Fish's Slippery Player Picks - 11/7 (YTD: 20-9)

We've hit a bit of a skid these past few days, but that was bound to happen at some point and we remain well and truly on the positive side of the ledger on the season overall. Couple to kick us off today.

Celtics @ Magic - Tristan da Silva over 7.5 points

I've been keeping a bit of an eye on da Silva over the past few games but have avoided pulling the trigger because of his inconsistency, but it's at the point now where it seems he's clearly taken a stride forward in his second season and will likely be exceeding this number (which is bang on what he averaged in his rookie season) more often than not. The German is averaging 11.9 points per game, and that's with a 0-point and 2-point effort. In five of his eight games he's scored at least 15 points, including three of his last four, and importantly he's not relying purely on an unsustainable three-point percentage - he's going at a very sustainable 41% and still passed this number in a game when he went 0-6 from long range, but is scoring plenty of his points from inside the arc too. He still makes me a little nervous because of his capacity to put up nothing games, but really that's only happened twice this season so I'm confident this is much better than a 50/50 proposition.

Pistons @ Nets - Michael Porter Jr over 7.5 rebounds

While it's been characterized by a little bit of inconsistency, Porter Jr has by and large had a really strong start to life as a Net. He's got a point to prove and a much bigger role on a much worse team than what he's been accustomed to, and career-highs relatively comfortably across all major statistical categories it's safe to say he's grabbing it with both hands. Importantly for us, he's also grabbing boards with both hands very regularly of late, racking up 37 of them at an average of 12.3 per game over his last three. He's snared at least 9 boards in each of those games, and I think there's good reason to believe he'll do that again in this one. His center in Nic Claxton is also in some strong form and is Porter Jr's main competition when it comes to snwatching rebounds, but Clax will have a big job to do keeping Jalen Duren - fresh off a 22-rebound performance - off the glass and will hopefully be spending a lot of his time boxing him out, rather than actually rebounding. With Isaiah Stewart also playing well and sharing the floor with Duren quite a lot, and Ausar Thompson running around, the Pistons have plenty of size, so expect Porter Jr to be tasked with getting his hands dirty under the rim in this game.