Razzup people?! It’s a glorious time of year! Postseason baseball, football in full swing, and best of all, the NBA regular season is about to begin! Less than two weeks! This will probably be my last post before the regular season starts, so pretty exciting stuff! Just a public service announcement to start out, I’ll be writing the weekly waiver wire column that will be released every Thursday afternoon during the regular season. So before that starts, I’d like to get everyone’s input on a few things: First, does anyone have a suggestion for the name of the series? I really want to stay away from the standard “waiver wired” theme that seems to be really prevalent in fantasy circles. It does have to have either wire or waiver somewhere in the title though. So let me know in the comments if you have any ideas!
The second order of business is the format. Is it more helpful to sort waiver pickups by overall value? Or sort them by overall value at their position? Also, I’d like to answer trade question on the article comments, and possibly feature at least a couple interesting trades, from the past weeks comments section, at the end of every article. Would you guys be interested in that?
So let me know what you all think about those questions, and I’m definitely open for input on what you’d like to see!
Preseason Thoughts
It’s extremely important not to judge player roles based on preseason. Player minutes totals are rarely topping 30 minutes, and coaches are still experimenting with rotations. It is possible to see how some of the rookie skillsets translate into the league, and it’s cool to see guys like Anthony Davis working on threes. Outside of that though, there isn’t too much to learn yet. That being said, here are a few guys that may be ready to outperform their expectations or have a bounce-back year.
Jeremy Lin
The legend of 2012 looks to have gotten his groove back with this Hornets team. With the injury to MKG, it appears as if the Hornets are willing to play Lin and Kemba Walker side by side. This automatically gives a boost to his value, and should give him solid offensive mismatches against shooting guards. The main thing that seems to be restored is his confidence. Granted, this could partially be from playing in China, but he definitely looks a lot more like the Linsanity of old, than the disappointment of the past few seasons. I’m not saying to draft him expecting his Linsane stats, but with the shortage of PG stats this year, I think he could be a big difference maker in the early-late rounds.
Stanley Johnson
This kid is the real deal. I’ve loved him for a while, but with his dominating preseason, it’s hard to see how the Pistons could afford to not give him major run. His skillset is extremely impressive, and there’s no telling what his ceiling is. Unfortunately, for this year, he’s probably the biggest boom or bust player available. Where you draft him just depends on how ballsy you are.
Rashad Vaughn
Rashad has definitely been a surprise this preseason. However, it’s hard to get behind the hype when all he offers is scoring. The peripheral stats are just non-existent at the moment. He probably is a late round draft pick or waiver target if you need some scoring or trey shooting, but I have a feeling someone else is going to pay more to buy into the hype. It’s also important to remember that the defense is much softer in preseason.
Justin Anderson
The summer league hype candidate of the year looks to be nearing bust status. He just doesn’t look good against NBA competition, and John Jenkins seems to be taking a grip on the role that Anderson would have had. Jenkins is hard to recommend, but if you need 3s and a little scoring, Jenkins could be helpful.
That wraps it up for me today! Feel free to post any trades or drafts you want an opinion on. See you in the season!
