The importance of minutes played in relation to fantasy production has been debated and discussed plenty over the past few years. While an uptick in minutes is certainly a good thing for a player’s chances at producing additional fantasy stats, the extent of the impact that is felt by a change in minutes varies greatly from player to player.
Certain players have a strong correlation between an increase in minutes and fantasy points, while others may see a minimal increase in fantasy production when given a few extra minutes per game. Looking even deeper, an increase in minutes can be more meaningful from player to player based more on the team that they play for than the player themselves.
For example, a four-minute increase per game could be extremely meaningful for a player on a team that plays at a fast pace and has a greater amount of possessions each game, while that same four minutes may not produce a noticeable impact on the fantasy production of a player on a slower-paced team – give this article a read if you’re looking to dig into this idea further.
Taking all of this into account, any time we see a player receive a change in playing time over a stretch longer than a game or two, we should be taking note. Each week in the space below I’ll take a look at a few players that have had a noticeable change in playing time – whether positive or negative – throughout the past week or two. I’ll attempt to flesh out the reason(s) behind the change, determine if this change has been correlating into an increase or decrease in fantasy production, and how long we can expect this change in playing time to continue.
In addition to this, I’ll go through the leaders in minutes by position, based upon DraftKings player position eligibility, and examine what these huge minute totals mean for some of the league leaders at each position.
The Good
Patrick Beverley
Despite a very disappointing start to his season, Patrick Beverley has rebounded in a nice way lately. After losing his starting point guard job to Ty Lawson and struggling with his new role off of the bench, Beverley was forced to miss time due to a concussion and ankle injury early in the season. Lucky for him, when your starting point guard is Ty Lawson, the old adage of “absence makes the heart grow fonder” couldn’t be truer. As the Rockets slowly realized Lawson was not going to be the answer at the point, they briefly turned to the 38-year old Jason Terry before realizing their mistake and handing the reigns of this team back over to Beverley. With his old job back-in-hand, he has flourished.
Over the past six games as a starter, Beverley has crushed his implied point total every night.
By utilizing Fantasy Labs’ Trends tool, not only can we can see that when Beverley has been projected for at least 28 minutes over the past couple of seasons, he’s been very successful. But by using the tool, we’re also able to see that tonight’s game meets these conditions, with Beverley projected to total 28.2 minutes.
Not only is he averaging a respectable 23.84 DraftKings (DK) points in these games, he’s exceeding his implied point total in 67% of them. Comparing this to a league average of 57% for the point guard position in comparable game situations, we can see that Beverley is a player that we can expect to see a nice increase in value whenever the minutes are there.
Look no further than Beverley’s defensive prowess – as he is not a volume scorer, peripheral stats tend to be his most consistent source of DK points – to account for his increased output when his minutes have risen. Since reassuming his role as the starter, he has averaged two steals and a block per game. Prior to that, Beverley had only managed 0.63 steals and 0.13 blocks per game off the bench. While his career averages as a starter fall in between both ends of this spectrum, it is clear that Beverley’s production does see a bump when he’s on the court more. As the starter over the previous two seasons – and accounting for the poor play of the other options the coaching staff have considered – there’s no reason to assume we’ll see a significant change in role for Beverley over the coming weeks.
Unfortunately the pricing algorithms over at DraftKings have also taken notice, as his price has risen $1,000 over the past week. While still not necessarily overpriced, Beverley’s new price tag of $4,700 puts his implied point total at 20.33 DK points. Certainly not out of reach for him based upon his historical production, but his low usage rate – 14.7% on the season – will make it tough for him to continue exceeding his value on a nightly basis if his price continues to rise. Still, if you need room to roster a star or two in your lineup, Beverley is a nice value option compared to others around his price point.
The Bad
Eric Gordon
With the New Orleans backcourt riddled with injuries early in the season, Gordon was getting all of the minutes he could handle. However, as his backcourt mates have slowly made their way back into the lineup, Gordon’s playing time and production have taken a hit.
With Norris Cole and Tyreke Evans returning to the lineup four games ago, we’ve witnessed a complete upheaval in the backcourt rotation. Early season starter Ish Smith has found his role reduced to the point that he’s barely getting off of the bench, while Cole (22.3 mins/gm) and Evans (28.8 mins/gm) are seeing substantial minutes. With Jrue Holiday still working his way back (24.0 mins/gm), the changes with this rotation may not even be done yet.
Though the previous four game totals do include a blowout loss that cost Gordon some playing time, the writing appears to be on the wall in New Orleans. Even prior to the return of Cole and Evans, Gordon’s minutes had been gradually decreasing over the past couple of weeks, along with his production.
Barring another injury to this backcourt, it’s difficult to imagine Gordon getting back to averaging minutes in the mid-30’s on a nightly basis for the foreseeable future. With his price at $5,300 and falling, he is not necessarily out of play, but until we’ve got a better idea of how these minutes may play out on a nightly basis, you may want to look elsewhere.
The Minutes Leaders
This week we see Blake Griffin make his way into the top three at power forward, with Kevin Love falling out. Griffin has been great this year, and even more so at home – where he’s averaging over 35 minutes per game.
We’ve seen his minutes drop to roughly 32 minutes per game in road tilts and his production has taken a hit when this occurs. While still early in this season, this split certainly warrants monitoring.
Last night’s dud in a blowout loss to Boston notwithstanding, Anthony Davis appears to have gotten over his early season struggles and has logged big minutes lately, which have correlated into some elite production. In the four games preceding last night’s loss, Davis had averaged 41.63 minutes and 59.5 DK points per game. For the first time all year, his arrow appears to be pointing up.
