There is a certain kind of fantasy basketball manager who sees one enormous box score and runs to the waiver wire like he smelled smoke in the kitchen. He drops a perfectly good player at 1 a.m. He adds someone whose name he’s still learning to spell. He refreshes the trade screen as if it owes him money.

I won’t say I am that manager. I’ll say we have a lot in common.

So it’s a dangerous week for people like us. On Sunday in Detroit, the Lakers played without Luka Dončić, who was ruled out with lower-back tightness, according to reports from the game. Austin Reaves scored 43, shooting 14-of-27 from the field and 11-of-11 from the line, and the Lakers won 121-116. That’s five wins in a row, and they’re 9-2.

Dončić, when he plays, has been doing something that barely seems allowed. Through nine games he was averaging 40.1 points, a start CBS Sports says only Wilt Chamberlain has matched. That run included four straight 40-point games and a 53-point night against Portland on Friday. NBC Sports’ latest Top 200 has moved him to No. 1.

That leaves a few decisions, roughly in order of how much they’ll keep you up at night.

First: don’t sell Luka high unless somebody pays you an absurd price.

The idea behind selling high is sound. You cash in a player while his numbers are inflated and before the averages come back to earth. Forty a night across a full season would be unprecedented, so some cooling is a fair bet. Even a cooled-off Dončić is still one of the handful of players every ranking board puts at the top.

What you’d actually get back is the problem. Nobody is sending you two first-round players for him, and if somebody is, please take that trade and tell no one. The back is a separate question that I’m in no position to answer. The Lakers haven’t said anything that would let me, and neither has your league’s group chat, whatever it thinks.

The verdict is to hold him. A trade has to clear an absurd bar to be worth making.

Second: Reaves isn’t a waiver-wire pickup, because he isn’t on your waiver wire.

If Reaves is sitting there unclaimed, close this page and add him. I’ll wait. In nearly every league, though, the real question is what Sunday means. Here it’s worth remembering that this isn’t new information. In October 2025, playing without Dončić in Sacramento, Reaves scored a career-high 51. When the Lakers’ main scorer sits, Reaves turns into the main scorer, and he’s good at it.

That makes the 43 a Luka-less number, not a new baseline. With Dončić back, it’s reasonable to expect the usual Reaves, which is still a very good player to have. Hold him, start him, and don’t send it to your rivals as a screenshot.

(If your first instinct after Sunday was to try to trade for him at midnight, you’re among friends.)

Third: if Luka sits again, stream the supporting cast. Don’t marry it.

The interesting names Sunday were further down the box score. Walker Kessler had 12 points, 16 rebounds and three blocks, and he leads the league in field-goal percentage at 71.6%, per SI. He’s likely rostered already in leagues that count blocks. Ziaire Williams scored 17 off the bench. He was rostered in about 6% of leagues when RotoBaller flagged him in Week 2, so in deeper formats he’s a reasonable one-week streamer when the Lakers are short-handed.

That’s a one-week plan, though. Once Dončić returns, those minutes and shots shrink, and you’ll be left with a Williams-shaped space on your roster and some explaining to do.

Fourth: read the injury report, not last night’s box score, before lock.

Monday’s game in Atlanta is the second night of a back-to-back. The AP’s pregame report listed Dončić as out with a back injury, and other previews called him questionable. When reports disagree like that, the honest move is to wait. If your platform locks lineups daily, check the official report close to tip. If it locks weekly, you’re choosing with less information, and it’s fine to admit that.

On the published schedule, the Lakers have three games this week: Monday at Atlanta, Wednesday at Milwaukee and Sunday at Phoenix. That’s three chances for Dončić to return and three chances for the Reaves question to come up again. For anyone watching the line, the AP preview had the Lakers as 2.5-point favorites with a total of 236.5 on Monday morning. Lines move, and they move fastest on injury news.

Fifth: if you want an actual fantasy basketball waiver wire add this week, look at guards who just got minutes.

Lakers aside, the more useful pickups are players whose roles grew because a teammate went out. In Charlotte, the Hornets announced Sunday that Kon Knueppel will be reevaluated in four weeks for a left hamstring strain, and Dennis Schröder will be reevaluated in two weeks for a hamstring strain of his own. Grayson Allen had already topped 34 fantasy points in two of three games before that news, according to RotoWire’s Friday column on Yahoo, where he was 35% rostered.

On the other side of Monday’s game, Atlanta’s Kingston Flemings had moved into the starting lineup and was averaging nearly 32 fantasy points over three games in under 26 minutes. He was rostered in 17% of leagues on Friday. Those percentages have probably gone up since, because other managers read the same columns you do.

There’s no guarantee either one keeps it up. Roles change, people get healthy, and coaches change their minds. They’re still the kind of add that costs you little if it doesn’t work.

Which brings us back to that manager, the one with the smoke alarm going off and the trade screen open. My advice to him is the same as my advice to myself: take a breath, keep Luka, keep Reaves, and spend your one impulsive move of the week on a guard with new minutes.

Then put the phone down. Or at least open the injury report first.