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Read below for the fantasy basketball Forecaster
In weekly transaction leagues, the schedule is one of the most important factors in determining how to fill out your fantasy basketball lineups. All fantasy teams have a hierarchy of player calibers, with a set of "best players" surrounded by a cast of lesser but still productive players from which to draw your weekly starting lineup. All things being equal, a manager would start their best players every week and fill out the rest of their lineup based on things such as matchups. However, all things aren't equal.
The schedule changes the bottom line, because teams can play a different number of games, against a different caliber of opponents, with different breakdowns of home vs. road, back-to-backs, rest nights, etc. All of these things matter, and as I've seen this season, they often matter more than a player's caliber.
For example, would you rather get two games of a great player at 35 minutes per night against tough competition, or four games of a lesser player at 30 minutes per night against high-paced, weak competition? When looking at it quantitatively, it's surprising (to me) how often the correct answer is actually the lesser player -- yes, based on schedules, sometimes even star players should sit for a week.
Thus, below, we have the Forecaster, which provides a scheduling and matchup tool to help you make better-informed lineup decisions for the upcoming week.
We also take your weekly prep to another level with my weekly projection rankings. Here, you'll find my top-150 weekly rankings, based on ESPN standard points-league scoring, so you can compare players to determine which players to start, sit, stream or drop for the week ahead. I also provide several typical starters whom you might want to sit, and several bench/free agents whom you might want to stream.
Without further ado, let's check out the Forecaster.
In the Forecaster and this article, we have to treat the schedule as though it's fixed so we can evaluate. Clearly, at this time, the schedule is very fluid with games being regularly postponed due to COVID-19 absences. This Forecaster operates on the currently scheduled games, but it's an absolute necessity to check the latest information on schedules on Monday before the leagues lock for the week. We'll update the Forecaster to account for postponements as they happen.
This week is the All-Star break, which means that this session will be comprised of two half-weeks. There are games until Thursday this week, then the games resume after the break on Thursday next week. The system treats these two as one long week, but the games actually spread over eight days altogether. Thus, there are more games than usual over this session, with nine teams scheduled for five games, 18 scheduled for four and three teams with only three games.
The Denver Nuggets have the only perfect 10 score of the session, with five games. The Boston Celtics, Brooklyn Nets and Phoenix Suns all turned their five games into 9s, while the LA Clippers turned five games into an 8. The Memphis Grizzlies and Milwaukee Bucks both play four times, and scored 8s on the Forecaster.
At the other end of the spectrum, the Orlando Magic (three games) and Oklahoma City Thunder (four games) reside in their usual slot with 1 scores. The Los Angeles Lakers and Cleveland Cavaliers both play three times and scored 2s. The Washington Wizards and Houston Rockets both scored only 3s with five games, matching the Dallas Mavericks who scored their 3 in four games.
As always, we recommend you checking out those weekly projection rankings to see our take on which players may be worth starting or sitting, based on what we know currently of the combination of the schedule and injuries. Please check back on Monday to see what team schedules may have changed ahead of Monday's roster lock.