Fantasy Basketball: Week 4 pickups and when to stream | The Playlist
Yahoo Sports fantasy analyst Dan Titus discusses key players to grab, streaming do's and don'ts this week, and his excitement for the return of the NBA in-season tournament.
Video Transcript
It's week four and Fantasy basketball.
Welcome back to the playlist to recap.
Week three didn't end the way that we wanted to see Chet Holgren of the Oklahoma City Thunder is going to be re evaluated in 8 to 10 weeks after suffering a hip fracture on Sunday night, just a brutal injury for OKC fans and Fantasy managers.
I don't know who's gonna be the immediate pickup here because we're all just waiting for Isaiah Hartenstein to come back.
This could be a committee approach of Lou Dort, Alex Caruso Aaron Wiggins, maybe Cason Wallace just wait and see, see how this unfolds over the next week or so.
And also we found out that Zion Williamson is gonna be out indefinitely with a hamstring injury.
John Morant is week to week with a hip injury.
Kevin Durant is out at least two weeks with a calf injury and Tyrese Maxie is also gonna be out at least two weeks with a hamstring injury, just tons of injuries across the board for a lot of stars on a lot of Fantasy teams.
But on a brighter note, the Cavs are 11 and oh, to start the season, the only undefeated team left in the NBA.
Let's get to the pickups.
First pickup has got to be Goga Beta of the Orlando Magic Wendell Carter Junior frankly just cannot be trusted.
He's dealing with a foot injury, Plantar Fascia to be exact and Goo Beta in his absence has been averaging 10.5 points, 10.5 boards.
He gets you stocks, he gets you a good field goal percentage.
He needs to be added in all leagues.
Next player I'm picking up is Khaw George.
Now, Bub Harrington suffered a leg injury on Sunday night.
We don't know if he's gonna be missing any time, but that shouldn't affect Khon George too much because he's been subbing in for Kyle Kuzma who also doesn't have a timetable for his return.
His minutes have been trending up and I really like what Khon George has been doing defensively.
He can shoot the three.
He's also one of the best blocking wings in the league right now.
So make sure you pick him up off of waivers.
He can be added in all league and lastly a bit of a deep leaguer.
But pick up Naji Marshall really like the Mavs schedule this week.
He plays on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, all lighter slates.
You can get him into your lineup.
He's been averaging 12 points with five boards in the absence of PJ Washington junior who continues to miss time with a knee sprain think he's gonna be a great streamer for those in 12 team leagues this week.
All right, let's get to the schedule things you need to know the week four schedule is looking way better than week three.
There's actually four days you can get away with streaming.
That's Monday, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, all four of those days have eight games or less.
That tends to be a good threshold for actually getting players off of waivers and into your lineups.
Be aware of those back to backs though.
Uh for example, the Sixers play a Tuesday, Wednesday back to back and you know, Joel and Bead and Paul George are likely not playing both sides of those back to back.
So Andre Drummond, Kelly Oubre in deep leagues, Jared mccain, those guys are all still viable fantasy options on one of those two games that, you know, NB or Paul George will miss.
But then also two teams that I would target Dallas Mavericks and the Utah Jazz.
They both play on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.
So three out of the four lighter slate days, they play on them.
So I think you'll be to get Naji Marshall into your lineup.
That's why I recommended him as one of my top pickups.
The Utah Jazz are a bit frustrating though just where the state of their franchise is right now.
They're losing a lot of games.
There's resting, there's injuries, it's gonna be harder to pick out a, a streaming option there.
But if you want to go for it, more power to you, I trust that the Dallas Mavericks a bit more on the flip side, the teams that you'll wanna avoid are the Golden State Warriors and the Denver Nugs.
Now, the Denver Nuggets, they don't play until Friday and then they play later in the week.
So it's gonna be hard to hold on to someone like Peyton Watson who is definitely benefiting and playing really well without Aaron Gordon in the lineup.
He's gonna be missing multiple weeks with that calf injury.
So make sure you continue to hold on to Peyton Watson if you can, but I understand if you're trying to go for the win, you have to drop him.
I totally get it.
Russell Westbrook, same situation as well as Julian Strath.
They're in deeper leagues, but then also the Golden State Warriors, Steve Kerr was just raving about D Anthony Melton how he likes him in the starting lineup.
But we know one thing about Steve Kerr and his lineups can't be trusted.
And frankly, I don't know that I can be able to hold on to D Anthony Melton after Tuesday because there's just such a long wait until the Warriors play again at the end of the week.
So Andrew Wiggins, chase Jackson Davis, um The Anthony Melton, all those guys might be hard to, to hold on to in week four, but just keep that in mind as you're navigating your schedule now that the schedule is out of the way, here's why I'm hyped about the NBA Cup.
So I'm hyped for the second iteration of the NBA cup because I think the NBA finally figured out how to make the regular season relevant and competitive.
I mean, are we really surprised that Joel and Bead was suspended three games for shoving a media member, but it just so happens to be able to return on Tuesday the first night of the NBA Cup.
Come on, man, they sold it to the Emirates.
Emirates is the sponsor.
If there's one thing that Adam Silver cares about right now, it's making sure that his stars are available for the NBA Cup games.
And last year was largely a success outside of the crazy loud courts and the ridiculous jerseys, they kind of cooled out on both of those.
They're, they're looking a little, a little bit more muted this year but still like it's, it's fun, it's different.
And when it comes to regular season basketball, the only thing you need is engagement and investment.
And I think we're finally gonna get that investment from the players.
We saw what that monetary incentive that additional monetary incentive did for the Los Angeles Lakers.
Their motivation as they were getting through that middle part of the season, which tends to be a lull, right?
Like NFL is still going on, but it's starting to kind of wind down.
That's an excellent opportunity for the NBA to take advantage, make the regular season more interesting, more compelling and from a fantasy perspective, I think that's gonna help because I think we'll actually start to see more stars play in those NBA Cup games and we'll start to see more resting and load management that might happen in those regular season, you know, standard games that don't really impact standings playoffs, potentially.
I'm ready for it, so I'll do it for the playlist.
I'll see you in week five.