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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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Sunday, November 7
Four players break for 30+ points on Sunday, and two of them are not like the other: Ricky Rubio puts up 37 in career-night while Cole Anthony keeps his fantastic start to the season up with a scorching hot 33-point game... as Kevin Durant and Bradley Beal remain their unstoppable selves
Starting for the least surprising of outcomes: Bradley Beal and Kevin Durant seem to still know how to get some buckets. Beal finished with a pinpoint accurate 30 pops on the night facing Milwaukee and paired that with 5 rebounds, 8 dimes, and 1 block shooting a mighty 63.6% on a team-high 22 FGA... and KD did pretty much the same with a 31-7-7 himself hitting bombs at a 61.1% clpi on his 18 FGA. They had so similar games that Beal turned the ball over 6 times and KD bested him by one finishing with a ridiculously high 7 TOs. Not that it mattered that much, though, with both guys inside DK's top-15 players of Sunday's slate.
Now, for the surprising stuff: what about pine-rider Ricky Rubio putting up a career-best line yesterday in 32 minutes!? And... can we just assume Cole Anthony has arrived for good after a couple of weeks of games, please? Ricky finished as the second-best player of the day only behind Giannis, and he broke for 61+ DKFP (also one of only two to do so). Rubio's final tally: 37 points (with 8 triples!!!), 3 boards, 10 dimes, and a steal to spare; he just couldn't miss a shot, going 13-of-19 from the field and 3-for-3 from the charity stripe. Cole Anthony was a top-5 player himself thanks to his 33-burger in a game in which he logged an overall 33-3-2-3-2 stuffed line on a 65 percent shooting on a bulky 20 FGA with only a couple of TOs.
- Giannis was the no. 1 player for a reason, though: 29-18-5-3-1 dub-dub with just 3 TOs and 12 FTA (and he missed nearly 60% of those freebies). Third 29-18 double-double of the season for a now-three-member club that features Giannis, Joel Embiid, and Anthony Davis to this day.
- Speaking of big-boy feats, Rudy Gobert came back from a putrid 8-8 outing a few days ago and put up a ridiculous 21-15-1-3-4 line on a customary game for him these days. Just 9 FGA scored at a high clip, but you don't worry about the total points too much as he goes to the line often (7-of-8 FTM yesterday) and pretty much everything he shoots gets in because he doesn't stretch the floor even just one bit. The boards, steals, and blocks are always delicious.
- James Harden was this close to trip-dubbing (28-10-8), same as Paul George (20-9-8 with one block), and Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (14-8-9-1-1 shooting a low 31.4% on 16 FGA). Not that those names come out of left field, of course, but they surely are perhaps the most important players for their franchises to reach their respective expectations this year.
- Evan Mobley has been so good that even after putting 26-9-5-1-1 stuffed line hitting 73%+ of his 15 shots yesterday we still don't feel like dreaming. He's incredible. As simple as that. Obviously, fellow Cav Ricky Rubio got away with the highest value among all eligible players on Sunday's slate because he was an absolute flamethrower dressed as a basketball player.
- Couple of sound off-the-pine performances by Warriors' Otto Porter (sky-high 15-9-1-2-1 line on just 19 minutes of playing time, including hitting 5 triples) and by Thunder's Mike Muscala (just 14 minutes but a ridiculous 2.18 FP/min efficiency after putting up a 20-4 line with 2 blocks and an unreasonable 5-of-6 FGM, 7-of-9 FTM in those ticks).
- Wendell Carter with a celestial top-4 finish thanks to 54.8 DKFP translating from his 22-15-6 outing in which he also swated one shot and scored 4 long-range shots manning the PF position from the start but playing a not-so-nonsensical 30 minutes. This is surely the Wendell we want to see daily and ROS.
- I know it's not a bad outcome, but Steph Curry's low 34.8 DKFP facing houston yesterday fell way short of his ceiling as he finished with a 20-3-2-3 line and 4 treys. The problem: the 27 minutes on the court, which murdered his upside on Sunday as he was putting up numbers at a 1.29 FP/min pace. Lost chance for a bounty, this one.
- Now, for a true stinker, what about Christian Wood on that very same game? 24 MP, and a 4-1-1-4 line with a 2-of-5 shooting performance and 3 TOs against GSW. Damn. Pretty much on par with R.J. Barrett (6-3-1 in 30 minutes) and Spencer Dinwiddie (6-2-4 in 27) as none of them topped 15 DKFP for their teams yesterday...
- Head Coach Steve Kerr announced James Wiseman will stay out for the Warriors upcoming road trip (8 games)... Rubio's explosion had to do with Collin Sexton's injury before halftime, so keep an eye on that... Deandre Ayton and Michel Porter Jr. are expected to stay out of Monday's games as they recover from leg and back issues respectively.
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