Isaiah Roby (PF/C, OKC): Week 19 Waiver Wire Pickups

BALLER MOVE: Add in 14-Team Leagues

ROSTERED IN: 25% of leagues

ANALYSIS: God bless the Tanking Thunder for paving their way toward 2030-contention on sheer mediocrity. The Thunder are the third-worst team in the West and can still finish the season lower than that. They lost 14 in a row before defeating Boston (LOL) on Apr. 27, but they're back on the losing track after dropping one to the Pelicans last Thursday. Oklahoma City can't catch a break, but I don't really think they want that if we're honest. One of the kids making this tanking effort possible is Isaiah Roby, the second-year biggie OKC acquired from Dallas back in January of 2020.

Roby logged a very good bunch of starts throughout the season but he's now a second-unit player coming off the pine nightly. It's been six games on the bench, but the truth is that this new role has made wonders to Roby's game: the average FP/min are sitting at a rather high 1.25 in that span of games, Roby has scored 11+ points in four of those six matches, he's hitting 1 3PG, and he's been a monster both on the boards (7 RPG), dishing out dimes (2.5 APG, good for a second-unit big-man), and stealing possessions (1.5 SPG).

Since becoming a bench player, Roby has been able to see an uptick in usage rate (from 17% after the AS break in games he started) to 20%+ in the last couple of weeks coming off the pine. Not only is Roby putting up great efficiency numbers, but he's also getting rather bulky counting tallies on the FP front, averaging 28 FPG on just 23 MPG. Tasty shooting, healthy rebounding numbers, great assists/steals numbers and only the blemish of TOs (for those in 9-cat leagues) make for a good package available for free in three of each four Yahoo leagues.

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