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The end of each year is now deemed “Silly Season,” when resting vets on contenders and breakout youngsters on tanking teams play havoc with lineup decisions.  Three weeks into the season, I now declare this time of the year “Wacky Season,” with Wednesday night a perfect example. There are players who started injured coming back, […]

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Welcome to your midweek guidance for Week 20!  In this post, I identify widely-available players who can help you win your head-to-head matchup.  Hopefully, you were able to add Mr. (W)Right last week and benefit from a top-25 run of games.  There are a number of other players whose names I constantly promote as streamers who can still be found on waiver wires – Donte DiVincenzo, Killian Hayes, Dennis Smith Jr., Kyle Anderson, Daniel Gafford.  They’re not perfect (Exhibits A and B: Gafford’s terrible Wednesday night and Hayes’ missed games), but their ceilings are high in categories that you might need.  I recommend looking their way first before reading down the rest of this list.

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After Julius Randle hit one of the more ridiculous game-winning threes last night to push the Knickerbockers past the Heat, I came up with the above headline. The only problem: I’ve never actually had an Orange Julius – which may be a sin in some cultural circles. Without a frame of reference to consider how Randle may compare the American quencher, I turned to my wife for help:

“It’s like better than an icy.” “I thought it was a smoothy. So it’s like an icy?” “No it’s not an icy.” “So what is it?” “It’s hard to describe. It’s indescribable. It’s like magic.” “So it’s like a mix between an icy and a smoothy?” “No. You’re obviously not getting it. Who are you trying to compare it to?” “It doesn’t matter, I just haven’t had one so just want a description to see if there’s any comparison.” “The most delicious thing I’ve put in my mouth.”

And that was the end of that conversation. 

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If you’ve been reading my NBA articles throughout the season – or at any point during the past 20 years or so – then you already know I’m a diehard Brooklyn Nets fan. So, as you can probably imagine, these past few weeks have been particularly difficult for me. I mean seriously, have you ever heard of a team winning 12 games in a row, being the No. 2 seed in the conference… and then dismantling that very same team before the all-star break of the same season? I’ve never, ever heard of such a thing, but I guess Kyrie Irving forced our hand on this one. Once one domino fell, the rest followed suit.

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Denver made a couple of moves on the margins. One was to shore up their backup center spot with the acquisition of Thomas Bryant. While that may help the Nuggets a smidge, it has no bearing in the fantasy realm. Bryant was a hot pickup when he took over the starting center role for a few weeks in LA, but he won’t get enough clock to matter behind Denver’s two-time MVP. Meanwhile, Denver shipped off a disgruntled Bones Hyland, opening up a backup point guard slot. Ish Smith filled in last night (technically as the backup to the backup with Jamal Murray sidelined) and scored 0 points with five assists. The main beneficiary will probably be Bruce Brown, who has been quite useful in spurts this season. Brown (56 percent rostered in Yahoo! standard leagues) has done a little bit of everything, but may get a couple more shots and assist chances if he gets the ball in his hands a bit more. Sliding into the starting lineup last night, he finished with a quiet seven points, three assists, two steals, and a block. He’s still a solid pickup in the almost half of leagues he’s out there in.

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It took a while, but we’re finally here. With the NBA trade deadline just days away, the swapping season is officially off and running and from the look of it, we could be in for a doozy. Way back in November, I floated the idea of buying Nets explosion insurance and now, thirteen weeks later, the bomb has finally gone off. On Friday, star guard Kyrie Irving requested a trade after failing to land a palatable extension offer from Brooklyn. By Sunday, his wishes had been fulfilled, as the Nets agreed to swap Irving and Markieff Morris for Spencer Dinwiddie, Dorian Finney-Smith, an unprotected 2029 first-round pick, and second-round picks in the 2027 and 2029. 

It’s a big move for two franchises and a massive opening salvo to the upcoming trade deadline, but the fantasy fallout is murky and there aren’t a ton of clear pickups or moves to make in its wake. Let’s dig in. 

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The universe got jokes. In 2014, Jerome Dobson and Joshua Campbell from the University of Kansas published a paper called “The Flatness  of the US States” back in 2014. Their motivation? To clap back on the general perception of Kansas being flat. NERDS!!! Anyways, I’m not going into to the technicalities of the study but they deduced that Florida, Illinois, North Dakota, Lousiana, Minnesota, Delaware, Kansas, Texas, Nevada, and Indiana are the flattest states in the US. On Sunday, Kyrie Irving was traded from the Brooklyn Nets to the Dallas Mavericks, so from New York to Texas, where he should automatically feel a oneness with the terrain. 

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Robert Covington has gotten lost in the sauce on a confounding Clippers roster. He hasn’t found his footing at all and been largely out of the rotation, but he’s maybe suddenly back on the map? Covington turned a vintage RoCo performance against the Spurs, finishing with 13 points, seven rebounds, two steals, three swats, and three triples in 21 minutes. He’s played at least 19 minutes in three straight, averaging 2.0 3PTM, 1.3 SPG, and 2.7 BPG. It’s impossible to rely on any set rotation from the Clips, but they did recently express a desire to cut back Ivica Zubac’s minutes. As Covington’s recent rim protection metrics show, he’s capable of sliding over to play backup center. We know what he’s capable of, and I’m okay with taking the risk of being fooled by the Clippers once more before letting him slip away to another manager if he’s indeed going to be a rotation regular going forward (21 percent rostered).

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Welcome to your midweek guidance for Week Seven!  In this post, I identify widely-available players who can help you win your head-to-head matchups.  While everyone else is watching the Lions lose, arguing, and deciding how many Breaking Bad box sets they’re going to buy on Black Friday, you can be poring over stat lines and analyzing team builds with me.

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