February 9, 2018

Justin Carter looks at fantasy basketball risers and fallers for Week 18 of the NBA season. These can be lineup sleepers and busts for your fantasy NBA teams.

The trade deadline hit big time on Thursday, with a ton of players changing teams and a ton of other players impacted by those moves, so I thought it would be a good idea to do a special edition of this week's risers and fallers column that focuses exclusively on how the deadline deals matter from a fantasy perspective. Who benefits? Who doesn't?

Of course, this means you're missing out on hearing about players around the rest of the league, so here's a quick bonus pick for y'all: Jusuf Nurkic is coming alive for Portland lately. He's putting the ball in the bucket, grabbing rebounds, and blocking shots. I like what I'm seeing from him.

Let's take a look at some potential risers and fallers heading into Week 18 of the NBA season. What players are improving? Which aren't? Do we know these things? Let's find out. Note: Isaiah Thomas is not on either list because he is a mystery at this point. He could rise or fall depending on how he takes to a role coming off the Lakers bench.

Week 18 Fantasy Basketball Risers

RISER - George Hill (G, CLE)

Hill gets out of Sacramento and heads to Cleveland, where he'll take over the starting point guard role from Isaiah Thomas. Hill currently leads the league in three point field goal percentage despite playing on a Kings team without many weapons. He'll now be playing next to LeBron James and will likely see a lot more space, which should keep his shooting numbers up. Keep this in mind too: the Kings had been reducing Hill's playing time over the past few weeks, which lowered his fantasy stock. He should be back to his old self pretty quickly.

RISER - Jordan Clarkson (G, CLE)

While we're looking at Cleveland, there's Jordan Clarkson, who goes from a bench scorer for the Lakers to a bench scorer for the Cavaliers. Clarkson's role in Los Angeles was always a little up in the air--he was a little too old to have a long term future there, so we'd seen minute fluctuations at times, from times when it looked like Clarkson wouldn't have a key role on the team and played under twenty minutes to 30 or more minutes in some recent games. Make no mistake, though: the looming return of Lonzo Ball would have cut into Clarkson's playing time. Now, he'll be taking lots of shots off Cleveland's bench. He's probably less a "riser" and more of a "now won't be a faller in two weeks," but whatever! Close enough!

RISER - Elfrid Payton (G, PHO)

I'm just, like, picturing in my head all the passes that Elfrid Payton--who is 10th in the NBA in assist percentage--is going to make to Devin Booker. Payt0n averages 6.3 assists per game on the season, but I can see that number going up in Phoenix. Aside from Orlando having Aaron Gordon, Phoenix has more weapons for Payton to work with. I'm also not expecting to see much drop off in his own scoring potential.

RISER - Doug McDermott (F, DAL)

McDermott doesn't really do much but be tall and shoot threes, but that's okay because he's heading to a Dallas team that can afford to let him do that! McDermott should be given a more consistent role on the Mavericks after spending much of the season playing wildly inconsistent minutes on a Knicks team that doesn't fully make sense right now. Dallas will want to see if McDermott has a place on the team moving forward, which means he'll see the court more and should up his three point attempts to an amount that makes him a sleeper pick-up in deeper formats.

RISER - Tyreke Evans (G, MEM)

He didn't get traded. See below for the corresponding faller and show existential questions about what the Memphis Grizzlies are doing. (Also, it's probably safe to pencil Evans back into the Memphis lineup and assume he'll pick up where he left off.)

Week 18 Fantasy Basketball Fallers

FALLER - Frank Ntilikina (G, NYK)

Yep, the Knicks acquired another point guard, Emmanuel Mudiay, to pair with their three current point guards, Jarrett Jack, Trey Burke, and Frank Ntilikina. Any of those three names could be substituted into that spot, but my best guess is that the Knicks try to play Ntilikina as a backup shooting guard more often, which also doesn't work because Tim Hardaway Jr., Ron Baker, and Courtney Lee. The rookie already has very little value, but this deal just makes it harder for him to see the floor.

FALLER - Andrew Harrison (G, MEM)

I labeled Harrison as a faller last week, but then the Grizzlies went and did a dumb thing called "not trading Tyreke Evans," which means Evans should be inserted back into their rotation and Harrison will see a drop off in playing time. Why did the Grizzlies do this? Do they really think Evans is going to re-sign to play for a terrible team next year? Really?

FALLER - Wayne Ellington (G, MIA)

Ellington missed a few games with a shoulder issue and now he comes back to find Dwyane Wade in Miami. I'm not sure how the minutes with end up breaking down, but I'd be very wary of Ellington for now, as he'll likely end up competing with Wade for playing time. Ellington's a good player, but he becomes more difficult to trust from a fantasy perspective if he isn't on the court as much as he needs to shoot a high volume of three pointers.

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