Tuesday’s Top NBA Fantasy Performers

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Tuesday’s Top NBA Fantasy Performers

March 7, 2007

The Starbury Shoe

Point Guard

There’s plenty of reasons not to recognize Stephon Marbury here tonight. In 46 minutes of action he registered a paltry 3 assists, only pulled down 1 rebound, and missed a crucial free throw with 0.9 seconds on the clock to seal a one-point victory for the visiting Seattle Sonics. He also markets those shoes. But despite his late-game choke and deficiencies in some categories, Starbury was a fantasy honcho tonight elsewhere. The man has taken and deserves his fair share of criticism over the years, but lately he’s been electric, including tonight at MSG: 40 points on 13-22 shooting, EIGHT three-pointers, 6-7 FT, and just 2 turnovers.

Honorable Mention: Gilbert Arenas was fantastic for the Wiz, but we’re used to seeing that; Earl Watson of the Sonics, not so much. Though he was the one Marbury was scorching for 40, getting your jockstrap handed to you isn’t a fantasy-stats category. Watson had a nice night: 23 points, 8-13 FG, 5 three-pointers, and 9 assists.

Shooting Guard

Here, again, both of our top performers squared off against each other, and though they put up very, very similar numbers, the T’Wolves’ Ricky Davis gets the slight nudge over Kobe Bryant. Really, it’s a toss up, so the decision comes down to Davis making a few more plays than Bryant in crunch time to win the double-overtime thriller over the Lakers 117-107 (a second straight double-OT loss for the Wolves might have killed their confidence altogether). Davis came up huge, logging a staggering 55 minutes, 2 more than Kobe, and almost notched a triple-double: 33 points, 10-23 FG, 12-12 FT, 10 rebounds, 8 assists, and 4 steals.

Honorable Mention: Kobe was Kobe, and Kobe will need to be… wait for it… Kobe each and every night if the Lakers are to have any success with Odom done for the season. Unfortunately for LA, 40 points on 13-30 shooting, 13 rebounds, 8 assists, 2 steals, 3 blocks, and 11-13 FT still wasn’t enough tonight in Minneapolis.

Small Forward

It’s safe to say that if Rashard Lewis still has any lingering pain from that torn tendon in his non-shooting hand, it’s not affecting his game. The ETB fave has picked up right where he left off since getting back on the court, tonight teaming up with Watson and Ray Allen to down the Knicks in a game the home team in New York needed much more than his Sonics. The free-agent-to-be almost put up a triple-dub with 24 points, 8 boards, 7 assists, 10-22 FG, 4 threes, and a block. No free throw attempts, though.

Honorable Mention: In a big 106-91 home win over Chris Paul and the NO/OKL Hornets, Carmelo Anthony made it work with AI, at least for one night, with both of them taking nearly the same number of shots (18 and 17). ‘Melo’s box score: 21 points, 8-18 FG, 7 rebounds, 6 assists, 1 steal, and 1 three-pointer.

Power Forward

Maybe it’s not fair because the game went into double overtime, but Kevin Garnett becomes the third player from the LAL/MIN contest to get a gold ribbon from us ~~tonight~~ this morning. The multi-talented KG—who my ETB associate and longtime KG-follower Andrew fondly refers to as “an alien”—was having a ho-hum, “big deal, you have 20 and 10″ night until asserting himself a bit more after regulation and giving his final stats a jolt: 26 points, 17 rebounds, 9-20 FG, 8-9 FT, 4 assists, 2 blocks, and a steal. Good job, you freaky freaky man you.

Honorable Mention: Dirk had a typical Dirk night for the Mavs, who won again tonight, this time 102-89 over the visiting and still Richard Jefferson-less NJ Nets. 22 points, 11 rebounds, 5 assists, 2 blocks, 8-17 FG, 6-6 FG. Yep, that’s another (yawn) double-double.

Center

Eh. Damn it. Okay. There weren’t a lot of overwhelming performances at the center spot tonight, so I guess it’s the King of Efficiency here, Tim Duncan. As usual, nothing eye-popping going on, just the model of consistency he’s staked his career and few rings on. Hey, nothing personal against the guy, he’s just… so… predictable. If you’re a Spurs fan, that’s fantastic. If you’re not, watching his game requires a pot of coffee. The Spurs scored 34 points in the 4th quarter to come back and beat the Blazers in Portland, and Timmy contributed 24 points, 10-17 FG, 8 rebounds, 2 assists, and 2 blocks to the cause. Fantastic.

Honorable Mentions: We’re going to list a few guys here. In a losing cause to the now Artest-less Kings, the Indiana Pacers’ Jermaine O’Neal went for 22 points and 12 boards. T’Wolves center Mark Blount had 18 points including three straight 3-pointers, and the Hornets’ Tyson Chandler had another sick rebounding night with 18 to go with 15 points.

Brandon Roy

Sixth Man

Portland has the leading ROY candidate on their hands in guard Brandon Roy, and tonight he showed why as he just about propelled his team to an upset of the Spurs. 19 points, 8-18 from the field, 9 assists, 5 rebounds, and 2 steals… not a bad night against one of if not the best defensive team in the NBA. Roy is the kind of high-character guy this franchise has been seeking for awhile now, and here’s hoping he sticks around and develops into someone they can build around.

Biggest Disappointment

The Toronto Raptors lost their fourth out of five games (uh oh), and though he was okay with 25 points on 8-14 shooting, there’s no excuse for Chris Bosh, rated by ETB as one of the top five centers in the league, to only grab ONE rebound the entire night.

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