Arron Afflalo  – TREND

The buzz on Afflalo is that he was somewhat of a late bloomer in terms of getting it together on the offensive end of the court.

He was drafted as a potential 3 and D guy by the Pistons, but didn’t really get a chance to shine until his second season in Denver. Having gone through Denver to Orlando and now landing back in Denver, Spell Check has gotten it going over his last four games to the tune of 17.8 points, 2.5 rebounds, 2.3 assists, 3.3 threes, just 0.8 turnovers and a very useful 50% from the floor on 13.5 field goal attempts. While his defensive stats are continually poor, he doesn’t turn the ball over and he’ll generally hit his free throws at a high clip, making him a useful player to pair with someone like Rajon Rondo, who is strong in the counting stats but abhorrent in terms of shooting the ball.

Even if Afflalo is dealt to a contender (quite likely) – you can expect him to stay strong at what he’s good at, as he’s comfortable in his role and he doesn’t try to do things he simply can’t.

Terrence Ross – MIRAGE

It’s not that Ross’ good start is a mirage, it’s that I can’t see him carving out a rosterable (made up word, I know) spot on competitive fantasy teams. Sure, he’s a safe plug for deep, i.e. 14+ team leagues where you’re choosing between adding Vince Carter, C.J Miles or stashing Jodie Meeks (don’t, he’s likely out at least another month), but he’s not going to help you in more than 2-3 categories.

The 51 point explosion last year was an aberration. To put it in perspective he’d scored 48 TOTAL points in the six games leading up to it, while it took him the five games after it to total more than 51.

This is a streaky player, and not the James Johnson or Corey Brewer type who can block 4 shots one game or grab 6 steals in another – threes are everywhere. For every good 6-11 performance he has, there’s a 1-5 or 2-7 outing soon after it.

Courtney Lee – TREND

Courtney Lee is another SG who has bounced around the league, as this current Grizz unit is his fifth team in just six seasons.

He’s a rock solid defender, better than advertised athlete and he’s a very capable outside shooter. Basically he’s the perfect SG to compliment the grounded Grizzlies beef up front and grit in the form of Tony Allen. Coming into the season not many picked Lee to start for the Grizz, even fewer likely thought he’d be nine games into the season and shooting 57% from the field, 92% at the line and knocked down two threes at a league leading 62.1% clip! He’s doing it, the Grizz are winning a lot of games, and this is most definitely a trend considering his career stats when he has gotten minutes. In 228 career starts, Lee’s stats are mirroring what he’s currently doing: around 12 points, a couple of rebounds and assists and over one steal and one three per game with 85% at the line and 45% from the field. As long as he’s healthy and the team is rolling, there is no reason to suspect he’s going to drop off too much (I say too much, because he can’t possibly sustain those video game shooting percentages).

Dion Waiters – TREND

Yes, a trend can be both good and awful.

The problem for Waiters is, what he’s good at, isn’t needed on this star-studded Cavs team. He isn’t a good or even really an average defender, nor is he particularly adept at knocking down the outside shot or creating for team-mates, but he can score in bunches. Don’t be surprised if Waiters is moved for more veteran pieces as the Cavs look to fill the holes currently littering their roster, at which point you can re-evaluate him for fantasy purposes in case he lands in the ideal spot to produce (the 76ers?).

He’s actually shown some signs of life over his last three games, averaging 11.7 points, 4.0 assists, a crazy 2.7 steals, 1.0 three as well as just 1.0 turnover per game.

There’s upside there especially in PTS/3s/STL, but he’s surrounded by superior talent on the Cavaliers.

Kentavious Caldwell-Pope – MIRAGE

I’m still hanging on desperately to the back of the KCP bandwagon – the talent is there with this kid and so is the opportunity with Jodie Meeks still on the shelf.

He’s getting plenty of minutes manning the SG spot but he’s done little other than knock down some threes, cause SVG to pull more hair out, and make fantasy owners question every ‘expert’ who picked KCP as a sleeper! He’s a good defender, was a former lottery pick, has a structurally sound jump-shot and his coach seems to like him – all recipes for success in theory, but KCP has to put these traits into practice.

Still, as a 21 year old on a rather ‘unbalanced’ team, KCP could be doing a lot worse than 11.8 points, 3.6 rebounds and 1.9 threes per game – just don’t look at his percentages or any other statistic or you’ll see he’s been hanging out with Josh Smith too much.

As always we welcome your feedback, so feel free to hit me up on Twitter (@macetastic) and I’ll do my best to reply to any comments.