Injured players can hurt and help you

Are you one of the few team owners that drafted a player that was injured? Are you now starting to wonder how profitable that was. Players such as Manu ginobli, Monte Ellis, and Gilbert Arenas were defenitely a risk when you drafted them, but will they win your league when it comes down the stretch. How about some calculations to see: In ESPN leagues, Gilbert Arenas was drafted around 65th. Last year Gil averaged 19.4 ppg, and 5.1 apg. However let's be generous and say that he can average 21 ppg, 5 apg, and 2 threes per game. At that position in the draft, a player can easily average 15 ppg and 3 apg or 5 rpg. So, in Arenas' case he will be out for about 30 games. In those 30 games, that average player drafted at or around that position could have gotten you 420 points, 90 assists, and/or 150 rebounds. For Arenas to make up for those numbers for the season, he would have to score 23.7 points, and that's just to catch up to the average player at that position. That is also not accounting how he will play coming off of an injury. What's the verdict you may ask? Well, if you have a player that is going to be hurt for a while, you may want to capitalize with a trade for a less valued player. In this situation you would go for a trade such as Mike Bibby for Gilbert Arenas, depending on how long the injured player has to go before coming back. On the other hand, when would you want to trade for an injured player? Well, this gets stickier, if you notice that a player is getting ready to gome back you can be sure that that team's owner notices it. Therefore you wanna jump on trades for that player rather early. This is where you break out the calculator and crunch it out. For example, if Arenas is 15 games from his return, you may want to come out of pocket a little deeper to entice a team owner to trade him to you. At this point, you should really consider giving up a player such as Ron Artest, Hedo Turkoglu, or even Micheal Redd packaged with another role player. You may have to give up a little more than you want to because at this point, you are paying for the storage. You are paying for that roster space given up by that awaiting team owner. However it can be worth it. So, with many good fantasy players getting ready to come back from injuries, don't be afraid to bust out that calculator and crunch some numbers!