The Art of B.S.

Streaking and Peaking

Dajuan Wagner – Paul Silas changes his roster more often than Paris Hilton changes boyfriends. The lineup is still being tweaked around for His Majesty, King James. Jeff McInnis is now the starting point guard so James can play off the ball. Here’s another switch you should make, Paul: make James small forward so Wagner can start as a shooting guard. He had a pretty good rookie season last year (when healthy) and he is returning to form after his injury. Wagner’s minutes (28) and points (17.0) are way up over the last three games.

Caron Butler – Another forgotten rookie of last year finally returns to prominence for a terrible team. The bulk of the small forward starts go to Butler who is now doing something with those minutes. He reached double digits for the first time on December 27, and has done so all but four times since then. His January points-per-game is up to 10.5 and he is a top-three scoring option as long Dwayne Wade is out. Butler is currently in a five-game streak of playing at least 35 minutes, easily his best streak of its kind this season.

Keith Bogans – With all the great rookies of 2003-04, Bogans understandably gets overlooked. And, of course, just when he was getting hot, he bumps into Yao (which is probably what he said when he bruised his leg: “Yow!” – never mind). Bogans is listed as day-to-day, but before his injury he started 12 consecutive games, his first starts since November. Over that time (excluding his last game when he injured himself) he averaged 12.5 points.

Steve Blake – He lost his starts to Brevin Knight, but his production is going up. Knight is passing the ball a little better, but Blake gets his fair share of assists and scores more. Over the past eight games, Blake is averaging 10.8 points per game. He’s also getting 4.9 assists per outing over that span. Without Gilbert Arenas, Blake is giving hope to all those scrappy, white point guards who always hear, “Well, he makes a good college player.”

Juan Dixon – Dixon and Blake must think they are back at Maryland. With Blake getting hot, Dixon is starting to recover from a particularly cool period from late December to mid-January. The past six games have been good to Juan, scoring 15.8 points per game. Larry Hughes finally succumbed to injury and had to sit out against Portland, letting Juan Dixon start and play a career-high 45 minutes for a career-high 30 points. Hughes is possibly going to be out for a few more games, so Fear the Turtle.