Why Pau Gasol is no fantasy of mine…
(I would skip this post if you; a) like the Lakers, b) like Pau Gasol, or c) think that fantasy analysis should be based solely on statistics and not subjective, whiny opinion about dopey, annoying PF/C’s)
It’s time for some explaining. Below are Gasol’s numbers for last season:
18.3 points, 11.3 boards, 3.4 assists, 1.7 blocks, 0.6 steals, 53.6% FG on 13 attempts and 79% FT on 5.6 attempts. He also commits 2.2 turnovers per game because he is a sucker. Anyway, as any fantasy guru will tell you, these are some pretty impressive numbers. In fact, nearly everyone agrees that this year he is a automatic first round pick.
I am here to try and show to you in some round about, semi logical, almost irrational way why you should not waste your precious picks on Pau Gasol in the first round.
This picture is evidence for points one and three (copyright: Rolling Stone Magazine)
1) Pau Gasol is not interesting. Try and stay with this because it’s important. Gasol will very often, as witnessed by his averages, drop a pretty sizable double-double. However it will be the most drib drab 18 and 12 you have ever seen. Post move, tip in, 6 foot jumper, tip in… repeat. Running the triangle is not the most forceful way to enliven your audience. What do you really want from your first round pick apart from top draw stats? You want to be amazed at least once a week at a box score which goes BANG (scroll to Rondo) and leaves you bedazzled. You want to be able to say to yourself, after your 2nd, 3rd and 4th round picks all shoot 43% and collect a combined 27 points between them, that it’s OK because your bomb diggy first round pick is still playing on the West Coast tonight and he is going to drop 40. Here are a list of players that can drop 40; LeBron, Wade, Chris Paul, Deron Williams, Dirk, Kobe, Amar’e, Steph Curry, Danny Granger and Melo. Pau Gasol does not make that list despite his stats and he never will. I know points aren’t everything, but when someone scores a bucket load of points, you can say hello to minimum three categories (points, FG%, FT%) and probably others because of the effort which will require those points (steals, threes).
2) Pau Gasol is soft. Yes he is and don’t try and think otherwise. He gets pushed around by bigger centers and power forwards. He falls to the ground. He misses games. Recount; 17 last season, 16 in 2007-08, 23 the year before that. In all, that’s 57 in 4 seasons. Yuck. That’s Dwyane Wade before the 2008 Olympics bad. That’s Danny Granger bad. Just think, you should now know that Andrew Bogut is probably going to miss about 4 weeks of the season (and it could be many more). Let’s say he does miss 4 weeks and about 15 games. Suddenly, he isn’t that third round pick everyone was talking about and it’s hello at pick 55. With Gasol, you don’t have the luxury of being able to plan around it because you don’t know when it’s going to come… and it will come. With Gasol, you know that Odom and Bynum will be there to ease back into it. With Gasol, you know that things will go slowly because he is on a contender and they don’t rush things like this. If you want some more evidence of why you don’t want this guy on your team because you will cop too much abuse from your friends when SportsCenter roles around, see here and flick to the 26 second mark.
3) Pau Gasol is a dick. He called out Kobe Bryant despite being infinitely inferior. He has a disgusting shaggy beard/haircut. I just needed to get this off my chest before we move on.
4) Pau Gasol cannot play as well as last season again. This one is the most important argument for fantasy in 2010-11. You might not agree here, but Andrew Bynum is going to pull it all together this season. The guy is a dead set beast and the Lakers will be feeding him the ball as much as possible this season. Gasol will see more rest as Theo Ratliff was signed for a reason. 37 minutes per game is too much and the Lakers reliance on him has been too great over the past two seasons. His struggles against the Celtics in the playoffs last season showcased the way to render his less effective and you can be sure that the rest of the Western Conference were watching. Over the past three seasons with the Lakers, his FG% has steadily dropped from a high of 59% to 53% last season. All of this points to the fact you can expect a drop off from Gasol this season. Not a massive one, but enough to suggest he is being slightly over-valued by the majority of fantasy speculators out there. Last year he was a late first rounder/early second round pick. Nothing has changed this year.
Let someone else worry about Pau Gasol and you enjoy some actual excitement with your first round pick.
Fantasy Basketball and that time of the year
Are all your friends talking about fantasy football and how awesome it is because they just drafted Chris Johnson? Chumps. It’s that time of the year for fantasy basketball where all news is boring news (see: Carmelo Anthony and the Nuggets and figuring out why so many people care about Rudy Fernandez despite him being a minimal role player at best).
Jason finished up our two man mock draft over at fbasketballblog. Here is round 13. I was going to do a full blown recap, but for a August mock draft, I thought it was a bit excessive. Instead, I’ll go with the best and worst picks in my eyes. First, Michael Beasley as a 6th rounder? Seriously, what was I thinking? While I was trying to slot him into a real ‘fantasy’ team (this sentence doesn’t make sense thus far), it was an epic fail. The T’Wolves actually have some talent as opposed to last year and Beasley hasn’t exactly shown much to date even as the second option on a shitty team. D- for this pick. Jason snagged Monta in the third round. It isn’t in the same ball park as the B-Easy variety, but I still think this is pretty high for a scorer who is going to be reduced to the third option on the Warriors team which has great uncertainty around the coach. But, I can live with it. Also, Dwight Howard should really make an appearance in the first round but each to their own. Good picks? D-Will at #8 even though I would have taken him above Granger and Gasol personally but still some people aren’t sold. The fact that he does nearly everything shouldn’t put you off people. Turkoglu in the 5th is a risky in the extreme but I LOVE it. Same with Ray Felton. Bogut in the 4th was probably my best as he is top shelf these days. It was good fun reading what another person thought about the direction of individual teams and how certain players matched up. So cheers Jason, until next year. Speaking of, see this post if you are interested in a mock draft next Thursday.
Since I have nothing original to say, I’m going to take the liberty to comment on other people’s work. I am trying to slog away at a beginners guide and player list, but it’s still awhile away yet.
Over at a relatively new blog (from what I can tell), Life is Just a Fantasy… Basketball Blog, there is a whole bunch of stuff about individual players and what the coming season holds for them. He likes Reggie Williams but has a distinct distaste for Greg Oden (Shame!). Perhaps some of you know my like of all things which came out of the 2007 draft and that’s why I shed tears when I see predictions ranging from the 10th to the 12th round in most people’s predictions. It’s his time to shine and it’s going to happen. That’s all I’ll say at this stage. Just be glad when your 8th round pick starts putting up 12-12-3 every night.
Give Me The Rock have their awesome, fantastically wonderful NBA schedule up already. This year it comes with improvements in the form of the entire NBA schedule, a weekly fantasy schedule, a daily schedule and a team comparison chart. I dunno what more you could ask for? Some pizza pie I suppose. Also, Nels breaks down the Denver Nuggets and Erik tackles the Milwaukee Bucks, nearly making up for the fact he wrote off Andrew Bogut last season… =) I agree with both these guys on most things except I never touch Chris Anderson (mostly because he scares the shit out of me) and I’m not loving Drew Gooden because Luc Mbah Morte is an athletic freak of nature who is going to dominate defensively in the near future and Scott Skiles loves defense. Also, Drew Gooden will have moved teams by Mid-November.
Fantasy Basketball Daily breaks down the SG position for this season. Unsurprisingly Kobe and Dwyane feature on the list. Somewhat more surprisingly, O.J Mayo comes in at #6. I love it, but I think most people will wait on him and go for the likes of Kev-Mart, Manu and Ray-Ray before they touch Mayo. He is also high on Mike Miller. If you are in need of three’s at any point, grab him and start smiling wildly. For Facebook fans, here is the new Fantasy Basketball Daily fan page.
And finally, Dr. A over at Rotoworld has a new Q&A column up which I’m sure most people have already seen if you read anything about fantasy basketball. Some of the questions are daunting indeed. On the Darren Collison question, I think he ranks ahead of Mo Williams, Aaron Brooks and John Wall. Of course, this depends on if you value assists more so than FG% or TOs.
Come next week, there will be some actual creative writing instead of rounding up other people’s hard earned keyboard strokes. Since there are other sites doing collective teams and in-depth positional looks, I will try and focus on a few things which get overlooked from my perspective. Like how an ageing Jason Kidd is still infinitely times better than anything Devin Harris will attempt on a basketball court in the 2010-11 season and a few strategy pieces which need rehashing (point guards and power forwards is so 2006).
Two Man Mock – Round 12
Jason handed out cookies in Round 11. He is a big softy when it comes to being nice. For Round 12, all you get is a link to Round 1 (because if this is your first time, you need an introduction) and a big picture of pick number 133. Please note we are not going to update or change anything for the trade which just went down and any into the future (but please also note my predictive $kills by picking up Collison in the 10th round one day before he got traded). This is my last round in this draft. I’m going to go out with a bang and pick the best people left on the board at each pick, as that’s what I try and do in Round’s 12 and 13 in normal drafts (also try and spot any starters still left on the board who have been overlooked). Now, back to that picture…
Old School, Josh, Old School.
133. Josh Childress (D. Lee, S. Nash, C. Boozer, S. Jackson, J. Green, B. Jennings, J. Salmons, M. Okur, B. Diaw, D. Collison, D. DeRozan): The kid out of Stanford didn’t like it much at the Hawks when he was last in the NBA so he left to play in Greece. Good for some. But now he is back and he has ended up at the Phoenix Suns, a place where mere mortals become fantasy legends. In 2007-08 with the Hawks, he put up 12/5 with a few extras thrown in and one wicked FG% – 57%. With more experience, you would think he could build on that, especially in the Suns system. But then again, Jarred Dudley, Grant Hill, Hedo Turkoglu, J-Rich and Hakim Warrick will all have some things to say about that in the playing time discussion which will occur. He has a proven ability to put some points on the board and is never going to kill you with poor turnovers or percentages. Plus, you get that afro all season long, even if it sits on your bench.
134. JaVale McGee (G. Wallace, D. Howard, M. Ginobili, R. Westbrook, A. Blatche, J. Wall, C. Butler, E. Turner, E. Brand, C. Frye, M. Conley): You know JaVale. Sure you do. He plays for Team USA these days. It’s a sad situation but whatever. This 7’0 beast is just waiting to destroy the NBA. Last season he struggled to do anything but freed from the shadows of Brendan Haywood after he was shipped to the Mavs, McGee did show some promise at the end of last season, averaging 13 points and 8 boards in the last 8 games of the season on only 23 minutes per game. With no-one else actually being able to play Center for the Wizards, this is as good as it gets for McGee and fantasy owners in the 12th rounds in search of height. Anyone with 4 capital letters in their name can’t be all that bad as well and if anything, this team needed some more height (/* sarcasm). But if anything happens to one of the 5 PF/C’s on this team who are before him, the owner can rest easy that JaVale has his back (public service announcement: in honour of McGee amazingly making Team USA, for the rest of the this round all players will have 4 capitalised letters in their name).
135. ThAdeus YoUng (D. Wade, A. Stoudemire, A. Bargnani, B. Davis, A. Randolph, L. Aldridge, T. Ariza, A. Miller, M. Miller, T. Williams, A. Johnson): Before he went down towards the end of last season, Thaddeus was crushing his opponents. He scored double digits 49 times last season (the Sixer’ only won 17 of those games though), to end up with 13.8 points and 5.2 boards per game. It was this third season and many fantasy owners are probably a tad disappointed he hasn’t amounted to more yet. He doesn’t block, didn’t shoot very well last season (47% and 69% as a Forward) and seems to be stuck with nowhere to go. That’s all pretty negative but even if he gives you 12/5 at this stage, you are not going to be super disappointed. Plus, when Elton Brand and AI9 suffer long season-threatening injuries before Christmas, his stock will rise again. If you combine the last two draft picks for this team (Amir and Thaddeus), you nearly get a pretty good NBA player.
136. AnDerson VaReja0 (S. Curry, C. Anthony, T. Duncan, A. Bogut, D. Harris, K. Garnett, E. Gordon, C. Landry, A. Harrington, J. Calderon, Ma. Williams): I don’t know how he slipped to here. No LBJ. No Big Z. At worst he will end up with 11 boards a game, lots of bandages from falling over so much and the stupidest hair in the NBA. Andy, as he is affectionately known by those few people who actually like him, could make a massive leap this year but my gut says he will fall over on route because the wind picked up a bit. He will play 35+ minutes which equals more steals and blocks, both of which he could average 1.5+. Very handy at for this position. Further, while he is ‘offensively challenged’ to be polite, he should manage at least 10 points per game as J.J Hickson can’t do it all.
137. TaYshaun PrInce (D. Williams, B. Lopez, D. West, D. Gallinari, H. Turkoglu, B. Griffin, J. Nelson, R. Stuckey, J.R. Smith, G. Oden, M. Chalmers): We are really scrapping the barrel at this point. Tayshaun (apart from also being a member of a previous Team USA) is one of those fantasy players I have an unexplained dislike for. Maybe it’s his blandness. 13/5/3 every year. Repeat. However now that T-Mac has joined the Pistons (please note his absence on this list… Jason… don’t even think about it), he might have to share whatever crumbs he still gathers in Detroit. He provides some very light cover for Blake Griffin as they are similar sort of players, if you ignore the athleticism, charm and ability to make basketball look fun from Griffin. Sorry to all those Prince lovers out there, but I just don’t get it.
138. JaMario MoOn (P. Gasol, R. Rondo, T. Murphy, Z. Randolph, K. Martin, O.J. Mayo, J.J. Hickson, J. Holiday, R. Hibbert, K. Azubuike, T. Outlaw): Talking of players too cool to name, I think our man Mr Moon fits snug in this team. There will be a bit of speculation about Jamario this season and everyone wonders what happens to the Cavs after LeBron leaves town. To be truthful, no-one really knows. He did everything and now he is gone, someone is going to have to step up. Moon is a good a bet as anyone else. He can stretch the floor with his distance shooting, is very athletic and can steal/block when given the opportunity. He could end up playing a lot of minutes at SF alongside Hickson and Varejao to try and move the ball up and down the floor as quickly as possible. That’s what I’d do and my two coaching championship trophies (under 12 girls division 2) I think attest that my opinion actually means something. If Azubuike, Outlaw and Moon all get some minutes this season, this team is going places fast. Then again, if they sit on the pine, there is some pretty serious trouble ahead.
Yes Please (Photo: NBAE/Getty Images)
139. WeSley JoHnson (D. Granger, J. Smith, N. Hilario, D. Rose, J. Richardson, J. Crawford, P. Millsap, T. Parker, R. Lopez, L. Odom, B. Udrih): Here is a real cool cat. You wanna make a big impression? Rock up to the NBA draft rocking that outfit to the right. Despite being drafted by one of the craziest GM’s who ever lived, big Wes is ready for the NBA. After spending an eternity at College, he is ready to hit the big time. He likes to score, hit the long ball and can block too. Well, he could do all that against undersized players in College who hadn’t reached puberty yet. At a minimum he is worth a pick in the late rounds because he is a pretty solid chance to wrack up 1.5+ threes and 10-12 points. This of course all depends on the how the minutes are divided up at Minnesota this season, but it doesn’t hurt to take a bit of a chance and hope for the best. He shores up three’s to consolidate on Granger’s strengths and is a patchy, possible diamond in the rough type pick.
140. RoNnie BrEwer (K. Bryant, A. Jefferson, M. Ellis, M. Gasol, R. Felton, L. Scola, R. Allen, L. Barbosa, C. Maggette, G. Monroe, R. Artest): There is only one certainty here. Steals. Lots and lots of steals. It doesn’t matter where Brewer plays, the result is always the same. Last season for Utah he managed a touch over 30 minutes, but managed to grab 1.6 per game. In the five games he played for Memphis, he grabbed a steal every 12 minutes (and shot 23% from the field…). I don’t like him for anything else, but with Monta, Felton, Kobe, Artest and Barbosa, this is turning into a break and enter kind of team. There is also the added bonus that if Luol Deng goes down, which is a more than reasonable proposition, you get bonus steals as his minutes shoot up.
141. DrEw GoOden (D. Nowitzki, J. Kidd, A. Iguodala, A. Jamison, A. Brooks, M. Beasley, V. Carter, Y. Ming, D. Cousins, W. Chandler, E. Okafor): We’re going big here. Dr. Ew joins Okafor, Yao and DeMarcus as late round selections for this team. Playing for the Bucks is not a bad sign for Gooden, but the rate at which he moves teams (8 in 8 seasons) does mean that he might be playing elsewhere by the time you finish this article. For the Clippers last season, Gooden put up decent numbers, 15/10, over 24 games. He also shot an amazing 92% from the free throw line on 4.2 attempts per game which is like gravy. I don’t expect that at the Bucks but even if he gets in that vicinity, this owner won’t be complaining.
142. CaRlos DeLfino (C. Paul, C. Bosh, J. Johnson, R. Gay, Mo Williams, C. Kaman, G. Arenas, A. Bynum, A. Kirilenko, S. Dalembert, A. Morrow): Anthony Morrow got me excited as this teams last pick, then he became the starting SG at the Nets after Courtney Lee left so I decided to add some impact by backing him up with extra three’s. Carlos hit 1.8 per game last season as he sat out on the line and dropped bomb after bomb. Admittedly this kind of killed his FG% (40.9 for the season) but he also kicked in 11 points and 5 boards, really helping out a lot of owners who picked him up off the waivers as he caught fire. As the Bucks grow as a team, his role will probably reduce but I still think he will be good for 1.5+ per game. He is probably still on cloud nine after beating the Hawks last year in Game 4 as he buried 6 of 8 from distance while also condemning Coach Woodsen.
143. KeNyon MaRtin (L. James, B. Roy, C. Billups, J. Noah, K. Love, L. Deng, R. Lewis, T. Splitter, B. Gordon, J. Flynn, D. Favors): When you search ‘Kenyon Martin Injury Update’ in google and get hits from 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010, you recognise this pick, even in Round 12, comes with some risk. As in, he might not play another game. Ever. He is questionable for the start of training camp and has no date set on a recovery. Hmm. When you are turning 33, this is not exactly a positive sign. But if he gets healthy, he dude can ball. Even in a shortened season (54 games) last year, he averaged 11.5/9.5 with 1+ blocks and steals. This is a long way from his hey day, but it’s pretty good production where you can grab it. Considering this team is already set for the season ahead, these types of picks can really add some value down the track.
144. BrEndan HaYwood (K. Durant, T. Evans, A. Horford, P. Pierce, M. Camby, J. Terry, M. Thornton, T. Thomas, Ge. Hill, S. Ibaka, A. Biedrins): You can’t teach height. Heywood is 7’0. Lesson over. Despite the Mavs potentially playing small ball with Dirk at the 5, the trade for Tyson Chandler and the pretty uneventful 28 games last season which Haywood played for the Mavs, there is a sense of inevitability with this pick. 8 points, 9-10 boards, 2 blocks. Pretty simple. Team Delicious didn’t really need another big man but I couldn’t resist trying to build that lead in blocks, the hardest category to gather stats in. Biedrins, Ibaka and Haywood will provide plenty of those and also some trade bait along the way if required or injuries hit.
And so it was. My part concludes in this epic two man draft which has spawned two weeks and counting. I’ll have a few looks back at where things could’ve improved along the way once everything is wrapped up by Jason with Round 13. It’s been an interesting challenge to draft with two different people. I thought a couple of times I was steering a direction only for it to be flipped completely, but the old adage, 2 heads are better than 1, is true in fantasy basketball just as it is in other facets of life. Below is an updated team list… minus cookies.
Team Delicious: K. Durant, T. Evans, A. Horford, P. Pierce, M. Camby, J. Terry, M. Thornton, T. Thomas, Ge. Hill, S. Ibaka, A. Biedrins, B. Haywood
Team Bulls 2.0: L. James, B. Roy, C. Billups, J. Noah, K. Love, L. Deng, R. Lewis, T. Splitter, B. Gordon, J. Flynn, D. Favors, K. Martin
Team Bang Bang: C. Paul, C. Bosh, J. Johnson, R. Gay, Mo Williams, C. Kaman, G. Arenas, A. Bynum, A. Kirilenko, S. Dalembert, A. Morrow, C. Delfino
Team Ipecac: D. Nowitzki, J. Kidd, A. Iguodala, A. Jamison, A. Brooks, M. Beasley, V. Carter, Y. Ming, D. Cousins, W. Chandler, E. Okafor, D. Gooden
Team Tru Warier: K. Bryant, A. Jefferson, M. Ellis, M. Gasol, R. Felton, L. Scola, R. Allen, L. Barbosa, C. Maggette, G. Monroe, R. Artest, R. Brewer
Team Stolen Block Party: D. Granger, J. Smith, N. Hilario, D. Rose, J. Richardson, J. Crawford, P. Millsap, T. Parker, R. Lopez, L. Odom, B. Udrih, W. Johnson
Team Too Cool to Name: P. Gasol, R. Rondo, T. Murphy, Z. Randolph, K. Martin, O.J. Mayo, J.J. Hickson, J. Holiday, R. Hibbert, K. Azubuike, T. Outlaw, J. Moon
Team Big Time: D. Williams, B. Lopez, D. West, D. Gallinari, H. Turkoglu, B. Griffin, J. Nelson, R. Stuckey, J.R. Smith, G. Oden, M. Chalmers, T. Prince
Team Frail: S. Curry, C. Anthony, T. Duncan, A. Bogut, D. Harris, K. Garnett, E. Gordon, C. Landry, A. Harrington, J. Calderon, Ma. Williams, A. Varejao
Team Dope: D. Wade, A. Stoudemire, A. Bargnani, B. Davis, A. Randolph, L. Aldridge, T. Ariza, A. Miller, M. Miller, T. Williams, A. Johnson, T. Young
Team Future: G. Wallace, D. Howard, M. Ginobili, R. Westbrook, A. Blatche, J. Wall, C. Butler, E. Turner, E. Brand, C. Frye, M. Conley, J. McGee
Team Know Your Limits: D. Lee, S. Nash, C. Boozer, S. Jackson, J. Green, B. Jennings, J. Salmons, M. Okur, B. Diaw, D. Collison, D. DeRozan, J. Childress
Darren Collison Just Became Liquid Gold
There have already been many fantasy reactions to the Pacers/Hornets/Rockets/Nets deal which went down last night. Fantasy Hoopster thinks Roy Hibbert is a big winner, Fantasy Knuckleheads believes it pushes Grangers value even higher, while there is green, yellow and red all over the page at fBasketballBlog (even Josh McRoberts gets a mention!). But while everyone seems to like the move for Mr Collison, I don’t get the impression this is going to really rocket him up many ranking boards to the level of Russell Westbrook or even Devin Harris. This might be a bit harsh as I haven’t seen any numbers attached to him draft wise, yet the excitement that was around for the David Lee trade doesn’t seem to be replicating in this case. Is this fair?
Collison was quite a sensation last season. The 21st pick in the draft out of UCLA, he ended up on the Hornets as an afterthought for backing up Chris Paul. When Paul went down, Collison stepped up. Despite averaging 4.1 turnovers per game as a starter, this was offset by the gaudy numbers elsewhere. 18.8 points, 9.1 assists, 3.5 boards, 1 three, 1.4 steals and seriously impressive shooting percentages – 48.5% and 85.2%. Remember, this wasn’t just for 5 or 10 games. This was a data set of 37, playing over 40 minutes a night. Sorry if you think otherwise, but those are late second round numbers in my book for a point guard.
Do I think those numbers will be put in Indiana? Don’t be stupid. On the New Orleans team minus CP3, he quickly became the first option on offense, with Marcus Thornton providing help on the perimetre and David West helping out inside. With the Pacers, he will be lucky to be the primary number two option, behind Danny Granger. Granger has been doing it all nearly on his own and last season resorted to just bombing away from distance. He doesn’t need to do that anymore, but he will see just as much of the ball. Probably just in better looks. Collison will also have to involve Roy Hibbert as much as possible as the Pacers look to develop the big guy now that Troy Murphy has disappeared. Plus, the Pacers have Hansbrough, Dunleavy, Stevenson, Rush and George who will be in the rotation at various points and need their touches. Despite all this, Collison should be the second option.
With that established, what type of production do we expect in Indiana and is it worth getting a little but more excited about? If we account for a substantial increase in output from Roy Hibbert (11.7 points last season) and even a touch more scoring from Granger as he comes into the season hopefully fully healthy (24.1 ppg in 2009-10), we still have a lot of room to move. Murphy dropped 14.6 points per game last season. Some of this will go to Hibbert, but they play a very different style of game (outside softy vs. inside hard man). I’ll say Hibbert peaks at 15 points per game this season. Granger should return to his best, which was 26.8 ppg in 2008-09. So that leaves about 9 Troy Murphy points (as the second scoring option on a team). We’ll throw in Earl Watson’s 8.0 points as a starter as well. That’s 17 points. Now, using my very non-mathematical logic, let’s add another 5 points because Collison has shown he is a pimping player and much better than Troy Murphy or Earl Watson. 22 points. To be fair, we need to take away points for those others mentioned before. So minus 5 points for those guys to split between them in addition to their averages last season. That leaves 17 points. Not a bad start.
Assists. At the Hornets, who play at the 15th quickest pace factor in the league, Collison averaged 9+ game with fellow starters Thornton, Peja, West and Okafor. At the Pacers, who last season played at the 2nd quickest pace factor in the league, our boy will line up with Dahntay Jones, Granger, Hansbrough (possibly) and Hibbert. The pace factor is near 5 possessions higher per game and I will subjectively assert that the starting line up’s are about even (Granger is far superior to West, while the other Hornets probably outrank the other Pacers by a small margin). I don’t think he will play 40 minutes+ per game at the Pacers, so that is a negative in the assist column. After summing all that together, the assists should come out at about 8-9 per game depending largely on how Collison and Granger connect with each other.
Therefore we are looking at potentially a 17/8 type of guy, who can also knock down the three and with the higher pace factor, should push his steals up towards 2+ per game. Not bad numbers at all. In fact, they are damn impressive.
Of course, it’s easy to speculate on stuff like this and then see it all come crashing down in flames when the actual season starts thanks to poor chemistry or an inability to carry that kind of form throughout an entire 82 game season. But if you like a point guard who scores, dishes, provides other tasty extras and you like to gamble a little bit, Collison in the late 3rd to early 4th round sounds about right to me. People inevitably sleep a little bit on players when they are in new situations but all the signs point to a very productive season for the newest Pacer.
PS: I recognise the nature of my analysis might not be ‘scientific’ enough for some people. However remember that this is not a science. No-one predicted that Steph Curry would be first round talent last season and some people were even sceptical on Durant in the top 5. This is my personal best guess on the situation.
Things are getting real: The (Fantasy) NBA Schedule Arrives
Well boys and girls, the NBA schedule was released today and what a day it is. This might not mean much to your average fan, but it fantasy guru’s all over the internet it means the first look at what will determine many things to come this season. When you set your weekly line ups, make sure you are checking these things out.
I’ll have something to put up as a tool just for ease of use, but it won’t be available for awhile. So while we wait for that, let’s take a peek at what two others have already achieved in a very short time frame.
First up, Doneycat over at Tales Of 9 Cats has dumped his early analysis on us. Manual counting? For The Win. As he poignantly observes in his dot points there are 3 teams this season with a 5 game week as opposed to last season when it was just the lonesome Bucks. His post comes accompanied with scheduling grids just for your pre pre-season analysis. A big tick from me.
A little bit more high tech, but not as many ghetto points, NBA Stuffer has some rest days analysis. While this doesn’t actually help you that much in regards to setting rosters, it does tell you a lot about those teams which might rest up players because they are about to play an epic amount of games in a row. For example, who has the most amount of 1 rest days? The Lakers (no surprises there) and Suns, each with 38. This is compensated for the fact that they both only have 15 2/3+ day rest breaks. Compare this to the Bucks who only have 22 single day breaks, but more than make up for this with 24 2/3+ day breaks. The major factor here is TV scheduling I feel. But this is pretty important stuff if you are into your hardcore fantasy. You can also break it down by opponent team breaks for charting out how strong the opposition will be.
I’m sure a lot more (free) schedulers will pop up over time. When I stumble across them, I’ll try and remember to link to them so you can choose the one you want to use.
Also, please note. Many websites will offer you their best attempt at a ‘scheduler’ help tool for some small price. But there will be a heap of free stuff, just as good (if not better) available from fantasy hoops sites around so don’t fret and have a little patience while people put them all together. As some examples, GMTR did an amazing google docs of the 2009-10 schedule last year which was nice and simple to bookmark and check while Basketball Free for All had a top shelf downloadable excel spreadsheet which blew my mind and was a bit more detailed (but not as easy to quickly check).
