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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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Wednesday, March 17
Welcome to the NBA in the 2020s: six players around the Association put up a triple-double on the same night, the first time that has happened in the history of the game
Do you know what is the most incredible fact about yesterday's six triple-doubles? It is not that it had never happened before, but that it actually happened after the previews record was set just last Saturday! I know, I know. We're in the middle of a statistical boom, but that doesn't take away anything off these guys' nightly performances, which are absolutely insane. All of the trip-dubs were of the points-rebounds-dimes variety, and we were close to witnessing even more of them as multiple players fell just a bit short of reaching those lines.
The offenders were your customary ones: James Harden (40-10-15), Russell Westbrook (16-14-10), Domantas Sabonis (18-11-11), Ben Simmons (13-10-12), Draymond Green (16-12-10), and Nikola Jokic (12-10-10). Other top-tier players like Luka Doncic, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Zach LaVine, and De'Aaron Fox just to name a few couldn't reach the trip-dub but still made it to the top-10 in yesterday's slate.
- The most impressive game other than those coming from record-men or the highly-rostered players was that of Saddiq Bey. The rookie was hot for a few games some weeks ago, and now that it looked like he was coming back down to earth a bit he went on and dropped a monster 28-12-2-2 line on Toronto (including 6 treys) that had him ranked sixth in Wednesday's FP leaderboard.
- Speaking of surprising (for some, not me) performances... what about Robert Williams? Coming off the bench, Rob Will put up a 13-14-3-2-4 stuffed line in just 27 minutes of playing time, logged the highest FP/min mark (1.78) other than Harden's (1.94), and is definitely calling for a heavier workload ROS. Boston, please, do it. Fantasy GMs, please, add Rob Rob through waivers (available in 40+ percent of Yahoo leagues).
- If Toronto makes a move before the deadline, the man gathering the most interesting around the Association from the Raps is Norman Powell. Powell raised his value yesterday with a top-10 50 FP to the tune of a 43-3 line shooting 78% from the floor on 18 FGA. Sure, he did nothing more than score the rock, but the 97.9 true shooting percentage was as impressive as it gets.
- Grayson Allen went back to Memphis' starting lineup but he was rather disappointed in his 25 minutes out there. Much better: De'Anthony Melton with 40 FP in just 23 minutes of play thanks to a 13-10 dub-dub to go with 6 dimes and a couple of steals.
- LaMelo had a night to forget against Denver. Not only did his Hornets dropped the game in disastrous fashion, but Melo could only put up a 14-1-2-1 line in 23 minutes on the court for a measly 20 FP. No issues with it, though, as we're talking about the upcoming ROY and there is no chance he gets moved back to the bench or sees his minutes cut in any way.
- Milwaukee traded for P.J. Tucker yesterday. That is not going to mean much for fantasy GMs out there, because Tucker is a real-life asset more than a fantasy one. That being said, watch out for the man going the other way: D.J. Augustin is now a Rocket and insiders expect Houston to move him to a contender before the deadline. Keep an eye on where he ends next week as he might turn into a very palatable WW addition ROS.
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