Fantasy Basketball Week In Review: Week 6

Welcome to the RotoBaller NBA Recap. In this feature, we will highlight a few key fantasy basketball takeaways from the games played during the past week. These viewpoints can be both positive and negative and will hopefully help to provide insight into different roster moves you should consider making.

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.

Without further ado, let's get right into the last week of 2021 games and try to figure out how to take advantage of what we saw transpire.

Monday, January 25th

The chalk comes back, Luka doesn't know how to stap

Fun night in the NBA that of Monday. LeBron came back to play his Cavs and brought back the chalk-toss pre-game routine. Not only did he brought back those memories, but also his best playing ways as he dropped a monster 46 points on his former franchise while shooting an impossible 73.1 percent from the floor on 26 (!) FGA on the day. He scored 7 treys and added 8 rebounds, 6 assists, 2 steals, and 2 blocks to a surely magic night in Cleveland.

But the true king of the slate was Luka Doncic, who has been impossible to stop all year long and put up his 16th 30-point triple-double before turning 22. He did so by finishing 35-11-16-4-1, though even such a great performance went for nothing as Dallas fell to the Denver Nuggets.

• Veteran Bull Thad Young turned into the most frustrating performer of the day, as he finished just one rebound and one assist short of reaching a triple-double line in a 16-9-9 night coming off the bench.
• Delon Wright, on the other hand, was terrific and starting his 10th consecutive game for the Pistons he was one of the most-valuables plays of the day. 36 minutes and a 23.9% usage rate yet a great shooting performance (28 points on 12 shots) allowed him to rack up fantasy points as he also dished out 9 assists and grabbed 7 boards.

• Michael Porter Jr. came back for the Nuggets last weekend, and he couldn't have been much better. Off the pine, MPJ dropped 30 including 6 treys on Monday, averaging one of the highest FP/min marks of the slate.
• Speaking of Nugs, JaMychal Green is definitely as valuable as Denver hoped he would be after losing both Plumlee and Jerami this past offseason. Another low-20s minute game for Green, who even then finished 17-8-1-2 with 3 triples and with contribs all across the board.

• For the Cavs, Collin Sexton went down to Earth a bit while Andre Drummond got things righter after a few recent duds.
• Some folks out there are campaigning for Eric Paschall's 6MOY bid, but he's just plain bad and not doing enough. 13 minutes on the night with a 5-5-1 line even though he logged a ridiculous 32.6% usage as part of GSW second unit.

Tuesday, January 26th

A boring night with no highlights in a quite thin three-game slate

Not much of a story to tell here. With just three games on the schedule and all three finishing in clear victories for the winning teams, there wasn't a lot to call home excited about. The Clippers were missing three of their starters, Utah played and won effortlessly, and the Wizards couldn't stop a John Wall-led Rockets squad, inching closer to a formal trade request by Bradley Beal.

Rudy Gobert was the best player of the day finishing with an 18-19 dub-dub and four blocks in just 31 minutes. DeMarcus Cousins was the other star of the day, putting up another dub-dub with a 19-11 pairing accompanied by a slate-leading five steals.

• Russ is a very random, inefficient, declining player these days. Playing along with Brad he put up a good 19-11-7 line but he shot just 41.2% from the floor, missed half of his freebies, and is just not doing enough to help Washington win games. If Beal gets traded, though, I don't rule out a potential triple-double version of Russ popping out of nowhere as he will be all alone on the court.
• John Collins has been overshadowed by Clint Capela's late exploits, but he keeps doing great things under the radar. JoCo dropped an 11-11-3 performance on Tuesday to go with five blocks.

• Knicks rookie Immanuel Quickley came down to earth against Utah, playing 22 minutes off the bench but falling way short of his recent great performances. A 6-4-1-1 line paints a not-so-good picture, but his 9% (yes, nine) shooting on 11 shots made it a straight-ugly night for the freshman.
• Zubac, part of a depleted Clips squad on Tuesday (no Kawhi/PG13/PatBev), had a rather nice 13-10 game in which he finished with 28 FP in just 18 minutes, the second-most FP/min among players with at least 18 minutes of playing time.

• Some good performances from 6MOY candidates: Clarkson keeps doing it all for the Jazz (13-5-4-3 with 2 triples), Eric Gordon is just not appreciated enough in Houston (20-2-4-1), and Austin Rivers went perfect in the first half for the Knicks (10-10, 5-5 from three) while finishing 25-3-1 in 27 minutes.
• I have no idea what to think of RJ Barrett. 40 minutes but only 17 points, 4 boards, and 4 dimes against Utah. That's not a bad line, but given the super-long run, he just keeps falling short of what he was expected to do before getting drafted in 2019. I'm afraid this is the RJ Barrett we are going to see career-wise.

Wednesday, January 27th

High-stake night full of high-end performers and tight-yet-huge Sixers win

The Sixers and the Lakers faced each other for the first time this season on Wednesday, and the former defeated the latter by just one point. Uh, oh, that was close. Tobi hit the final dagger, but it was all about Ben Simmons and his 17-11-10 trip-dub on a night in which JoJo seemed to be a little bit off (compared to his MVP-worth prior efforts, I mean).

In a game that went to OT, the Nets beat Atlanta with Harden putting on the best game of the night thanks to a resounding 31-8-15-2-1 stuffed line in a massive 46 minutes of playing time. Beal dropped 47 pops... yet the Wizards lost once more. Rudy Gobert logged just the third 29+ points, 20+ rebounds performance of the season league-wide. Sabonis also got his trip-dub, joining Simmons at it.

• Andre Drummond was incredibly efficient, averaging 2.13 FP/min in just 28 minutes for Cleveland as its starting C on Wednesday. The problem with Dre is that he's turned into an absolutely bouncy and random play since Jarrett Allen arrived in town, which cuts his upside a bit.
• Kevon Looney got another start above rookie James Wiseman but his 12 minutes of play, although good (2-10-4) didn't bode well to keep penciling him in as a starter going forward.

• Oubre, as false as this sounds, hit 77.8% of his floor shots and scored 20 points including two triples. Given the year he's had to date, that's nice to watch him do here and there...
• Speaking of shooting and Warriors, it couldn't get much better for Damion Lee. The guard came off the pine and closed Wednesday with 17 pops on just 6 shots thanks to hitting five of them (four of them treys) and adding a perfect 3-for-3 points from the free-throw line.

• If (when) Bradley Beal gets traded, someone will need to take care of all of the possessions he's using on offense. Beal logged a stupid 46% usage rate on Wednesday, and he had put up 40+ percent rates in five of his last six games through this slate. Get your WW-guns ready to score yourself some Wizards' shares once the trade takes place, folks.
• Even on a putrid shooting performance (17.6 FG% on 17 FGA for just 0.59 points per shot), Fred Vanvleet finished as a top-15 player on Wednesday thanks to his contributions all across the board: 10-5-10-4-3 was the full line. Only two other players (Tobias and Drummond) have put up 10-5-5-4-3 lines this season once.

Thursday, January 28th

Detroit wins its fifth game of the season upsetting the Lakers, Clippers take on the no. 2 seed

In a night in which only four games were played, the Lakers dropped a very winnable affair against Detroit while the Clippers won against a Butler-less Heat. That combination of results meant that the lowly brother moved up to the no. 2 seed, with the no. 3 in the Lakers' hands. Oh, and Utah went to sleep with that sweet no. 1 seed gracing the Jazz name!

As far as individual performances go, LeBron was the best player of the night but not even his 22-7-10 effort was enough--not even close--to put on a fight against the Pistons, who got a 15-point win by the game's end with Anthony Davis not playing on Thursday. Herro came back for the Heat and already put up a 19-10-5 nice line, and Miami will definitely welcome those types of games from any of its players going forward while trying to right their very bad start to the year.

• Christian Wood returned from injury, moving Cousins back to the Rockets bench and limiting DMC to just 11 minutes and a paltry 6-4-3-1 line. That's as efficient as it gets (1.59 FP/min), but the upside of Cousins is back to nonexistent now for his fantasy GMs part of shallow leagues.
• A truly unpredictable performance was that of another biggie coming off the bench: Frank Kaminsky. The Suns ran Golden State off the court and Kam put up a near-trip-dub with a 12-13-8 line in just 24 minutes for 1.84 FP/min. Limited role in a surprising Suns squad, but the upside is there for Kaminsky to keep putting up numbers in efficient performances.

• Portland is going through a stretch in which the Blazers don't have many important pieces such as Jusuf Nurkic and CJ McCollum available, and other than Dame and Kanter this team has pretty much nothing going on and helping. Hood, Melo, Giles, Trent, and Simmons all played 15+ minutes on Thursday yet all put up below-average per-minute marks (<0.9 FP/min).
• Speaking of Carmelo Anthony, he played an incredible 38 minutes yet he finished 3-of-15 from the floor and scored 6 points on the night. Day to forget for the vet, with Kelly Oubre and Eric Gorden the only players with lower shooting percentages (<20%) and 10+ FGA on the slate.

• With the Clippers and Heat missing key players, Lou Williams and Gabe Vincent were very important (and valuable) plays for their respective teams coming off the bench. They will try to solidify their utility-roles while they keep getting reps.
• Another bench player, this one already established and potentially looking to finish the season far from his current home: Derrick Rose. D-Rose put up a 14-1-3-2 line shooting 50% from the floor on 12 FGA. Not the highest of upsides, but if he is eventually traded to a contender the change of scenery and another environment might boost his numbers a lot, making him a worth WW/trade-target before that move happens.

Friday, January 29th

Utah gets its 11th straight win and locks into the West no. 1 seed

The last time we watched the Jazz put on a losing effort it was barely 2021, a month ago, back on Jan. 6. Utah was 4-4 after its loss to the Knicks, but currently sports a conference-leading 15-4 record and in a 72-game season the Jazz have almost already made their job when it comes to getting into postseason contention. Seriously. We're past the 25% point of the season, and there is still a lot to play, but even losing every game remaining in their schedule they'd still finish with a better percentage than the worst three teams in the NBA right now have.

In other news, Giannis was the best player of Friday's large slate of games thanks to a 38-11-5 high-end double-double. The Greek shot the rock as many as 27 times hitting 55%+ of those shots from the floor, and adding 5 more from the line on 7 attempts. If only could have he limited his 4 turnovers a little bit more...

• James Harden, keeping up his do-it-all new style of play, put up another trip-dub to the tune of a 25-10-11 performance for a Nets squad that missed Kevin Durant yesterday. Irving also played and did well with a 25-7-5-1-1 all-across-the-board contribution.
• Speaking of top-heavy superstars, Embiid was terrific with a 37-11 game in just 26 minutes of playing time. He was the most efficient player of the day with 2.28 FP/min (Harden finished second at just 1.92).

• Sacramento boasted two of the best reserves of Friday in Whiteside and Haliburton. The former has been a little upsetting mostly due to his limited run, but the latter is in clear contention for the ROY and kept building his resume yesterday with a 10-6-11 double-double in 33 minutes off the pine.
• Lonzo Ball, surprisingly, hit 7 triples on a night in which he finished with 27 pops and 8 dimes... and boosted his value in a potential trade as we near the deadline. New Orleans is looking to move the upcoming FA, so keep an eye on where this ends as it could make Zo available in some fantasy leagues for a reasonable price and return tremendous value.

• Rookie Immanuel Quickley, if still available in your fantasy league (no matter the depth), should be your no. 1 target these days. Another day, another great show by Quick who finished 25-5-3 with 5 treys in just 25 minutes of playing time. The days before he gets into the Knicks starting five are more than numbered, Thibs wanting it or not.
• The Wiz are slowly but surely getting all of their players back. One of those, Davis Bertans, had a night to forget on Friday. He played 25 minutes coming off the bench and all he could do was hit a free-throw while missing another and all of his 7 FGA on a night to forget in which he got 3 boards and stole a ball. That's why you don't fully trust players in contract years, folks.

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