The Sun Also Rises

It turns out I was right about Amare Stoudemire's "exploratory surgery" being a little more serious than the Suns were letting on. As has been widely reported by the press and bemoaned by fantasy owners worldwide, Amare had microfracture surgery on Tuesday and is expected out for four months.

That means that Phoenix has now lost three of its five starters from last year's running and gunning playoff team, and with these three, 61 points of collective scoring. That's a lot of production to replace.

Luckily, though, all is not lost. Steve Nash is still running the point in Phoenix, and he has a reputation for turning fantasy straw into gold. This year should be no different.

Which former fantasy scrubs will he turn into relevant fantasy contributors in 2005-06?


Raja Bell, G

The 29-year-old Florida International product is now entering his sixth year in the league and seems poised for a breakout season.

While he will never be mistaken for a well-rounded fantasy player, Bell will contribute a great deal in points and threes in 2005-06. Despite playing less than 30 minutes per game last year for a Utah team without a real point guard, he averaged 12.3 points (that's 20.7 per 48 minutes) and shot over 40% from three point range.

Last night, in Phoenix's exhibition opener against Seattle, Bell played 37 minutes and scored 26 points on 11-16 shooting and 4-7 from beyond the arc. He also managed to grab 7 boards and turned the ball over only once.

With Nash kicking it out to him for wide open shots on the perimeter all season long, expect Raja to contribute points in the high teens--that might actually be conservative--and hit at least 2 threes per game. If he averages anything like the 8 threes per game that Q Rich attempted each night last season, he could be a fantasy revelation as a scorer and three-point specialist.

He doesn't do much else though, so temper your expectations.


James Jones, SF

Jones, 25, a 6-8 swingman out of Miami, is more of an unknown quantity.

When the Pacers were decimated by suspensions and injuries in November last year, Jones entered the lineup and got major burn for about two weeks. During this time, he had a couple of very impressive games, scoring 22 with 10 boards on Nov. 23 and a career-high 27 less than a week later on Nov. 28.

We do know two things about Jones: he can shoot the trey and he hits his free throws. The former alone is enough to score in bunches when you're on the floor with Steve Nash. Jones connected on 39.8% of his 2.2 nightly attempts from downtown last year (not bad for a guy who only played 17.8 minutes per night), and shot 85.5 percent from the line.

Like Bell, Jones could also average more than 2 threes per night, and this could make him a very valuable specialist. How much he scores beyond this will depend on what's left over after Nash, Marion, and Bell get their shots.

Be wary of his FG percentage, though, as he's a member of that rare breed that shoots worse from the floor overall than he does from beyond the arc (39.6% last year). Q Rich did this, too but he also was among the league leaders in steals: fantasy owners might not be so forgiving with the more one-dimensional Jones.