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When my wife was pregnant, the experience was…..interesting. At least for me. I can’t even begin to try and understand what my wife was feeling. All I know is that women are the GOAT. Anyways, after the initial gamut of emotions, things became very business-like. Doctor’s office. One month. Two months. Three months. Everything was mapped out and the “ride” was slow and steady. Then, the due date approached and….well, I was Robert DeNiro in Heat. The bags were packed and the routes were mapped out with contingencies for all possibilities. At the same time, though, I was like my five-year-old son in the back of the car on a long trip: “Are we there yet? When will we be there? Why is it taking so long?” Damian Lillard and his girlfriend had been expecting the birth of their child for the past few days. Lillard had been struggling a bit with his shooting efficiency, but the raw production was still there. It could have been the matchups or anxiousness with the pregnancy. Regardless, it was Lillard Time for the whole family last night.

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A 40-burger!!! On Damian Jr.’s birthday. Y’all know what time it is.

Here’s what else I saw last night:

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Why did you do this to me Jahlil?? I trusted you. I placed my faith in you to turn your career around in Brooklyn. I even criticized the Sixers for not wanting to develop you and what is the return? Three DNP-CDs and a meh 10 points/4 rebounds game in 23 minutes played. I rushed to pick you up everywhere but dropped you in all but one very deep league. Even his coach admitted he is out of shape and that it is going to “take some time to integrate him more into the system”. The vegan diet doesn’t seem to work that well….

I think I support Ron Swanson’s opinion on this matter more…

Thankfully, the rest of last week’s calls were much better than the gentleman above and Marvin Williams, who was also below average. J.J.Barea and Yogi Ferrell continue to hold down the fort until Dennis Smith Jr returns, Taurean Prince had a great week averaging 15.0/3.3/5.0/2.7/0.7/1.0/2.3, Lebron James’s Fg% dropped a bit as predicted, and Andrew Wiggins continues to disappoint so much that he was ranked 264th in per game value for last week.

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A capella music is singing without instrumental accompaniment. According to choraldirectormag.com, here’s what’s needed to create an a capella group: soloist, great bass, original music, time together, and momentum. That basically describes the Houston Rockets. Let’s break it down. Mike D’Antoni doesn’t micromanage possessions like some coaches. Things flow naturally. Soloist. James Harden. Great bass, the voice that’s low and powerful. Clint Capela fills that role by battling down low and doing the dirty work on the glass. Original music. Mike D’Antoni’s “Seven Seconds or Less” offense from the Phoenix days combined with the analytics of Daryl Morey equals “Game the Math.” Time together. Self explanatory. Momentum. The Rockets offense in a nutshell. Yesterday’s game against the Indiana Pacers was a microcosm of the synergy they’ve displayed all season enroute to an 11-3 record, with six victories in a row. Harden led the way with 26 points, five boards, 15 dimes, and two steals. Capela provided the base with 20 points, 17 boards, one dime, and one block. Eric Gordon filled his gunner role by hoisting up 11 downtowners. He finished with 21 points, one board, four dimes, two steals, and one block. If this was college, you’d think he was trying to get laid. Trevor Ariza scored 15 points, grabbed five boards, dished out a dime, and pilfered two. He’s Mr. Versatility. Can hit the high, low, and middle notes. Luc Mbah a Moute and P.J. Tucker provide toughness while still being an offensive threat. It’s going to be interesting when Chris Paul returns to the fray.

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Image result for kristaps porzingis in city

The five boroughs of New York City are Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, The Bronx, and Staten Island. But the title says 6 boroughs!!! That was typed by the hundreds of people streaming a live feed to watch me type this post on Twitch. Yes, it’s gotten to that point. Once poker was able to show the cards of the players on television, the game took off to a different level because viewers were able to get into the minds of the players. Same gist. People are now able to see the thoughts and processes that writers go through to arrange the letters of the alphabet into words and sentences so that we can hallucinate lucidly while looking at the screen. Not only that, they get to experience the emotional highs and lows. Ha! Wouldn’t that be some shit? Anyways, the Sixth Borough is located at 4 Pennsylvania Plaza, New York NY 10001. That’s Madison Square Garden for you non-New York folk. But that’s in the borough of Manhattan. Not anymore. Madison Square Garden is now a city-state like Vatican City in Rome. The Pope is considered the closest living person to God and is the head of state of Vatican City. Who is the pope or mayor of this new borough and what is it called? They call him/it Kristaps Porzingis. Is it a coincidence that he is often referred to as PorzinGOD? I think not. Porzingis went absolutely bonkers last night against the Denver Nuggets: 38 points, seven rebounds, two dimes, and three blocks. 14-for-26 from the field, 4-for-7 from downtown, and 6-for-6 from the charity stripe. He’s scored 30 or more points in five of six games to start the season. He’s crossing over defenders like Kevin Durant, draining baseline fadeaways like Kobe Bryant, and splashing 26 feet three pointers like Steph Curry. He does it all and has an insane 34% usage rate this season. He is the King of New York and will reign over all six boroughs in due time. If you didn’t know, the title to this post was an homage to the Beastie Boys – To The 5 Boroughs album.

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With this being the NBA All-Star Weekend, our typical weekend streamer options post will take a backseat to some fantasy implications of any trades that have (and will) occur with the trade deadline coming next week.  There’s been a couple of trades that already happened.  I was hoping to get a glimpse on all of them but looks like the players involved in the ORL-TOR trade didn’t suit up for their new teams.

I said fantasy implications, but let me just add to the growing voices that are asking the Magic management-WTF?!  You trade Victor Oladipo, a near solid (at the very least pretty darn serviceable) stretch 4 in Ersan Ilyasova, the #11 pick (Domantas Sabonis) for Serge Ibaka which you in turn trade for Terrence Ross and TOR’s 1st round pick which is probably no earlier than the 20th pick.  It doesn’t take a math genius to figure out that ORL traded away all those essentially for Ross and that 1st round pick.  No disrespect to Ross but seriously?! </rant>

So, with both Ibaka and Ross not playing last night, we can only speculate as to see how they could initially be utilized in their respective teams.

Let’s start with Ross: I think he will end up being the starting SF.  The way I see it the starting lineup will be this:

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Sorry for not posting last week everyone!  I’ve been a bit under the weather lately.  Before we kick off the updated list, we have some basketball to talk about!

As many of you may have heard, Yogi Ferrell had an absolutely epic scoring performance against the Blazers, and now his ownership is up to 50% already.  If you got him, I’d hold til he cools off, but if you didn’t, I wouldn’t worry too much.  He puts way too much leg into his jumper to maintain accuracy, and that’s partially because he’s undersized.  On top of that, he has a bit of a hitch as well.  I think he’ll end up being a solid bench spark in the league, but it wouldn’t be surprise me if this was the only time in his career that he’s 10 team relevant.  He probably will flirt with 12er relevance with injuries, but that’s not a must add.

At any rate, lets dive in!

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“Hey hey, Boo Boo!” I still know the exact tone of the voice from the cartoon saying that phrase. I’d imagine we all do. Yogi Bear wasn’t just a cartoon. No, he was an icon. He was the answer to Jim Halpert’s question: ‘What kind of bear is best?‘ How could you miss that Dwight!?! Or is it JimDwight that missed it?

He’s ‘smarter than the average bear!’ And the Mavs have clearly outplayed the rest of league, most notably the Cleveland LeBron’s, but bringing Indiana product Yogi Ferrell up from the D-League to help their depleted roster. And in a flurry not seen since perhaps Linsanity, Yogi’s taken off since joining the senior circuit. In his four game stint he’s posting a 17.8/3.0/5.0/1.8 line with 3.3 3PG and only 1.5 TO per game, while shooting 44.4% from the field in his 38 mpg. He’s revitalized the geriatric Mavericks and is helping push them towards the 8 seed. What did he get for his 32 point outburst with 9 threes on Friday? A 2 year deal at the league minimum. What do we get out of it? A legit waiver wire pickup that has averaged top 25 numbers in his four games. He should be swinging onto your roster faster than that gif up there…minus the sandwich.

Onto the 7 Ahead!

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Fun night for JB last night! I was driving down a desert road, opened up my suitcase, did… something with a lot of things… and next thing I know I’m raging next to Benicio Del Toro and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope in a hotel bathroom! KCP was absolutely unconscious last night, hitting 12-18 from the field (8-11 3PTM 6-8 FT) for a career-high 38/4/1/4/0.

Somebody call the ThrAGNOF police, we’ve found a face! As Slim noted on the Pod, KCP has some of the wildest game-to-game variance with his scoring, but as we saw last night, when he hot, he hot! The big changes for this year is he’s taking and making career-high treys (2.3 for 5.6), and making them at fantastic 40.3% clip. Even though he’s at a career-high scoring, he’s actually taking less shots per game than last year. And you know I’m an addict for AST:TO – 1.8:1.4 last year to 2.9:1.3 this season. So much to get addicted to! Let’s just hope the good times keep rollin’, and John Travolta won’t have to stab a foot-long needle in my heart if things go sour! Here’s what else went down on a busy night of basketball last night:

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Is it done with that much sass? Probably not. But man, talk about taking the long road to success, and not even getting rewarded for it. The Nets are a clustereff, as we all know, but there are some bright spots. Many of their assets belong to the Celtics, and their best player is always the center of trade rumors (Brook Lopez). Sounds bleed (and it is), but through the dark skies rests a young’n with enough creativity as a playmaker to bring people to the arena and make the Nets a viable contender soon. Now, soon is a subjective term, so for the sake of the Nets we’ll say soon is, I don’t know…five years?

Seriously, they need a Process. Maybe it’s years from now, maybe it’s decades (Clippers, anyone?), or maybe it’s just months (nope), but one thing is for sure: they’re ruining the process of creating young fantasy assets this season. That creative playmaker I just mentioned? Caris LeVert. And while his average stats of the past two weeks are strong (11.8/2.7/3.5/1.3 with only 1.2 TO on 57.1 FG% and 82.4%), he’s not getting enough consistent run to make himself worthy of the add. Instead, Sean Kilpatrick trades time with him, effectively canceling out the two. Coach Sean Atkinson said, “we’re just taking a futuristic approach and keeping his best interests at heart.” Well, that’s great, but doesn’t help anybody. You don’t even own your 1st pick this year!

Point of this small rant? If you can play the days right, both Kilpatrick and LeVert are good adds as a stream option, but it’s eenie-meenie-minie-moe between them with LeVert getting a sweet, ‘Have a seat, child.’ every other day.

Enough about the Nets. That was a waste. Onto the 7 Ahead!

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Austin Rivers is finally busting out, and showing the ability that we all knew he had.  It appears that biggest factors in this breakout are minutes and confidence.  Rivers is playing with swagger now, and the numbers bear that out.  Over the last two weeks he’s averaging a slash line of 17.2/2.3/4.3/0.5/0.3 with 2.2 treys, 48% FG and 80% from the stripe.  He’s a must-own while CP3 is out, and frankly, he should be a solid part of the Clippers future from here on out.  Unfortunately he’s now just over 50% owned in most leagues, so this is the last call on Rivers.  Please go get him…

Secondly, I would just like to point out what a miserable team the Sacramento Kings are.  Rudy Gay is out now, yet nobody gained any value.  How is that even possible??? Gay’s injury opened up 34 minutes per game of playing time, and the result is negligible!  Come on man!

Anywaysssssss, here are the updated wire recommendations for the week:

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Over the last few games, Kelly Olynyk has established himself in the Boston front-court.  His ability to space the floor really makes him a deadly weapon in the Celtics already stacked lineup.  At only 26% ownership, I highly recommend his solid mix of points, boards, and 3s.  Plus, he’s been assisting at a high rate, and even blocking a shot here and there.   Give him a look!

Without further ado, here are this weeks updated pickups.

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Happy MLK day! Sorry the notes were a little late this morning, I have the day off work and decided to sleep in! Holidays be holidays! And this is a great one – not only for the message and for one of the most influential men of the 20th century – but for the day-NBA we’re about to get! Hell yes, day games!!! ATL@The Poppycockers starts it off at 1:00 PM EST and games stagger their way through 10:30 tonight. So be sure and set your line-ups early this morning/afternoon, and get ready for early action to kick off week 13.

As you all know, I write with an extreme stream-of-consciousness-ness (as you can tell by that mastering of the English language there), and I’ve decided I’m too excited to turn this into a standard open! Big stuff happening in the REL (update up in a few hours), I’m about to watch the NBA all afternoon with a day off work, and Grey put out his top 10 for Fantasy Baseball this morning! It’s like Christmas for me in fantasy sports land! Then in the down time between games and Razzball writing, I’m going to spend my day off playing Rocket League, which I just got addicted to. This is turning into the best day ever… I guess I need to get to some daily notes at some point, ahhhhhh! Here’s what went down over the weekend in fantasy hoops action:

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