This year, RotoBaller is separating its waiver wire recommendations by position a little differently.  In our three position breakdowns, we'll be separating players into GUARDS, including point guards (PG), shooting guards (SG), and combo guards (PG/SG); WINGS, including small forwards (SF), swing men (SG/SF), and small ball fours (SF/PF); and BIGS, including power forwards (PF), centers (C), and bigs who play both front court spots (PF/C).

In this post, we are looking into some potential Week 12 waiver wire pickups for guards. We'll provide options for guards, eligible at PG, SG, or PG/SG who may be available in both standard leagues (less than 50% owned) and deeper leagues (less than 25% owned), and will typically provide a boost in points, assists, threes, and steals.  All position eligibility and ownership rates based on Yahoo! fantasy leagues.

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Standard League Waiver Wire Guard Adds

Buddy Hield, SG, NO (46% owned)

The relative logjam of the Pelicans backcourt could eventually shorten Buddy Hield's minutes, especially as Tyreke Evans ramps up his minutes moving into the season. In the short term, Hield has been a useful fantasy asset in standard leagues. Since being named starter on December 5, he has been averaging minutes in the mid twenties and finally knocking down threes at the rate people were hoping he would as a hyped player coming out of Oklahoma, knocking down almost half his three point attempts, for a solid 2.4 per game.

I've been a big skeptic of Hield, and my doubts about his fantasy value still hold. He does next to nothing every category that is not related to shooting. While those threes are sexy, he's averaged a pitiful 3.4 rebounds, 1.8 assists, 0.4 steals, and 0.1 blocks as a starter. That means if his shot gets cold, like it was to start the season, he has little fantasy value to fall back on. It also means he has little real life value to fall back on if his shots not falling, so his minutes would start falling away, draining his value even more. While his shot is falling, he has to be owned, but he's the type of player I'm looking to move while things are going well.

Austin Rivers, PG/SG, LAC (13% owned)

Before missing his last game with an illness, Rivers had been on a bit of a hot streak as a starter for the small-balling Clippers. In seven starts since Christmas, he's averaged 17.9 points, 3.3 rebounds, 3.6 assists, and 1.9 threes, all while putting up a high impact .857 FT% on four three throw attempts per game. Having had a couple of days to recover from whatever was ailing him on the 8th, Rivers should return to the starting lineup and will likely stay there until Blake Griffin returns. He's a bit of the same deal as Buddy Hield in that he doesn't bring much in the defensive stats. He's actually better than Hield with assists and FT% impact, though, with a lot of Hield's edge in rankings systems coming out from his relative lack of turnovers compared to Rivers. In eight category leagues, Rivers looks like the better short term option -- and one who's much more widely available.

Standard League Honorable Mentions: Allen Crabbe, PG/SG, POR (29% owned); T.J. McConnell, PG, PHI (24% owned)

Deep League Waiver Wire Guard Adds

Caris LeVert, SG, BKN (3% owned)

After sitting out the first month of the season, the Nets have been building up minutes for their first round pick Caris LeVert, inserting him into crunch time lineups, letting him run a little point here and there, and generally seeing what he could do. He's responded well in the past three games, where he's topped 20 minutes in all three and hit 60% of his shots. As the season progresses, the Nets should find more and more ways to unleash him. By the end of the year we could be looking at a standard league breakout, so if you're in a deeper league, now is the time to get on board and hope for some upside.

Deep League Honorable Mentions: Garrett Temple, PG/SG, SAC (7% owned)