Toddlers and retailers aren’t the only one jazzed about the holiday season. Half the damn league seems to have put in to take vacations around the same time: for about six weeks starting right now. I already went over the spate of all-stars missing substantial playing time last week. This week, go ahead and throw Brandon Jennings‘ name onto the smoldering pile of embers that was once your fantasy basketball team. Go ahead! So B.J.’s out 4-6 weeks with a foot injury. That blows. Especially because the only help to be vultured from this comes in the form of Keyon Dooling, whom I thought had long ago purchased a Kia dealership out east (“Turn your key on, drive to Keyon’s, and get your Kia on at Keyon’s Kia Doolership! Just off Interstate 295!”) and Earl Boykins, whom I thought had retired two seasons ago. At this point, Milwaukee’s a who’s who of guys I’m shocked are still in the league. By the fourth quarter of yesterday’s massacre, I had built up hope that Skiles had Jack Sikma to throw out there for some run. Dooling is your primary pickup in place of Jennings, but feels more like an Eric Bledsoe than a Ty Lawson. His 12/0/5 night in 28 minutes on Monday does little to dissuade me from that hunch. On the bright side, no matter who you pick up, with Jennings gone, your field-goal percentage is bound for an upswing.
Here’s what else I saw in fantasy basketball yesterday:
Gerald Wallace – Out. Missed his third straight game on Monday with a sprained ankle that appears worse and worse with every game he misses. You know who else appears worse and worse with every game he misses? Raise your hand if you guessed “The Bobcats” so I know how many gold star stickers to hand out.
Mehmet Okur – Hurt himself in practice. No clue how it *pinkie to mouth* okurred.
C.J. Miles – 22/4/5 against the Cavs. He’ll have games like this, then poop in your ice box the very next game. For what it’s worth, he’s had at least 16 points, four rebas and a pair of dimes in three of his last four.
Josh Howard – 6/3/1 in 21 minutes in his second game of the season, slightly better than his first game of the season. Eventually this pattern will break. And that is the art of prediction!
Daniel Gibson – Season-high 27 points and stacked seven treys on top of that. I love it when Boobie racks up the points and sinks the long bombs. Welcome Google searchers looking for keywords: “stacked”+”boobie”+”rack”+”bombs.”
Lester Hudson – 8/1/6 with three steals, two treys and a block. He’s worth a pickup in deeper leagues based on D.C.’s lack of PGs alone.
Kirk Hinrich – 18/6/11 with two steals in a relatively short 31 minutes. No reason not to expect this kind of output until John Wall returns. The waiver wire bellows its siren song!
Jason Richardson – 9/2/3 in 30 minutes in his Orlando debut. Welcome to Devaluation, U.S.A., Richardson. Population: you.
Hedo Turkoglu – command+c, then command+v : “Turkoglu struggled with his outside shot and scored fewer than 10 points tonight.” It took me five weeks to get through to you not to bother with Hedo when he was in Phoenix, are you gonna drag me through this again until February?
James Posey – 5-for-7 from the field, 5-for-7 from the arc. Yeah, this was an unlikely outcome.
Danny Granger – Granger Danger continues as he shot under 39 percent from the floor for the eighth time in his last 10 games.
Roy Hibbert – Made Granger look unstoppable (1-for-10).
Trevor Ariza – Monty Williams minutes before the opening tip: “Hey, Trev’. How you feelin’? Feelin’ good? Great. Hey, remember what we talked about? About you not shooting so many threes? About you not really needing to shoot any threes, seeing as how you’re not really good at making them? Right, right? So we’re gonna stick to that, right? ‘Cause sometimes you and me have a talk and you say you understand, but then you go and your shot looks as stable as someone who stood up too fast. So, that won’t happen tonight, right? Just good, solid D and a few dribble-drives? Cool, cool. I knew I could count on you there, Trev’.” By game’s end Ariza shot 1-for-13, including 0-for-5 from the arc.
LeBron James – James was a -20 last night in the loss against the Mavs in 36 minutes. Dwyane Wade was a +5 in 39 minutes. Fun fact!
Mike Miller – Made his season debut, played four minutes, grabbed four rebounds and went 0-for-4 from the floor. Just a hunch, but I give it four games before he’s fantasy-ready.
Jared Dudley – 27/5/3 with three threes, two steals and a block. He was kind enough to demonstrate what the Suns will expect Vince Carter to bring to the Suns once he begins playing. For a demonstration on what Carter will actually bring to the Suns once he begins playing, stay tuned for Vince Carter to begin playing.
Gary Neal – Scored a career-high 22 points in 31 minutes. The world waits with baited breath for Gary Forbes‘ response to Neal’s challenge as the best player in the league who also keeps track of his teammate’s remaining vacation hours left in the fiscal year.
LaMarcus Aldridge – He’s averaging 29.3/12.8 in the last week. He killed the Maverick bigs last Wednesday and realized two years after everyone else that he should be able to do that every night.
Rudy Fernandez – He’s averaging 19 points, six assists and more than 2.5 threes a game. He’s shooting almost 54 percent from the field, which isn’t likely to remain that high, but his minutes per game might. Rudy wants your undivided attention.
Baron Davis – 8/5/12. Only three of those assists came from something other than a redunkulous alley-oop to Blake Griffin. I may be wrong about that. Who’s got time for box scores? I’m going on my gut!
Martell Webster – Dropped 18 points and a pair of treys in 33 minutes. He’s averaged 15.4 points and 1.6 threes in the five games of his season. He’s a model pickup in moderate-sized leagues. Call him The Model-Pick Martell.
Darko Milicic – Assumed he wasn’t playing tonight. Forgot he played under an Ignorambis regime and made a surprise start. Surprise! He played five minutes before leaving the game.
Acie Law – Averaging nearly 22 mpg as a Warrior and has effectively replaced Jeremy Lin on the depth chart, disproving Lin’s briefly held belief that Harvard Law would be his biggest obstacle.
Monta Ellis – 44 points, seven assists, three steals and he shot .750 from the field. And as long as the mule plows that field, the crops be growin’! (I don’t know what that means.)
