Day 114 of 170: Don’t Get Too Comfortable

Categorized as: Author: Patrick, Cleveland Cavaliers, Fantasy Basketball, Houston Rockets, New York Knicks, Player News, Sacramento Kings, Trades
Posted on: February 18th, 2010

Line of the Night: Dwight Howard (1.74). Kids, see what happens when you take your vitamins and make your free throws. Howard led the Magic to a win over the Pistons by scoring a season high 33 points (going 11-16 from the field and 11-13 from the line), adding 17 rebounds and 7 blocked shots. Much like Howard’s physique, you are not going to find a much better line from a big man this year.

Honorable Mentions: Jason Kidd (1.62) harassed the Suns for an impressive 7 steals, also adding 18 points, 10 assists while going 4-8 from three; Shane Battier (1.20) pulled out his once-a-month scoring barrage against the Bucks. He finished with a 20 and 10 as the Rockets were able to score 127 points; Stephen Curry (1.18) continues to be an offensive gift from the heavens for the Warriors. Last night against the Kings, he scored 24 points on 10-15 shooting, with 15 assists and 3 steals.

Waiver Wire Line of the Night: With Monta Ellis out for the Warriors, CJ Watson (1.26) got the start and responded with a career high 40 points, adding 7 boards and 6 assists. Ellis is expected to miss at least the rest of the week, making Watson a great short-term add, especially if you happen to be an Ellis owner.

Injury of the Night: Dwyane Wade left last night’s game in the first quarter after straining his left calf on a rebound. He was wearing a walking boot by the end of the game and will go for additional testing in Miami today. If Wade were to miss any significant time, Daequan Cook and his 32% field goal percentage on the season becomes your boy.

Holy Trade Action Batman: The floodgates are open as the trade deadline quickly approaches. It’s too much action to coherently breakdown here, but a few more incoherent thoughts on the recent trades (or those that are nearly done) seems like something I can stumble through.

• I already took a quick look at the Jamison to Cleveland blockbuster deal last night. Kelly Dwyer, as usual, has a great take on the trade from the Cavs point of view. The one technicality of the trade that I missed last night was that the Wizards are likely going to buy out Zydrunas Ilgauskas, paving his way back to the Cavs or some other team in need of a backup center (say the Mavs).
• Say the Mavs because they just lost Erick Dampier for a “while” after a gruesome open dislocation of his right middle finger (sorry, no video) on a Russell Westbrook kick to the hand. While horrible, it we wouldn’t be doing our job if we didn’t look on the bright side of the situation. This obviously means more minutes and opportunities for Brendan Haywood, so hopefully you held onto him after he was shipped from the Wizards.
• Kevin Martin looks to be headed to the Rockets for Tracy McGrady in a surprise 11th hour play by Sacramento. Great news for the slumping Martin, who joins a team who desperately needs his scoring and also great news for Beno Udrih, who is posed to get his starting job back (you know, when the Kings were actually winning). Word is that the Kings are still trying to work out a second part of the deal that would send McGrady to the Rockets for a prize bag full of crap and draft picks.



• The Celtics and Knicks swap undersized offensively focused shooting guards in Eddie House and Nate Robinson. It’s not a great fantasy move for Robinson, who is going to be relegated to coming off the bench behind Rondo and Ray Allen. He could potentially provide enough scoring pop off the bench to make it work, but, away from the we-have-absolutely-no-other-options-at-guard Knicks, his upside takes a huge hit. House and his expiring contract his just part of the Knicks master plan to have absolutely no one under contract for 2010. House is not worth a pickup if the Knicks’ plan to get McGrady comes through.
• I mentioned the John Salmons to the Bucks trade last night as well. Looks like the other players involved are Joe Alexander and Hakim Warrick, both of whom have expiring contracts and won’t be significant parts of the Bulls’ future plans. Great move for Salmons’ fantasy prospects and it should also help Brandon Jennings and his plummeting field goal percentage.

Got absolutely nothing better to do today? You could do worse than following all the last minute trade deadline action.

The Biggest Loser: Toronto went to overtime against the Grizzlies, and yet Hedo Turkoglu (-0.7) only managed to score 1 point with 1 rebound, 2 assists and 3 turnovers. He finished the game shooting 0-5 from the floor.

The GMTR FreeRoll: Congratulations again to Addicted, who won GMTR weekly fantasy game at 365 Fantasy Sports for the third (?) time. Maybe it’s even more than that, I don’t know. What I do know is that Addicted is obviously paying off NBA players and teams to give himself an advantage, like getting the Bulls to bench John Salmons in anticipation of his trade to the Bucks.

All Eyez on Me: Two games tonight:

Boston (33-18) at Los Angeles Lakers (42-13) – After missing the Lakers’ last game, Kobe Bryant is again questionable for this one. One motivating factor for Kobe: if he does play in this game, he’ll become the youngest player ever to play in 1,000 games, breaking the current record held by Kevin Garnett. Oh, sweet motivation.

Denver (35-18) at Cleveland (43-11) – The guy to watch in this one is obviously Cavs’ new acquisition Antawn Jamison to see how he fits in with the rotation. My guess: spectacular.

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Tags: Antawn Jamison, C.J. Watson, Dwight Howard, Dwyane Wade, Erick Dampier, Hedo Turkoglu, Kevin Martin, Tracy McGrady