Day 20: A fantastical fantasy basketball blog post, featuring Mo Williams

(Illustration courtesy of Timothy McAuliffe/ESPN)

Hey, y'all. Gonna keep it brief today, since there were only three games on the docket yesterday, and I'd quite frankly like to celebrate the occasion by keeping the writing to a minimum for once. The providing-fantasy-analysis part of a daily fantasy basketball blog is actually the easy part; it's the writing-everyday part that's the horrible, colossal barricade.

Burnout strikes every writer at some point, no matter how slovenly in love they are with their subject. It's nearly impossible to write about the same thing over and over again without getting sick of it, which is why I'm allowing myself the safety valve of getting to keep it brief today. The Dailies are a marathon, and the best way to keep my mind fresh-ish is to stave from the keyboard when it's not absolutely necessary.

(Boy, those were two pretty self-serving paragraphs, huh. Like, I can't imagine anyone but me was interested in that at all. Oh well.)

I've finally caught up to The Walking Dead, so I'll be concocting a big ole review of it in the next couple days. Teaser: I despise Andrea with a fiery passion. Also, if you find the title of this post curious, it's because I'm trying to woo Google into raising the site's page rank when you search for "fantasy basketball blog." Shamelessly cramming those words into the headline of a post may not do much of anything in the long run. But... you never know... Google is weird.

All right. Let's tackle some NBA fantasy basketball stuff!

• Nicolas Batum had a terrific game in Toronto, scoring 24 points to go along with 5 three's, 6 rebounds and 4 assists. His numbers are almost all up from where they were a year ago, which is mighty impressive considering how good he was last season.
• Mo Williams played 33 minutes for the Blazers and chipped in with 13 points, 7 assists and 5 rebounds off the bench. After being more or less invisible in the first part of the year, Williams has begun to carve out a comfortable role as a scoring sixth man (as he did in Los Angeles), and he's absolutely worth a pick-up for those in need of a guard. Not only does he have dual eligibility, and not only are his percentages so good that he'll never hurt you, he's on the precipice of being substantially more valuable than he currently is. Right now, he's only able to get playing time because Terry Stotts likes to go to a smaller lineup where Williams replaces Robin Lopez. BUT... if Damion Lillard or Wesley Matthews were to go down with an injury, then good lord could Williams be valuable. And here's the thing: considering just how many minutes Stotts is having his starters log, I think it's more likely than not that one of Batum, Matthews or Lillard will suffer an injury of some consequence. Granted, that's pure speculation and should be taken with a massive grain of salt, but hey, that's what I do.
• Rudy Gay had an odd statline on Sunday: 30 points, 10 rebounds, and zero assists. Gay has been given free reign with the Raptors to do whatever the hell he wants, which is mostly a good thing for fantasy purposes. The problem, though, is that he's becoming something of a ball-hog, which is a notable statistical deficiency. In his last 74 minutes of game time, Gay has recorded 1 assist.
• Kyle Lowry was great, posting a line of 10 points, 10 assists, 7 rebounds and 4 steals against Portland. There's no dispute that Lowry is one of the best all-around point guards in the NBA when he's healthy. Unfortunately, Lowry is as injury-ridden as anyone in basketball, to the extent that Dwight Buycks should be on everyone's watch list due to the high likelihood that Lowry will suffer an injury at some point.
• Tony Allen's productive season continued, with the Grizzlies' guard getting 12 points, 5 rebounds, 4 assists and 2 steals. The primary reason to own Allen is for his ability to steal the ball; everything else he contributes is pure gravy. He's playing well enough that he should be owned in most leagues, but he's just a rental player until either someone better comes along or Allen starts to have trouble scoring again.
• Brandon Jennings somehow managed to hoist up 22 shots against the Lakers and make only 8 of them AND STILL finish with 14 assists, in a game his Pistons happened to lose by 15. I seriously don't know how Jennings came up with that statline, but it's nonetheless a good one for his owners -- bad shooting aside. Jennings has returned from his early season injury with a vengeance and should be a great source of scoring at the point guard position the rest of the way.
• Jordan Hill had 24 points and 17 rebounds for the Lakers. If you're in any competitive league, Hill has probably been owned for a while now. Still -- if for some reason he's still out there, pick him up without reservation.
• Steve Blake is absolutely flourishing in a Mike D'Antoni offense where he doesn't have to cede the ball to Kobe Bryant. The veteran point guard got 9 points, 4 steals and 16 assists -- his fourth straight game of at least 10 dimes. He's a must-own player while Kobe and Steve Nash are out of commission, and is likely to maintain some of this value even when one or two of them return. That said: this is excellent time to sell high on him, just because it's going to be next to impossible for him to get this many assists when Kobe comes back.
• The Sacramento Kings got annihilated by the Grizzlies on Sunday, and DeMarcus Cousins and the other Kings starters were benched for most of the second half, which resulted in Boogie producing only 9 points and 5 rebounds. Cousins, sometimes for reasons not of his own, is still prone to dud performances like this. But he's money in the bank and puts up elite stats in between the occasional bad outings.
• I neglected to mention that Andray Blatche had 19 points and 8 rebounds on Saturday for the Nets, who are so banged up right now that they only had one regular starter (Joe Johnson) healthy for Saturday's game. Brook Lopez, who's hurt with a sprained ankle, could be out of commission for a few games, which opens the door for Blatche to work his magic. Blatche -- as Wizards fans know all too well -- is perhaps the least shy basketball player in the entire league and is a shoo-in to put up good numbers so long as he's in the Brooklyn starting five. If you're interested in someone who can help you this week, Blatche isn't a bad option at all.
• People who say goodnight on Twitter amuse me.