Fantasy Basketball: Fallout of a Denver Trade that Hasn’t Happened Yet

As the entire NBA awaits Carmelo departure from Denver, we wonder what the fallout will be. It slightly depends on if ‘Melo goes to New Jersey as expected, it depends on which of the following players it uses – Devin Harris, Al Harrington, Chauncey Billups, Derrick Favors, Rip Hamilton, Troy Murphy, or Nicholas Batum. Obviously all of these players’ values will change with a trade, but let’s try to get a headstart on the fantasy impact of the possible trade by looking at the players who will not get traded.

Ty Lawson: If Billups leaves, Lawson will receive a bump, even in Devin Harris comes over to Denver. The Nuggets have expressed their interest in making TyLaw their future, and moving Billups will give them an opportunity to test out TL. Beyond just enjoying shortening his name each time I write it, I enjoy Lawson’s 17 PPG, 6 APG, with 1 SPG and 1.6 3PG on 53.3% FG shooting in his 5 starts. Lawson has always had great efficiency stats that improve drastically when he starts (Last year he shot 56.7% from the field in 8 starts). Even if Devin the Dude is starting for the Nuggets, they will give Lawson more minutes and might put Devin at SG sometimes. He’s nearly a necessary pickup at this point as he is only owned in 25% of leagues.

J.R. Smith and Arron Afflalo: With Carmelo gone it seems obvious that J.R. and Arron will see increased touches and be scoring in the 20s. They look primed to do what Nick Young did with Arenas gone, but the Nuggets are weird. The Nugs have looked really interested in Batum. Both players are unnecessarily owned in around 60% of leagues, and I expect those numbers to rise with Melo leaving, but the truth is that they will still have spread out time and touches between the two and whoever gets brought in (probably Batum) and nobody will average more than 15 pts with just under 2 threes. Considering thats what these players are best at, that’s not that great.

Kris Humphries: With the addition of blocks to his box score, Humphries has become a genuine fantasy player – a person that should be owned in every league. If Derrick Favors and Troy Murphy both leave, that can only mean more minutes and more double doubles for the double double machine.

Tracy McGrady and Ben Gordon: In a similar situation to Denver and what happened in Washington, one player may be leaving a three person lineup. Rip Hamilton has been averaging around 20 minutes of late, and if he leaves some of those minutes will go to Will Bynum and Rodney Stuckey, but also a significant percentage will go to the two players who were supposed to be battling for point leader, but instead are competing for 20 minutes on one of the worst teams in the NBA. McGrady has been an assist machine lately, and Gordon with minutes makes threes, so if RipHam leaves, I’d pick them both up.

Rudy Fernandez: If Baby Face Batum leaves Portland then operation replace Brandon “Bones as Brittle as a Boy” Roy comes down to Wesley Matthews and Fernandez. He’s already averaging over 20 minutes a game, and those 38 minutes that Batum has been hogging are going to have to go to somebody. Rudy will be averaging 20 PPG, 5.5 APG, 2 steals and 2 threes, which are great numbers for a waiver pickup. Of course this is all dependent on if Batum leaves.

Travis Outlaw, Anthony Morrow, Stephen Graham, Sasha Vujajic: All those claims that these players could come to fantasy relevance will be shattered if Melo joins their team. Only Outlaw has a chance to still be productive because he’s least reliant on points to maintain his fantasy prowess. Melo will be eating up all of these kids’ minutes and points.

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