RADIO
Another week of the season is the in the books and it was, as always, a wild one. We had that fun Oklahoma City/Indiana game. We had the Bulls winning games. We had the Rockets being the Rockets. Andre Drummond almost getting a triple-double. The NBA! It's a fun place. It's also likely been a good week for some fantasy owners, because there were a ton of strong performances this week. It was pretty tough to highlight the fallers for this week, actually.
Let's take a look at players whose recent strong play should continue this week, and at players whose recent struggles could continue on and hurt your fantasy squads. These are the risers and fallers heading into Week 10 of the NBA season.
Note: all statistics used are from before the games played on Friday, December 15th.
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Week 10 Fantasy Basketball Risers
RISER - Ersan Ilyasova (F, ATL)
There's no question that the Atlanta Hawks are a bad basketball team. Maybe the best summation of that point is this: over the past week, the team has increased Ersan Ilyasova's minutes and now seems to be relying on him for scoring. That is...not the way to win real life basketball, but it could be a key to fantasy players winning in their fantasy leagues, because Ilyasova was likely either a late round pick or grabbed off waivers. He's scored 20 or more points in three of Atlanta's last four games, though he's not going to give you much in terms of the other counting stats. His shooting percentage has been up, though, and he's been launching shots from behind the three-point line lately, so he's got those things going for him.
RISER - Spencer Dinwiddie (G, BKN)
I follow a lot of people from NBA Twitter and all my Nets follows have been talking about Dinwiddie this week. The stats back it up, with Dinwiddie's scoring, assisting, and rebounding up over what they were at earlier in the season. Aside from a bad outing against the Thunder--a game in which Dinwiddie was in foul trouble--last week, Dinwiddie has become a much more consistent player. His minutes are routinely up over 30 per game. One of the big knocks on him right now is that he's missing a lot of threes, but that'll happen when you're taking a lot of threes. How many is a lot? 31 attempts from behind the line in his past three games. If that volume keeps up, the buckets will come and Dinwiddie will be even more valuable than he is now.
RISER - Brandon Ingram (G/F, LAL)
Maybe Brandon Ingram has finally arrived. In seven games since November 29, Ingram has 18 or more points in six of them, six or more rebounds in five, and at least one steal in six games as well. Even when his shot isn't falling--he played over 40 minutes and only scored five points against the Knicks--he's able to get involved in other ways. Ingram looks to be the Lakers go-to scorer at this point. Expect that to continue as the season goes along and he continues to improve. He was written off too early after a rough rookie season.
RISER - Nikola Mirotic (F, CHI)
Not writing much on this one because it's a bonus fourth player and anyone who's engaged with sports media this week has heard about Mirotic and the Bulls winning games with him back, but hey--Mirotic is back, he's playing exceedingly well for the Bulls, and Chicago is winning games. He should be a good source of points and rebounds going forward.
Week 10 Fantasy Basketball Fallers
FALLER - Stanley Johnson (F, DET)
Johnson saw his spot in the Pistons starting lineup go to Reggie Bullock this week, and his reduction in minutes is reason enough to not trust him going forward. It's not like Johnson was even playing well enough before the benching to justify any ehh, he'll be a leader of the second unit talk, and in his two games off the bench he's had a combined two points, three rebounds, and one assist. The third-year forward should be taking a step forward this season, but Stan Van Gundy has apparently seen enough of his inconsistency and isn't going to keep him in the lineup when it's been negatively impacting Detroit's abilities to win games.
FALLER - Jakob Poeltl (C, TOR)
It's only been about a week since we were seeing Poeltl and Jonas Valanciunas playing in something resembling a timeshare, but Valanciunas has exploded in his past two games and Poeltl has seen his minutes dip in response to that. At this point, all Poeltl provides to fantasy owners is a consistent source of about one block every game and four or five rebounds, which just isn't enough to make him worth a look in your lineups in anything but the deepest formats.
FALLER - Josh Jackson (G/F, PHO)
This is less of a faller and more just a reminder that Jackson hasn't had a great rookie season. With Devin Booker set to miss a few weeks, some expected Jackson to take some of Booker's minutes, but we now have four games in a post-Booker world by which to judge Jackson's role and it...isn't really changing. He's almost looking worse as a scorer than he did before the injury, and he's not a consistent source of any other statistic. If you thought Jackson would be a riser in Phoenix, you would have been wrong. I wouldn't be willing to trust him in any lineups at this point until he shows that he can contribute on a nightly basis.
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