December 9, 2016

Milos Zvekic's buy low, sell high trade advice for Week 7 of fantasy NBA. His buy/hold/sell recommendations for Marc Gasol and Ricky Rubio in fantasy basketball leagues.

Life is full of ups and downs. All of us have our good days and our bad. That is especially true in professional sports and therefore in NBA basketball. Hot and cold streaks are inevitable. If fantasy basketball owners read into them the right way, and use them wisely in their trade politics, that could certainly be a deciding factor come fantasy playoffs.

Below is my Week 7 fantasy basketball buy low and sell high candidates. We will be looking into players overachieving and underachieving, why that is and weather it is going to change. Also what you should look to get in return for those hot players or what kind of offer should tempt a disgruntled owner of a "buy low" target. Here are a couple of suggestions on who you should be looking to "sell high" or get at a discount.

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Buy Low, Sell High Advice for Week 7

Are You for Real, Marc Gasol?

Now first of all, let me kick this one off by saying I'm a big fan of Marc Gasol. He is a consistent fantasy stud. His career averages testify to that. 14.5 PTS on 50.1 FG%, 7.7 REB, 0.9 STL and 1.5 BLK in 34 minutes per game through out his 9 seasons (including games played so far this season) are nothing short of a 2nd or 3rd round pick. Add to that out of position assists of 3.1 per game, which have gone up to almost 4 per game in the last five seasons and the fact he has been shooting his free throws at around the 80% clip for that same period, you could say Gasol ages like fine wine.

This season Marc has been returning top 30 value, despite being ranked at around 50. Furthermore, he is killing it in the last week and my Yahoo! 10-cat league (double double's are the 10th cat in addition to regular 9-cat leagues) has him ranked at number five in the last 7 days! And deservedly so! He is averaging 27.3 PTS on 50.0% shooting from the field along with 8.8 REB, 5.8 AST, 1.5 STL and 1.3 BLK. He is even hitting 2.0 3-pointers in his four games in that period and is on 1.6 for the season, which is a "slight" bump in that category after hitting 0.0 threes in all of his 8 previous seasons.

But be wary!

These crazy stats are coming in while the Grizzlies are more banged up than ever. Mike Conley went down with a back injury a couple of weeks ago and is expected to return in a month, month and a half. Zach Randolph has taken some time off due to his mother's passing and has been back for just the last two games. Furthermore, Z-Bo is averaging only 22 minutes per game this season, down from 30 in his previous one. Chandler Parsons has also been out for the most part of this season. To add to Memphis' misery, backup starter James Ennis and the veteran presence from the bench that is Vince Carter also picked up injuries. All that extra time and space allowed Gasol to up his usage percentage to 30.4 in his five games in the month of December. That is a huge bump from 23.9 he was getting in the 2015-2016 season. It's bound to go down, along with the rest of his ridiculous stats when some of the injured players return.

Moreover, Gasol is just a month and a half away from his 32nd birthday. Now age might not slow a player down, just ask Tim Duncan. Or better yet, Marc's own brother Pau Gasol, who is 4 years older and was actually in the top 20 in 9 cat leagues last season and is returning value at around 75th pick this season even with playing just 26 minutes in Gregg Popovich's rotation. In addition to age, there is also the injury risk. Although Marc has missed more than 20 games just twice in his previous 8 seasons in the NBA, those two times both came in the last three years.

So if you are a cautious owner expecting Gasol's stats to go down, or even him to go down with an injury himself, or would just like to use his recent extraordinary play to get great value in exchange, this is the right time to try and trade him.

Depending on your preferences and who your trade partner is you might be able to get anyone from C.J. McCollum or Blake Griffin all the way up to Kemba Walker, Kyle Lowry or someone else from around the 20th pick in the preseason drafts in exchange for a red, hot, chilly Marc. Of course, if you believe his streak will continue and that there is no slowing the "younger" Gasol down, you wouldn't be too crazy just to keep him.

Baller Move: Sell high

Time to Panic on Ricky Rubio?

While Marc Gasol is going nuts, his younger colleague from the Spain national team is in a slump.

Ricky Rubio is a borderline cut candidate in standard formats, and his performances of late aren't helping that change at the moment. He is averaging 6.4 PTS with 0.6 3PM, 6.5 AST, 3.8 REB, 1.5 STL and 0.1 BLK on the season while turning the ball over 1.9 times, shooting an awful 34.4% from the field and hitting 77.8% of his free throws. And his shooting is even worse in the last seven days with him scoring just 5.8 PTS on an abysmal 25.9 FG%. His steals are also down, he stripped his opponents just three times in those four games. At least the other stats are on a small rise. He is averaging 6.8 AST, 4.5 REB, 0.8 3PM and 0.5 BLK with his TO down to 1.3 per game and his FT% up to a decent 85.7% in that same period.

He suffered an elbow injury at the start of this season which kept him out of five games and one could argue that he is still getting comfortable and that the injury is the reason why his already poor shooting is even worse this season. But it's been a month since he's been back and the improvement still hasn't come. It's worth mentioning here that Rubio only shoots 5.5 field goals per game, so it's not too hurtful for your fantasy team.

Now lets be honest. Whoever took Rubio in the draft didn't take him for his sharpshooting. His output in assists and steals are what got owners interested, and although they're both down this season compared to his career averages of 8.2 AST and 2.2 STL, Rubio is still helping out decently in those two categories as mentioned in the averages above.

His minutes are safe at around 30 per game. Even though there had been chatter before the season that rookie Kris Dunn might tap into Ricky's playing time, he failed to capitalize on the run he got while Rubio was injured so it's hard to believe he will take over the job now that Rubio is back.

Rubio was a constant double double threat last season when he averaged 10.1 PTS and 8.6 AST along with 4.3 REB and 2.1 STL. If he can get his shot back a little his confidence will come up too, and those last seasons averages, which had him ranked around 40 in standard leagues, wouldn't be out of reach.

If your team needs some help in assists or steals, maybe some out of position rebounds, and you don't mind the low-volume, low-percentage FG% you might be able to get Rubio from his current owner for one of your late round picks like Bismack Biyombo, Marcus Morris or even Dario Saric.

Baller Move: Hold or buy low