Foul trouble cost Karl-Anthony Towns and Isaiah Hartenstein on our board, and why we expect it back

The biggest moves on our boards after opening night were not about scoring. They were about minutes, because our projections read a player's role off his recent games and move it quickly, so one short night lowers his projected minutes, and with them every stat he produces. That is the right design for a coach's decision, and the wrong result when the short night came from fouls. Two of opening night's biggest fallers were centers whose minutes were cut by foul trouble: Karl-Anthony Towns, who picked up two fouls in the first three minutes and fifteen seconds against Philadelphia, and Isaiah Hartenstein, who finished with five fouls in 17 minutes against San Antonio.

Our projections do not currently tell foul trouble apart from a smaller role. A night missed through injury does not count against a player's minutes, but a night shortened by fouls does, so Towns and Hartenstein are both projected below where we think they really are. We expect both to recover within a week or two of normal games, and in the meantime both are better buys than their ranks suggest, especially if a league-mate is reading the same numbers.

Every player in this story is on the fantasy basketball rankings and the 2026-27 projections, and the NBA depth charts show where each one stands in his team’s rotation tonight.