We truly believe here at FantasyLabs that we have the most unique tools and data available to DFS users. However, we also realize that those tools and data are only as awesome and helpful as our ability to effectively communicate how to use everything. As such, we will continually listen to feedback of what you need and try our best to teach our subscribers how to use all of the cool things we have to offer.

With this in mind, we’ve begun a “Trend of the Day” series. Every weekday we’ll walk our subscribers through an important trend for that day’s slate of games.

When my turn comes around to write an installment in the “Trend of the Day” series, I like to look at a highly-rated player within the Phan Model and see what is unique about that player’s matchup. At the moment, Isaiah Thomas’ 91.14 rating makes him the top-overall player in the model. While that may change a bit throughout the day as other value opens up, he should still end up among the highest scores at the PG position by the time tipoff rolls around this evening.

What I find really interesting about IT’s matchup is that his -1.9 pace differential is among the worst on the board today, and he is also playing on the second half of a back-to-back. While in general, these might be red flags, I don’t think that’s necessarily the case here. Let’s take a look.

Trend: Negative PaceD & B2B for Fast-Paced Teams

The Celtics currently rank third in John Hollinger’s pace rating for the 2015-2016 season. Let’s start by setting the pace filter to include teams who play between 101-106.4 in the category:

Step 1: Trend Filters > Pace > Set “101-106”

 

The results are not what we would have expected from teams that push the pace, but we also haven’t set any threshold on minutes yet. Let’s use the Projected Minutes Filter to filter out anyone who is expected to see under 20 minutes in a game:

Step 2: Projection Filters > Proj Minutes > Set “20-45”

 

Now, we’re up around +2 in Plus/Minus and that’s a little bit more in line with expectations. Next, we want fast-paced teams that are facing an opponent who, while slower than the sample team, still plays at a fast pace relative to league average.

Step 3: Trend Filters > PaceD > Set “-3 to -1”

In other words, we are implicitly setting the opponent’s pace to a minimum of 98. To put that into context, the Lakers’ current pace this season is 98 on the nose and they rank 15th overall in the category. An opponent must rank within the top half of the pace ratings for a game to match now.

 

While we’re here, let’s take a peek at the teams that have performed the best under these conditions:

 

The Celtics average +2.6 fantasy points per-player per-game when facing a team that meets these settings. That’s right around Thomas’ individual Plus/Minus, which as we just saw was +2.42.

Step 4: Time Filters > B2B > Select “2H and 2A”

The Celtics are also playing on the second half of a back-to-back set tonight, having played in Indiana last night. Unfortunately, applying this filter is going to knock the results down over half a fantasy point:

 

In fact, although the Plus/Minus is still a decent +1.64, we can see that compares negatively to the +1.96 score we saw when we looked at players on fast paced teams that were projected to log 20 or more minutes. In other words, it’s about a -0.3 downgrade from what would be a normal game for Celtics starters.

I have heard anecdotally that the Celtics are one of the better performers on the second half of back-to-back sets because they are a young team and well-coached. Let’s put that theory to the test while we are here. When facing a team with a Pace Rating of 98-plus on the second game of a back-to-back, the Celtics do average +2.7 fantasy points against expectations. The result set is pretty small though, so let’s back up a little bit.

 

BONUS: Remove Pace and PaceD Filters

After removing both of the pace filters, we are now looking at all players who are projected to play 20 or more minutes in the second half of a back-to-back set. By opening up Team Filters, we can see that the Celtics do actually have the second best Plus/Minus score, at +3.1, behind only the Wolves. In this case, the numbers do seem to support the narrative.

 

Is this enough to outweigh the -0.30 difference between our baseline expectations for the league’s fastest teams and ones within the result set that were on the second half of a B2B? Well, that is for you to decide as you consider whether or not to play the Phan Model’s highest ranked player at the moment, Isaiah Thomas.