Fantasy Basketball Forecaster: January 14th - 20th

Welcome to this week’s Fantasy Basketball Forecaster! In here, you’ll find:

• 3 players who are coming into the week hot
• 3 players who are coming into the week on a cold spell
• 3 waiver wire adds (among all players under 50% owned)
• Each teams schedule ranking, based on opponents’ stats allowed, where the #1 ranked team faces the easiest fantasy schedule this week, while the #30 ranked team faces the hardest

Let’s begin!

3 players who are hot

1. Bradley Beal (99.1% owned) — Two weeks ago I said to buy Bradley Beal where ever you could when the John Wall injury news broke. Welp, if you were able to do that, you’re welcome. This past week Beal has been the literal definition of the fire emoji. He averaged a ridiculous 34.3 points per game while hitting 4.8 threes, grabbing 5 boards, 7.3 assists, 2.5 steals and a block. He’s coming into this week ROASTING.
2. Anthony Davis (100% owned) — We all know Anthony Davis is a fantasy freak but he’s been especially freaky as of late, particularly his scoring. Despite not seeing an uptick in minutes over the last seven days, Davis still managed to average 34.7 points last week, well above his 28.9 points per game on the season. He’s a freak. He’s super freaky.
3. Donovan Mitchell (98.9% owned) — It’s taken a while for Mitchell to get back to the rookie year success that we all expected he’d build off of, but it seems things are clicking back in gear for the Jazz’s young stud. This past week he averaged 10 more points per game than he has all season—31.5 vs 21.5—while also improving his threes, rebounds, assits and blocks. Hopefully this isn’t just a hot streak.

3 players who are not

1. Kyle Lowry (99.5% owned) — Lowry made is way back from injury last Sunday and since then has taken a little bit of time to get back into the NBA groove. Last week he failed to score above 16 points and his threes, rebounds and assists were all below his season averages. I don’t expect Lowry to be stuck in the doldrums for long, but it seems he’ll need sometime to get back into the swing of things.
2. DeMar DeRozan (99.3% owned) — After his spectacular triple double against his old team, DeRozan hasn’t been quite as spectacular (which is tough to write since he’s one of the stars of my fantasy team). He shot a pretty terrible 39% from the field last week and led the Spurs in that time with 3.5 turnovers per game. Not great.
3. Kemba Walker (99.3% owned) — Remeber when I said to trade Kemba last week? Kemba’s production all around took a hit last week, particularly his shooting. He shot 38.3% from the field and a pitiful 29% from three despite taking 8.5 threes per game. I’m still recommending you sell Kemba since these numbers are the start of him regressing to his norm.

3 players to add off waivers

1. Brook Lopez (41% owned) — Lopez is a starting center who blocks shots, occasionally gets rebounds, and has been shooting threes like a BOSS all season. This past week in particular, Lopez shot 47% from downtown on 4.3 three attempts per game. That’s not bad for a seven-foot center.
2. Marcus Morris (26.1% owned) — I’ll admit when I’m wrong. I had Morris as a sell a couple of weeks ago saying that his level of production at the time simply won’t keep up. Well, it has and he’s been one of the Celtics’ best shooters all season. He’s shooting a ridiculous 45% from three while taking 5.2 per game. That’s easy points right there.
3. Alec Burks (1.1% owned) — Burks made the most in his uptick in minutes last week, averaging 16.5 points, 2 threes, 6.8 rebounds, 2.5 assists, and 1 steal on 29.3 minutes (third most on the Cavaliers in that time). He’s been shooting lights out from three and the free throw line. Grab him for as long as the hot streak lasts.

Strength of schedule

Both the Pacers and Spurs boast the easiest schedules this week while it’s going to be a shitshow for your Cavs players (which, let’s be honest, who are you really relying on on the Cavs? Larry Nance?)