Fantasy basketball: Will Harden still be a fantasy star on the Clippers? - ESPN

Whatever one may think of the way future Hall of Fame PG/SG James Harden successfully engineered his controversial exit from the Philadelphia 76ers to the LA Clippers via this week's trade, Harden averaged a glorious 48.9 ESPN fantasy points per game last season. That is fantastic.

Only 12 players averaged more per game, and that list includes the best players in the sport. Harden didn't just lead the league in assists per game at 10.7. He scored, rebounded, hit 3-pointers and myriad free throws at the highest level. He was a winning fantasy basketball player for sure.

Harden will surely remain a winning fantasy basketball player with the Clippers, even with other excellent players, each likely to end up in the Hall of Fame as well, at his side. In fact, Harden may improve his stats from last season.

SF/PF Kawhi Leonard and SG/SF/PF Paul George each averaged better than 40 fantasy points per game last season as well, but they are not 76ers C Joel Embiid, who averaged 56.7 points. The main concern with Leonard and George is they miss a lot of games.

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Not a few games, but so many games.

Harden should be cool with that. He wants to score more points, and he will, especially when his new pals sit. He didn't like deferring to league MVP Joel Embiid last season.

Fantasy basketball managers probably weren't so pleased that Harden missed the first week of this season, but get ready and think bigger picture, because here comes the good stuff. The current statistical version of Harden actually bears strong resemblance to the MVP version from his later Houston