Daily Fantasy Basketball Stats Watch: Gorgui Dieng Has Been Unleashed Again

Basketball is a game of streaks. Whether it's wins or losses, makes and misses, or court time and bench time, the numbers can get skewed over small samples, and guys can sometimes just defy logic with a hot streak of shooting.

You can reap the benefits from a positive trend and weather the storm when the numbers are bad in season long basketball more often than not, but in daily fantasy basketball, you need to have a pulse on how things are changing.

These are some examples from the past few weeks of players whose stats are trending up or down.

Minutes

Up: Gorgui Dieng has been unleashed (again), and he's played 34.2 minutes in the past two weeks (seven games). That's up from his 25.1 minutes per game mark on the regular season. Wayne Ellington has played 9.2 more minutes per game in the past two weeks (29.4) than his season average (20.2). Dion Waiters has played 36.3 minutes per game over that span, an 8.2-minute boost from his regular season mark. Taj Gibson, thanks to a depleted Bulls' frontcourt, played 34.6 minutes per game, up a full 8 minute from his season total.

Down: Hassan Whiteside averaged 20.4 minutes per game in his three games in the past two weeks, down from 28.6 minutes on the regular season, so that's a situation to monitor for an uptick. Bradley Beal's minutes are down in his past seven games, as he's averaged 24.5 per game (and 31.6 on the season). In fairness, though, that number is marred by a nine-minute outing on January 25th. In his past six games, he's averaged 27.2 minutes.

Points

Up: Jeff Green has poured in 21.5 points per game over his last six contests, up 9.4 points per game from his 12.1 on the season. However, he has gone 0-for-5 from beyond the arc in his last two after shooting 11-for-21 from deep in the four games prior. Dieng, in his increased minutes, has scored 17.4 points, up from 9.2 on the year. Marvin Williams has scored 17.9 points in his past seven, up from 10.6 on the year. He's done that with a 14.1 percentage-point boost on his Effective Field Goal Percentage and a 5.9 percentage-point boost on his Usage Rate. Kevin Durant has averaged 34.8 points in his last six, the only player with greater than 30 points per game in the past two weeks. Rodney Hood (20.6 points), Wayne Ellington (12.3), Norris Cole (14.9), and Stanley Johnson (14.1) all saw increases of at least 5 points from their season average in the past two weeks.

Down: Wesley Matthews managed just 7.4 points per game in his past eight, down from an already not-great 12.0 points per game on the year. Former teammate Damian Lillard has been 4 points per game off his season average of 24.0 in the past six contests, a 5-1 stretch for Portland. Mike Conley's scoring average is down 3.5 points (to 11.0) in the past 6, a stretch during which Memphis was also 5-1.

Rebounds

Up: Aaron Gordon has averaged 9.9 boards in his past eight games, up from 5.8 on the regular season. Of course, he's taking advantage of a bigger role with the Magic. Nikola Jokic's boards are up 3.5 (to 9.5 per game) in his past eight games. DeAndre Jordan has somehow raised his 13.9 boards per game to 17.0 in his last seven, a 6-1 stretch for the Clippers. Dieng's boards are also up by 3 per game to 9.9 in the past two weeks. Both Russell Westbrook and Carmelo Anthony averaged 10.2 rebounds per game in the past two weeks.

Down: On the flipside from DeAndre Jordan, leading rebounder Andre Drummond averaged just 12.6 boards per game in his past eight contests, down from his season average of 14.9. Despite some promising outings for each recently, star power forwards LaMarcus Aldridge and Kevin Love saw a decline in boards in their past seven games each. Aldridge dropped 2.2 (from 8.5 to 6.3), and Love is down 2.1 (10.5 to 8.4).

Assists

Up: Norris Cole has also upped his assists to 5.9 per game in his past seven, and in lieu of scoring, Damian Lillard has averaged 10 dimes per game in his past six, up from 7.3 on the year. Similarly, Mike Conley has dished 8.5 assists per game in this span, up from 6.0 on the season. In addition to rebounds, Russell Westbrook also is adding to his helper number, posting a league-best 12.7 per game in the past two weeks of action. Joe Johnson has handed out 6.4 per game (compared to 4.0 on the year), and DeMarcus Cousins has 5.0 assists per game in his past seven, all losses for the Kings.

Down: Chris Paul's 9.4 assists per game are down to 7.4 in the past seven games, a dip of 2.0 per game. Reggie Jackson has an identical drop off, but he fell from 6.3 to 4.3 per game. All-Star Kyle Lowry's numbers fell from 6.2 to 4.7 in his past six, but Toronto was 5-1 in that span.

Fantasy Points

Up: Markieff Morris averaged 38.9 FanDuel points last week (three games) and 29.1 in his past seven. Of course, two of the seven featured fewer than 20 FanDuel points, and another two saw more than 40, so the production hasn't come evenly. Kobe Bryant averaged 44.4 FanDuel points last week (three games), as he saw more than 32 minutes in each contest. Nikola Jokic has averaged 32.8 FanDuel points per game in his past eight (two weeks). He topped 16 real points just once, and he's doing a lot of damage with rebounds and peripherals. 

Down: Ryan Anderson averaged 28.3 FanDuel points in his past two weeks but just 16.9 in his past four contests. He's 3-of-18 from beyond the arc in that four-game stretch. Robert Covington has averaged 14.4 FanDuel points in his last three contests (21.7 minutes per game). In his previous four games (33.8 minutes), he averaged 29.5 FanDuel points. Paul Millsap has averaged 29.8 FanDuel points in his past eight games and just 26.4 in his last six. However, in those last eight, he's averaging more than a FanDuel point per minute, an elite mark, and he's been hampered by three games of fewer than 30 minutes in that stretch.