Daily Dose: Big Wednesday - 04/05/2012
BY Aaron Bruski I’ll tell you, when you’re deathly ill and it’s the first time you’ve been sick in three years, any little thing helps. Once the over-the-counter stuff didn’t work anymore for my sinus stuffs, I resorted to eating jalapenos and some of you brought up the good idea about eating wasabi. So I ate a pound of wasabi last night and moved at about a fourth of the speed that I usually do. And when you’re in that pain, when the NBA puts on perhaps its best night of the year -- it is THE single-best thing that could happen to distract you. Between the big-time matchups, the Blake Griffin domination of all things Twitter and Spaniard, and a seemingly non-stop string of big plays and close endings – I made it through the night. I wouldn't have it any other way as we are knee deep in it right now, which is why I’ve expanded the analysis a bit here. So let’s waste no more time and go through a HUGE 12-game night. For all of your fantasy news and information in real-time, click here to follow me on Twitter. 80 MINUTES OF MEDIOCRITY The double-header on the four-letter network was simply awesome last night, and it kicked off with a battle of athletes in the Thunder at the Heat. It was the type of game I didn't really 'watch,' enjoying it instead. Ultimately the Thunder came up short, and you can blame Kevin Durant's nine turnovers if you want, but of course it came down to substituations and philosophy. Serge Ibaka played an inexplicable 24 minutes and still racked up four points, seven boards, two steals, and five blocks. Meanwhile, ineffective Thabo Sefolosha, Kendrick Perkins, Derek Fisher, and Nazr Mohammed combined for nearly 80 minutes. I know that Brooks is a good guy and everybody’s buddy, and that the media doesn’t want to have to backtrack on their narrative-driven Coach of the Year vote – but for the love of crumb cake. LOST IN TRANSLATION Dwyane Wade’s knee emerged as the biggest fantasy storyline in the Heat locker room, as the swelling due to his bruise has indeed been an impediment to his recent play. The team has a game against the Grizzlies on Friday, so they don’t play a cupcake, but owners need to be watching the situation closely as we wrap up the year. He’ll be sat if there’s any concern that his effectiveness in the playoffs will be jeopardized. LeBron James was a beast in the box score last night, scoring 34 points with seven rebounds, 10 assists, four steals, one block, and three treys. He’s going to win the MVP award unless Durant goes nuts and the Heat lose an inordinate amount of games. James' numbers are just that insane. As for the MVP talk, I find it incredibly brain-numbing as everybody in the basketball media has different criteria for what the MVP award should be, but we all press along comparing apples and oranges. Are we voting on the guy whose teammates suck the most? The guy whose No. 2 player is a big step down in terms of production? Would in-his-prime Michael Jordan still not be the most valuable player on the planet if he was surrounded by (gulp) his present-day Bobcats? Kobe Bryant has won just one MVP award. If MVP voting was a job they’d all be fired. MOUNTING EMBARRASSMENT The nightcap to Thunder/Heat was the Battle of L.A. and it took about one second to take over Twitter, as Blake Griffin made it his personal quest to emasculate Pau Gasol in ways never thought possible on a basketball court. To Gasol and the Lakers’ credit they won the game, and that’s all that matters, but I find it very telling that not even hot head Matt Barnes would retaliate after Griffin literally threw Gasol to the ground after dunking all over his face. Correct me if I’m wrong, but Griffin is already the best in-game dunker of all-time. For the Clippers, it looks like Vinny Del Negro might be loosening the leash on DeAndre Jordan, as Jordan played a whopping 40 minutes and posted 11 points, 13 rebounds, one steal, and four blocks. He is averaging nine points, eight boards, and two blocks over his last five games, and hopefully Del Negro realizes that Jordan needs to stay on the court if the team wants him to develop at all. Caron Butler rejoined the rest of the world with 28 points, and maybe this is a sign that he’s ready to produce again, but calling him a better than 50/50 bet to do so is a bit optimistic in my opinion. Chris Paul was electric and scored 22 points with a season-high 16 assists while dicing up the Lakers’ inexplicable strategy of switching big-men onto him so he could blow by them. The Lakers, who seem to have identity issues now that Phil Jackson is gone and the kids are running the show for Dr. Jerry Buss, they were their normal entertaining selves. Andrew Bynum continued to make an ass of himself by saying that he’s going to continue shooting threes, and he even caught a pass with time expiring at the half – and instead of putting up a shot right away he dribbled out to the 3-point line just to be that guy. You don’t need me to tell you that he missed. The good news is that Bynum would have to really escalate things in order to stop being a fantasy beast. He posted 36 points with eight boards, one steal, and four blocks. Ramon Sessions was cool as a cucumber with 16 points, six rebounds, eight assists, two steals, and two threes, Kobe had 31 points and a full line, and Pau Gasol picked up his manhood up off the ground and put it on display for 12 points, seven boards, and two blocks. For Gasol's effort, Bynum made the funniest face I've seen on a human being in at least two weeks. Z-BO NO SHOW O.J. Mayo kept his foot on the gas with 17 points and four treys, and the real question out of Memphis is what’s wrong with Zach Randolph. He played another listless 23 minutes last night with four points and five boards, and until he can be a No. 2 or 3 guy then Mayo and others will continue to step up. Tony Allen went down with a nasty cut on his mouth, but he should be okay going forward. As for Randolph’s owners, I had mentioned last week that Randolph would have two five-game weeks to put up low-end numbers while finding his groove. I prefer a stash by far, but this isn’t the time to be tied to any given idea. He is droppable for teams that can’t afford to bench him, even with the five-game week ahead. Delonte West started for Jason Kidd (groin) and will do so for the rest of the week, finishing with 14 points on 6-of-7 shooting, two threes, two assists, and a block against the Grizz. Backup PG Roddy Beaubois played 22 minutes on his way to eight points, two rebounds, five assists, on steal, and two blocks. The two are nothing better than low-end plays with equal parts upside and downside in 12-team formats, and both are only short-term options, obviously. West is still the preferred play because he is starting and doesn’t draw the coaches’ ire with nearly as much frequency as Buckets does. A ROSE BY ANY OTHER NAME ISN’T NAMED DERRICK Derrick Rose went through a full practice on Wednesday and C.J. Watson was revealed to be dealing with a host of nagging injuries, which may or may not explain his nosedive in recent games. Regardless, Rose is questionable for Thursday’s game against the Celtics, but really we shouldn’t believe anything that comes out of Chicago. I read a Chicago Sun-Times report that said it was more likely that he would return against the Knicks on Sunday, for what it’s worth. Just be ready to move as the situation calls, and feel free to drop Watson if you haven’t already. SOFTBALL Ryan Anderson (right ankle) will likely be out another five or six days and is wearing a walking boot. He said his ankle is the size of a softball, but is reportedly “optimistic” about his prognosis. He has also missed time in the past due to the same ankle. Owners can rely (loosely) on this timetable right now but I’ll be watching for any funny business. From Tuesday’s game, Glen Davis (31 & 10, no Dwight Howard), J.J. Redick (four points), Quentin Richardson (nine points), Earl Clark (five points) were the minute-moppers and as you can see none of them are exciting. Dwight Howard (back) and Jameer Nelson are both questionable for Thursday’s game against the Knicks. IDENTITY CRISIS Players develop their own injury identity, which gets tossed into a coach and organization’s mentality toward such things, and out pops a loose guideline for fantasy owners on how to handle their guys. Kyrie Irving (shoulder) sounds like a guy that that’s going to fib about his injuries a bit, at least right now, which is common for a younger player trying to prove themselves under a no-nonsense coach like Byron Scott. It doesn’t hurt that he lost all that time at Duke, either. He convinced Scott to put him back into action on Tuesday, and proceeded to reinjure the shoulder right away. I’m not sure if the 10-day timeline released yesterday is conservative or not, but I know the Cavs will be decidedly so when dealing with their franchise player from now on. Donald Sloan put up 10 points, seven boards, four assists, and two steals in his first start for Irving on Tuesday, and backed it up with 12 points with eight assists in Wednesday’s loss to the Bucks. Backup Lester Hudson also put up an interesting line last night with nine points on 3-of-13 FGs (0-for-6 3PTs), five rebounds, six assists, and a block in 28 minutes. Part of why these guys’ lines were fatter was that the Bucks now employ a small backcourt/lineup with an up-tempo game plan, and the other part is that newer additions to a rotation often create on the fly until they get the concepts of the offense down. Anthony Parker, of course, led the way with a season-high 27 points on 11-of-14 shooting, seven boards, four assists, and three steals, and he has to go in front of the two youngsters in fantasy leagues because he’s both better and more apt to produce. The only upside the young guys have is that the Cavs could indeed phase Parker out during the last 10 days of the season. I’m calling Parker a must-add player in 12-team formats, and I'm calling Sloan a must-add player if you need a guard or guard stats in those formats. Hudson is worth a look by the same guard-needy group as a desperation stash. THAT’S FUNNY HOW WE DRAFTED SO MANY POINT GUARDS Luke Ridnour will miss a week with his ankle injury and I don’t see him returning for any other reason than that the Wolves are desperate. If the team can find a stop-gap I wouldn’t be surprised to see Ridnour shelved for most if not all of the year. I hope you guys heeded my calls to go all-in on J.J. Barea earlier in the week. I know we were a little soft in our blurbage on Wednesday, which should have read ‘run, don’t walk’ in the event he was available in your league. Barea posted a predictable line of 15 points, six boards, eight assists, and three treys in 37 minutes, and the only roadblock he has is his health. So far we haven’t heard of any extraordinary news about an aggravation to his thigh last night, just normal rust and pain coming off injury. Wayne Ellington scored 17 points on 7-of-11 shooting (including three treys) with seven rebounds and a steal in 28 minutes off the bench. He is creeping up on 13 points and two threes per game over his last three contests, which all told equals some late-round value over that span. I don’t trust him, but the Wolves are so beat up that he could end up playing a role for owners with two four-game weeks upcoming. MERCENARY Eric Gordon finally returned to action in time for his new Adidas commercial to launch, and I have to applaud his management this time for rolling out the promotion in the right way. Most casual basketball fans don't know who Gordon is, and for him to get a big money deal the new GM has to be able to sell it to the fan base. He scored 15 points on 3-of-11 shooting with four rebounds, four assists, a steal, and two threes in 34 minutes, and as long as he can handle the workload -- productivity shouldn’t be an issue. Gordon is a mercenary right now, so there is a lot to like about him if you ignore the durability concerns. As I’ve mentioned in a few places, I just hope he knows what he’s doing. Chris Kaman (14 points, 10 boards, five blocks) is back in the starting lineup and that has revised the pecking order, knocking Gustavo Ayon (11 minutes, two points) off the fantasy radar. Jason Smith posted a nice low-end line of 10 points, four rebounds, one steal, and one block, and I like him a whole lot more than Carl Landry, who scored 12 points with five boards and didn’t have his heart questioned by his coach. Baby steps. When picking between the two, I can only go with the fact that Smith does more things right on his worst day than Landry does on his best day. That has to pay off somewhere. Trevor Ariza returned from his ankle injury and scored 10 points on 5-of-10 shooting with six rebounds, one steal, and a three in 25 minutes. We’re hearing reports of better shot selection, and we’ve seen a bit of it ourselves, and on the whole he should be in most lineups as long as he is reported as healthy. ASSHAT OF THE AFTERNOON I’m trying to clean up my language around here so I didn’t go with the feminine procedure of the day. I went with Ass Hat. I don’t know why we love this term, but maybe it’s the imagery of one actually trying to fit their ass into the hat. Anyway, the Ass Hat of Wednesday afternoon was Deron Williams, who not only decided that he had the flu with no real mention of sickness at any point in time prior to tip off – but he also decided to go out of his way to embarrass a well-intentioned, and probably younger writer in Portland’s media group. He gets a pass for most of his asshattery, in part because of how good he is, but talk about a guy running a coach out of town – and Mike D’Antoni couldn’t hold Jerry West’s protective cup. Sundiata Gaines bombed with zero points and one assist in his start for Williams, and needless to say the Nets are a mess without their star PG. MarShon Brooks was benched at one point for not passing in a 3-on-1 situation, and I’d put a small sum of money on Avery Johnson completely obliterating his confidence at some point during the year. I’m sure Brooks’ defense is a long-term issue that is mostly at fault, but there are few coaches that can wear them out like the Little General. Drop Brooks until he shows a shred of hope. Anthony Morrow continued to play hit-or-miss and was a ‘hit’ last night with 20 points, but can only be a risky 3-point specialist unless he really picks it up going forward. Gerald Green was great again with 20 points, seven boards, and a three, but the two three-game weeks ahead are total buzz kills. He’s not an auto-drop, but he’ll need to do some real convincing before next week. THEMS ARE FIGHTIN WORDS Raymond Felton told reporters where he lived and invited those that criticize him to come over for some punch and pie, and in other news he also neared a triple-double with 14 points, eight boards, nine assists, two steals, and a block. Now everybody knows Raymond was a buy low guy of mine with the hopes the coaching situation would get worked out, but I have talked about Blazers fans waterboarding him with nacho cheese lately so I hope he’s cool with it. Nicolas Batum is back on track and posted 20 points, 10 boards, two steals, and four treys, and J.J. Hickson bounced back to help remove owners’ doubts with 18 points, eight boards, a steal, and three blocks. Yep, he found a home. Jamal Crawford (knee) played but scored just seven points with one three. I know the value could be there, but you can almost certainly do better at this stage of the game. STASHABLE Jarrett Jack (ankle) was a surprise late-scratch for the Hornets, putting Greivis Vasquez back in the spotlight and giving the small group of folks that stashed him some hope. Admittedly, I was not able to hold on in about two-thirds of the situations in which I owned him. Vasquez posted 11 points, five boards, 11 assists, and a three in 37 minutes, and I think he needs to be owned unless owners are completely desperate to fill his roster spot with a safer play. There’s just too much upside at this time of year to care about the timeshare risk. GOODEN PLENTY OF QUESTIONS Drew Gooden (back) was a surprise absence and a lot of owners are panicking here. Scott Skiles said, “He can barely move, so if we give him a couple of days. He’s had yesterday, today and tomorrow.” This, of course, sounds like he’ll be targeting either Friday or Saturday’s game to return, but Skiles also said that Gooden “couldn’t move,” which could mean a number of things. Ekpe Udoh has been playing well since his arrival in Milwaukee and posted 11 points, eight boards, one steal, and two blocks over 32 minutes in his spot-start last night. I don’t want to understate the job that Gooden has done for Skiles in many regards, but his stats are fairly inflated because of the system he plays in. I point this out not to take a dig at him, but to give a little credibility to the idea of a timeshare or extra rest for Gooden where the team can get it. That said, they are currently one game out of the eighth slot so they can’t get too cute. The real issue facing Gooden’s owners is that he and Udoh are complementary pieces due to their opposing styles of play, and that always lends itself to a timeshare element. If I own Gooden, I’m going to do what I can to hang on until news about his status for Friday and Saturday arrives via carrier pigeon. The Bucks have four games next week and three after that – so if he can’t prove that he’ll be ready for next week then his value drops significantly. As for Udoh, I need to get a sense that Gooden’s injury is serious before I’ll be taking him too seriously unless I’m desperate for a big man. Carlos Delfino did not play due to his groin injury, and I can’t think of too many players that I would be less willing to deal with on an injury basis. He could be back on Friday or never, and we won’t know until the tip-off in most cases. I’d much rather own Mike Dunleavy, despite his five-point, four-rebound outing last night, as his mid-round value has worked nicely and I haven’t seen any other red flags. FAILURE TO TANK The Warriors can’t even tank right, as they walked into Minnesota and had a 20-point comeback win in a game which featured no defense. Charles Jenkins (19 points, four rebounds, seven assists) had the ‘good’ night and Nate Robinson (two points, four assists) had the ‘bad’ night, and that’s something that’s going to continue until the Warriors finally decide to stop developing Lil’ Him. That ship has already sailed. My take is that both should be owned for the chance the peaks and valley iron out to at least late-round value with the upside that comes with playing in a ton of garbage time games. Klay Thompson has seen his minutes scaled back, which I actually agree with in the sense that the Warriors were just sticking him on the floor for all those minutes to show how smart they were for planning their future around him. The problem with that was that his defense was actually worse than |
