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Welcome to the RotoBaller NBA Recap. In this feature, we will highlight a few key fantasy basketball takeaways from the games played during last night's slate. These viewpoints can be both positive and negative and will hopefully help to provide insight into different roster moves you should consider making based on trends and statistical nuggets from around the Association.
Fantasy basketball has a lot of moving pieces with all the different scoring settings that are possible to play under, so I will always do my best to spotlight where players gain or lose value in certain game types. For the sake of simplicity and consistency, every time I mention Fantasy Points in these articles I will be using DraftKings' scoring system, which goes as follows: 1*PTS, 0.5*3PM, 1.25*RBD, 1.5*AST, 2*STL, 2*BLK, -0.5*TO. On top of that, bonus points are awarded for Double-Doubles (+1.5) and Triple-Doubles (+3), only one per player at a time.
Without further ado, let's get right into the latest slate of games from the 2021 season and try to figure out how to take advantage of what we saw transpire.
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Saturday, February 20
Damian Lillard and the Beal-Russ pair go mano a mano as Washington pulls off the upset
The marquee matchup of Saturday night was definitely the Bubble Finals rematch between the Lakers and the Heat, but it didn't quite live up to expectations--reasonable, considering Anthony Davis and Dennis Schroder were out. It wasn't even LeBron James who put up the best fantasy game, with Kendrick Nunn (27-5-3-2-1) being the man for the Heat.
Anyway, what stole the show yesterday was the battle of backcourts between Portland's one-man army of Dame Lillard and Washington's Beal-Russ duo. Lillard was the better overall player with a sound 35-6-12 dub-dub on a very bad shooting night (33% from the floor, though he hit 7 treys), but Brad (37-7-3-2) and Westbrook (27-11-13) were too much for Portland to get the win.
- Zach LaVine keeps doing it. Another game, another 30+ pops with 38 points on the night to go with 4 boards, 3 dimes, and 3 steals on a game in which he put in 15-of-20 FGA and went 5-for-5 from the charity stripe. That All-Star berth looks closer than ever.
- After a stupid double-tech by Draymond Green, Terry Rozier went to work and dropped the winning bucket on the Warriors with the time expiring at the end of the game. That's the highlight of the day, but the truth is that Terry was great closing a 36-3-4-1 performance with 8 treys baked in. Graham's 2020 season might have been a mirage but Rozier is for real, folks.
- Tons of fantasy GMs are still rostering Marvin Bagley III expecting him to get the game right eventually. He's part of 75% of Yahoo rosters, and yesterday he had one of his better games of the year to the tune of a 26-11-2-2 dub-dub. I have yet to lose all faith, but I'm inching closer by the day even with these random explosions.
- If only because of the lack of warm bodies, Montrezl Harrell turned into yesterday's best reserve. He was on the court for 23 minutes but he managed to reach a nice 18-10 double-double with a monster 1.54 FP/min.
- Somehow, someway, Davis Bertans is still rostered in almost 70% of Yahoo leagues. His line yesterday: 6-5 in 34 minutes of playing time. His season average: 11-3-1 in 26 minutes per game. Not cutting it of late, not cutting it for the year. Drop or trade him, seriously. Whatever you get in return (a roster spot or some flyer in the shape of a player) would probably be better than Bertans has been after filling his bag this past offseason.
- DeMarcus Cousins and Houston are parting ways. Cousins is not going to win you the league, of course, but keep an eye on where he eventually lands as a change of environment, even if he stays coming off the bench, might do him wonders (Brooklyn, anyone?)
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