Toney Douglas – Just when you thought you had a handle on the New York guard situation – KAPLOW – Master Douglas continued the debate. Do not debate Douglas! Give a New York guard 31 minutes on the floor, he’ll have a big night. On Thursday, it was a 30/4 night with four steals, five threes and a .642 FG%. There can be no complaints here. Actually, there can be two complaints. The first is that Douglas is no less risky a pick now than he was yesterday. Despite shooting .548 on the season, he’s still sharing minutes with Raymond Felton and Wilson Chandler. The second complaint is that Douglas doesn’t spell his name ‘Tone,’ or even more appropriately: Ton’e. I hear the Knicks pay big bucks for apostrophe guys.
Anyway, here’s what else I saw in fantasy basketball yesterday:
Danilo Gallinari – The Rooster crowed early in Chicago and woke himself up, scoring 21 points in the first half (two points more than in his previous three games combined) on his way to 24 points and 4-for-4 behind the arc. Now that we know he has it in him this season, the question is whether he’ll make a habit of it.
Anthony Randolph – One rebound in 2:53 and he looked like a kid forced to go away to summer camp. Give it three more games. If his line still look like this, send him away for anything more than a half-filled spittoon.
Amar’e Stoudemire -STAT was on the floor for more than 37 minutes and only managed 14 points/8 boards and eight turnovers. He’s turning the ball over 6.3 times a game and shooting .394 on the season. I don’t own him anywhere so consider this little update a bit of the ol’ schadenfreude.
Taj Gibson – Chicago’s favorite blues bassist double-doubled for the first time this season (14/10 in 33 minutes). He’s third in the league in FG% (.667) but averages fewer than 10 shots a game. Whatever. Four more weeks ’til the Booze Cruise.
Kyle Korver – Went 7-for-10 in including four treys. With Keith Bogans only somewhat successfully taking up space, I’d be interested to see what Korver would look like in the starting lineup. Until it happens there are a handful of better sharpshooters to go after.
Samuel Dalembert – Starting in place of DeMarcus Cousins from here on out. Or until Cousins gets better. Or until Sammy Davis Dalembert gets hurt. Playing time for either player won’t change much, so really this is how you thought it would be four weeks ago. Hi, old you! How’re things? Same old, same old? Yes, I guess that would have to be true, wouldn’t it?
Fabricio Oberto – Left Tuesday’s game with dizzy spells then retired with a heart condition on Thursday. Not retired the same way tennis players are retired each time they lose a match, he’s done for good. The Frailblazer center succubus strikes again. Although Oberto wasn’t on many fantasy radars, his absence means Marcus Camby and Dante Cunningham are going to share Oberto’s nine minutes until Joel Przybilla returns on November 26.
LaMarcus Aldridge – Twenty-two points on, like, eight alley-oops. He also earned … lemme see here. I know the rest of his line is around here somewhere. Is it in my jacket? No. Wait. Maybe my left pocket? I always forget to check the left pocket. Nope. Not there. Ah, here it is: Oh. Five rebounds, an assist and he never got to the line before fouling out. That’s more Somedridge than Aldridge.
Kevin Durant – After averaging over 10 free throw attempts a game last season, Durantula has only reached the line eight times in the last two games. Kevin expects more from Kevin than that.
Jordan Hill – The Rockets signed Brad Miller so Yao wouldn’t get busted up at the 25th minute the way Edward Norton did in the ’25th Hour.’ Now it sounds like Miller has troublesome ankles (he didn’t play Wednesday), which the Rockets must have found out early on in the season because they went hard after Erick Dampier despite Dampier probably being more rickety than Yao, Miller and all of the wooden bridges featured in Indiana Jones movies combined. Which means that Jordan Hill is your best bet to earn heavy minutes in future Rockets games – futuristic rockets are the best of all rockets. And for the record, “heavy minutes” from the five-spot in Houston’s lineup means 11-15 minutes. You’ve heard Hill’s name. You’ve stored it in your brain. Now sit on the information until you see how the minutes shake out or all three of Houston’s centers need help because they’ve fallen and cannot get up.
