Each and every Wednesday, we are going to be providing players that you should not only look to acquire via trade but also players you should look to trade away.
Going forward, where fitting, with the data that we’ve seen so far, we’ll build in potential trade scenarios for those you should look to acquire and those you should look to move.
Let’s get to it, and happy NBA season.
Trade For
To pull back the curtain a bit here, on Tuesday, I start this column by listing the names of the players I want to focus on this week. I had Johnson here, and then he went out and dropped 29 points – with seven three-pointers – in Tuesday’s win over the Timberwolves.
It may be a little bit harder to trade for him after that, but he’s ranked No. 129 even after that performance. After starting out slow, it’s his third straight game with 16 or more points, and he’s hit 12 triples in his last two games.
With Deandre Ayton out, Johnson is the third option in a high-scoring offense. He’s played 30 minutes or more in three of his last four games and registered 27 in the fourth game.
What’s more, Johnson’s 59.3 eFG% is tied with Tyrese Haliburton and higher than the likes of Kevin Durant and Joel Embiid. He’s still cheap – I just got him as a throw-in in a deal, but he won’t be cheap for long.
Players to trade for him that are ranked higher:
Collin Sexton, Julius Randle, Isaiah Stewart, Kyle Kuzma
Trade Away
I was annoyed that LeVert had his come-back-to-Earth game before this column was published, because he was the player who I really wanted to highlight the most.
After dropping an out-of-nowhere 41 points, LeVert followed it up with a one-point performance against the Knicks.
But the scoring isn’t what I’m worried about. We’ve seen these spurts from LeVert before.
It’s the assists that you should be looking to cash in on.
As of this writing, Darius Garland is questionable for Wednesday’s game against the Celtics, which means that you’re running out of time to get something of value for LeVert. On the season, LeVert is averaging 6.7 assists per game due to Garland being out for all but a handful of minutes this year.
LeVert ranks in the 95th percentile in AST% at 26.8. That’s his highest number outside of a four-game sample in 2020 with the Nets. Beyond that, you’d have to go back to 2017-2018 to find him in the 26% range.
The offense will flow differently with Garland back, and LeVert will be the odd-man out.
LeVert is just outside the top 100 right now, but 150 is more likely for him.
Players to trade for him that are ranked lower:
Keegan Murray, Zach LaVine, Jerami Grant, John Wall
Trade For
This isn’t a fun or even a sexy pick, but with everything that is going wrong with the Nets – that’s an evergreen statement, tbh – it’s not hard to imagine a situation where Kyrie Irving isn’t with the team much longer.
Now, a lot of that will depend on who they can get back in a trade – we saw this offseason that there is essentially no market for him – but if that doesn’t include a point guard, it could be Sous Chef Curry season soon in Brooklyn.
Curry made his debut last week after getting a late start to the season, but we saw him play right around 30 minutes per night on average, and one would have to assume that he’d take over the lead guard duties over Patty Mills. Well, unless the Nets deploy Ben Simmons there.
He’s more of a high-floor player, but he can score in bunches and help you with threes on the cheap.
Players to trade for him that are ranked higher:
Evan Fournier, Chris Duarte, Moses Moody
Trade Away
This one hurts because he’s put together a fantastic season so far. Fox ranks No. 36 on the year with 24.5 points, two threes, six rebounds, 4.8 assists, and 1.5 STOCKs per game.
The issue is, though, that he just got diagnosed with a bone bruise on his right knee.
Catastrophic? Hardly, especially when considering it could have been an ACL or an Achilles. But this is the same injury that Fred VanVleet dealt with last year in the second half when we saw his production dip by a ton. It also lingered so much that it caused his ADP to be lower than it normally would be this year.
I’m optimistic that Fox won’t have the same issues with it, but I like to be injury averse, so I’m OK moving Fox for top-50ish value.
Players to trade for him that are ranked lower:
Jrue Holiday, Jordan Poole, Anthony Edwards, Anfernee Simons
Other Players to trade for:
Jalen Williams (SG/SF – OKC)
Tre Jones (PG – SAS)
Jalen Smith (PF – IND)
Kevin Huerter (SF – SAC)
Other Players to trade away:
Jalen McDaniels (SF/PF – CHA)
Dennis Smith Jr. (PG/SG – CHA)
Jordan Clarkson (PG/SG – UTA)
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Michael Waterloo is a featured writer at FantasyPros. For more from Michael, check out his archive and follow him @MichaelWaterloo.
