Oklahoma City Thunder's Russell Westbrook dribbles the ball during the first half of an NBA basketball game against the Los Angeles Lakers, Wednesday, Jan. 3, 2018, in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong)
The NBA regular season is breathing down our necks and we'll be in the thick of the DFS fight soon enough. Before Tuesday's opening night rolls around though, let's look at four situations where a team is looking to replace a lot of 2017-18 usage. All on court/ off court stats are courtesy of NBAWowy.com.
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Gone
29.8% Usage Rate
2016-17 Usage - 31.8
Other beneficiaries - Fred Vanvleet, Danny Green
The biggest trade of the off-season also opens up a ton of shots for the Raptors. Derozan’s 30% usage rate leaves a lot of shots to fill and Kawhi instantly steps in as the go-to offensive option for the team. He didn’t shoot all that well in the preseason and is basically following up a lost season that saw him play only nine total games. But there's a lot of reason for optimism for Kawhi in this new situation.
For all intents and purposes, he looks healthy and if the preseason is any clue, the offense is going to run mostly through him to start the year. He’ll fill much of what Derozan did in the midrange game and could easily return to his 2016 Spurs’ numbers in which he put up a 32% usage rate and 25.5 points per game on an average of 17.7 shots. Interestingly enough, that’s exactly the amount of shots per game Derozan took last season.
It’s worth noting here that Kyle Lowry saw no real change in usage with Derozan off the court last season. I’m willing to translate all (if not more) of Demar’s shots right to Kawhi and he’ll be a fantasy superstar right from jump street on this new team.
Gone
30.6% Usage Rate
2017-18 Usage - NA (Rookie)
Other beneficiaries - Taurean Prince, Kent Bazemore
The Hawks made something of a bold move trading out of the third pick in the draft in order to ensure they got an extra pick and the ability to draft Trae Young instead of Luka Doncic. Time will tell how that plays itself out, but from a fantasy perspective, we should be looking at a steady (never-ending) flood of shots from the Hawks’ rookie. Atlanta traded away their usage leader in Dennis Schroder to OKC and no one else was particularly close last season. Schroder’s 30.6% usage rate far eclipsed the second most on the team in Kent Bazemore (23%). This means there are a lot of shots/ possessions to go around and Young stands to eat up all of it and then some.
During the preseason, Young gave us a little glimpse of what he and the team have in store. He played the most minutes (106), took the most shots (57) and had the highest usage (27%). He’s not likely to be an efficient scorer, but the minutes and time on ball will surely be there. Even with Jeremy Lin around, there are combos where both play together.
The good news for Young is also on the tanking front. Atlanta will be completely and utterly terrible no matter how many minutes he plays so I don’t think we are at risk of him getting limited run early in the season. It appears the plan is to play him and let him chuck from the rafters early and often.
Gone
32.6% Usage Rate
2017-18 Usage - 24.6%
Other beneficiaries - Rodney Hood, Jordan Clarkson
The Cavs are going to be awful. That much is perfectly clear. You simply can’t lose the best player in the league in Lebron James and improve. They did next to nothing in the off-season and this is a squad that should be headed firmly into the tank. But as in every situation, there’s a DFS upside to the team’s downside. Kevin Love could head back to his 2013-14 fantasy heyday in which he averaged a 26/12.5 line for the Timberwolves. Dude was a double-double machine and even chipped in 4.4 assists per night.
Last season’s minutes were an issue for Love as he struggled to stay in on some rotations because of his trouble on defense, especially when teams would draw him into mismatches. I can’t imagine the Cavs will have anything like the same kind of leverage thinking this year with very little to play for. Love should average in the mid 30’s minutes and see his shot attempts increase (possibly) dramatically.
Lebron didn’t spend much time off the court last season (he played every game and averaged 37 minutes per) but when he wasn’t around Love did look down the barrel of a 28% usage and a 19% total rebounding percentage. The Cavs’ projected starting lineup has very little in the way of scoring and they could even use Love more in the post now that Lebron is gone. Statistically, Love stands to be the big winner in Lebron leaving and should fill the stat sheet nightly.
Gone
22.9% Usage Rate
2017-18 Usage - 35.6%
2017-18 Usage - 26.3%
Other beneficiaries - Dennis Schroder
The Carmelo Anthony thing didn’t really work out last season. He was a disaster on defense, he and Russ never really clicked in any meaningful way and from a DFS-perspective the dude didn’t contribute all that much beyond some scoring. He’s gone to Houston’s bench and leaves behind something of a usage gap for the Thunder. Melo averaged 15 shots per game and a 23% usage rate last season. That was good for third on the team but is meaningful because his replacements at power forward (Patrick Patterson and Jerami Grant) aren’t likely to fill his shooting void beyond some corner threes. Instead, I think we can make a meaningful assessment of the usage disbursement by seeing that when Melo was off the court Westbrook went from a 35% to 40% usage and Paul George went from 26% to 32%. (Interestingly enough, Steven Adams actually saw a usage decrease with Anthony off the court).
Dennis Schroder might eat into some of those shots (his usage rate detailed in the Hawks’ writeup) but considering the Thunder will pair he and Westbrook a fair amount on the court, I don’t think we can translate much of Melo’s usage to the Thunder’s newest addition. Westbrook and George were already DFS superstars (the former especially) and will likely control an incredibly outsized amount of the Thunder scoring.
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