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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.
Editor's Note: Our incredible team of writers received five total writing awards and 13 award nominations by the Fantasy Sports Writers Association, tops in the industry! Congrats to all the award winners and nominees including NBA Writer of the Year, Best NFL Series, MLB Series, PGA Writer and Player Notes writer of the year. Be sure to follow their analysis, rankings and advice all year long, and win big with RotoBaller! Read More!
Thursday, February 18
Brooklyn gets the W in a hypothetical (but softened) Finals preview; Butler and Adebayo elevate the Heat
No more than a couple of weeks ago we were all anticipating with tons of excitement what could very well be a Finals matchup between Brooklyn the Better L.A. come July. It wasn't mean to be, though. Durant and Davis missed this game, and although Kyrie, Harden, and LeBron all played and had good performances, we missed two top-10 players and it showed. Here's hoping we can get the full experience down the road.
The most impressive thing of the night, though, were the performances of two Heat players: Jimmy Butler and Bam Adebayo. The two of them put up triple-doubles with 13-10-13 (Butler) and 16-12-10 (Bam) lines that were more than enough to beat the Kings, whose best player was Nemanja Bjelica. Yes, that's all you need to know to get an idea of how bad things went for Sacto... This is the 12th time two teammates have trip-dubbed on the same night, with Bam & Butler becoming the first pair to do so twice (Dec. 10, 2019).
- Shout-out to Tyler Herro because he played to a great level after some voices raised questions on how Miami passed on trading for Harden because they refused to give up on Herro. Coming off the bench, Herro was yesterday's best reserve with a 27-4-3-1 line and shooting 71% from the floor on 12 FGA.
- Speaking of role players... It was Timothe Luwawu-Cabarrot's time for the Nets yesterday. The Big 3 will eat every night, obviously, but with so many spaces opened by those three, someone is always going to benefit. TLC hit 5 treys for 15 points on the night while adding 2 boards, 3 dimes, and a couple of steals. This "role-star-player" will be rotating between TLC, Joe Harris, Jeff Green, and Bruce Brown nightly, which is not the most optimal thing for fantasy GMs.
- Great game from Marvin Bagley, which is closing on becoming a free agent (2022, restricted; with a QO this season) yet I'm not sure what Sacto thinks about yet. 24 minutes of run starting at C yesterday good enough for a 19-10 outing with a couple of triples and two assists.
- There is nothing clear about Toronto's position from this point to March's deadline when it comes to potential trades, but Norman Powell could be the only viable asset to trade away if they want to bolster the current squad in preparation for a postseason run. Powell was nice yesterday starting and playing 31 minutes, putting up a 29-4-3-2 stuffed line on a more than healthy 26.7% usage rate.
- The Lakers need all of their players to level up with Davis out for a month--if not more. Wesley Matthews sucked (2-2-1), same as Kentavious Caldwell-Pope (9-1-1-1), Alex Caruso (2-5-3-3), and Talen Horton-Tucker (9-2-5). No real fantasy value there, if we're honest, even on larger roles and heavier usage.
- DeAndre' Bembry, starting for the Raps, was plainly atrocious. He played 37 minutes starting at SG and all he could do was score 5 points, grab a couple of boards, and dish out 4 assists. The usage was a laughable 5.4% (!!!) and to make things worse he had a turnover. Ugh.
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