Break out the Moet and Chandon!

Congratulations to noy101 (GMTR Readers League, Standard Snake Draft) and to (World) PEACE OUT (GMTR Dynasty League) for winning in their respective leagues. Good Game.

As for this blog’s authors, we didn’t do too shabby. Patrick finished second in the keeper league, while Nels and I took second and third places respectively in the the Readers league. It’s nice to see that we were able to save some face and take a step up onto the winners’ podium. I unfortunately do not know the results of the GMTR Auction League that Patrick was in charge of, so we’ll let him chime in his congratulatory remarks in the comments later on.

With that out of the way, let’s move on and recap last night’s games and see how our beloved NBA players fared for us in fantasy basketball.

Line of the Night: Wesley Matthews (2.52) made the most of Portland’s need for offense in the wake of them losing LaMarcus Aldridge for the rest of the season. While it wasn’t enough for the Trail Blazers to defeat the Sacramento Kings, Matthews’ 31 points, EIGHT treys, one steal, one block, and three assists were nonetheless impressive for our player rater. Either he or Nicolas Batum will be the top fantasy performers for the team, for the remainder of the season.

Honorable Mentions:

Carmelo Anthony (2.40) had a valiant yet futile attempt to take on the Miami Heat single-handed. He and J.R. Smith (1.54) were obviously not enough to salvage a win. Melo bore the brunt of the scoring load and scored literally half of New York’s total output with 42 points! He added nine rebounds and five assists to his line. Smith on the other hand had 16 points, four three pointers, seven rebounds and three steals. JR is only owned in 41% of Yahoo leagues and looks like he’s going to remain productive for what remains of the NBA’s regular season.

Joakim Noah (2.19) steamrolled over the Detroit Pistons via an impressive 20-point, 17-board performance! He was a perfect four for four from the line and added two blocks as well.

Two Jasons did well for their teams. The first, Jason Terry (1.85) led all of the Dallas Mavericks in fantasy performances for the night via 21 points (5 threes)and four assists. While Jason Richardson (1.81) lifted Orlando versus the hapless Cleveland Cavaliers with 16 points and four treys of his own. J-Rich also logged six boards and two steals.

Pau Gasol (1.75) had a sweet 20-10 night with, well literally,  20 points and 10 rebounds. Beyond his big man role he moonlighted as a guard very briefly by handing out five assists and knocked down not one, but TWO back-to-back shots from downtown.

***

Waiver Wire Line of the Night: Greg Stiemsma (2.31) made the most of Boston’s Big (or should I say OLD) Three getting the night off. Greg not-so-quietly scored eight points and grabbed five boards, but added four steals and six blocks! It’s a shame the Celts only have three games this week. But hey, if you need blocks, Greg’s your man! (11% owned)

Pick Up Lines: Daniel Orton (1.59), whose name made me do a double take as I thought I was reading about professional wrestling then realized that dude’s name was Randy. So yeah, Daniel who? As you can imagine, he’s not owned at all, anywhere, but had a good enough night to log a ping on our rater’s fantasy radar as he had a productive defensive night with 11 points, five steals, and three  blocks. Glen Davis has a hyperextended knee and is expected to miss tonight’s game. So yeah, Orton might just be worth some stream material this week, as long as Davis is out.

Chase Budinger (1.57) broke his streak of quiet games and exploded for 19 points and five treys. He nailed four of those threes in his first 12 minutes on the court, so clearly he caught fire from the get go. He added six rebounds and a couple of steals to his performance. With Kyle Lowry back and feeling better, these nights will be seen less and less.

Derrick Brown (1.54) was the lone fantasy bright spot for the Charlotte Bobcats last night as he scored 15 points (6-10 from the field), grabbed seven rebounds, and three steals. He’s a gamble of an add, but with Corey Maggette done for the season, Brown will be getting enough burn to warrant at least a serious look in deep leagues. (2% owned)

Biggest Loser:

O.J. Mayo (-1.46) was awful in his 27 minutes on the floor for the Grizzlies as they lost to the New Orleans Hornets. Mayo scored 11 points, but he also committed six turnovers and was just three of twelve from the field.

Al Harrington (-0.89) does have a partially torn meniscus and is just gutting it out for the rest of these remaining days of the season, so we understand. But also do understand that his injury is severe enough to limit him on most nights and thus resulting in lines similar to 5 points, 4 rebounds, 1 assists , 2-9 from the field.

Tony Allen (-0.85) is back in action for the Grizzlies but obviously is in need of shaking off some rust. He might not recover in time to make much of an impact as his four points, and two boards weren’t really signs of an encouraging return.

Marcus Camby (-0.77) left Houston’s game early with a sore back and only managed to log one rebound and two assists for his owners.

***

Daily rankings and stats come from the GMTR H2H Player Rater (beta version). They are based on the stat Wins Above Replacement Player (WARP) an estimate of the number of wins a player produces per week in H2H leagues over a replacement (waiver wire) player.

Do not miss a day of the Fantasy NBA. Subscribe to Give Me The Rock right now. You can also get bonus (and easily digestible) content by following GMTR on Twitter, or become a fan of GMTR on Facebook! We are so social!

If you like what you read here, come back every day for new content! And if you come back every day, please consider donating…

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The league featured writers from ESPN, SI, Yahoo!, SLAM, Dime, CBS Sports, Hoopsworld, and Rotoworld among others, so it’s pretty competitive to put it mildly. Let’s just say that before the season started, we had a raging debate about whether or not to institute a max transaction cap due to the fact that someone ::coughErikcough:: may or may not have streamed the season prior.

Dennis asked each owner to look back at the season and answer a couple of questions about the league. He then compiled the answers over at the Basketball Jones. Of course, when you ask 14 writers to contribute to a single column you’re going to get about 25,000 words, so the final product needed to be edited down for length. I’ll post my entire response below, but you can read everyone’s responses on The Fantasy Jump Off.

Not the guy you wanted to see on your fantasy team this season

My TBJ Expert’s League Draft Results (and I’m using the term expert loosely given the mess of a draft below)

1. (7) Danny Granger SF,PF
2. (18) Chris Bosh PF,C
3. (31) Brandon Roy SG,SF
4. (42) Zach Randolph PF,C
5. (55) Antawn Jamison SF,PF
6. (66) Rashard Lewis SF,PF
7. (79) Baron Davis PG
8. (90) Luol Deng SF
9. (103) Anthony Morrow SG,SF
10. (114) Samuel Dalembert C
11. (127) Thaddeus Young SF,PF
12. (138) Greg Monroe PF,C
13. (151) Rodrigue Beaubois PG,SG

My Recap

I’m going to be honest; this was not a winning fantasy basketball season for me. I could fire up the excuse machine and point to the fact that my wife gave birth to our first child a couple months before the start of the NBA season and, as a result, I was operating in a haze for the latter half of 2010. But that isn’t going to change the fact that my draft was so bad that David Kahn and Isiah Thomas offered to give me some team building pointers this off season.

1) Who was your best value pick in the draft?

In a thirteen round draft, I only see three picks that even qualify as “not bad”. That’s Zach Randolph in the 4th, Luol Deng in the 8th and Thaddeus Young in the 11th. In terms of value to draft position, I’d say Deng was probably my best pick (which says all you need to know about my team). Deng was about what we expected him to be this season, averaging 17.4 points and 5.8 rebounds a game. But like Derrick Rose, Deng benefited from the Tom Thibodeau approach to basketball and saw his threes increase from 0.5 a game in 2009-10 to 1.4 a game this season. I’d give the pick a solid B+.

2) Who was your worst pick in the draft?

While there are plenty of nominees on this team, the answer is pretty clear: Brandon Roy in the 3rd round. It’s not only the worst pick on my team, it’s likely the worst pick of any team in the entire draft. Roy – who you may have heard has a little bit of a knee problem – was limited to 65 games last season. I’m not sure why I thought his degenerative knee injury would improve this year. And I have no idea why it necessitated a third round pick to get him. Roy missed his first game by mid-November and hobbled around the court for 47 games for the Blazers. It would have been the year’s least surprising injury if not for Yao Ming and Greg Oden.

3) Who was your best waiver wire pick-up during the season?

After combing through all 41 moves I made in the league, the best was a Channing Frye pick-up that came on Nov 7th. Frye was coming off the bench behind Robin Lopez at the time and was dropped in the league after starting off the season in a horrible shooting slump. I grabbed him and Lopez flamed out shortly after, which pushed Frye into a starting role. Frye ended up having the best season of his career and finished with a line of 12.7 points, 6.7 rebounds, 2.2 threes and a block a game. Some people don’t like to deal with a center who is afraid to step past the three point line like he’s Moonlight Graham in Field of Dreams, but he ended up being one of the few bright spots on my team this year.

4) What did you learn about fantasy basketball this past season?

I am never going to draft Brandon Roy again for starters. But more importantly, this team of underachievers and waiver wire players finished a mere two games out of the last playoff spot in the league, which is a testament to never giving up on a league no matter how badly your draft goes. Yes, you are going to fail in the end, but at least have some pride while you’re going down in flames. I’m sure there is a motivational poster in there somewhere.

My season was a disaster, but it should be noted that Erik had a great year. He rode the Gasol brothers to a first place finish during the regular season and a third place finish in the playoffs. Way to represent GMTR Erik!

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Yeah, corny, I know. What are you gonna do about it, choke slam me?

Alas, it wasn’t written in the stars for me to win all of my championship matches. But that, as they say, is how the ball bounces.

And as you know all three of our Give Me The Rock leagues are now done. Patrick came in second in the Auction league, losing to team Ogre Tactics 3. I came in second in the GMTR Dynasty League, getting thrashed 1-8 by Rain Dogs. Nels’ team came in third. So that’s a cool two-of-three podium finish for the host bloggers. And last, but not the least, I bring home the bacon, laying the smacketh down in Give Me The Rock’s Standard, Head to Head Readers’ League; beating team Noy101 by seven to two. (Insert compulsory “Dikembe Mutombo, Not-in-my-House finger wag” image HERE).

Overall, I’d like to be the first to thank everyone who participated in our three leagues. It was one good and challenging fantasy basketball season you all shared with us, and for that we at GMTR are truly grateful. My sentiments are best summarized by my all-time favorite tag team’s tagline: “Oh What a Rush!”

In my third match for the week, GMTR (c/o Me) bows to Rotowire 4-5, losing down the wire by a margin of 11 points scored.

***

Line of the Night belonged to George Hill (1.91), who was like a hurricane as the Spurs eliminated the Suns from playoff contention and putting a tombstone on their hopes this season. The Spurs starters were non-existent, just like the Undertaker’s total losses in his 19 Wrestlemania appearances, so it was up to George and the rest of the bench to take Phoenix down for the count. George was the big boss man of the bench as he led all reserves with 29 points (4 threes, 10-16 from the field, 5-5 from the line) and 4 assists.

Honorable Mentions:

Andray Blatche (1.73) may not be known for his basketball IQ, but he’s a junkyard dog on the court when push comes to shove. And like leaping off the top rope with a flying elbow, Blatche pummeled the Bobcats into submission via his 25 points, 17 boards, and 3 steals. Yup, he was an animal on the glass!

Like a hot rod, Chauncey Billups (1.62) led the New York Knicks to its first playoff appearance in since 2004.  Sharp as a razor’s edge, Mr. Big Shot crippled the Cavs, like he had them in a camel clutch. Old? Yeah, but this one’s still had some of that second wind left in him, rallying his team with 23 points (3 threes, 6-6 from the line), dishing 7 dimes, and getting  2 steals.

Josh Smith (1.41) was his usual Ultimate Warrior self as he valiantly fought off the Rockets in a backbreaking 109-114 loss. Even with the Hawks’ backs to the ropes, Smith’s 21 points, 11 rebounds, 7 assists, and 2 steals were not enough escape Houston’s relentless barrage of blows and buckets.

Paul “the Truth” Pierce (1.35) didn’t need a shamrock to get the Celtics to K.O. the hapless Pistons 101 to 90. He was in vintage form with 22 points (3 threes, 7-10 from the field), and 6 rebounds. Unfortunately for the Cs, Big Daddy Diesel hurt his achilles, but initial reports point to it as being minor. There was no big show in his short lived comeback from injury. He should be fine. He’s one tough Celtic warrior.

Waiver Wire Line of the Night: While the Spurs recent bouts with injuries made them look like a series of natural disasters, Matt Bonner (1.47) was a shining light from the bench with 16 points (3 threes, 6-10 from the field), 11 rebounds, and 4 assists. He’s 7% owned and might just be of value in the last week of the regular season as it will take more than a new world order, or even a “Doomsday Device” to prevent Poppovich from resting Tim Duncan more and more down the stretch.

Pick Up Lines: Chuck Hayes (1.41) played the role of “big boss man” for the Rockets as he speared Atlanta in the gut with 19 points (8-9 from the field), and 12 rebounds, 3 steals (49% owned)

Kyle Weaver (1.35) was clearly not utilized by anyone as he is 0% owned in Yahoo. He did, however, surprise us all with 19 points (3 threes, 7-11 from the field) and 2 blocks. That performance was just a power bomb; impressive, but not likely going to happen again any time soon.

Biggest Loser:

George Hill ended up getting our LOTN. Why? Well because Tony Parker (-0.61) sucked! Big time! He finished with 7 points, 5 rebounds, and 8 assists, while shooting 2-11 from the field. OMG! Those 11 points I needed to win my match against Rotowire SHOULD have been produced by Tony, and for that I have two words for him…. “Suck It!”

*If you can’t count the number of wrestling references in this post, then you’re one candy-assed jabroni! That’s IF you can smell what Give Me The Rock, was cooking!

***

Daily rankings and stats come from the GMTR H2H Player Rater (beta version).

Do not miss a day of the Fantasy NBA. Subscribe to Give Me The Rock right now. You can also get bonus (and easily digestible) content by following GMTR on Twitter, or become a fan of GMTR on Facebook! We are so social!

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Along this same vein, I am an avid fan of trades. Since I obviously am not able to draft ALL the players I like during the draft, I do try to wrestle some guys from their owners’ clutches within the season. At times, I guess I enjoy these changes far too much, seeing as I’ve had more than my fair share of being on the losing end of deals. Trades, or at least coming up with a deal that works for both me and my counterpart, is a thing of beauty.

Sadly, not all managers enjoy this much roster “boat rocking” as I do, and are averse to shaking things up.

Have you ever been in a league where NO ONE is interested in mixing things up? Do you enjoy trying out different player combinations? Are you hardcore enough to ride the weekly, micro-fluctuations in player values? Do you see yourself as looking good in a snappy blue, pinstripe Armani suit?

If you’ve answered “YES,” to any one of those questions above, then GMTR has the league for you!

RotoHog’s NBA Stock Exchange is UP!

And since it’s GMTR’s pleasure to cater to every nuance of your fantasy basketball addiction, we’ve set up an official GMTR NBA Stock Exchange (NBASE) League, with yours truly as its commissioner.

How does it work? Well, you are started off with F$180 fantasy dollars (not to be confused with real USD$). Signing up is FREE. You use the F$180 to purchase players, who are given pre-season F$ values by the system. Spend your money however you wish. Once the first game of the regular season is played, these F$ change based on SUPPLY and DEMAND. You are then allowed to make a maximum of three (3) transactions at the trading floor. There is an option to “purchase” (with real money) the rights to execute MORE trades, but for the purposes of fairness and equality, and frugality, that option has been DISABLED in the GMTR league. Everyone in this 12-man league will be on equal footing. Well all 11 of you, as I will be kicking your butts! (W00t! First trash talk of the season) Now, you REALLY wanna join to kick my ass, huh?

Q: How do you win?

A: Each roster spot is assigned maximum number of games, like in the rotisserie format. Each game played by an NBA player for your team generates FANTASY POINTS for your team. The fantasy team with the MOST fantasy points at the end of the season, wins.

Do not confuse your team’s running total F$ value with fantasy points.

Trades, like in regular fantasy games, are a means to an end and not the end themselves.

Fantasy Points

Field Goal Missed (FGMI) -0.46

Field Goal Made (FGMA) 0.54

Free Throw Missed (FTMI) -0.75

Free Throw Made (FTMA) 0.25

Point Scored (PT) 0.50

3-Point Shot Made (3PT) 1.00

Rebound (REB) 1.50

Assist (AST) 1.99

Steal (ST) 3.00

Turnover (TO) -2.00

Blocked Shot (BLK) 3.00

***

Q: How much time will this league eat out of my “busy” schedule?

A: It all depends on how much you want to put into it. You can shop well at the beginning and ride your boys til season’s end. Or you can play the market DAILY. It’s all up to you.

For more details and rules, read THIS.

As I previously mentioned, it’s a 12-team league. All three of GMTR’s writers are participating, so there are nine slots left for you, dear readers.

If you’re interested in trying it out and getting your Gordon Gekko on, or just to make me guzzle a liter of STFU sauce, please send an email expressing your interest to givemetherock [at] gmail [dot] com.

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After a fairly successfully first season in which I made the league playoffs, I had disastrous second and third seasons that featured way too much Gilbert Arenas for my own good. So this year I could use some help. I need some perspective.

A little about the league

• 30 teams
• H2H with 9-categories
• Starts 6 players (PG/SG/SF/PF/C/UTIL) with 6 bench spots. That means the league starts 180 players and goes 360 players deep. Typically you’re lucky to get 1 bench guy who is actually worth anything.
• Traditional draft

I’m picking 22nd, so the odds are already stacked against me.

So, I have two questions. Who would you be shooting for with the 22nd pick (and on the rebound with the 39th)? And the larger question. What type of draft strategy would you employ in a league with 30 teams?

My goal is to win this league and I’m not afraid to go down in flames trying.

The Draft Order

1. Brian McKitish, ESPN
2. Matt Stroup, Rotoworld
3. Eric Mack, CBS Sports
4. Sergio Gonzalez, CBS Sports
5. Tom Carpenter, ESPN
6. Matt Satten, BarkleysMouth.com
7. Hector Castro, RotoExperts.com
8. Tom Lorenzo, FanHouse
9. Aaron Gleeman, Rotoworld
10. Jamey Eisenberg, CBS Sports
11. Keith Lipscomb, ESPN
12. Corey Guerrera, CBS Sports
13. Daniel E. Dobish, OPEN Sports
14. Ryan Knaus, Rotoworld
15. Dave Gonos, Open SPorts
16. Rick Kamla, NBA
17. David Klyce, HoopsKlyce
18. Nando
19. Robert Hirsch
20. Scott White, CBS Sports
21. Brian Flood, CBS Sports
22. Patrick Madden, GiveMeTheRock.com
23. Dave Gawron, RotoCommunity
24. James Questel, MSG
25. Greg Urbano, CBS Sports
26. Eric Karabell, ESPN
27. Aaron Bruski, Rotoworld
28. John Cregan, ESPN
29. Mike Yam, ESPN
30. Steve Alexander, Rotoworld

Thanks for your help.

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I was pleasantly surprised to have every member of the GMTR Keeper League from last season accept their invitation to continue this year. Unfortunately for everyone else, that means there are no spots in that league open to offer. Fortunately there are spots available in 2 GMTR leagues this year. Check the deets.

GMTR Standard Readers’ League
This is your standard 9-cat H2H league with weekly lineup changes and a playoffs at the end of year (on Yahoo). If you’re just looking for a good, competitive league with no alarms and no surprises, this one will help you focus on your fantasy basketball core competencies. The only thing you really need to consider with this league is the draft time: Saturday, October 16th @ 5PM Eastern US time. If you can’t make that draft time and don’t want to submit pre-rankings for an auto-draft, then consider learning how to draft a team in an auction draft so you can participate in the…

GMTR Auction Draft League
This one is very similar to the Standard except that instead of a snake draft players will be drafted auction style and the draft time is more flexible. This is also on Yahoo.

GMTR NBA Stock Exchange League
I’m not sure if the NBA (via NBA.com) is going to continue this competition this season, but if they do, we are committed to running a GMTR league in order to maximize the league options available to our readers. (How’s that for some awesome corporate-speak?)

How to Join
Send an email to givemetherock [at] gmail.com (replace the [at] with an actual @ symbol) with your preference of league. Invites will be sent to whatever email address you use, so keep in mind that these are Yahoo leagues.

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With all three leagues having been completed for weeks now, it’s time I finally congratulate our three league winners.

1. GMTR Readers League “Headed to the Head”

Congratulations to In Baclao We Trust (managed by Ferdinand)

I did not participate in this league so the details are a little sketchy, but it appears that Ferdinand answered the age old question, “Can David Lee single handedly lead a fantasy team to a championship?” IBWT entered the playoffs with a H2H record of 91-85, but the team got hot at the right time, which is all that really matters both in fantasy and in real life. Nels set the readers league playoffs a week earlier than most leagues, and as a result, IBWT caught Lee’s run of insane double-doubles all the way though the fantasy playoffs.

Other than Lee and Chris Bosh, Ferdinand’s team had a nice set of role players like Jrue Holiday, Marcus Thornton, Jason Terry, Jameer Nelson and Boris Diaw. I’m not really reading championship team from that set of players, but the common thread seems to be that nearly all of them were playing well at the end of the season.

If you gave David Lee a nickel for every double-double he had this year, well… he’d have over 3 dollars.

2. GMTR Readers League “Inside GMTR Readers’ Heads”

Congratulations to Z-Bo Knows (managed by phill976)

Z-Bo crushed this league, finishing with the best record (101-75) and the number one seed to begin the playoffs, before running the table in the playoffs. He apparently was playing in another, better league, and we were all just watching him go.

Unlike Baclao in the first readers’ league, Z-Bo featured a lineup with a high enough Q-rating to make George Clooney jealous. In addition to Zach Randolph, his team featured Kevin Durant, Rajon Rondo, Brook Lopez, Tyreke Evans and Jason Richardson. Hell, even Baron Davis put up some decent number this year. Z-Bo even traded Jamal Crawford for Chris Paul late in the season, likely gearing up for that playoff run. Paul’s ill-fated return was a semi-disaster, except that his two weeks back on the court coincided exactly with the last two weeks of this league’s playoffs. Well played my friend.

Z-Bo, contemplating the greatness of Z-Bo Knows

3. GMTR Keeper League “Die Nasty”

Congratulations to the Maine Cousin Lovers (managed by me)

A competitive league, as my team’s record of 98-79 was only good for the 4th best regular season record. But I made the decision to go for it anyway and I ran the Cousin Lovers like Danny Ferry is running the Cavs, going all in this year.

I drafted a team which was so big that Josh Smith was my small forward for most of the season. This caused me to disastrously give away a great keeper in Andrew Bogut for the corpse of Jose Calderon, easily my worst move in any league this year. But right before the playoffs started, I flipped 4th round pick and uber keeper in Smith for non-keeper Kevin Durant. It was enough for the championship, although possibly at the cost of being competitive next year.

During the playoffs, I ran though top-seed and fellow GMTR-ite Erik (who had the dreaded triple-headed PG monster of Nash, Kidd and Rondo) before beating the 6th seeded Ninjas (a Danny Granger led team) in the finals.

***

So, there you have it. Congratulations to the league champions and thank you to everyone else who played in the GMTR leagues this season. Nels already wrote about his disastrous fantasy performance this year, I hope yours was a little better than that. We’ll likely set up next year’s leagues starting in September, but I hope you’ll be checking in well before that.

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(Note: In the style prescribed by many lectures and training seminars, I’m going to tell you what I’m going to tell you, then tell you, then tell you what I told you)

I was in 4 leagues this year, and even though one was a Mock Draft League, it was still to many…
1. GMTR Mock Draft League: 8th place
2. GMTR Readers League “Headed to the Head”: 8th place
3. GMTR Readers League “Inside GMTR Readers’ Heads”: 7th place
4. GMTR Keeper League “Die Nasty”: 12th place

At least I have a chance to redeem myself through shrewd management and keeper choices in the dynasty league. Never having played in a Keeper league before, though, I’m not sure if that’s a good thing.

So… The Mock Draft League. Now, with Dirk Nowitzki at 11, you’d think I would have had an awesome team. I mean, the German did move up to #4 on the Player Rater, so that’s a pretty good first rounder. Unfortunately, I was pretty high on both LaMarcus Aldridge and Brandon Roy coming in to the season. Since I had a big many, I went with Aldridge at 14. He currently sits at 55. That was the beginning of the end.

Next was Jameer Nelson at 35 (ending at 123), then Shawn Marion at 38 (ending at 95). I’m not sure what to say there except that I think a lot of people thought they’d be better. Unfortunately for Marion, I think he’s done. He’s a Top 100 player now, and with the Mavericks the way they are, I don’t see him moving back into any sort of fantasy prominence.

Yahoo says that Marion’s Average Draft Position (ADP) was 37.2, so I was right on with that. Definitely too early with Nelson, but not by more than a round and a half… so, a lot of people got screwed by these two, but probably not everyone had both. Add it my stupidly high pick of Aldridge (ADP of 40) and I am starting to consider myself lucky to have finished in 8th.

To look at the strategy I was going with here, it was probably too much of a wishy-washy approach, which was in fact, my undoing through all my drafts. While I recommended to everyone I could to strongly type their teams as either Big Ball or Small Ball, I went with the scripting language approach and just said, I’ll instantiate a team, and call it whatever it ends up looking like. In other words, I was just picking players who seemed to fit somewhat and hoping that it turned out okay instead of taking Dirk’s strengths: Points, Rebounds, FG%, Blocks, and TOs and saying “This is a Big Ball team”, which is what I should have done. I tried when I went with Aldridge, but then I started taking these fill-in-the-cracks guys… like…

John Salmons. At 59, it was still too early, but he did end up at 71, so it was only a round early (and he was on the Bulls, and I was bullish on him as well – pun intended). Then came another SF: Ron Artest. Even earlier again to be taking him, but even the people who took him at his ADP of 80 got screwed by his final rank of 116. I knew he was a chronic FG% bad boy, and yet, at this point, I’d already taken Salmons, so who was I to complain about poor FG shooters? Had I known that Salmons was going to come up with a decent and above-his-career-average 46.7%, I might have skipped Ron-Ron and saved myself a lot of pain.

Speaking of pain… next up was Thaddeus Young. At least he fit more with the Big Ball strategy I should have been pursuing, but I took him at least a round too early for where people felt he was, and about 5 rounds too early for where he ended up.

The next two picks were my Two Shining Moments as I got Luol Deng (another Bull! Fancy that!) at 86, and Joakim Noah (even more Bull!) at 107. They ended up at 63 and 62 respectively. So, that’s how I saved my ass with this team, because my last 3 picks were all throwaways: Jarrett Jack (who I drafted over and over as you’ll see), Udonis Haslem (in a vain attempt to shore up the Big Ball stats), and Richard Hamilton (because I thought he had to be able to outperform 155 – which he actually did, ending up at 153).

Next up: Headed to the Head and the first of two drafts where I picked Brandon Roy in the first round. It wasn’t just a bad choice because of where he ended up in the rankings; I don’t think anyone would have predicted he’d be even or worse in every fantasy category, and he was drafted an average of 12 in Yahoo leagues. But for me, it was a bad choice because it did not establish a clear direction for my team. Roy’s numbers and his ability to play anywhere from PG to SF made it hard for me to go one way or the other with later picks. For example, I followed up with Chauncey Billups, and could have had a strong Small Ball team if I’d gone through with it, but in the 3rd round, I went again with LaMarcus Aldridge. At least this time I didn’t lose quite as much value, but the eventual winner of the league took David Lee three picks after I took Aldridge. Of course, taking Lee after Roy and Billups would have been foolish at the time, because he contradicted what I was going for with the team. Instead of Aldridge, though, I probably should have taken a 3rd PG (or 2nd PG since I could have used Roy fairly efficiently at SF). Aldridge was a hedge at best, and a poor one at that with all the Small Ball big men still on the board at the point, which forced me to wait until later on to pile on the PGs resulting in a bunch of crappy ones.

I got Mehmet Okur in the 4th round, which was decent considering where he was being taken at the time, and since he’s thought of as a strong Small Ball Center. Then I took John Salmons once again, and while it wasn’t a terrible pick, it was another one that I lost value on. That was followed by another not-that-terrible pick of Al Harrington who worked well for a Small Ball team, but again, was a value loser.

Then I started taking big hits by trying to shore up categories I should have shorn up in the 3rd round… A huge disappointment with Mike Bibby in the 7th, followed up by Marvin Williams. I redeemed one of those two picks with Jamal Crawford in the 9th, but so far, I had only 2 of 9 picks that would turn out equal to or higher than where I drafted them.

I took a gamble with Delonte West in the 10th, and then got my 3rd positive value pick with Jarrett Jack in the 11th. My last two picks were Richard Hamilton because – once again – he had to end up higher than 136th, right? and Luke Ridnour who did end up higher than I picked him, but the move from 153 to 147 isn’t exactly the stuff champions are made of.

3rd League: Inside GMTR Readers’ Heads: Here’s where I moved up to 7th place, mostly thanks to the efforts of LeBron James (and the fact that the league ended the week before the end of the season, so LeBron sitting out the end didn’t hurt me). Patrick ended up in 3rd place in this league, so it might be better to ask him what he did with his team, but I’ve already put in 1300 words at this point, so why stop now?

Obviously I got the first pick here, or I wouldn’t have had LeBron.

With my second pick (24th), I went with Troy Murphy in an effort to go Big. Murph ended up at #20 on the Player Rater and made it to 72 games, so things look pretty good so far. I wanted to try to get a guard at this point, and Joe Johnson seemed like a good Big Ball guard. He was a little early at 25, but he wasn’t going to be around by 48, so I still think it’s a decent pick. His FG% is bad for a Big Ball team, but most guards are, so I thought I was going to try to make up for it.

Evidently I forgot about making up for it after 2 rounds went by. I picked John Salmons again, who, while his 46% didn’t totally kill my FG%, didn’t really help my whole “Big Ball” concept. As such, I again went wishy-washy and picked up Eric Gordon next. Not only did he far underperform this draft position (49 -> 96) but he also hurt me in FG% (when I already had Joe Johnson giving me all I could take there), rebounding, and blocks. Of course, he’s not supposed to help in those categories, and that’s why it was a stupid choice. Especially when, in this case, Al Horford was the next player picked. Ouch.

The next time around, I regained my Big Ball focus and went with Luis Scola, who ended up right about where I took him. The only problem: 0.3 blocks. I shouldn’t have (and didn’t) expect more in that category, but it was just another piece of this ruined puzzle.

I guess at that point I thought I needed a PG when I really probably should have taken another big man. Instead, I went with Andre Miller. He’s had become a pretty decent FG shooter in Philly, and was also up over 4 rebounds per game (and had been for nearly his whole career). Not a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad pick at the time it was made… But then Miller went and had his 2nd worst FG shooting season of a long career, along with his career low rebounding season. Little consolation that his Turnovers were also down.

Marvin Williams at 96: Bust. Joakim Noah at 97: Some redemption, but not enough to salvage a team that already had at least 3 players who probably should be on it.

Delonte West: Another bust, and another terrible fit for a Big Ball team. Seriously, what was I doing? Next: Jarrett Jack. Again, I thought he’d be rebounding more. To my credit, he did shoot 48%… to my discredit, his career FG% is 45%, so again, what was I thinking?

Second to last pick: Grant Hill, who ended up 20 spots higher than I drafted him, but that’s not saying much this far down. Hill had shot 50%+ in the past 3 seasons, but then dropped to 47.8 this year. He made up for it somewhat by increasing his rebounds, and decreasing his Turnovers, but his Blocks and Points were both down slightly, so I lost on 3 of 5 categories.

Finally (for this draft): Kevin Love. I took him knowing he’d miss time, but at this point, I was heading straight for a Mid-Ball team and who’s a better Mid-Ball big man than Kevin Love? For the 60 games he played, Love ended up at 66 on the Player Rater, so some definite value there. Of course, like Hill, his FG% was not good for a Big Ball team, and he only averaged 0.4 blocks per game, so while he dominated Rebounds (11 per game) I was losing out on 3 categories (Turnovers were pretty high at 2 per game) and only coming out slightly above average with 14 points per game.

Last, and certainly least: The Keeper League… Not sure how much interest there is in dissecting this one, especially from my POV, since I went with Brandon Roy again in the first, and then took Eric Gordon in the 4th as a possible keeper (I did get Andre Iguodala and David Lee in the interceding two rounds, so that’s something, but still left me below value on 3 of 4 picks). It all kind of blew up when I took Blake Griffin in the 5th. As we all know, he didn’t play. At least I have the option of keeping him and building a real Big Ball team next season.

The 6th round went to Thaddeus Young, and shows you why picking the same players over and over is maybe not a great strategy… It means if you win, you win big, but if you lose, you lose big.

Also, you can see at this point that I once again had no clear direction for this team. That’s fine if you’re doing Roto because you need a little bit of something from at least 8 of 9 categories. In H2H, it just means you get beaten in the categories where you’re average by the teams that are above average in those categories, and usually that means you end up losing more categories than you win.

Then there was Spencer Hawes who I honestly thought was going to be good. He actually ended up behind my next pick: Ronnie Brewer, but both of them were at 140+ on the player rater. Not good for guys who are actually supposed to be in your starting lineup.

Next was Rodney Stuckey – not a bad pick for where I got him.

The next pick was probably my best pick of all 4 drafts: Marc Gasol. Picked at #113, ended up at #37. If I hadn’t had so many total busts in between my first 3 picks and this one, I might have avoided being the Nets of this league.

Luol Deng was another sweet pick – not quite as brilliant, but very good – except that it once again hedged towards the middle like a politician running for re-election. Deng did me a solid by upping his Points, Rebounds, and Blocks, and coming through with a solid FG%.

One more value pick: Kenyon Martin, who might have helped save me from the cellar if he’d played in more than 58 games. I guess that’s why he was still available down at 137.

And finally, Delonte West again. Even at 152, he couldn’t give me any positive value, end up at 166. Honestly, though, I consider the last 2-3 picks a total crapshoot, so considering that 2 of the last 3 came through for me, I’m happy with the end of this draft. If only I hadn’t butchered the middle section like that dude in Saw V.

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When I found the news in my inbox about the transaction taking place, I was completely dumbfounded, utterly and completely. I took a moment to gather up my composure and studied what just transpired.

Why would Nels, who owned David Lee, trade away his FG%-generator for a definite non-factor. Oh yes, did forget to mention that the transaction did not occur in real life, but just in one of GMTR’s readers leagues? My bad.

Anyway, my first thought that this was some sort of “social experiment” Nels was conducting about how active managers are at vetoing “unfair” trades late into the fantasy season, and was going to write about it here. That initial thought was quickly washed down the drain along with my being impressed with Nels’ dabblings as a social scientist when I took a look at which GMTR league the deal was about to take place. It was in GMTR’s first-season KEEPER LEAGUE!

The rules of our keeper league are very straight forward. Each manager is allowed to keep three players on their team as long as those players were not drafted in the first three rounds of the fantasy draft. Got it? Simple, huh? Not really. Well at least as far as I am concerned. I am in two keeper leagues this season and both of them are in their maiden seasons. It’s a new experience for me and it’s something that’s giving me some difficulty to digest. Keeper strategy is more long-term oriented than anything I’ve undertaken before. This trade snapped me into a more lucid state and got me thinking about who I want to keep and who are the viable keepers in the league.

Before I get into that let’s breakdown the trade that was. Nels’ team is dead last in the keeper league and I figure he wanted to nab Arenas as a potential keeper candidate. Since his level of fantasy genius is unparalleled, well maybe paralleled by at least by me and Patrick, I decided to interview Nels and pick at his fantasy basketball machinations. And by interview, I really mean sending him an email asking “What were you thinking?”

Here’s his reply:

I’d like some advice on who I should keep on my team! Haha!

So, first off, I’m in last place in the Dynasty league. Just to make that clear, since it is an important piece of the trade. I’m not quite sure how that happened, but I think it had something to do with picking Blake Griffin in the 5th round so I could make sure to get him as a keeper. My 2nd and 3rd round picks were Andre Iguodala and David Lee, so that worked out, but I also have Brandon Roy and Eric Gordon who’ve both underperformed for where I took them in addition to missing stretches this season.

Really, though, my big mistake was not building a team that dominated categories. As you can see from the 4 guys above (Griffin obviously doesn’t count), my team is a all over the place in terms of categories. So, yes, I’m in last place. Someone has to be.

And as such, I decided to tank the season and send David Lee (3rd round pick, so not a keeper) for Gilbert Arenas (4th round pick, so keeper!). My rationale was that David Lee isn’t doing anything for me. I mean, yeah he’s doing something, but it’s not like his numbers are going to overcome the fact that after Griffin, I took Thaddeus Young, Spencer Hawes, Ronnie Brewer, and Rodney Stuckey (and the fact that the guys I picked after them and the guys I picked up out of the Free Agent pool have actually outplayed them).

The trade just basically expanded my options for my keepers. Since I’m obviously not going to stick with Young, Brewer, or Stuckey (Hawes is not even on my team any more), I’m left with Eric Gordon (96th on the year in 9 cat leagues), Blake Griffin (DNP), Luol Deng (58), and Marc Gasol (a surprise 30 – and a definite keeper). Since we keep 3 players, you can see it’s not the best set of players to choose from. I mean, do I keep Gordon and hope that he becomes the Top 50-60 player I thought he’d be? Do I keep Griffin and hope he actually plays? Will I want to keep Deng when the Bulls are obviously trying to add someone ahead of him in the scoring order?

Now, instead of just losing Lee at the end of the season, I at least have Arenas to consider. Yes, he’s probably just as risky as those other options, but I could also try to trade him to someone with a higher risk tolerance for a keeper player that I would find more promising than the options I have otherwise. I’m thinking something like another big man to compliment Marc Gasol and cement my direction towards a Big Ball team for next year. If I can do that, then I can avoid the conflicted type of team that I had this year and hopefully come out knowing I can win 5 categories every week instead of wondering which categories I’d be able to compete in on a week-to-week basis.

Understand Nels’ move, completely. Here are several reasons why I respectfully disagree with going for Gilbert Arenas as a keeper.

1. He is old.
2. He is an injury risk.
3. He might go to jail, not pass go, not collect $200.
4. Nels could have gotten a better keeper option than Arenas. If I knew he was pimping David, I would have offered some of my young studs to be able to utilize Lee’s services in the fantasy playoffs.

Marc Gasol is an excellent keeper pick for Nels. I would Eric Gordon another shot next season. We all know that this kid has a lot more potential to grow into. I’m just not 100% confident that he will be worth selecting as a keeper. I mean if you timed it right, you could probably nab him again in next season’s draft. Given Nels’ slim pickings, Gordon isn’t too bad of a gamble, relatively speaking of course. Blake Griffin still is promising, but I can understand if Nels is afraid of getting odenized by Blake next season.

Onwards with keeper leagues and keepers… As for my team, I was last to pick in the draft and decided to pick three of the oldest, most fantasy-functional players I could find. I went Nash-bounce-Kidd, then grabbed Ray Allen in the third round. I have a lock on two keeper prospects. They are Rajon Rondo (who I picked in the 4th round) and Andrea Bargnani (5th round). The third and final keeper slot is a three-way battle between three big men.

1. Carlos Boozer - He was drafted in the seventh round by another team, but I acquired via a trade for my sixth round pick, Anthony Randolph. Boozer is not exactly young, but this season he gave us all a reminder why he was once a second-round draft lock.
2. Joakim Noah – I drafted him in the seventh round and he was just awesome for most of the season. He’s hurting right now, dealing with plantar fasciitis, but his upside for the future is huge.
3. Tyrus Thomas – I didn’t draft him. He was drafted in the seventh round by another team and dropped into the FA pool during his absence due to injury. I was able to snipe him off the pool, just before he got traded to the Charlotte Bobcats. He’s been looking good so far in his new team, but new Bobcats owner Michael Jordan is scaring me.

If you were me, who would you choose as your third keeper for next season?

Picking keepers is about striking a balance between long-term potential and already inherent productivity.

Here are some strong to just okay keeper candidates and the rounds they were picked:

Round 4

• Josh Smith  - There are many reasons why Patrick is a fantasy basketball genius. This is just one of them.
• Monta Ellis
• Derrick Rose
• Rajon Rondo
• Al Horford
• O.J. Mayo
• Russell Westbrook
• Jameer Nelson – I think he still might be worth it.
• Gilbert Arenas – Well at least as far as Nels is concerned.
• Rudy Gay

Round 5

• Andrew Bynum – Scary, but probably worth it.
• Trevor Ariza – Kevin Martin is slowly dowsing his fantasy flame.
• Tony Parker
• Mo Williams

Round 6

• Antawn Jamison – IF LeBron leaves, guess who will inherit the Cavs. No-brain keeper here.
• Nene Hilario
• Stephen Jackson – The “Bobcats Renaissance” is slowly making me a believer
• Jeff Green – I know he was hugely disappointing this season, but he still has that long-term potential ahead of him.
• Paul Millsap – Carlos Boozer may not stay with the Jazz after this season.

Round 7

• Carlos Boozer
• Tyrus Thomas
• Zach Randolph
• John Salmons
• Joakim Noah
• Andre Miller – I’m on the fence about him.
• Emeka Okafor

Round 8

Round 9

• Michael Beasley – Fantastic!
• Kevin Love – Oh I wish I had him as a keeper option. Drool.
• Anthony Morrow – He might actually be the third component in the Ellis-Curry-future-of the-franchise mix.

Round 10

• Marc Gasol
• Andrew Bogut
• Chris Kaman – He’s old(ish), injury prone, but his production is worth keeping.
• Tyreke Evans – R.O.Y., well my prediction at least.
• Louis Williams – He’s underrated, but with Allen Iverson out of the picture I think he has a bright future ahead.

Round 11

• Brendan Haywood
• Brandon Jennings (?)
• Aaron Brooks
• Stephen Curry

Round 12

• Randy Foye
• Mike Miller
• Yao Ming – Yes he was drafted.

Round 13

• Corey Brewer
• Andray Blatche – It’s hard to believe how a player who was so dang inconsistent last season, is putting together an unfathomable string of solid games…

As far as undrafted players are concerned, I feel Marcus Thornton of the New Orleans Hornets is making a strong case a potential keeper. The same goes for Taj Gibson of the Chicago Bulls, but he’s nowhere near the level of potential to explode next season as Thornton is.

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The CBS 30-Man league is on. For those of you who are unaware of this league, CBS invites 14 fantasy basketball experts and me (aka, “The Word”) to complete against 15 CBS employees (aka, the “CBS”). The man who runs the league, Sergio Gonzalez, is pretty much the man when it comes to fantasy basketball-related content over at CBS.

It’s my third year in the league, which starts 6 players (PG, SG, SF, PF, C, UTIL) with 6 bench spots. If your keeping score at home, that means the draft goes 30 teams x 12 rounds = 360 players deep, which is beyond ridiculous. Add in the fact that CBS is the position nazi when it comes to dual position eligibility and you have one tough league to draft in. When you hope that Bobby Simmons falls to you in the 8th round, that’s the 30-Man.

Anyway, it’s an H2H league using standard 9-cat scoring where you compete against 2 different teams every week. Unlike most H2H leagues, it uses an all or nothing win/lose format. If you beat your opponent 9-0 or 5-4, it doesn’t matter, you “win”. Likewise a 4-5 score for the week is a “loss”.

So, starting with year 1, here is what I’ve learned playing in this league.

Year 1

In my first year in the league, I didn’t know what they hell to expect. The draft, which wasn’t timed, took like 3 weeks to do and I may have gotten married somewhere in between, it’s tough to remember. I fortunately got hold of Chris Paul in the draft, but unfortunately I built my team more like a roto one than an H2H one. The results were decent and I made the quarter-finals of the playoffs, but ultimately my lack of a cohesive H2H plan left my team a little short of the best teams in the league.

Year 2

Ok, 1 year of experience behind me, I now “knew” that there was exactly 1 quality free agent that could be picked up during the year. The first year it was Jamario Moon, while in the second year it happened to be Anthony Morrow (both of whom were not on the player list to begin the season, resulting in someone calling “dibs” while waiting for the player to be manually added to the list). And while you could trade players, you were basically stuck with the team you drafted at the start of the year. I also knew that my year 1 team lacked the star juice to complete with the best in the league. So, I did what I thought was the smart thing and went high-risk, high-reward.

And it completely blew up in my face.

Picking at spot 16, my first round pick was Elton Brand, Kevin Martin “fell” to me in the second and I went to DEFCON 1 in the third with Gilbert Arenas. It was the most epic failure of a draft I’ve ever had the pleasure of conducting. Somehow, with Nazr Mohammed and Walter Herrmann leading my squad for most of the year, I did not finish in last place. It was the sweetest 28th place finish ever.

This Year

Ok, I’ve learned some more things.

1. Injuries will break you – injuries hurt in all types of leagues, but when there are no free agents to pick up, you are screwed if more than 1 of your starters gets hurt.

2. I need a f**king plan – Given the win/loss structure of the league, the best way to protect myself from injuries while giving myself the most chance to win every week, is to only complete in 5 or maybe 6 categories while tanking the rest. Call it the ultimate in H2H strategies.

3. F**k you Gilbert Arenas

The Draft

For a complete rundown of the draft for every team in the league, check out the CBS 30-Deep page.

So, heading into the draft, here is what I was looking at in terms of draft order and competition.

1. Tom Carpenter, ESPN
2. Jamey Eisenberg, CBS Sports
3. Mike Yam, ESPN
4. Sergio Gonzalez, CBS Sports
5. Matt Stroup, Rotoworld
6. Scott White, CBS Sports
7. Rick Kamla, NBA
8. Jeff Lippman, CBS Sports
9. Dave Gawron, RotoCommunity
10. Peter Madden, CBS Sports
11. Patrick Madden, GiveMeTheRock.com
12. Eric Mack, CBS Sports
13. David Klyce, HoopsKlyce.com
14. Dave Richard, CBS Sports
15. Steve Alexander, Rotoworld
16. Greg Urbano, CBS Sports
17. Brian Flood
18. Michael Hurcomb, CBS Sports
19. Eric Karabell, ESPN
20. Fazal Imam, CBS Sports
21. James Questel, MSG
22. Jason Horowitz, CBS Sports
23. Aaron Gleeman, Rotoworld
24. Corey Guerrera, CBS Sports
25. Hector Castro, RotoExperts.com
26. Ross Devonport CBS Sports
27. Brandon Funston
28. Denny Burkholder, CBS Sports
29. Dennis Velasco/Matt Satten, BarkleysMouth.com
30. Lauren Shehadi, CBS Sports

So, I had the 11th pick in the draft, which is nothing to complain about (man, picking in the bottom half of the 30-Man draft has to suck). Here’s how it all went down for me.

Round 1 (11) Amar’e Stoudemire

Tough to complain about Amar’e falling to me at 11 (although I remember being exciting about getting Brand at 16 last year). While he’ll always be an injury risk and he’s not center eligible in CBS leagues, drafting Amar’e clearly defines my team. I’m going big.

Round 2 (50) Vince Carter

People think they can find shooting guards later in the draft, so VC falls all the way to 50. Going big, I want points, percentages, threes and rebounds from my guards if at all possible, so Carter actually kind of fits with what I’m doing. At least that’s what I tell myself.

Round 3 (71) Troy Murphy

Ugh. Murphy is not exactly in line with what I’m trying to do, but I couldn’t pass him up all the way down at 71. On the down side, he’s an injury risk and only qualifies at PF in CBS leagues, so I’ve effectively painted myself into a corner by eating up my UTIL spot after 3 picks. Here’s hoping Amar’e gains C eligibility quickly in CBS leagues.

Round 4 (110) Marvin Williams

Back on track. Not only does Williams look good going into the year, but he brings a nice all around game that jives with what I’m trying to do – he shoots threes, decent rebounder, will block some shots and shoots good percentages. He also qualifies as a small forward.

Round 5 (131) Samuel Dalembert

Needing both a starting center and point guard, I bypass the last remaining starting PGs (like Aaron Brooks) to grab Dalembert. Unfortunately, the Murphy pick left me a little short on blocks, so I needed a good shot blocker to compete in my big man categories.

Round 6 (170) Steve Blake

When you wait until pick 170 to draft your starting point guard, not only do you get Steve Blake, but you’re lucky you get Steve Blake. Someone like DJ Augustin would have been awesome for my team (especially since Raja Bell is now injured), but he went at the beginning of the 5th. Instead, at the end of the 6th I get Blake, who will hopefully contribute to my team in 1 lone category: threes. Fortunately, news breaks a few days after my pick that Blake will enter the season as the Blazers starting PG because Andre Miller isn’t meshing with the team. So Team Give Me The Rock is now powered by chemistry.

Round 7 (191) Mike Dunleavy

Bazinga! Dunleavy neither fits my strategy nor is a safe pick health-wise, but rather this was a pure value play at pick 191. It is certainly is a risk that Dunleavy may not play until January and when he finally comes back he may not be all that effective, but considering the picks around Dunleavy included Roger Mason Jr., Nicolas Batum, and Darko, it seems like a calculated risk. Once Dunleavy regains some value (crosses fingers), my plan is to flip him for someone more big ball appropriate.

Round 8 (230) Bobby Simmons

There is a chance Simmons will start. And he shoots threes.

Rounds 9-12

(251) Shaun Livingston
(290) Joel Anthony
(311) Earl Clark
(350) Bobby Brown

Livingston is my backup point guard, which means that Blake better stay healthy. Anthony is the Heat’s 3rd string center, but I like that Jermaine O’Neal and Jamaal Magloire are the two guys ahead of him on the depth chart. At pick 311, my only goal was to find someone who might be good at some point in the future. And taking Brown at 350 is my prerogative (SING IT).

The Lesson

It was a lot more difficult to stick to my plan of staying big than I was expecting, especially in the later rounds when you start sifting through garbage to try and find something of value (hence the Dunleavy pick).The team is still more of an injury risk than I would have liked, but that tends to be how I roll in fantasy leagues. Unlike most fantasy leagues, it’s almost impossible to get a starting six that you’re happy with, but overall I’m content with the team’s focus on big man stats, percentages and threes. If I can win rebounds, FT%, TOs and threes in nearly every matchup I have, all I need is one more category out of points, FG% or blocks to win the week.

It remains to be seen if my strategy will work and if I was able to execute it successfully. But as was the case the past couple of years, no matter what horrible things happen to my team, it should be a fun ride along the way.

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