Kristaps Porziņģis climbed our board on a night that changed nothing, so here is what his 96th is really worth

Golden State beat Miami 120-100 on Thursday for its sixth straight win, and overnight a center who has not been with the team all season moved up seven places on our points board. Kristaps Porziņģis went from 103rd to 96th under ESPN's standard scoring and from 87th to 83rd on our 9-cat board, and we want to be plain that this movement means nothing. ESPN's injury list carries December 1 as his estimated return, our projections count the Warriors games left before that date, and each game Golden State plays takes one off the count, so his projected total rose from 42.2 games to 43.7 without anything happening to him.

The reporting points the other way. Shams Charania and Anthony Slater of ESPN reported on Wednesday that the Warriors have stopped paying his $20 million salary, having ruled that he is not rendering services, and Bleacher Report's summary of that report says he is leaning toward ending his career. Yahoo Sports reports that he is away from the team with recurring POTS symptoms, and that he released a statement last month saying he was working with doctors on a way back to better health. About 40% of ESPN teams still roster him, which is a lot of bench spots tied up in a player with no return in sight.

Why the number is wrong and the arithmetic is right

The line behind the rank is a healthy one, 18.6 points, 6.2 rebounds and 1.3 blocks in 27 minutes a game, and the only thing holding it down is the games count. That count rests on an estimated date rather than any report that he is coming back, and no outlet we read gives a timeline for him at all. The analysts' consensus has him 107th on points and 111th on 9-cat, which is lower than our board and still generous for a player who may not take the floor again. Read both as the price of a healthy Porziņģis, and nobody can roster that player right now.

A trade would not rescue him for fantasy purposes either. The Warriors have no plans to void the deal and want to keep their options open until the February 11 deadline, and Charania's reporting, as Bleacher Report relays it, frames the contract as something a rival could absorb to shed salary and then clear by buyout. The player is not disputing the withheld pay, according to Yahoo, and ESPN's Bobby Marks puts the cost to him at $218,341 a game.

Nobody inherits anything new

The usual reflex after news like this is to look for the man who gets the minutes, and here that search comes up empty, because Golden State has played all nine of its games without him. Whatever his absence opened up has already been handed out. The Warriors started Stephen Curry, Yaxel Lendeborg, Draymond Green, Brandin Podziemski and Will Richard on Thursday, and Curry recovered from a 2-of-10 first half to score 29 with six threes in 28 minutes, passing Oscar Robertson for 17th on the NBA's career scoring list, according to the Associated Press recap on ESPN. Green had a season-high 11 assists, and Lendeborg's 17 points, eight rebounds and six assists were worth 46 ESPN fantasy points in a game both veterans played, which matters given how his numbers split when they rest.

Charles Bassey is the nearest thing to a beneficiary. He had eight points, seven rebounds and three blocks in 14 minutes on Thursday, and across his last four games he has averaged 23.8 ESPN fantasy points, including a start against the Clippers on November 1 and 23 minutes against Phoenix on November 2. He also played just two minutes in each of two October games, so his role can vanish, and he is 252nd on our points board and 237th on our 9-cat board on 2.7% of ESPN rosters. In a 14-team league or deeper where blocks are the need, he is a reasonable last man on a roster. Al Horford is playing 18.6 minutes a game in the same frontcourt and stands 217th and 192nd, so he is not a pickup in a standard league.

There is one more thing to watch. Bleacher Report's roundup says Golden State hopes to use the contract to bring in a frontcourt player on an expiring deal, ideally by December 16, and a move like that would squeeze Bassey before it helped anyone else.

What to do

Drop Porziņģis in any league without a spare injured-reserve spot. If he sits in an IR slot that you are not using, leaving him there costs nothing today, but the first injury on your roster should send him to the wire. Do not hold him for a trade, and do not read our rank as a reason to wait, since that number will keep drifting upward by itself until ESPN's date changes.

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. Weighing a deal for one of them? Trade Winner, our NBA fantasy trade analyzer, prices both sides under your league’s scoring.