RADIO
Welcome to the RotoBaller NBA Recap. In this feature, we will highlight one key fantasy basketball takeaway from each night during the past week. These viewpoints can be both positive and negative and will hopefully help to provide insight into different roster moves you should consider making.
Fantasy basketball has a lot of moving pieces with all the different scoring settings that are possible to play under, so I will always do my best to spotlight where players gain or lose value in certain game types.
Without further ado, let's get right into the sixth week of the season and try to figure out how to take advantage of what we saw transpire.
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Monday, November 25th
Spencer Dinwiddie For The Win!
Spencer Dinwiddie connected on a 22-foot jumper with 1.8 seconds left to lead the Brooklyn Nets to a 108 to 106 road victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers. It has been an impressive recent run for Dinwiddie, who has averaged 24.6 points and 6.6 assists in the past six games without Kyrie Irving in the lineup, but the robust run could be slightly derailed once the star guard is able to return to action.
Irving's ball-dominant nature has always affected those that play next to him, and it places Dinwiddie in a similar situation as last season, which saw D'Angelo Russell control a lot of the proceedings and eventually prevented the 6'6" guard from reaching his greatest heights. If you own Dinwiddie, you obviously are going to keep riding this momentum wave for as long as Irving is sidelined, but I do believe category and points league owners have a very different situation on their hands.
Dinwiddie's capacity to score with either the starting lineup or second-team offense will continue to allow him to produce top-100 value in points groups, but the same can't necessarily be said for category participants. The 26-year-old is a volume shooter that shines when given an expanded usage rate, but that explosive nature also makes him slightly one dimensional when the offense isn't solely running around him. Sure, he will get his fair share of operating the second unit, but Dinwiddie's value might not reach a higher level than it is currently at right now, especially when you consider the fact that he is a career 40.8% shooter from the floor. That percentage obviously isn't quite as bad if you are punting that category, but it is difficult to find where he is an elite producer other than scoring once Irving returns. I wouldn't be giving Dinwiddie away, but it never hurts to try and parlay a hot run into greater talent for your squad.
Tuesday, November 26th
Gary Harris Continues To Struggle
Gary Harris' career trajectory has gone in the wrong direction over the past two seasons. After a breakout campaign in 2017 that saw him average 17.5 points on 48.5% shooting, the Michigan State product stumbled in 2018 with arguably his worst year since his first year in the league - producing just 12.9 points on 42.4% from the field.
Unfortunately for Harris, the bad run has continued in 2019, with the 25-year-old providing only 10.2 points on 40.4% shooting from the field. Harris currently features the lowest usage rate of any starter on the Denver Nuggets and is generating numbers below his career average in practically every meaningful category. That is a recipe for disaster and leaves him outside the top-150 for nearly all settings.
Wednesday, November 27th
Skip To My Lou
Kawhi Leonard's schedule of not playing in back-to-back sets has allowed Lou Williams to shine this season with a career-best 6.2 assists per contest. On Wednesday, Williams added to that average by totaling a career-high 13 dimes to go along with 24 points, two steals, one block and three three-pointers.
If you have been following my article since Week 1, you will realize by now that I am constantly trying to trade players that show sudden spurts of production for more consistent producers, but Williams seems to be playing the best basketball of his career at the age of 33 and has transformed into a steady option in all settings.
My biggest gripe for Williams throughout his career in category leagues has been the fact that he is a one-dimensional asset that can plummet field goal percentage with his volume-based shooting, but the more statistics he can bank as quality categories, the more valuable he becomes for lineups. I don't love the idea of playing or treating Williams as a PG for my team, but the second-round pick in the 2005 draft is a sneaky two-guard for just about any fantasy squad because of his ability to add in some dimes under the radar.
Thursday, November 28th
Gobble, Gobble
No games on Thanksgiving!
Friday, November 22nd
Markelle Fultz Has Earned Ownership In Standard Leagues And Perhaps Beyond
Currently owned in just 41% of Yahoo leagues and 12.6% of ESPN settings, Markelle Fultz is someone you might want to consider adding in leagues with as small as 10 members. I do believe that is currently on the aggressive side of things at this very moment, but head coach Steve Clifford has made the most of his promise that he was going to begin ramping up Fultz's minutes, and the results have been encouraging.
In Fultz's past seven games, he is averaging 14.7 points, 4.1 assists, 2.5 rebounds, 1.4 steals and 0.6 triples on 53.2% shooting from the floor and 88.2% from the line. To put his recent run into perspective, the former number one pick in the 2017 draft had failed to exceed 25 minutes in any of his first nine games in 2019 but has surpassed that total in each of his last six contests.
Sometimes it takes players a little longer to reach their potential than others, which bodes well for Fultz that the Magic seem to be behind him and ready to infiltrate him more into the offense. Fultz is less encouraging of an add if you are forced to play him at point guard for your roster, but his recent percentages from the floor and respectable assist totals start to look a lot better when viewed from the shooting guard perspective. I am scooping him up in all 12-team leagues and would consider adding him in some 10-man settings if I was in need of a little upside.
