While perusing the standings the other day, I was surprised to see we’re already past the half-way mark of the NBA season. And for those in head-to-head leagues, that means we’re almost 2/3rds of the way through the fantasy regular season! It’s time to take stock of our team(s) and see where injuries, pick-ups, and dropped busts have left us situated. For example, half my starters this week on one team have been free agent pickups. I have some idea of my team’s strengths and weaknesses, but it’s a vastly different group than what I started with. Once we identify our short-comings, it’s as simple as grabbing a couple centers for a pair of guards to make up ground in boards and blocks, right? Maybe. But there are constraints that might make it more complicated than that. You may be losing stats you need by doing that and you may not be able to fit two extra centers into your lineup, anyway.
This week I’d like to bring up a concept many of you are probably familiar with, but often goes forgotten: Out-of-position stats. What if you’re low in rebounds, but you don’t have room to add/start a center? Well, you could trade a traditional point guard (assuming you were set with PG stats) for Dejounte Murray (9.5 rebounds per 36 minutes last season, and yes, by the way, I’m choosing an alternate universe in which he’s healthy for this hypothetical situation). Considering trading for or picking up players that get atypical stats for their position can make a ton of sense for a lot of reasons. Maybe you lost a big assist guy like John Wall or your dominant rebounder in Clint Capela. Maybe you’ve got another out-of-position stats guy that hurts you because of what he lacks (Dejounte’s assists and three-pointers, for example). Also, when you have out-of-position stats, like say Nikola Mirotic’s 3s, you can afford to have additional atypical players that others in your league might devalue, like Elfrid Payton, a guard that doesn’t hit many threes. Get creative and check out some of the players I’ve listed below.
Before I get into some names, here are the average stats by position from an exercise I did last year so we can start with a baseline for typical fantasy starters.
Point Guard:
.452 FG%/.829 FT%/1.8 3PTM/17.6 PTS/4.2 REB/5.5 AST/1.3 ST/0.4 BLK/2.4 TO
Shooting Guard:
.454 FG%/.828 FT%/1.9 3PTM/16.9 PTS/4.3 REB/3.7 AST/1.2 ST/0.4 BLK/1.9 TO
Small Forward:
.468 FG%/.798 FT%/1.6 3PTM/16.0 PTS/6.0 REB/3.0 AST/1.2 ST/0.6 BLK/1.7 TO
Power Forward:
.490 FG%/.766 FT%/1.1 3PTM/16.4 PTS/7.6 REB/2.7 AST/1.0 ST/1.0 BLK/1.9 TO
Center:
.522 FG%/.724 FT%/0.6 3PTM/14.7 PTS/8.6 REB/2.0 AST/0.8 ST/1.2 BLK/1.7 TO
Based on that, the rare position/stat pairings are mainly:
*High FG% Guards
*High FT% Bigs
*3-Point-Shooting Bigs
*Rebounding Guards/Wings
*Assisting Wings/Bigs
*Stealing Bigs
*Blocking Guards/Wings
*Low Turnover PGs
For each of those, here are some targets outside of the super-valuable, perceived top-50-type guys. I think many are overlooked, and therefore undervalued.
High FG% Guards (order adjusted for volume)
56.3% – T.J. McConnell
51.5% – Malcolm Brogdon
54.3% – Kyle Anderson
50.3% – Bojan Bogdanovic
50.2% – Joe Harris
48.5% – Derrick Rose
49.2% – Elfrid Payton
High FT% Bigs (order adjusted for volume)
89.9% – Jeff Green
84.1% – Harrison Barnes
86.9% – Marcus Morris
91.3% – Rodions Kurucs
87.3% – Dario Saric
86.0% – Thomas Bryant
3-Point-Shooting Bigs
2.6 – Harrison Barnes
2.5 – Brook Lopez
2.3 – Lauri Markkanen
2.3 – Marcus Morris
2.0 – Jae Crowder
2.0 – Davis Bertans
1.9 – Marvin Williams
1.9 – P.J. Tucker
1.9 – Kyle Kuzma
Rebounding Guards/Wings
8.2 – Al-Farouq Aminu
7.6 – Aaron Gordon
6.7 – Luka Doncic
6.5 – Rudy Gay
6.2 – P.J. Tucker
6.1 – Marcus Morris
6.0 – Kyle Kuzma
5.9 – Thaddeus Young
5.8 – Kyle Anderson
Assisting Wings/Bigs
5.1 – Luka Doncic
4.8 – Joe Ingles
4.2 – Justise Winslow
3.9 – Bogdan Bogdanovic
3.7 – Caris LeVert
3.7 – Trevor Ariza
3.6 – Evan Fournier
3.6 – Gordon Hayward
Stealing Bigs
1.6 – Thaddeus Young
1.5 – Steven Adams
1.5 – Larry Nance Jr.
1.3 – P.J. Tucker
1.3 – Paul Millsap
1.2 – Willie Cauley-Stein
Blocking Guards/Wings
1.3 – Jerami Grant
1.0 – Jonathan Isaac
1.0 – Moe Harkless
0.9 – Michael Kidd-Gilchrist
0.9 – Kent Bazemore
0.9 – Danny Green
0.9 – Kyle Anderson
Low Turnover PGs
0.6 – Malik Bealey
0.6 – Tyus Jones
0.7 – Monte Morris
0.8 – Terry Rozier
1.1 – Patrick Beverley
1.1 – Patty Mills
1.1 – Tomas Satoransky
1.2 – Bryn Forbes
1.2 – Cory Joseph
1.3 – Fred VanVleet
So, there are a few options to consider. And you get the idea. There are plenty more down the lists a bit. If the rest of their stat set matches what you need, make an offer or scoop them up if they’re on the wire.
This week’s classic fantasy line:
A decade before the farewell tour, those of us playing fantasy knew Dwyane Wade as a sneaky source of blocks from the guard position. Here he was, blocking like an average center in the season in which he won the scoring title.
