RADIO
Welcome to the RotoBaller NBA Recap. In this feature, we will highlight a few key fantasy basketball takeaways from the games played during last night's slate. These viewpoints can be both positive and negative and will hopefully help to provide insight into different roster moves you should consider making based on trends and statistical nuggets from around the Association.
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. For the sake of simplicity and consistency, every time I mention Fantasy Points in these articles I will be using DraftKings' scoring system, which goes as follows: 1*PTS, 0.5*3PM, 1.25*RBD, 1.5*AST, 2*STL, 2*BLK, -0.5*TO. On top of that, bonus points are awarded for Double-Doubles (+1.5) and Triple-Doubles (+3), only one per player at a time.
Without further ado, let's get right into the latest slate of games from the 2021 season and try to figure out how to take advantage of what we saw transpire.
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Monday, March 29
Russell Westbrook and Evan Fournier chose the same night to make complete-opposite NBA history
Let's get rid of the bad news first. The Celtics were seemingly close to acquiring Nikola Vucevic prior to last week's trade deadline but ultimately balked. Instead of Vooch, they traded for Evan Fournier to bulk up their wing-shooting... or so Boston thought. Fournier played his first game as a Beantowner on Monday coming off the bench--as expected--and logging 33 minutes on the night against the Pelicans. This was Fournier's line: 0-2-0-2-2. But that's not important. What truly sucked was, precisely, his shooting: 0-of-10 FGA, 0-of-5 3PA, 0-for-0 FTA. Fournier became the first player to debut with those shooting numbers, and also contributed the 38th such performance in NBA history.
Speaking of history... We all know about Russ and his triple-doubles. Well, this man knows no boundaries. Russ became the all-time leader in trip-dubs for the Wiz franchise on Monday and he did it in some fashion, putting up the first 35-20 trip-dub in the history of the Association. The only two players prior to Russ that came close to it were Magic Johnson (32-20-11) and Oscar Robertson (32-20-15). Russ demolished that with a 35-21-14 line to which he also added 2 steals and a block. The Wiz might suck, but Russ is still a walking spectacle.
- Quite a night for big men around the L. All of Karl-Anthony Towns, Domantas Sabonis, Bam Adebayo, Rudy Gobert, Richaun Holmes, and Jonas Valanciunas made it to the top-10 in the fantasy leaderboard while being eligible at either/both the PF or/and C positions. The fantasy tallies ranged from 62 FP to 50 FP.
- Stephen Curry came back for the Warriors, helped them edge Chicago, and dropped a slate-leading 6 treys. Nothing to discover in Steph, but it was nice to watch him back cooking his 32-5-6-1 line on a monster 39% usage rate. Not so cool: Zach LaVine, who played 32 minutes but at the end of the game made it clear that he had reaggravated his ankle issues, which might force him out for some time or limit his on-court presence.
- Hamidou Diallo, recently acquired by Detroit, had himself a day with a 19-10 dub-dub and stuffing the rest of the line with 3 dimes, a steal, and 2 blocks. It is not that he will save the Pistons' horrid year, but they will need Diallo to keep on this evolving path going forward to build a strong team and contend in a few years.
- The same goes for another Piston, Cory Joseph, who dropped a 17-4-5-2-1 line off the bench for Detroit in just 24 minutes. When it comes to pine-riders, though, it was all about Josh Hart and his silly 15-15-3 performance shooting 63% from the floor on a healthy 13 FGA. Hart has been one of the best second-unit players of the year, and although it might be a stretch to consider him a 6MOY candidate--shout-out Jordan Clarkson!--he has a strong case to make.
- Bam Adebayo ate Julius Randle alive yesterday, as the latter could "only" finish with 35 FP and a 22-8-3 line that included 5 TOs on the night. More importantly: the Knicks might have to shut Mitchell Robinson down ROS and are looking to add a warm bought-out body to their squad. Until then (and even after New York adds someone) Nerlens Noel will keep that starting gig at C.
- Malik Beasley was suspended in late February and came back last Saturday. He played his second game since then yesterday, and oh boy did it suck. Beasley has put up a total 22-5-7-2 line in those two games (again, total line adding up the two matches) while shooting 24% from the floor on 29 FGA. If this is the man who will keep playing 30+ minutes per game and taking chances from Anthony Edwards, I guess Minny better be reconsidering their plans going forward...
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