So a little bit of a weird daily notes this morning, as I’m speaking to you from a day behind! I’m out traveling as I add another notch to my belt as they say, and well in more ways than one! Eating some good food and going on brewery tours is pretty much the pinnacle of life! Long story short, notes are through Friday/Saturday games and I’ll be a little slow with comments until Tuesday. Although I’ll likely pop in at some point with some horrible typos and weird drunken advice….
Anyway, we mentioned on the Pod last week how surprisingly bad the Wolves have been this year, and it looked like they might be turning the corner Saturday night, maintaining a big lead against the red hot Rockets. But they collapsed in the final minute losing a 9 point lead pushing it to OT, the Rockets took over, Zach LaVine hit a big 3 with 5 seconds left, then on the last gasp, LaVine got nudged out off bounds throwing up the desperation shot. Another game you throw up your arms and go “huh?!”; all the starters played well and they held Houston to 95 in regulation! Plus Karl-Anthony Towns went off for a 40 burger! 41/15/5/0/1 on 15-28 shooting and 10-12 FT including this NBA Jam quality alley:
I don’t have much else to expand on here, except the Wolves are going to have to go through some sort of massive change. Yes, they’re the youngest team/starting 5 in the NBA, but all of the starters are already too good for this team to be 7-19. Obviously Ricky Rubio getting traded is what most point to, but we’ll see what happens. And I think KAT is the kind of player that will keep his motor going every night, and not phone it in down the stretch (cough, Hassan Whiteside, cough)… Here’s what else down over Friday and Saturday’s games in fantasy hoops action:
Jeremy Lin – I mentioned last week I was worried about a back issue coming off a bad hamstring injury, but looked fine against the Magic! 17/3/3/0/0 in only 20 minutes Friday night, but if you’re risk-averse with injuries, I might shop him off this one.
Evan Fournier – Well, poop. There went that little AST-run he was on. 21/4/1/0/0 on 5-15 shooting, but only 1 TO and has put his TO rate in the pool. A lot of shrinkage.
Nikola Vucevic – After a few games off, goes rainbow! Just needed some maintenance, that Vuccy Mane. 21/10/4/2/3. Well, maintenance and playing the Mess…
D.J. Augustin – Ugh, stupid Magic rotations… The ghost of “we know who” is still haunting their hallways! 17/6/4 and an absurd 14 shots Friday on 27 minutes, with Elfrid put on the Shelfrid for 10/6/5 in 21 minutes, filling out their PG 48. Ugh.
Kentavious Caldwell-Pope – HUGE weekend (Huge Gina!) going 24/6/3/1/0 and 20/5/3/1/0 with 9 combined treys. Back-to-back nights of me huffing KCP gets my motor going baby! “Don’t you f$%*ing look at me!” Wow, that’s actually a pretty rough reference…
John Wall – Broke hearts with only 29 points Friday! A popular 30-point challenge pick became the Friday goat… But not so for the rest of his fantasy owners: 29/2/11/3/0 with 4 treys and no TO! Efficient Wall!
Kelly Oubre – Moved back to the bench with Markieff Morris back, but Kieff only got 18 minutes and Oubre played 34. That said, 7/6/0/1/0 for Oubre on 1-6 shooting… Bleh. Love his future, but it’s gonna be bumpy this year even with more minutes.
Isaiah Thomas – Instead of “Put your dick in a box”, IT2/3 needs to “Put ice on that dick”! Keep that groin loose, mi amigo, I need you! 26/3/5 in his return from a groin injury, hitting 2 treys on Friday night.
Terry Rozier – Been gushing over him the past week, and went down to 16 minutes and didn’t do much on Friday. I’d give it a few weeks of lower run, then buy him low in deep dynos. I tried in REL and got REJECTED!
Kemba Walker – Sat out Friday (personal), but came back strong Saturday for 18/6/10 against the Hawks. Glad to see him back!
Michael Kidd-Gilchrist – Mannnnn, he looked so good to start the year! Minutes faded to 22 then 20 on Fri/Sat games, with anemic lines. Slim was right to be done with MKG, toss him out post haste!
Kyle Korver – Hit 6 treys on Friday night against the Raps. Probably was like, “Me, Kyle Korver, is coming off the bench for another three point shooter?!” But then 7/4/2 on Saturday with only 1 three. Irony is that you can trust any Hawks’ wings.
Jonas Valanciunas – Only 26 minutes Friday against the Hawks, in a loss where Dwight Howard played 34 and went 27/15. The crusade against the Luminescent Lithuanian’s minutes is out of control! But here to stay, we’ve seen it for years now!
Giannis Antetokounmpo – Look out for the Bucks! 13-12 with back-to-back wins over the Bulls, holding them to only 69 (teehee) on Friday. 22/7/11/3/1 on 8-13 shooting with 2 treys in that Friday win. 19:2 AST:TO over his last 3. Greeky make me Freaky!
Nikola Mirotic – The motor of the Bulls?! Missed a walkthough on Friday and got a DNP-CD because of it. I have a feeling he’s getting close to needing a change of scenery…
Nerlens Noel – …speaking of change of scenery, we need Noel to get to the other side of the country! Dude lit up the Sixers for only playing him 8 minutes on Friday, and we can see a divorce coming faster than when that dude from the 19 kids and counting show was found out to be groping his sisters then was on Ashley Madison. His wife needed to get on that alimony pony right away!
Julius Randle – Man, he looks SOOOOOOO good when I slum myself down to watch Lakers basketball. 25/9/4/3/0 in the Philly win on Friday, then 16/4/7 Saturday. Did have 5 TO in each of those games, but a nice bounce back after a mini-lull the 2 before.
Nick Young – Ugh. Scores 32 against the Cavs with 8 treys. I still think he’s garbage, just a hot shooting game. Does absolutely nothing in the D stats, and gets good ratings because he never turns it over. If he shoots sub-40% on a given night, I think it should count as turnovers!
Brandon Ingram – As Slim puts it “minutes should be a category too!” Haha just kidding, but the 41 minutes Saturday got Ingram to slowly accumulate a 9/10/9/0/0 line with 2 TO and a trey. No D stats, and it’s a little Rondo-ish. Woo. Hoo. He hadn’t topped 3 dimes in his other last 10 games, or 7 rebounds. Still think he’s well, WELL outside of 12er ownability other than last gasp streaming. Gotta love those 0 STL and 0 BLK the last 6 games!
Anthony Davis – Got a leg contusion and left Friday, but reports were saying he could’ve come back, it was just a blowout. Was questionable heading into last night, so hopefully he’s out there and we’re not in another fragile Brow booboo vortex again…
Cheick Diallo – Sweet Cheicks! 22 minutes aided by less Brow and Omer Asik getting a DNP-CD. 10/7/1/0/1 on 4-5 FG (2-2 FT) for Sweet Cheicks, who might be less of a project than we imagined… Keeping an eyeBrow raised here on the Pels.
Eric Gordon – Ugh, I was wrong not to be higher on him! 11 treys over the weekend, and playing some primo ThrAGNOF ball. That said, if you can get great value, we’ve seen him have several injury issues and he’s still over 30 MPG off the bench…
Kosta Koufos – Getting some added run as they play bigger with Rudy Gay (hip) out, going 16/13/2/0/3 against the Grizzlies in a shocking win at Memphis. Maybe he gets a little more run even when Gay is back – been pretty solid his last 3 games going into yesterday.
Garrett Temple – Playing obscene ball! 17/6/4/2/0 on 4-11 FG (3-6 3PTM 6-6 FT) in that Friday win. I’m streaming him in a few RCLs with the added run, and this came with Ben McLemore back in the starting 5. Playing too well to be put back on the bench. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Temple!
Mike Conley – Played 29 minutes after breaking his back 2.5 weeks ago. Dude, that sounds LES MISERABLE! Only 8/3/6/2/1 though – you like the full line and all the songs, but it just has that stench of Russell Crowe singing floating around it that the regression from his hot start is gonna hit hard while he plays through this back issue.
Rodney Hood – Hits a trey with 0.8 seconds left to beat the Mavs Friday night. This play was so Dallas…
Hahahaha. Only the friggin’ baby giraffe Salah Mejri jogs back from the on set! Look at Harrison Barnes. HAHAHAHAHA. I swear, I looped this 15 times and laughed non-stop.
Russell Westbrook – Man it’s fun to own him in the REL… OKC just tore up the Suns, with Westy going 26/11/22/2/1 on 9-17 FG (1-2 3PTM 7-7 FT) and “only” 5 TO.
Devin Booker – Tried to keep the Suns in it on a 31/3/5/1/0 line, but 6 TO. Bleh.
T.J. Warren – My boy is back! 14 minutes of 2/2/0/0/1 in 14 minutes Saturday, but 1-1 FG and was +6 in a 13 point loss! Hopefully he can push P.J. Tucker back to a small bench role SUPER fast.
Glenn Robinson III – 12/12 with no other stats for Big Puppy Saturday night. Filling in admirably for Monta Ellis playing big minutes and sound D, but so blah for fantasy and Monta might be back early this week. Monta has been blah too, but it’ll suck both into non-relevance.
Kyle O’Quinn – Damn, look at Willy Hernangomez giving O’Quinn owners a nice big punch to the KOQ! 17/10/2/0/2 in a huge line from Willy, shooting 5-8 FG with 7-8 FT. I guess Hornacek wanted to pit the Hernangomez bros together… Wait, Juancho didn’t even play 2 minutes… Ugh! Anyway, The Irishman only got 7 minutes, which was a big bummer. I still have KOQ on a few RCLs, and I’m gonna give it one more game.
Gary Harris – Solid encore, going 16/3/2/1/0 with no TO and no treys. He was always gonna be a metrics guy and this was a solid line, so congrats to all of you who stashed him in non-IL spots for a few weeks!
Kenneth Faried – Ugh, my Nuggets frustration boiled over here. 10-11 FG when I’m having a great FG% week in REL going against him. MANIMALLLLL! 25/7/2/0/3 in 29 minutes as the Nuggets are rolling right now. Rolling, with Jusuf Nurkic barely playing. I’m about to Hulk out on my keyboard.
Moe Harkless – Why you gotta be, MOE HARKLESSSSS! 17/1/0/2/2 and the only Blazer to survive the savagery of the Warriors…
Ian Clark – The beneficiary of said savagery! 23/2/4 in 21 minutes on 9-11 shooting late Saturday night. I thought the junk time winner was supposed to be Patrick McCaw. McCAAAWWWWWWW!!! …McNaw….
I hope everyone in Razzball Nation had a great weekend! As I mentioned in the intro, I’ll be a little slow with comments today, and Peter Kap has got Daily Notes tomorrow until I get back. Then I’ll see you Wednesday and Thursday for the daily notes. Catch ya then!
