Give Me The Rock
this is fantasy basketball
Line of the Night: Is anyone ever excited when they draft Rasheed Wallace (1.02)? Detroit fans, do you even get excited about having Sheed on your team? Well, Wallace can have long stretches of seemingly mundane fantasy lines, but he can occasionally break out with something like this: 17 points off 7-9 shooting, 12 boards, 6 blocks, and 2 threes. Now back to your regularly scheduled 12 point, 8 rebound games.
Honorable Mentions: is this Chris Paul’s (0.72) first mention in the daily rundown? I believe it is. I’m very disappointed it took him so long. Paul rolled with 24 points and 15 assists. Joe Johnson (0.72) scored 35 to rally Atlanta from a 23 point deficit against the 76ers. Thanks to Johnson, we get this money quote in the game recap:
The Hawks improved to 2-0 in their home opener, the team’s best start in a decade.
Dwight Howard (0.71) went for a beastly 29 and 14 and shot better from the field (11-14) than he did from the line (7-12). Is there any chance Howard is NOT heading down the Shaq fantasy career path? Gerald Wallace (0.59) did what he does on a daily basis: 34/9/3 with 2 steals and 3 blocks. And credit where it is due to my boy Kevin Martin (0.55). A night after being crown the biggest loser at GMTR, he comes back with 31 points off 11-20 shooting.
Waiver Wire Line of the Night: James Posey (0.65) has always been a better real NBA player than a fantasy one (what a waste…). But last night he went for 15 and 6 with 4 steals and 4 threes in 29 minutes to help the Hornets put the smackdown on LeBron James and company. Through three games, his scoring has nearly doubled from last season, which Posey has attributed to playing with the master time and space, Chris Paul. While some of that may be true, the fact that he’s also shooting 56% from the floor through 3 games (compared to 41% last season) maybe also have something to do with it.
Honorable Mentions: Before the season started, list of potential fantasy sleepers from Detroit was so long that I think I saw Mateen Cleaves mentioned: Rodney Stuckey, Amir Johnson, Jason Maxiell, Kwame Brown (ok, maybe not that last one). But, who thought Walter Herrmann (0.54) would be contributing for an NBA team right now? Last night, he got 23 minutes off the bench and finished with a line of 16/7/4. He also shot 67%, meaning he squeezes under my waiver wire test.
Forget Brook Lopez, Josh Boone (0.41) had 17 points, 14 rebounds and 3 blocks for the Nets yesterday. Marquis Daniels (0.41) – remember him – got 39 minutes for the Pacers (who are still without Mike Dunleavy Jr.) and put up a 13 and 10 with 2 steals and 2 blocks. And dammit, would you pick up Anthony Carter (0.41) already? Is 20/6/6 not good enough for you? What do you want from the man?
The Biggest Loser: And we thought Leandro Barbosa (-0.81) had a disappointing year last season! Yikes, he’s been bad through 3 games, averaging 22 minutes and 7 points a game. Yesterday, he was 0-3 from the field and finished with 1 point in 18 minutes. He should come out of it – at least a little – but it looks like his minutes are going to be way down from his career average.
Dishonorable Mentions: Oh, Yi Jianlian (-0.84). You just love to tease fantasy owners, don’t you? Luol Deng (-0.79) was 4-13 from the floor on his way to 11 points, and the Darrell Arthur (-0.78) bandwagon (4 points/3 boards) comes to a screeching halt after 2 games.
Retroactive Dishonorable Mention: Thanks to reader Arabain, I realized I wasn’t outputting the entire game score list over at Basketball Monster when there were over 156 guys playing in a particular night. So, Tyrus Thomas and his 2-17 shooting night two nights ago were spared humiliation yesterday because it sucked soooo badly. Just know Thomas, there is no statue of limitations on a biggest loser award.
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