Give Me The Rock

Well, that was a quick moment of relevance for the LA Clippers. A week after Baron Davis opted out of the final year of his contract and signed a 5 year $65 million contract with Los Angeles, Brand has walked away from his verbal agreement with the Clips and, according to the LA Times, signed a five year $82 million contract with the 76ers. This was after Brand’s agent, David Falk, said that he was opting out of the final year of his contract to “give the Clippers more payroll flexibility to strengthen the team around Brand.” The Sixers offer was apparently on par with that of LA’s, so someone – and the word on the street is that it’s Falk – really, really despises the Clippers. I mean, it’s like he can’t even stand the way the Clippers smell.

Sixers

This signing basically completes the 76ers roster for next season and leaves the Clippers in shambles, so it’s really only worth discussing the fantasy implications for the Sixers at the moment.

Brand will presumably slide into the PF spot on the Sixers and immediately become their best player (no offense, Andre Iguodala). While his legs have seen better days, he should still be able to keep up with the young guys and becomes the low post threat that the Sixers sorely lacked last year. Brand is still good enough to be a 20-10 guy (ok, maybe a 20 and 9 guy) while shooting 50% from the floor on just about any team, including this one.

Andre Miller’s scoring will certainly drop from the career high 17.1 a game he averaged last season – and back to the 13ish range that he has averaged most of his career. With Brand now fronting a lot more of the offense, Miller can focus on his PG duties, which will hopefully boost his assists back into the 8+ a game range (they fell to 6.9 last season). The trade for Brand also puts the Sixers in clear “win now” mode, which is good for Miller’s status with the team and his playing time – at the unfortunate expense of Louis Williams (we might have to console Nels - I believe he was in the running for the vice presidency of the Louis Williams fan club).

We’ll have to wait to see how much, if at all, Andre Iguodala is hurt fantasy-wise from this trade. Word on the street is that he could move to the SG position, which would allow Thaddeus Young move to his more natural SF position and Willie Green to his more natural bench position. Iguodala’s game is so well-rounded that I think he’ll be ok even if he loses a few touches on offense and a rebound a game because of the move to SG. Young will be a nice sleeper going into the year who will improve on his rookie season, as long as the minutes are there for him. And Samuel Dalembert… who the hell knows? I’d be afraid that he might regress a little bit by playing alongside a great player like Brand, but the opposite could be true.

Clippers

Does Baron Davis want a do over on this one? The poor Clippers just can’t catch a break. In additional to losing Brand, the icing on the irony cake is that Corey Maggette jetted to the Warriors on the same day. That leaves them with a starting 5 of Baron Davis, Cuttino Mobley, Tim Thomas, Al Thornton, and Chris Kaman. Not exactly a group I’d want to go into battle with.

But the Clippers offseason is far from over. Just ask Mike Dunleavy: “Now, we’ll just have to go out and find new good players.”

Wow, I never knew it was that easy. The Clippers DO have the cap space and are supposedly going to be meeting with Josh Smith and Emeka Okafor, so something good could be in store for them*. But as long as the Clippers have their current roster in place, Al Thornton really starts to shimmy his way up draft boards. To be continued…

* Although the amount of goodness exuded by Emeka Okafor is very debatable

Passion and Pride does a sort of video comparison of Louis Williams against the 2008 draft prospects. The part that I find the most intriguing is that Williams is playing against people who are already in the NBA in his video, where as the draft prospects are shown against high school and college players. Of course, Williams has been in the NBA for 3 years already (I know! Who knew?) and who knows what Derrick Rose and OJ Mayo are going to be playing like after 3 years in the league.

But, let’s look for a moment at Williams’ numbers before and after the All-Star break.

Situation	G	Min	FGPct	3Pct	FTPct	Reb	Ast	TO	Stl	Blk	PPG
Pre All-Star	51	22:30	41.0	37.1	77.2	1.9	3.3	1.6	1.0	0.2	10.8
Post All-Star	29	24:36	44.6	33.9	80.2	2.5	3.0	1.5	1.0	0.2	12.7

Let’s also keep in mind that Andre Miller - the 76ers starting PG - played 36 minutes per game in all 82 games for Philly last year. That means Williams was getting some time as the backup SG. At 6-2, that can be a red flag for fantasy owners, but when your team is young and fast and running all the time like the 76ers, you can get away with having a smaller lineup out there.

In his last 10 games, Williams had a -3.5 on the Player Rater, which - for a whole season - would have put him at somewhere between 140 and 146 with guys like James Jones, Jordan Farmar, Larry Hughes, Ben Wallace, Drew Gooden, Maurice Evans, and Jermaine O’Neal. In a 12×13 league, there’s 156 players drafted, so being in the 140s means a late 12th or 13th round pick.

I’m not pointing out Williams as if to say he’ll be better than Derrick Rose or OJ Mayo in 08-09, but rather to simply say that he has gone from Off The Radar to On. He is above the league average in Scoring, Assists, and Steals, and is listed on Yahoo as a G, which means he would fit very well into a small ball lineup.

I’m going to make a pre-draft prediction (and feel pretty safe since the Sixers are unlikely to take another PG with Miller and Williams already slotted) of: 11.5 points, 0.8 threes, 3.2 assists, 2 rebounds, 1.0 steals, 0.2 blocks, 1.7 turnovers, with 45% FG and 80% FT. As I mentioned above, that’ll probably place him in the 140s, and you probably won’t want to go higher than that in order to leave room for the Upside Potential that makes him a Sleeper pick.

Line of the Night: Iverson’s (5.08) half of the abbreviated year of Independence was not enough to top C-But’s (aka Caron Butler) line last night (5.40). Butler’s 57% on less attempts put him just below Iverson’s 56% (more attempts), but Caroming Caron’s 4 steals was where he made up ground like Obama in Iowa. Both had 3 three pointers. LeBron’s 39 points (4.76) came on 48% (yet more attempts), and he gathered 11 rebounds while equaling AI in assists at 8. No Steals and No Blocks hurt Bron Bron’s attempt-at-a-triple-double fantasy score, dropping him to 3rd in the polls.

Honorable Mentions: Mike Miller came through in 4th place (4.68) mostly due to his 12-13 from the line. Since Marcus Camby was 6th on the night (7 blocks), let’s celebrate two Nuggets in the top 10 with the startling and profound realization that Denver has not only a Dance Team, but a Cheer Team.

I expect Dance Teamer Nicole Hurdle to make a strong run for All-Star Dance Team member. Observe.

I think that every team should get a Cheer Team in addition to the Dance Team. This makes it easier on the dancers since they can focus on their core competency, and it also means that instead of those random people shooting t-shirts out of cannons and slingshots, there will be friendly faces providing an alternative brand of energy for NBA fans. Friendly faces like those of Sarah and Chris. Observe.

He’s kind of an old skool Troy Murphy, no? Before Muph decided to cultivate a Jim Halpert look.

Waiver Wire Line of the Night: Speaking of Nuggets, Anthony Carter (4.02) has started running the show pretty effectively for the Nugs, dropping 15 dimes last night. His shooting was fairly off-ful, but he did have 2 steals and 3 blocks. Not bad for a plug-n-play PG.

Rise With Us: Chris Quinn made 5 more three pointers. Mike Conley played 35 minutes again and had 11 points, 7 assists and 5 rebounds.

Goat of the Night: It’s been a while since we’ve heard from Antoine Walker. The TWolves have pretty much made headlines only when it concerned Marko Jaric’s Significant Other. But since Walker played 20 minutes and came up with only 2 rebounds and a three pointer, I thought I’d throw him out there. That, and there really wasn’t anyone else outside of the top 100 yesterday that shouldn’t have been there. Two rebounds, 20 minutes. Where’s that put him on Hollingere’s Rebound Rate thing?

I don’t really follow the 76ers, so it’s hard to come up with any good quips or analogies. But when Passion and Pride has posts about Hersey Hawkins and Question Marks, I don’t feel like I’m missing much. Of course, some of those question marks have fantasy relevance:

• Will Sam Dalembert become a more consistent force in the middle?
• Rodney Carney and Willie Green flip-flopped in the starting lineup last year. Will either one step up and claim the fifth starters spot?

Hopefully Dalembert steps up to break into the top tier of centers and Rodney Carney takes over the SF spot for the Sixers. That’ll be good not only for Philly, but for fantasy owners as well. The more players that are BOC (ballin’ outta control) the more interesting the fantasy basketball gets.

Here’s last years rankings for the 76ers (TO included):
34 - Andre Iguodala
68 - Samuel Dalembert
72 - Andre Miller
75 - Kyle Korver
252 - Rodney Carney
256 - Willie Green
259 - Shavlik Randolph
315 - Reggie Evans
320 - Calvin Booth
321 - Kevin Ollie
346 - Louis Williams
401 - Louis Amundson
NR - Derrick Byars
NR - Herbert Hill
NR - Ricky Sanchez
NR - Jason Smith
NR - Thaddeus Young

Starting Lineup:
PG: Andre Miller
SG/SF: Andre Iguodala
SF/SG: Kyle Korver
PF: Reggie Evans
C: Samuel Dalembert

Bench:
Everyone else

The good news is there’s no one in Philly now who’s going to take any more minutes away from the starters than there was last season. That’s good news for My Two Andres, Kyle “Cute for a basketball player” Korver, The Nutcracker, and Camembert. You like I how I just made up nicknames for all of them off the top of my head? I’m pretty sure I’m at least as good as Kanye.

Each of those starters should be getting at least 30 minutes a game, which means that everyone else on the team is pretty much worthless from a fantasy perspective. I know I said I hope that Rodney Carney gets some more time in, but that would probably require Mo Cheeks to go with a 3 SG/SF line-up. Although, that might not be all bad. I don’t know enough about the Sixers to really know if that’s a possibility, but it’s probably not worth spending a late round pick on the off chance that it happens.

GMTR Draft Predictions
Andre Iguodala - 2nd Round
Samuel Dalembert - 5th/6th
Andre Miller - 5th/6th
Kyle Korver - 8th

Thus far, this NBA season has been a calamity of injuries. Did NBA players stop treating anti-inflammatories like sweettarts? I am tempted to stop writing this article and start rampantly buying shares of stock in whoever distributes Naproxen, buy low baby. Here are some of the players who are watching their value skyrocket.

- Earl Boykins - Height is no measure of value as Nels reminded us. If you own Earl, then last week’s trade is your fantasy birthday.

- Gerald Green - *Gulf Shores Houston Tx Shout Out!* Gulf Shores is actually on the other side of the city from my house. But, what the hell, shout outs are always necessary for Houston area prep stars, Rashard Lewis in the House!

At least the Rockets never got a chance to pass on Gerald Green, yes the city has still not forgiven you CD. Gerald posted some good numbers when he stepped on the court, but Doc Rivers was up to his antics; antics is code for terrible coaching. After riding the bench some more Green has gotten another chance due to Tony Allen’s injury. If you have an expendable roster spot then add him.

- Willie Green - Dear Billy King, nice one. You went from Eastern Conference champs to bottom feeders in a few years, I would compare you to the band Puddle of Mudd, but that would be an insult to one of the worst bands of the past five years. Either way, Willie Green is now the number two option, make the best of this trainwreck and pick him up. Honorable mention goes to Louis Williams, you don’t know who he is? Oh, you will in a few years, or at least in a few weeks when i write an article on him.

- Grant Hill/Hedo Turkoglu - Trevor Ariza has been riding both of them Damon Huard style for the past few months. If this injury keeps him out for any amount of time then GH and HT will be worth having in shallow leagues. The only problem both have faced is consistency, not having the youthful Ariza as an off the bench option will keep them both on the court.

Three of my favorite players of the last decade.

- Josh Childress - The afro is seeing some time at the point. Both Speedy Claxton and Tyronn Lue are out so Josh is seeing time in the backcourt. Any time is good time for Josh.

- Nick Collison - 25 and 13, still coming out of nowhere. I guess he just needed time to warm up.

Also, welcome Becks! I can’t wait to see him in action live and to jeer him, though I secretly love him.

Joe Smith (Phi - PF) Add
Mike James (Min - PG) Drop

Mikki Moore (NJ - PF,C) Add
Chucky Atkins (Mem - PG) Drop

We’re having ourselves a little discussion over on the post about Nick Collison and the names Mikki Moore and Joe Smith came up. As you can see here, Mikki and Joe have been added, but Little Nicky remains a Free Agent. Guess that tells you something right there.

Damon Stoudamire (Mem - PG) Add
Charlie Bell (Mil - PG,SG,SF) Drop

I guess with Pau Gasol back Damon Stoudamire has someone to pass to. Funny that it was actually a different team that dropped Chucky Atkins above. Is Alexander Johnson still available? Anyone?

or: How the Nuggets kept themselves in the playoff race, and simultaneously crushed the dreams of at least 1 fantasy owner in every league

Probably the biggest trade that will happen all season. First spotted on Fantapedia. AP story on Yahoo right here.

Iverson and Ivan McFarlin for Andre Miller, Joe Smith (another former #1 overall), and 2 first-round picks in 2007.

Couldn’t have happened at a better time for the Nuggets. Of course, Iverson will have 15 games to play by himself, essentially, and then the Nuggs will have to figure out how to get he and Carmelo to coexist with their gigantic scoring averages. At least he’ll keep them in the playoffs until Carmelo returns. Meanwhile, as Sixers Chairman Ed Snider put it: “It was time for us to take a deep breath and say we’ve got to move in a different direction. Allen wanted to move in a different direction.”

Fantasy Impact: Nuggets

Iverson will be playing the role of Carmelo Anthony for the next 14 games. Everything else will probably look about the same until Carmelo returns. So much for that Earl Boykins pickup.

Obviously with two 30+ point scorers on the floor, others are going to suffer. Unfortunately for me, The Others at are JR Smith and Earl Boykins.

Najera and Camby (the other two in the starting lineup) will probably continue to do what they’ve been doing. I imagine JR Smith will continue to shoot/make a healthy number of three-pointers, but his overall scoring will probably dip, and I can’t see him getting any more assists than he already does. Andre Miller was only putting in 13 points a game despite playing 35 minutes. Iverson will gladly take those minutes, but might reverse that 13 to make it a 31. Of course, in order to do that, he’ll have to steal some minutes from someone - most likely Boykins. But if Iverson drops his minutes to the 35/36 that Andre Miller was playing, Boykins can probably continue to contribute his 11.7 points in 24 minutes.

So, the real question is, can both Iverson and Melo score 30+ points a game for the Nuggets? With the pace that the Nuggets play at, it’s possible that Or will they both be happy with about 24? If they do somehow manage to maintain their preferred levels of scoring, Smith, Boykins and Camby are going to take some hits to their point totals. Smith is first in line there, as I said above. Boykins and Camby don’t have as far to fall, and both of them give you other stats that make them valuable. If JR can’t continue to get his nearly 3 threes and 1 steal, he provides almost no value to your fantasy team. It certainly doesn’t help that he’s out for 9 more games.

Fantasy Impact: Sixers

Good news for all Sixers owners! Have another round! This one’s on the house! The Sixers gave up 42 minutes and 31 points, and got only 36 and 13 back. That means even if Andre Miller steps it up to former career levels, he’ll still be providing more points through assists than he’ll be scoring. I can see him getting up to 16-18 points a game, but he’ll also still be getting his 9 assists. Iverson didn’t distribute the rock quite as much, which means a few more openings for guys like Andre Iguodala - who will probably pick up the bulk of the scoring load, Kyle Korver - he’ll be back to getting decent looks at three-pointers, Chris Webber - his game will work better with Andre and Andre in the backcourt, and even “Chillie” Willie Green. I listed them here not only in order of their scoring averages, but also in order of upside from the trade. Willie has rillie been stepping it up in Iverson’s absence and he might even be available on your Free Agent list, but, of course, you’ll want to wait to see what his minutes look like when Miller joins the team.

Of course, another strategy to take with the Sixers players is to try to trade them right now to someone who thinks they’ll start Ballin Outta Control with Andre Miller around to distribute. I’d hang on to Iguodala, but I think any of the other guys are sell-high candidates. Chris Webber is an especially good looking Fools Gold right now, since he should see the ball a lot more without Iverson on the court, but he’ll have to get on the court before he can make that dream a reality. If you’re as risk averse as I am, you wouldn’t have drafted him in the first place, but if you did, now is the best opportunity you’re going to have to see what you can get for him.

If you’d like a second (or third) opinion, you can check out Fantapedia, and also Matt Buser from Yahoo Sports.