverev somewhat of a scare last week, should be too skilled of an opponent for the young American.
Value FLEX Options
Grigor Dimitrov ($8,500)
The cracks are beginning to show for Dan Evans ($6,200), who has played a lot of tennis over the past couple of months. He’s had to claw to get through his past five victories, and has gone three sets in three of his last five matches — excluding his match against Aljaz Bedene, which ended with a retirement. Dimitrov, on the other hand, owns Evans — going 3-1 over his career — and is playing some of the best tennis of his past two seasons, coming from a set down to knock off Stefanos Tsitsipas in a thrilling match on Thursday. His level is simply too high at the moment, and I could even see a straight-set win. Evans is gassed, and Grigor is poised to perhaps run to the final in Vienna.
Dominic Thiem ($8,000)
Yeah, I’ll bite on this one. We’re getting an extremely low price on one of the three best players in the world due to the fact that, well, he’s playing No. 8 in Andrey Rublev ($7,000). While Rublev is perhaps the hottest player on tour at the moment (something I’ve said many times about him, and it’s remained true), this is Thiem’s home tournament, and that often helps him find a sixth gear in big matches like this. My mind goes back to last year in the Vienna Open final against Diego Schwartzman, when Thiem dug perhaps even deeper than he had to to win a Grand Slam, outlasting him in three to raise the trophy. As a nice added bonus: Thiem holds a 2-1 lifetime record over the Russian.
Others to consider: Mikhail Kukushkin ($6,500)
Set your DraftKings fantasy tennis lineups here: TEN $40K Line Painter [$10K to 1st]
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I am a promoter at DraftKings and am also an avid fan and user (my username is jetsfan196) and I may sometimes play on my personal account in the games that I offer advice on. Although I have expressed my personal view on the games and strategies above, they do not necessarily reflect the view(s) of DraftKings and I may also deploy different players and strategies than what I recommend above. I am not an employee of DraftKings and do not have access to any non-public information.
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