Fantasy Basketball Dynasty Weekly: Evan Mobley starting season off strong |Max Sporty|

While it’s important not to overreact to the first few games of a season, it certainly doesn’t hurt to react to what happened. That means don’t make drastic moves because of a few bad plays. However, we can acknowledge what happened and how we should feel about it. It’s tempting to throw everything out the window early in the season if things aren’t going the way you expected them to, but a big part of being successful in dynasty leagues is staying patient and sticking to your beliefs about certain players.

We can still be excited or frustrated about the start of the year. We’ll take a look at five players I’m happy with how they started and five I wasn’t so optimistic about. Then we will decide if it is sustainable or not. Taking the time to analyze several aspects of a player’s start allows us to make the best decision.

Five players I’m excited about:

Cam Thomas

On a tanking Nets team, the expectation was that he would take a ton of shots, and if they went in, he would make a big impact in fantasy basketball. It’s early, but the results so far have been great. In the past, Thomas has had some huge winning nights, but he hasn’t been able to do much else in matchups, so when he’s had bad nights, he’s been ineffective. He hasn’t had any major mistakes this season, but his field goal percentage to this point is 44.8%, which is right on par with his career average. So, despite becoming the undisputed top option with Mikal Bridges gone, Thomas posted career highs in points, rebounds, steals, 3-pointers, free throw percentage and shot attempts without sacrificing his shooting efficiency. This isn’t some crazy hot shooting streak where he makes 60% of his 3-pointers. This percentage is absolutely sustainable, which encourages moving forward. However, his long-term value is more of a question mark. Win-now teams should take advantage, but rebuilding dynasty teams should look to sell-high on Thomas.

Jordan Poole

Much like Thomas, Poole was expected to dominate on a bad team. Well, that was also the expectation last year, and we all know how that went. Clearly, things are different this time around, and the main reason for that is that he now controls the offense more as the team’s point guard. Poole has so far been the best player in 9-cat leagues, which can be inflated by three games. He is averaging 5.3 triples and 3.0 steals while making 51.2% of his field goal attempts and 61.5% of his 3-pointers. Is that sustainable? Probably not, but the expectation was never Poole’s first fifth season. He was much better than he was last year and reminded everyone of how talented he is. I’m glad he’s playing so well, and I hope he can keep it up, even if I’m not optimistic that it will be as good as his first three games.

Christian Braun

The shooting guard battle in Denver came down to Braun and Julian Strawther, with the winner of the battle landing in a great role that should play well in fantasy rings. However, this did not necessarily mean that the production would be based on talent, but that the opportunity would be enough for the starter to provide standard league value. The early returns suggest that Braun will be more than just a beneficiary of a big role. So far, he is averaging 14.0 points, 5.3 rebounds, 1.0 steal, 1.8 blocks and 1.0 triple in 35.4 minutes per game while making 53.8% of his shot attempts. The Nuggets have had a disappointing start to the season, but Braun has been excellent, playing well in 9-cat leagues. If he continues to play at this level, Denver won’t have to look elsewhere for a new shooting guard for a while.

Evan Mobley

It was always destined to happen, but the Mobley breakout seems to finally be here. On offense, he continues to expand his range off the 3-point line, he creates his own shot off the dribble, he runs the floor in transition, and he knows how to move without the ball to get easy shots at the rim. Ideally, managers wanted him to play centre, but he could take advantage of smaller fours by overpowering them and bigger fives by using his pace to succeed. Mobley has generally been a subpar free throw shooter, but after shooting 71.9% last year, he is knocking down 88.2% of his attempts from the charity stripe on 4.3 shots per game. He even showed off some fun playmaking prowess. Defensively, he was the absolute monster we knew he could become. Not that he was bad before, but the numbers were great to start this season. There have been many positive signs of Mobley’s development thus far, and it shows in the box score.

Payton Pritchard

With Kristaps Porzingis sidelined until December, Pritchard was Boston’s sixth man to start the year, which allowed him to play a big role. He shot poorly in the season opener, but he’s been on a tear ever since. He’s averaging 16.3 points and 4.8 triples in 25.0 minutes per game off the bench, and he’s made over 60% of his shots over their last three games. He will continue to be overshadowed by the stars in Boston, but he has been effective in his role, which has allowed him to produce a top 75 value in 9 cat leagues to this point. More minutes helped, but he’s simply been better overall offensively this season. It’s unclear when he’ll really get the opportunity and role he needs to provide value in more categories, but it’s good to see him playing at this level early in the year.

Five players I’m upset about:

Tyrese Haliburton

Monday night’s loss to the Magic went much better for Haliburton, but before that, there were certainly some concerns. He averaged 9.3 potential assists per game (a number that is now up to 10.0 after Monday’s game) after averaging 17.8 per game last year. Was Monday’s 10-assist game simply a result of his teammates hitting shots and not Haliburton setting up more open shots? If that’s the case, that number won’t stick, and Haliburton won’t match his assist average from last season. Nothing has changed with Haliburton’s talent, but it seems the Pacers are putting the ball in Andrew Nembhard’s hands more and using Haliburton off the ball. I’m still not worried about Haliburton, as defenses are obviously affecting him early, but for a guy drafted in the top ten in both draft and dynasty formats, this start has been suboptimal. (I’m attaching an excellent tweet thread that goes much deeper into how Haliburton was used).

Scoot Henderson

It would take a lot to make me give up on Scoot, but inefficiency continues to be a major problem for him. This isn’t the type of inefficiency where he also makes up for it with insane counting stats either. He just shoots a low percentage and turns the ball over a lot. It’s better than his rookie year, so things are trending in the right direction. His field goal percentage increases from 38.5% to 41.2% and he only turns it over 3.3 times per game, which is definitely better than 4.3. Henderson has played better this year, but it still hasn’t come across in a way that benefits fantasy managers. We will continue to be patient though, because learning to play point guard in the NBA takes a long time.

Jalen Johnson

Atlanta made Johnson the team’s second option this summer, and the defense treating him as a No. 2 scoring option has impacted his game early. Before finally figuring things out Monday night, Johnson shot 29% from the floor. He’s 3-of-13 on 3-pointers, and he’s taken a lot of floaters and mid-range shots that just haven’t fallen over the first few games. My frustration was not with the percentage directly, but with the shots he took. JJ has developed quite an offensive game where he can do a little bit of everything and score from all three levels. However, that doesn’t mean the bread and butter of his game isn’t still attacking the rim and getting vertical. He took some 3-pointers that felt early or rushed, and while the fading floaters are shots he can make, he’s athletic enough to get to the rim for a stronger finish. He was better at that against Washington on Monday, which is encouraging for managers moving forward.

Jonathan Kuminga

Last season was a strange one for Kuminga, as he voiced frustrations with the organization’s inability to develop him earlier. He ended up figuring things out and finished the year incredibly strong. However, his start to this season was not what we expected. He started at small forward in a higher lineup for Golden State, but he wasn’t his typical effective self. Kuminga took a few extra 3-pointers, but his field goal percentage was 33.3% through their first three games, which is down from 52.9% last year. I don’t expect that number to stay that low, but another concern is that lack of minutes. Their first two games were blowouts, so he played less than 20 minutes, but he only played 22 minutes against the Clippers in a close loss on Sunday. Steve Kerr ended up bringing him off the bench for Tuesday’s game against New Orleans, but he had his best game of the season in 28 minutes. It may seem like a demotion, but Kerr attributed the move to lineup configuration and spacing, and the early returns are positive.

Amen Thompson

It was always going to be difficult for some of Houston’s young kids to carve out a big role this season, but it felt like Thompson was good enough to do so. However, Ime Udoka preferred Dillon Brooks over Amen, playing him 33.7 minutes per game to Thompson’s 21.1. In those minutes, Amen was not as productive as we hoped, which I can partly blame on Udoka as well. Thompson’s half-court offensive game may be limited at this point in his career, but there have to be better ways to use him than having him sit in the corner. One way that Udoka has tried this is to have Amen be the examiner in PnR games, which has given mixed results. On defense, the stocks just weren’t there. Do I give up on Thompson? Not even close. Am I a little frustrated with the way he played and how the Rockets used him? Absolutely.