Basketball season is upon us. On December 22nd, the 2020-21 NBA season will get underway with matchups between the Lakers and Clippers and the Warriors and Nets.
The folks at Underdog Fantasy have put together an exciting promotion for the upcoming action. They’re running a $100,000 NBA Best Ball Championship, and for a $25 entry fee, you’ll be eligible to win up to $20,000! As of Wednesday, December 16th, the contest had 2,800 entrants out of a possible 4,600 (60% capacity). So while you still have some time to draft your lineup, you don’t have much left.
If this contest has piqued your interest, keep reading for details on how to enter — and pointers on how to approach your draft!
Check out Underdog Fantasy today! 
I. Entry and Registration
To be eligible for the contest, you must create an Underdog Fantasy account and make your first deposit.
While the site is available in most states, it’s not available everywhere. Fantasy players in Arizona, Delaware, Hawaii, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Washington are not eligible for the contest. You can find the site’s fine print here.
Once you’ve created your account, you’ll be redirected to the lobby, where the NBA Best Ball Championship is pinned. Simply click on the image, select enter, and proceed to your draft.
II. Drafting, Lineup, and Scoring Rules
After you sign up, you’ll participate in a 16-round snake draft against 12 other users to pick your team. You’ll have 30 seconds to make each pick, and you can check out more specific details here.
Each week, you’ll receive points for six players: two guards, two wing players, one big, and one flex. The rest of your 10 players will sit unscored on your bench for that week. Check out the following chart for how Underdog Fantasy’s scoring rules operate.
III. Tournament Structure and Payout
Because this is a 4,600-person contest, Underdog Fantasy has split the competition into four rounds of group play, with each group consisting of 12 players.
Round 1 will run for most of the season, as it spans NBA Weeks 1 to 12. Once it ends, the top three entries from each group will advance, and each of the 1,152 advancing users will receive at least $25.
Once Round 1 concludes, each subsequent round will only last two weeks. Round 2 spans Weeks 13 to 14, and the top two lineups in each group will advance, and each of the 192 advancing users will get at least $100. Round 3 spans Weeks 15 to 16, and the top lineup in each group will advance and claim at least $400. Round 4 will cover Weeks 17 to 18, and the last 16 users standing will battle for the $20,000 grand prize.
IV. Player Projections
A player’s overall upside is king in best-ball drafts. You’ll have to balance that with positional scarcity in order to construct a competitive roster, but upside should always guide your decision-making in this format.
Using FantasyPros’ fantasy basketball projections, we figure out how much to expect from players next year. Note that these projections aren’t position-adjusted. That means you’ll want to avoid sinking too many of your first few picks into guys that can only fill a few slots in your lineup, like bigs.
Check out Underdog Fantasy today!
Whether you’re new to daily fantasy basketball or a seasoned professional, be sure to check out our Daily Fantasy Basketball Glossary. You can get started with Why “Points Per Minute” is the Single Most Important Stat in DFS or head to more advanced strategy — like How to Select Core Players in Multi-Entry Tournaments — to learn more.
Isaiah Sirois is a featured writer at FantasyPros. For more from Isaiah, check out his archive and follow him @is_sirois.
