FanHouse Chris Paul

Yeoman beat man Sam Amick of the Sacramento Bee reports the Kings are mulling a trade offer from the Hornets that would send high-priced center Emeka Okafor to Sacramento in exchange for roleplaying, aging forward Kenny Thomas. K-9 has looked spry in early action for the Kings, but his best attribute is his $8.7 million expiring contract. Okafor is on the books through the 2013-14 season.

New Orleans acquired Okafor this summer, committing a grip of cash long-term in the process. The Hornets sent Tyson Chandler -- an expensive center himself, but on a much shorter contract -- to Charlotte in the deal, which came several months after the Hornets tried to unload Chandler for a package of expiring contracts amid the throes of a playoff chase. Chandler, however, failed his physical with the Thunder, reversing the trade.

In other words, this trade would effectively finish the job of losing Chandler's contract, and would set the tone for continued salary cuts from New Orleans. Boo to all that.

Leave it to me to go ahead and write the following words less than 48 hours ago: "if you're worried about Chris Paul -- don't be." In all fairness, that was meant as a bit of reassurance that Paul would not let the Byron Scott firing affect the way he plays on the court. Now let me say this: If you're worried about Chris Paul, you're only human.

On Friday night Paul went down with a severe ankle injury that has knocked him out for up to two weeks, possibly more. So what can we do in his absence?

The first thing you need to do is go and pick up rookie point guard Darren Collison. No, he won't "replace" Paul, but his Friday performance after the injury looked rather promising. Collison finished the gamed with 18 points on 7-of-14 shooting with two assists and two steals. At the very least you can slot him into your lineup next week with the Hornets on the schedule for four games: home to the Clippers, Suns, Hawks, and at the Heat.

Collison, though, was known more for his leadership and intangibles in college, and less for his ability to take over games. His upside may be limited, but at this point you have to take what you can get.

Not the best night for the New Orleans Hornets. In the team's first game under new coach Jeff Bower, supernova point guard Chris Paul was ineffective and reportedly frosty through three quarters, before spraining his ankle and leaving the game, an eventual 86-78 loss to the Blazers. The New Orleans Times-Picayune reports that the ankle injury is severe enough to knock Paul out for up to two weeks.

Despite the Hornets' disappointing start, Paul has been the best player in the league statistically. Paul is averaging nearly 24 points and nine assists per game, and has shot 59 percent from the field and 65 percent from three. Rookie Darren Collison played the fourth quarter of Friday's game and is expected to start Saturday in Atlanta.

UPDATE: Yahoo! is reporting that Paul could be out of action for up to a month.

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Home Delivery is your morning roundup of last night's action in the NBA from a fantasy perspective.

The lesson in last night's game was: what goes around comes back around. Just 24 hours after punishing the Hornets with a 124-102 victory, the Suns went into the Staples Arena and ended up on the other side of a lopsided loss. The Suns shot just 36.5 percent from the floor and pasted 12 assists to 13 turnovers. It was a pretty ugly game as each Phoenix starter played less than 25 minutes. On the bright side, Louis Amundson made sure that the Los Angeles fans went home taco-less.

Steve Nash had just five assists. There's really no need to read to much into this one. It was a road loss against the Lakers after playing on back-to-back nights. We won't hold this one against you, though owners have to be dissapointed with how the Suns performed.

Andrew Bynum returned to action for the Lakers to drop 26 points on 13-of-18 shooting. He also pulled down 15 rebounds and blocked three shots. This is great news for Bynum owners. You can know breathe easier.

Smartly, the Hornets braintrust offered up a player for the media horde at the press conference announcing the firing of Byron Scott and the ascension of Jeff Bower. It was David West, the All-Star power forward, who said generally negative things about recent times under Scott and who publicly placed some faith in Bower. Of course, the media (and fans) really only cared what superstar Chris Paul thought ... but Paul was otherwise tied up Thursday.

Eventually, John Reid of the New Orleans Times-Picayune found Paul and got his thoughts on the move. And you understand why the Hornets are glad Paul was unavailable, and he was not nearly as optimistic about the change as West.

Flash forward seven months from now. Teams are rife with cap space, even under a substantially lowered cap. Friends of yours are all traveling to different teams, finding which team is the best fit financially, personally, and most importantly, in terms of playing for a contender. The world is their oyster. There is nothing but possibility and with the right decision, they'll walk away not only even more obscenely rich than they were before, but in a better situation to put the ring on their finger.

Meanwhile, you're staring at another two and a half seasons watching Peja Stojakovic and James Posey slowly turn into the bad guy from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade after drinking from the wrong cup and being coached by the GM that shackled your team with huge contracts for mid-level players.

Welcome to the life of Chris Paul.

How good are the Phoenix Suns this season? It may be too early to tell, but they're at least good enough to get their latest opponent's head coach fired just nine games into the season.

Byron Scott has been relieved of his coaching duties and the team will make the formal announcement at a press conference later this afternoon. This comes in the wake of a disappointing 3-6 start to the season, and, most recently, a completely lackluster and discouraging performance against the Suns in a nationally televised blowout on Wednesday night.

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Home Delivery is your morning roundup of last night's action in the NBA from a fantasy perspective.

It was all Phoenix last night as the Suns beat the Hornets 124-104. The Suns scored 101 of their points in the first three quarters, so you can tell where this is going. Steve Nash needed just 23 minutes to post 12 points and 10 assists. Amare Stoudemire added 21 points. Even Goran Dragic got in on the fun adding 14 points, seven rebounds and seven assists. Unfortunately, Alando Tucker was the only Sun held scoreless. On the bright side he wasn't the worst player in the game. That honor goes to the player responsible for last night's lotto line.

On the other side of the ball Chris Paul played inspired ball after Steve Nash called him the best point guard in the league. Paul had 25 points on 9-of-16 shooting with four treys, six assists and four steals. Chris Paul is making 2.2 threes per game and is shooting 63-percent from the floor in his first nine, which is making him the clear-cut No.1 player in all of fantasy.

Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the lig. Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.

The last time we got together, three different players scored 40 points or more on the same night. Well, maybe it's not as rare of an occurrence as we thought, since we were just a single point away from it happening again on Wednesday.

Chris Paul missed by one with 39, but Kobe Bryant and Dwyane Wade each delivered, with 41 and 40 respectively.