Fantasy Review For 2017/18 Season:
It was a first season of Luka Doncic reign and the one when they have traded for Kristaps Porzingis. No one ever will mention it to you other way. It might have been a franchise settling season like the one of 2011/12 when Warriors laid the foundation for their future success, rolling with the Splash Brothers duo, trading for Andrew Bogut and drafting Harrison Barnes, Festus Ezeli and Draymond Green.
Fantasy wise they had only 4 relevant players, none of them being really good. Even Luka, as exciting to watch as he is, didn’t made it to top100, due to very unbalanced stat line. Obviously they’ve traded away another fantasy contributors in Harrison Barnes and DeAndre Jordan and put the main focus on player development, therefore the team wasn’t the best environment for steady fantasy production. It should change this season.
Lost = Wesley Matthews, Trey Burke, Salah Mejri
Added = Seth Curry, Boban Marjanovic, Delon Wright
Projected Depth Chart:
| PG | SG | SF | PF | C |
| Delon Wright | Luka Doncic | Jalen Brunson | Kristaps Porzingis | Dwight Powell |
| Seth Curry | Justin Jackson | Tim Hardaway JR | Dorian Finney Smith | Maxi Kleber |
| JJ Barea | Courtney Lee | Ryan Broekhoff | Isaiah Roby | Boban Marjanovic |
Positional Battles: Guards, C
The guard battle isn’t that fierce in fact, as it is mainly between role players. The question here is only whether the veterans JJ Barea and Courtney Lee would be plugged into rotation – if they are playing, there is going to be some kind of a log jam and a true position battle. If not – guard rotation is quite clear.
Center rotation might be trickier. Dwight Powell is supposed to start, but he will have to share minutes with Maxi Kleber and with Porzingis getting back to shape, he may also play some center… not to mention Boban Marjanovic who is a high end offensive role player, suitable only for particular matchups, but in those matchups he will thrive and cut deeply into the other players share of cake.
Fantasy Relevant in leagues with 12- to 15-teams:
He was, and frankly, he still is, a polarizing fantasy player. Its due to his unbalanced fantasy production, he was amazing in counting stats other than blocks – pts, 3, as, reb, stl – in this combination he was a top20 player – and in other four he was absolutely horrific – in combination of blk, FG, FT and TOs he was second to last, only above Russell Westbrook. That made him much better suited for h2h format than roto, especially for 3-cat punt tactics. What is important for this upcoming season is a fact that he will probably raise both of his percentages – that is the typical development in sophomore year both for very young rookies and for European players moving to NBA, and he is both. For the whole summer Doncic worked on his athetic ablity and with better conditioning he has a legit chance to make a huge leap in FT%. His shooting woes from the stripe should be accounted for the exhaustion – as his mechanics and head there have been proved before, both in Euroleague and on the international level. If he improves his conditioning, he could really become a neutral FT contributor and that feature alone might bring him up to that top30-40 range.
He is one of those unsexy, solid picks, that should turn out to be really good values. He gives you an elite FG influence along with positive free throws and solid combination of points, rebounds and blocks. Also he shoots some threes and doesn’t turn the ball over, so if you grab him outside top100, you should be more than satisfied. In our projections, in only 26 minutes per game, he sits comfortably in top80-90 range with potential for more if more minutes come.
Just a blocks streamer, that can contribute also in threes and rebounds departments while being neutral in percentage categoties.
What he gives you as PG are rebounds, assists, great steals, positive percentages and TO’s. That makes him a solid top100 prospect, even considering the fact, that his preaseason wasn’t all that great. He is obviously low ceiling guy, as he lacks elite percentages, 3s and points, but he suits well as a great source of assists and steals later in the draft.
Threes and percentages with some assists. Thats what he is… but you may need those threes badly if you also care about FG%.
He is proven as an absolute elite in 5 categories – points, 3s, rebounds, FT% and blocks, but he lacks production in other four. However, he should be better across the line, especially in FG% and assists, as he develops as a player and truth to be told, his upside is tremendous. As for now, I am not that high on him, as I am really concerned about his reccuring health problems and due to info I hot from several great trainers – comeback from ACL takes all that prepering before playing again on the court, and then another year on court, before regaining one’s athletic ability and confidence.
Could be useful with trades/injuries [or in deeper leagues than 15 teams]:
Boban Marjanovic, Jalen Brunson, Tim Hardaway Jr, JJ Barea,
Just don’t bother with:
Justin Jackson, Courtney Lee, Dorian Finney Smith
Don’t forget to check the rest of the Dallas Mavericks fantasy basketball projections.
Posted in Teams preview