Fantasy Basketball: Run The Numbers – Find the Recent Specialists

As the season winds down and we jockey for position in roto leagues or load up on categories in the head-to-head playoffs, it’s imperative that we track down some category specialists to get us over the top. And with so many new fantasy contributors due to injury or tanking, the specialists aren’t necessarily the same old names. Fortunately, that makes some of them available in most leagues.

Let’s get right to it. Looking at per-game numbers for the last month, which takes us back to the trade deadline, here are the best likely-available guys to grab. Note that I skipped turnovers. Since those are so sporadic, I’d just go with the season-long numbers there. For head-to-head matchups, you might even be able to just sit a few players at the end of the week that can’t help you in any other categories to win turnovers.

 

Field Goal Percentage (accounting for volume)

62.3% – Robin Lopez

64.3% – Dwight Powell

72.7% – Cheick Diallo

58.9% – Kenneth Faried

58.4% – Joe Harris

56.7% – Thomas Bryant

61.2% – Jakob Poeltl

 

Free Throw Percentage (accounting for volume)

96.7% – Terrence Ross

93.3% – Wes Matthews

90.3% – Delon Wright

95.8% – Kelly Olynyk

87.2% – Jeff Green

87.5% – Jordan Clarkson

94.4% – Al-Farouq Aminu

90.0% – Landry Shamet

89.5% – Tyler Johnson

91.7% – Cedi Osman

 

Points

18.9 – Collin Sexton

17.8 – Jordan Clarkson

16.8 – Terrence Ross

16.4 – Cedi Osman

16.3 – Robin Lopez

16.1 – Avery Bradley

16.1 – Dwyane Wade

15.7 – Joe Harris

15.3 – Bobby Portis

 

Three-Pointers

2.9 – Landry Shamet

2.9 – Cedi Osman

2.9 – Terrence Ross

2.8 – Wayne Ellington

2.8 – Joe Harris

2.7 – Wes Matthews

2.7 – Luke Kennard

2.6 – Jae Crowder

2.5 – Danny Green

2.5 – Taurean Prince

 

Rebounds

9.3 – Kenneth Faried

8.9 – Bobby Portis

8.7 – Cody Zeller

8.1 – Joakim Noah

7.4 – Cheick Diallo

7.3 – Patrick Beverley

7.0 – Dwight Powell

7.0 – Ivica Zubac

7.0 – JaMychal Green

 

Assists

8.9 – Elfrid Payton

7.2 – Rajon Rondo

6.8 – Tomas Satoransky

5.9 – Kris Dunn

5.7 – D.J. Augustin

 

Steals

2.1 – Mikal Bridges

1.9 – P.J. Tucker

1.8 – Derrick White

1.6 – Moe Harkless

1.6 – Josh Okogie

1.5 – Patrick Beverley

1.4 – Kris Dunn

1.4 – Tyler Johnson

1.4 – Marcus Smart

 

Blocks

1.9 – Robin Lopez

1.4 – Thomas Bryant

1.4 – Derrick White

1.2 – Joakim Noah

1.1 – Marvin Williams

1.1 – Jakob Poeltl

 

This week’s classic fantasy line:

Here’s one of the best specialists of the last few seasons. Hassan Whiteside significantly increased his points and rebounds the following year, but neither he nor anyone else has been able to come close to those 3.7 blocks per game since (go for it, Mitchell Robinson). That, plus the boards and FG% had him all the way up to #7 on the 9-cat per-game player rater for the 2015-16 season.