David Butler II- USA TODAY Sports
The New Orleans Pelicans’ back court has been thinned by injuries recently, with Jrue Holiday expected to miss at least a month with a stress fracture in his right tibia and Tyreke Evans continuing to deal with a left ankle issue. Evans missed a second straight game Monday night against the San Antonio Spurs, and Brian Roberts had a season-high 19 points (3-for-5 on three-pointers) along with four assists and four rebounds while playing more than 30 minutes for the second straight game.
Holiday is out for the foreseeable future and Evans may be in and out of the lineup until further notice, so should fantasy basketball owners be paying attention to Roberts?
After Monday night’s game, Roberts is averaging 11.7 points, 4.7 rebounds and 4.3 assists per game over the last three games while getting the start in all three contests and the expected increase in playing time associated with that (30.3 minutes per game). Widening things out a bit further, he is averaging 10.4 points, 3.3 assists and 2.7 rebounds per game over his last seven games, with four double figure scoring games in that stretch. As expected, all of the aforementioned numbers are above his season averages up to this point (6.3 points, 2.5 assists and 1.6 rebounds per game) and create some potential for solid production with more playing time coming.
Roberts is worth adding in deeper leagues, particularly for owners who are now without Holiday, and he is available in 84 percent of Yahoo! leagues right now. But his value from here to the end of the season is hard to determine, at least until Holiday’s recovery timetable is more clearly defined, and without starter-level minutes Roberts would go back to being waiver wire fodder fairly quickly.
Brad Berreman is a Senior Writer at Rant Sports.com. Follow him on Twitter @bradberreman24 or connect with him on Google +.
