Welcome back to another edition of the Insider cheat sheet, our weekly roundup of valuable fantasy basketball information taken from ESPN's group of NBA Insiders.
Every Friday throughout the season, we'll provide a rundown of the most crucial bits of intel. You'll gain guidance from some of the biggest names in the game -- Amin Elhassan, Tom Haberstroh, Kevin Pelton, David Thorpe, Bradford Doolittle and others -- to take your fantasy teams to the next level.
Here's what our experts are saying about the week ahead.
Worry about late-season rest for Warriors?
The Golden State Warriors, barring an epic collapse, will finish the season as the No. 1 seed in the Western Conference (and NBA for the matter). Typically, teams in a similar position will rest key members of the rotation down the stretch. After all, their postseason spot is locked and they want to be able to play their stars big minutes in the conference playoffs or NBA Finals.
But there's more on the line than in past years.
Steve Kerr's team is so dominant, they are on pace to set the record for most wins in a season (72), set by the 1995-96 Chicago Bulls. As of this writing, the Warriors are 57-6 with 19 games to play. Being up this much in the standings is typically bad for fantasy owners because of the aforementioned extra rest. How killer would it be to see Stephen Curry, who has carried your lineup all year, sit on the bench? According to our experts, however, don't expect it to happen.
Bradford Doolittle, Kevin Pelton, Tom Haberstroh, David Thorpe and Amin Elhassan got together this week to discuss the long-term potential of Golden State. And everyone but Thorpe believes the Warriors should -- and will -- go hard for the all-time record.
Pelton: "As long as it doesn't mean extending players' minutes to unreasonable level, I don't think there's anything wrong with continuing to try to win every game. Golden State's starters are still logging relatively few minutes because of the team's propensity for blowouts."
Elhassan: "The ultimate goal is of course a second consecutive championship, but other than overworking their mainstays beyond a reasonable standard, I don't necessarily see why trying to break the wins record would adversely affect their championship campaign. They have to play the games either way, so they might as well try to win them."
Fantasy players don't necessarily need Curry, Draymond Green and Klay Thompson to be overworked, but they do need them to consistently get minutes. Seeing them go from 30 to 15-20 minutes a game (or worse, take full contests off) would be a major loss. Thankfully, at least according to our experts, you won't have to worry about that.
Lakers' young core worth considering
With the "Kobe Bryant Farewell Tour" almost complete, it's time to look forward to next season. Will the Lakers be much improved? Likely not. But Los Angeles does have a few interesting young players in its core, all of which are worthy of a look in fantasy.
Let's start with rookie point guard D'Angelo Russell, who has been on fire as of late. The Ohio State product is averaging 19.4 points and 4.6 assists a game over his past 10 contests. Byron Scott has shown more trust in his young floor leader, and so far, the results are good. Second-year forward Julius Randle dropped 23 points and 11 rebounds against the Orlando Magic earlier this week and has topped double-digit boards in four of his past five games. Jordan Clarkson has been consistently strong in 2015-16 and has seen his usage increase as the season has progressed.
And they are all likely to get better without Kobe Bryant on the floor alongside them.
"As is the case with the Lakers as a whole, lineup data reveals that those three have been better with Bryant off the floor," Micah Adams wrote. "In the 454 minutes they've played together with Bryant, the Lakers have been outscored by 13.5 points per 100 possessions. In 326 minutes played without Bryant, the Lakers have been outscored by 8.6 points per 100 possessions."
This has been emphasized even more over the past month. According to Adams, "In the 62-minute span in March alongside Clarkson and Randle but without Bryant, both (Russell's) usage rate and PER have soared above 30, the combination of high usage and high efficiency any team would crave from a star, let alone from a rookie who just turned 20 in February."
Expect fantasy production from all three to be on the rise next year and to target them in the upper half of drafts, particularly Russell. The former No. 2 overall pick has a chance to be an elite point guard in the NBA sooner rather than later.
Ranking "seniors" by fantasy value
By the fourth year of a professional career, NBA players are starting to fully hit their stride. The 2012 class is a great example of this, boasting such talent as Anthony Davis, Damian Lillard and Draymond Green. Our group of Insiders -- Kevin Pelton and Chad Ford -- debated the group's long-term potential earlier this week. Which player from 2012 would be the best piece down the road? Does it rank the same for fantasy?
The clear No. 1 was Anthony Davis, who entered the season as a darkhorse MVP candidate and ESPN Fantasy's No. 1-ranked player. Though he has disappointed some -- currently No. 12 on the player rater -- he's still a dominant force. Pelton and Ford agreed, with Green and Lillard as the next two players. But the most interesting debate came at No. 4 with Detroit's big man.
"[Andre] Drummond is even younger than Davis; he won't turn 23 until August. Had Drummond not chosen to reclassify and enter UConn a year early, his graduating class would still be seniors in college right now," Pelton says. "Yet Drummond is already an All-Star and likely to be a fixture in the All-Star Game. While Drummond's box-score stats may not improve much and his rebounding is likely to decline since it peaks at an early age, more experience should make him a better defensive anchor in the paint and help the Pistons win."
From a fantasy perspective, I'd disagree with him being in that spot. Currently, Drummond ranks No. 104 overall and there aren't too many signs to show his improvement will increase dramatically in the offseason. I would look more to wings Khris Middleton and Jae Crowder, both of whom do a little bit of everything for their respective clubs, and rate much higher on our rankings.