13 Predictions
I see lots of lists everywhere I look on basketball blogs at the moment. The internet + fantasy + basketball = lists. Why aren’t I getting in on that action I asked myself? Probably because I don’t do anything the easy way was the response. BUt times, they are a changing. So here is a proper list, with an arbitrary number of points on a specific subject.
13) Kevin Martin will play more games than Gilbert Arenas and also have more fantasy value. Boom. Take that email argument from two days ago. This came out of a discussion with my Gilbert Arenas loving house-mate who thinks that Arenas is about to turn into the next incarnation of Pistol Pete Maravich. Apparently when John Wall is the savior, miraculous things happen to players who have lost their way. I call absolute balony on the grandest of scales. I do think Arenas will provide fantasy value but a top 5 SG? Nope. Lead the league in 3PTM? Nope. He will continue to shoot a terrible clip for FT% and manage a way above average TO rate for a SG. Kevin Martin on the other hand is about to light it up, Rockets style. He is playing for a smart coach and embedded in the highest basketball IQ team in the league. He has zero pressure on his shoulders with Yao and Brooks running the show. I can easily see 20+ points per night, with multiple threes, a wicked FT% and best of all, a career high FG%. He will miss time but 70+ games is to be expected.
12) DeMarcus ‘Boogie’ Cousins will win fantasy rookie of the year. This is mainly because of what he won’t do, as opposed to what he will do. John Wall will also put up big numbers, but like every rookie point guard to ever have played, his FG% will be somewhere in the dirt and his turnover numbers will be through the roof. Cousins has the advantage of being a big man who comes in as the most NBA ready rookie of those selected in the lottery. For fantasy, this means relatively low turnovers, higher FG% while still doing things like score, board and block. There are no negatives here people unless he has a brain explosion. The more I see of Cousins, the more I get this feeling that Sac-Town are going to fall in love with him and Evans running the place ragged. While he might initially battle for minutes, by Week 6 he will be playing 30+ night in, night out. You can’t keep a good thing down.
11) Chris Bosh, Dwyane Wade and LeBron James will all average within 4 points of each other. Every time the Heat get mentioned, all I see are camera flashes and smirks on faces accompanied by a loud groan from the NBA masses. It has already reached that point. However this is not just a story about one player. Or two. It’s going to be about all three. People will look back and Chris Bosh could well be the reason why this all worked out fine, or why it all crashed in flames. He has to want it at least a thousand times more than his play in Toronto suggests. He will get his points in all kinds of manners which we can’t even understand yet. Left unguarded under the basket, dropping 18 foot jump shots with no-one chasing him down, alley-oops from distance. This season will have it all for Chris Bosh and that means points, points and more points. I’ll put it officially at 22.9 per game, which would be more than enough to stay within the margin of Wade and James. It also makes him a very attractive fantasy option, one of a handful of 20/10 guys out there. He still probably can’t block, but those points will be some of the most efficient in the league.
Baby Davis didn't make the cut for 2010-11 predictions
10) Jameer Nelson will storm back into some form and be one of those pesky point guards that seems to have a blinding week for your opponent but against no-one else. Two seasons ago, despite playing only 42 games, Nelson was the bee’s knees as a second tier point guard. He has never been one for a cache of assists but he has the ability to turn it on when required. In that 2008-09 season, he averaged 2 3ptm, 1+ steal and amazing efficiency. His drop off has been pretty substantial since then, as he struggled with injury and the arrival of Vince Carter. But Nelson is the glue guy for Orlando this season. Carter hasn’t proved anything and may get moved before the deadline. Rashard Lewis is stuck in major funk from which I don’t think there is an escape. The thing is, this Magic team is only good enough when it really counts when Jameer is in top gear. Chris Duhon and Jason Williams are capable but small spells will be the order of the day. If the rumors about Dwight Howard’s offensive game (I think I’ve heard this one before though) are true, it’s only going to contribute. I’m not advocating you take Nelson anywhere in particular for your squads just that he’ll bounce back and cause some pain for opponents at some point during this season. He is too good not too.
9) The proliferation of the 1-1-1 guy. Last season we only saw two players actually record more than 1 three, 1 steal and 1 block every game over the course of the season and they are called Durant and James. Many others were close, but close sorta don’t cut it in my books. This season, there will be a rash of 1-1-1 players crowing their talents from the treetops. A certainty you can add to the list is Dwyane Wade. But let us focus on some more low key guys. Whatever you think about Channing Frye, as he seems to be a pretty polarising player in fantasy circles, he should average more than 27 minutes a game and in turn, nudge up his steals (0.8) and blocks (0.9) from last season to walk on hallowed turf. Andrea Bargnani should easily make this list but can’t steal a ball worth a damn. Last season he only managed 0.3 per game. Lazy? Perhaps but if he is going to be ‘da man’ in Toronto, this will have to change. There are a pair of Knicks (Gallo and Azubuike) who will be there about. If you are a Rudy Gay believer (and I’m not) then his 0.8 3ptm and 0.8 blocks totals are disappointing for a player of his ability but I don’t see him busting many balls on the court given his massive pay day. The most promising candidates though are those who were short, but only managed to play limited minutes. Nic Batum and Michael Beasley fit the bill here. And a flier? Troy Murphy only averages 0.4 blocks per game but playing alongside Brook Lopez and coming across with help defense could, in some far off fairy land, bump this total up.
8) Serge Ibaka will start for the Thunder and become the Chris Anderson for the next decade. The playoff series against the Lakers was Ibaka’s coming out party. Despite losing that series, Air Congo as he is affectionately known to OKC supporters was a monster. Against the best big combination in the league and the eventual NBA champions, Ibaka held his own defensively for long periods of time (25 minutes per game) over the 6 games. He isn’t exactly an offensive mega star in waiting but with Durant and Westbrook as teammates it’s not exactly an issue. But he can block. And block and block. So, instead of picking Chris Anderson with that 11th round pick, aim for Ibaka in the 10th instead just to make sure you nab him.
7) Old guys will continue to make fools of the haters out there. I’m talking mostly about three guys. Marcus Camby, Steve Nash and Jason Kidd. For the past two years I have been railing against anyone who brings their names up, deriding them for believing in players who cannot keep doing what they do. Yet they keep on keeping on regardless of what anybody says. Perhaps this is my personal mea culpa, an apology to what I believe have been overrated old fantasy stars but in reality they are just plain fantasy stars like everyone else. Steve Nash led the league in assists last year. Marcus Camby finished the season with a top 25 overall fantasy rank regardless of what system you use. Jason Kidd has missed 3 games in the past 2 seasons while throwing down three pointers with alarming regularity (+2 per game) and amazing accuracy (+40%), not to mention the 9+ assists and 5+ boards. Each of these guys have slid down draft boards over the past month because of concerns about age but what makes this year so much different? Nothing.
Steve Nash as he was originally intended
6) Twitter will make you more competitive in your league. If you are reading this blog, you probably know what twitter is. That said, unless you are a junkie, this isn’t going to apply to you. You know those people, scanning their phones every 15 seconds not because they got a text message from an actual friend but because they racked up another 3 @ replies. Those people. Well, they have an advantage over you and your reliance on Rotoworld to update you on the latest player movements, injuries and form. You are officially 1-2 hours behind the twitterati who if this were last season, have already picked up Darren Collison as Chris Paul is still sitting on courtside wondering what just happened. Twitter explodes at key moments because someone is always watching the news as it’s happening and this news spreads like wide fire, first on Twitter then to other parts of the internet and finally to the mainstream. If you think catching the scores on SportsCenter when you get home is going to cut it in 2010-11 for your fantasy news, you have another thing coming my friend.
5) Elton Brand will be the player who most outperforms his Average Draft Position. I know this is a big call considering it’s normally some rookie or super back up who was not even drafted in the vast majority of leagues, but I think Brand is just going to kill it this season. This comes from someone who dislikes watching 76er games so much, if it happens to be one of the two televised games that week in Australia, it doesn’t get tivo’d. Doug Collins is on the record as a big Brand supporter. He is fully recovered from his injury. All signs point to a massive boast. One the other side, his name is often mentioned as a 4th or 5th option at PF and nowhere I read is even the least bit excited in him. Perhaps wisely, but I don’t understand how a player with as much talent as he obviously does can continue to suck for so long. 34+ minutes, 19/9 with 2+ blocks.
4) As opposed to the above, Paul Pierce will be the most disappointing player related to his ADP. On the latest yahoo big board he is late 4th round. Pierce was a great player. He led his team when it was going through the worst era of the franchise. He led the league in scoring. He adapted his game when necessary over the past three seasons. But he looks OLD. With KG fit and better than ever (compared to the last two seasons anyway), Rondo taking on more and more responsibility and the combination of Ray Allen and Nate Rob in the backcourt and Shaq and Jermaine O’Neal in the front spells the least reliance on Pierce since he was a rookie. He will still get minutes, still do that annoying head fake, draw the contact crap that has been his bread and butter for years but the excitement and the bang for your buck is way over. 14-15 points with filler (2-3 assists, 3-4 boards, 1.2 3ptm) is fine for the Celtics this season but the problem is, that’s not 4th round material.
A picture tells 1000 words
3) Kid Delicious (aka Kevin Durant) will be the most dominant fantasy player since Garnett’s 2003-04 season. The gap between KD and whoever ends up as the 2nd option is going to be spectacular (barring injury). Sure, he is a consensus number one pick everywhere you look, but his dominance is going to be unbelievable. Box scores are literally going to explode with goo half way through the 3rd quarter. I’m big on going over the top, so let’s not stop at the 2000 word count. Toss out the pencil, grab your permanent marker and write this down: 33 points, 9.5 boards, 50/40/90 with 1.8 threes, 3+ steals/blocks. Eat it Chris Paul. (post script: as I was finishing this post up, this was on twitter about KD and partying. EXACTLY why he is number 1)
2) Tyreke Evans will play beautiful, exquisite basketball for the Kings but this will not translate into first round talent. I just saw this tweet from Steve Alexander (head of Rotoworld NBA) saying that he is going late first round/early second round in all of his drafts. Which makes me sick. There is no doubt he is an ungodly talent on the basketball court but one quarter of pre-season hoops against the Clippers does not mean he can shoot threes or make free-throws all season long. Sorry, just the truth.
1) Luol Deng will continue his domination of Rashard Lewis. This one is for my boy Jason over at fbasketballblog who is forever doubting the talents of Britain’s greatest export. If you are still reading, I’m sorry to end on such a middle of the road kind of thing but this is going to become my singular achievement for the season after the inevitable collapse of my fantasy teams by about week 15. Deng has been biding his time but now it has arrived. He has always flirted with being a major piece of the puzzle and now that Derrick Rose has matured a little, Joakim Noah is a beast in the middle and Kyle Korver is running around jacking threes, Deng is left to hit his stride and carry his load on offense. While Rashard Lewis might be making $19.5 MILLION US DOLLARS this season (this point needs to be emphasised over and over again with every bricked three point attempt), he cannot compete!
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.
Where rankings are made
While most fantasy basketball enthusiasts are busy watching their baseball team or having a real life in the summertime, other, more evil hearted people, are conspiring against your team already. 3 months before the season has even nearly begun. Who are these people? Well, if something is wrong with sports, together with the blogosphere having disregard for it, it is only one of two things… Rugby League or ESPN. And since Rugby League should never be mentioned again, we’ll stick with ESPN.
Often those at the top are victim of tall poppy syndrome. See Rudd, Kevin. And often those emotions are completely unwarrented. However I feel safe in saying after ESPN’s last couple of big basketball stories (The Decision, the production of the NBA Finals), that in this case they completely deserve it. But why are they trying to destroy your fantasy team in mid-summer? I don’t know. The proof is here though. The ESPN Fantasy Basketball top 150 rankings. But Brian McKitsh is so cute? But ESPN is the only thing I use when I do my draft prep? Be damned people.
Here are but three issues with the above list (the July 19 Version).
1) There is no preface whatsoever about what type of rankings these area. Roto? H2H? 9 cats? No trade? Lots of trades? Incompetent owners? By having a quick glance, I can nearly deduct that it’s a Head to Head league because Dwight Howard is at number 7 and there is no asterisk near his name. You might casually say, this isn’t a big deal. But this is a MASSIVE deal. ESPN and Yahoo are the two biggest fantasy sites on the net. Nearly all beginners would be getting 95% of their advice from these sites and lists just like this. For Fantasy Basketball to ever grow into a real rival to the MLB or NFL, this sort of stuff has to be sorted out. If, into week three, you see that Dwight Howard is actually going to bust your balls in your newly minted Roto league and he was your first pick, how are you going to feel? Ask Tom Brady owners from two seasons ago. Some people will just have fun regardless, but some will not. They will not come back. They will not play again. It’s pretty simple in my books. A nice two sentence preface about what the list actually represents would go a long way in fantasy basketball circles.
2) Rajon Rondo (#22) and Chris Bosh (#23) have swapped spots since the last update (date unknown but after the Decision). Why did this occur? None of the 21 players above the list swapped places. No-one fell. No-one rose. However Rondo was deemed to have inched ahead of Bosh. Because of… His rad shoes? Well, maybe. But we can’t be sure as there is no explanation for this. I understand the need to get stuff out quickly, meet deadlines and keep things concise so people will read them, but what I don’t understand is how this list works and why people move up and down, because there is no commentary alongside it. And ESPN fantasy basketball analysis can be VERY good, when it takes the time and get’s it right.
3) Risk Aversion in the highest form. The two standouts for me here are Troy Murphy (#43) and Greg Oden (#150). Murphy might not be an amazing player. He is slow, doesn’t really contribute to winning actual basketball games and finds defending is sometimes just too hard. However, he is money in fantasy basketball. M-O-N-E-Y. I know people drop off after awhile, but this a dude who finished top 15 ranked (Yahoo Average Rankings) over the past two seasons and is in a CONTRACT year. C’mon people. 43? Wedged in between Joakim Noah and Baron Davis? B-Diddy??? It makes my blood boil. If you want the best big man to hit open three pointers and grab 10+ boards per game, look no further. The best small ball center in the league. Bar none.
This is where people might start losing me. Greg Oden has killed owners in the past. In fact, anyone who has ever drafted him, has been hurt eventually by his inability to stay on the court. But hear me out. Despite averaging 4.0 fouls per 22 minutes last season, listen to these November numbers. 12.9 points, 64% FG, 7.8 boards, 2.1 blocks AND he doesn’t kill your FT% (66.6% on a low 3.5 attempts for career). OK, so he is no Pau Gasol. True. But this kid (and he is still a kid) is on schedule for 5v5 practice in september and full ability by training camp. Yes, he has been injured. But you know what? So was Andrew Bogut for 4 seasons and now he is ranked #29. Greg Oden has disappointed in the past. But this is a guy who is built to play NBA basketball. He is deft on his feet, swift for a 7 footer and can just be beastly on the defensive end. Don’t reach for him in the 5th round, but the 10th round isn’t out of the question.
This is not meant to sound too harsh on ESPN. They have standards, editors and all sorts of crap I don’t understand. They also have a brand. However I think, despite the fact it’s only a game, as the gorilla in the room, there should be some more explanation around this type of stuff. These lists set the tone for everyone else. Bloggers read them and slowly turn conservative. Beginners read them and might never come back. From here, other lists are dreamed up and populated.
That’s enough ranting. I was planning on something much more positive, but that’ll have to wait until next time (no more stumbling across ESPN in the future).
In the meantime, links!
FantasyHoopster is back at it, as he couldn’t resist the urge to blog in the summertime. Nice. But please note, I do not condone any talk of Anthony Lin after last summer’s Anthony Randolph debacle.
GMTR are working their way through the NBA teams already. And with zingers like this, “At this point, if you’re interested in getting Ford for your pick-up team, Larry Bird wants to speak with you.”, how could you resist? I don’t wanna sound like a LeBron groupie, but Nels and Patrick really set the standard, even in mid-july.
I’ve only just been introduced to Daniel Eade on Twitter, and I don’t agree with much he has to say about LBJ, but it’s an interesting perspective regardless.
A super piece from FBasketballBlog on some myths and truths about fantasy basketball. He’s on the money with the majority of the strategies as well.
Until next time.
