Juan Gone?

As I told you in my last post, Juan Dixon looked like a great bet to put up nice fantasy numbers as a replacement for Larry Hughes.

In his first game after Hughes' injury, Dixon started, played 43 minutes, and gave a really nice performance with 19 points, 6 rebounds, 6 assists, 4 steals, and a three to cap it off. The nasty parts of his line were the parts you'd expect: 8-20 from the field (1-5 from three), 2-3 from the line, and 4 turnovers. All in all, this is a guy you wanted to start and would want to start for the duration of the injury.

But this production apparently isn't good enough for Wiz head coach Eddie Jordan, who told the press today that Jarvis Hayes will replace Juan Dixon in the starting lineup, because "there was no one to replace the spark that Juan usually gives when coming off the bench."

I hope that this leaves you scratching your head, as it does me. Apparently, Jordan went to the Flip Saunders school of coaching, which teaches that you should punish players for having good attitudes about coming off the bench, and reward those who have bad attitudes about coming off the bench (see: the recent benching of Wally Szczerbiak, playing incredibly well in starting role, in favor of the "mercurial" Latrell Sprewell... who I promptly added to my squad).

"It's nothing against Juan," said Jordan, "Juan's a great energy guy off the bench." That's outstanding. I think that's really intelligent, Eddie. Well done. Meanwhile, note that Jarvis Hayes has played shitty all season long because he has a thumb injury that won't "recover fully until he gets some rest in the offseason." Congrats, guys. Way to go. Get that production into the lineup.

In all seriousness, though, Jarvis Hayes probably won't offer you much this year. Not only is his thumb busted, he's just not that valuable a fantasy player. He does have the potential to score in bunches, and to rebound a little bit, but he won't give you any defensive numbers whatsoever, and as far as dropping dimes goes... forget about it.

He did have one ridiculous game this season, and it was recent (January 17):

32 10 20 50.0 5 7 71.4 2 2 100.0 0 4 4 0 1 2 0 0 27

That's: 32 minutes, 27 points on 50% shooting, 5 threes, 4 rebounds, 0 assists, 2 steals, 1 turnover. Not bad, not bad.

If he duplicates that line in the coming weeks, I'll be shocked. I would expect him to average about 13 points, 1.5 threes, 5.5 boards, 2.3 assists, 1.1 steals and 1.7 turnovers during his stretch as a starter, at a clip of about 40% from the field (if he's lucky), and 83% from the line.

It has its charms, I guess, but it's not Juan Dixon. It isn't that John Blaze shit.

It's a difficult situation because I don't want to drop Juan Dixon, nor do I want to pick up Jarvis Hayes. It could be a good idea to just cut bait with the both of them, and take Jason Hart for a spin, who is filling in for Brevin Knight, out with (surprise!) an ankle injury.

I'd recommend waiting and seeing on both Hayes and Dixon to see if Jordan changes his mind... Cross your fingers.