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Line of the Night: What didn’t Joe Johnson (6.5) do last night? Well, he didn’t tuck me into bed, but he was all over everything else. First, Johnson and the Hawks beat the Heat in their 52 second do-over game, and then he went out after a 15 minute break and matched his season high with 39 points, hitting 5 threes and adding 8 assists, 3 steals and a couple blocks. With those wins, the Hawks are now guaranteed a playoff spot in the East.
Honorable Mentions: If you’re familiar with the usual player rater scores on the daily rundown (5.5 to 6.0 = line of the night on most days) you’ve got to be impressed with this list of honorable mentions. Jason Richardson (6.2) had 34 points off 13-20 shooting and added 8 boards, 5 threes, 4 steals, and a block; Mehmet Okur (5.7) was 9-11 from the field and 6-7 from three and had 11 rebounds, 3 steals and 27 points; LeBron James (5.7) had 38/11/4 with 5 threes and a couple blocks; and 18-straight for Houston and Tracy McGrady (5.6), who shot 17-27 and finished with 41/6/9 and 2 blocks.
Due to all the great games, I’m leaving out a bunch of guys who scored 30+ points and even Dwight Howard who blocked 5 shots yesterday. Deal with it. As the great Ric Flair said, “To be the man you have to beat the man.”
Waiver Wire Line of the Night: Nate Robinson (4.8) dropped 45 on the Blazers in an overtime loss. He also had 6 rebounds and 6 assists. I have a feeling he’s available in your league, even though he probably shouldn’t be considering the way he’s been playing as of late. It may have something to do with the fact that he’s a Knick.
The “I Wish I could Trust You More” Lines of the Night: One look at Anderson Varejao’s (4.6) box score – 15/16/6 with 4 steals – and you can see why he’s always been a sort of, kind of, intriguing pickup; and my good bubby Paul Millsap (4.5) went for 16/10/4 with 3 steals and 2 blocks. If he could average more than 20 minutes a game, I’d totally be interested.
Let Me Preempt Tomorrow’s Waiver Wire Line of the Night with This: I’ve been hitting the Thaddeus Young pretty hard over the past week, and since I’m putting this rundown up a little late today, I noticed that Young finished today’s (Sunday) game with 18 points and 9 boards in 28 minutes. Sadly, he only had one steal.
The Biggest Loser: Jason Terry (1.2) only got 17 minutes of play yesterday, going 2-5 from the floor and finishing with 5 points, 0 boards and 1 assists. Nothing I’d worry about too much, although it looks like his time was stolen from a one Mr. Antoine Wright, formally of the New Jersey Nets. So, it’s possible (though not likely) we could be seeing a trend here.
And since we’re talking about the Nets, Devin Harris (1.6) had an atrocious game against his former team. Harris shot 3-12 on the night and finished with 9 points, 2 boards and 2 assists in a loss to the Mavs.
