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There were several quality match-ups coming into the week including 1v6, 4v5, and 7v9.  It could have been the kind of week that destroys dreams, crushes hopes, spoils milk.  Maybe not the last 1 so much, and really not the other 2 either since all 3 match-ups finished close.  After 9 weeks we finally have a couple of tiers of teams starting to develop.  There’s the top 4, the playoff teams, who have started to put some distance between themselves and the rest of the field.  Then there’s the top 9, the playoff contenders.  All 5 teams are capable of making the playoffs but each has an issue or two they need to solve first.  Finally there’s everyone else.  There might be one or two teams capable of making some noise but they are falling behind and need to make a simple decision.

To play for now or not, that is the question
Whether ’tis Nobler to hold your aging vets
The 3s and Assists of outrageous Fortune
Or to trade Arms against a Team of troubles

 

RAZZBALL ELITE LEAGUE

 

1. Kap’s Team  (55-23-3)

FAAB Remaining: $100  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

2. HateUsCauseTheyAnus  (51-29-1)

FAAB Remaining: $54  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

3. Slim – Razzball  (51-29-1)

FAAB Remaining: $21  FAAB Moves this week: Tyus Jones ($11), Joe Ingles ($9)

Unfortunately there’s only one thing to talk about this week. My team is being devastated by injuries. To start the week I had Nurkic $16, Smart $21, Lillard $36, Kobe $15, and Sullinger $5, an absurdly combined $93 (of a $200 budget) worth of injured players. As the week went on a few guys starting filtering back in. Kobe didn’t miss a game this week with his shoulder and for a split second I thought the week might be OK. Sullinger missed a Monday game with his back but came back in the middle of the week to contribute a little, but this was the best it ever got. Lillard is by far the worst with his Plantar Fasciitis, he still isn’t back and I won’t be holding my breath waiting for it. There’s rumblings that Smart is close (he played a few minutes Sunday) and Nurkic shouldn’t be too far behind, but obviously non of that helped me much this week, and both will be brought along extremely slowly. So those are just the injuries I came into the week with. On Saturday I lost Burks to an ankle/shoulder/concussion and I should probably plan on him being out a while (6+ weeks apparently). Poison Geese hurt his right index finger on Saturday and it’ll probably hurt his shot in the short term, but at least the reports say he should play through it (he did on Sunday and was just OK). Then on Sunday there’s a report that Henson has a back issue and isn’t practicing, and shockingly Kobe is hurt once more.  And with that I end the week down Nurkic, Lillard, Burks, Henson, and of course Kobe for a combined $87 worth of injured players and another $49 of banged up players in Smart and the Goose. Awesome… How this past week was even close I have no idea.

The strong play from the bottom of my lineup has been the only thing keeping me competitive lately, so of course it’s now the middle tier guys’ turn struggle. Beverley, Henson, Adams, Sullinger, and Burks are all under-performing (injuries are playing a major role) and have each seen their minutes declining. It’s a problem that I can do absolutely nothing about. It’s tough to move any of them considering age, keeper cost, and upside but I’ll move any of them for the right price right now. The only guys I’m considering dropping this week are Hairston, even though he’s been solid in his limited minutes, and Anthony Brown who despite his upside can’t seem to consistently crack the Lakers rotation. I added Joe Ingles for what I’m hoping is the direct backup to Alec Burks, and since half of the Jazz are injured right now there should be no less than 25 minutes a game for him. The other add I made wasn’t about trying to make up for injured players. Tyus Jones has massive and I do mean massive amounts of keeper potential and with KMart and Andre Miller now DNP kind of guys and LaVine playing 100% of his minutes at SG, Tyus has the backup PG job all to himself, and since he’s backing up an injury prone PG (sorry JB) who the team has tried to shop multiple times it means there’s plenty of upside for a big role this year as well. Not to mention the Wolves aren’t going anywhere and will more than likely play their youth as much as possible.  Was he any good in his 6 DLeague games? Would I have added him if he wasn’t?  Yes he was balling, 24.7/3.8/4.8/1.5 with 3.3 3s, but the icing is the .492/.426/.923 triple slash line with only 2.3 TOs in 35 minutes.  And No if he wasn’t so dominant against lesser competition I don’t think I would have added him.

This week I’m up against another good team who has finally gotten completely healthy, well JV is still down but he should return for the Monday game. He absolutely destroys me in overall games played and I really have no chance at coming close to any counting stats unless I get 2 or even 3 guys back in quick order. For a bit of reference if everyone played I wouldn’t be able to field a full roster.  I’m not ready to pack it in and call it a year but right now it seems like the ball just won’t bounce in my direction, and even when it does Alec Burks is just going to throw his ankle/shoulder/head at it anyway.

 

4. Yappers  (49-30-2)

FAAB Remaining: $49  FAAB Moves this week: Sam Dekker ($2)

Finally! A victory in FG%!

That was critical in Yappers 5-4 victory last week, as we won only 2 of the 6 positive counting stats. Still a win is a win is a win, even if done the hard way.

My big positive notable from last week was a three block game by R.J. Hunter.

My big negative notable from last week is that Kevin Martin for now is in DNP-CD land. I imagine he is being dropped left and right in normal leagues, but in this league, patience is warranted. I expect he will be traded at some point and be at least a useful part again.

My big FAAB pickup of last week was Sam Dekker, 18th round pick of the Houston rockets. I notice this draft pick received an A+ rating in the Razzball review of the draft and prior to the draft he was mocked at 15. So yes, he really should be owned in this league and at $1 keeper price, I am happy to be that owner.

This is in line with my strategy of investing in the draft via the FAAB budget route. No drop was necessary because this week both Deron Williams and Danilo Gallinari received the “Injured” designation. Now Sam is injured himself (out until sometime in February) but since I expect both my injured players back this week, he will be a stash in my IL slot. For now.

My thoughts are that $1 investments in the draft are very valuable in a dynasty league and should I decide to trade any of them for a rental at the deadline, I should get a part more useful than what is normally available via FAAB. Maybe Sam will ultimately be more valuable to Yappers via that route.

But maybe I just hold as part of my plan to get younger. Anyway these are decisions to be made later near our league trade deadline.

 

5. Martyball – IFBL  (47-34-0) 

FAAB Remaining: $83  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

6. JB Gilpin – Razzball  (44-32-5)

FAAB Remaining: $1  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

Well, all-in-all it could’ve been a lot worse…  After raving about my depth, I pick up injuries – two to shoulders of all things – get those in place! – flu-like symptoms, guys run out of the rotation, and a schedule with a full Wednesday and Saturday and no Sunday games.  Kap was able to tie me in steals with a lot of Sunday players, but I snuck by with a .001 FT% win.  Wow, FT punt was the wrong assessment!  Beat #1 and “only” a 3-5-1 loss to #1 again in FT%.

The tough loss was Joakim Noah who was really coming on, and Tony Snell moving from starter to DNP-land.  In summation, F the Bulls.  I really want to hold onto Snell, but if he gets a week of DNPs he could be dropped if my $1 left of FAAB can do anything.  If anyone wants a Snell stash then hit me up.

I’m finally through my brutal first half schedule, and come out this time 6th – in the playoffs – vs. something like 14th last year.  Loving this turn around.  Even though there were a ton of injuries across the league this past week to bigger name guys than my back end players, I still need to have this rash of injuries to stop to be strong through the second half.

 

7. Scurry to the Left  (45-34-2) 

FAAB Remaining: $98  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

8. Heat Apologist  (44-36-1)

FAAB Remaining: $51  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

Why couldn’t my team have a week like that against a top 10 team? Not only did they continue the 2:1 assist:turnover, but also shot 50%. The newest addition, Butler, had a very nice week, averaging 2.7 steals, while still giving 5.3 assists. Eric Gordon is proving to be more than a thragnof with a nice .514/1.000/3.3/17.7/3.0/4.3/1.3/0/1.7 line. Saucy. Speaking of which, a Stauskas sighting. Was on the verge of dropping, but now I reluctantly have to keep him. Conley, Harris, and Bogut joined Gordon and Butler in giving top 26 value for the week. Not much more to say other than if I stay healthy, I can compete with most teams. I also get Al Jefferson back this week, which should help with the boards and blocks. Unfortunately I wasnt able to make an pickups this week. Big Al was in my IL spot, but became active over the weekend. I dropped Wes Johnson and moved Jefferson to my bench for Monday. When I put in a bid, I received an error saying Jefferson was on my IL and was active. In other words, to make the change I had to drop Johnson on Saturday and move Jefferson to the bench for Sunday in order to make a move for Monday. Not sour grapes, just throwing it out there for general consumption and maybe someone else can avoid the frustration.

 

9. Hardenoutherr4apimp  (43-38-0)

FAAB Remaining: $82  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

10. High as Greg Kite  (39-41-1)

FAAB Remaining: $83  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

11. Greek Freaks  (39-41-0)

FAAB Remaining: $23  FAAB Moves this week: Maurice Harkless ($7), Carl Landry ($4)

 

12. I Ain’t No Jok(ic)  (39-41-1)

FAAB Remaining: $60  FAAB Moves this week: Ronnie Price ($26)

 

13. Niko-Cola  (37-42-2)

FAAB Remaining: $88  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

Whew…. What a weekend. Slims depleted roster gave us all we could handle. We were able to squeak out a 7-2 victory. Sunday morning it could have gone either way and things broke about as well as we could have asked when it was all said and done. Prior to the week starting we decided that we had to go no worse than 8-10 over the next two weeks. Why such low standards? Last week we played Slim ranked 2nd at the time and this upcoming week we play Kap currently the league leader. If we failed to meet the 8-10 mark we were going to throw in the towel and sell off for the future. Crisis averted!

Slim took another big blow this week with Burks going down for next next month or two. As the Burke owner this was a boost we will need to get back into the hunt. We have been lucky on the injury front so far and our team is really coming on. Based on the last 3 weeks we are 15-12 against Kap. Not an exact science by any means, but it tells me we could Holly Holm the Champ. Sitting on 8.5 games out of 6th we are closer then we have been in a long time. The great news is after this week we only have 2 top 10 teams the rest of the way. Obviously a lot could change, but it seems we are about through the meat of our schedule.
We thought about making some claims this week, but did not like the upside or longer term potential of any of the new performers. When making adds that are worth any sum of FAAB dollars we have to be relatively confident that they will perform not just now, but at playoff time as well. With the trade deadline rapidly approaching and the grind of the season beginning to produce injuries there will be some names rising to the top and we like our FAAB situation.

Good luck Kap and we will catch you guys in 2016.

 

14. Foreign Affairs  (38-43-0)

FAAB Remaining: $91  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

Well my team put up a surprising fight this week in a 4-5 loss to Hardenoutherr4apimp, it was quite the encouraging performance for my team given its currently depleted state and the continued sufferings at the hands of head coach Byron Mitchell.  Bojan continues his fantastic recent run for me and I hope this helps him cement a solid long term role with the Nets… you know not immediately bench him when RHJ comes back because we all know Joe and Jarret are the future for that team.  Decided not to spend anything on FAAB again, still waiting for that big one to show up..though with Ish smiths trade back to Philly he might have been the big one and killed Kendall’s future value which is annoying.

I remain abit stuck on the no value for the three guys I really would want to move treadmill, Willie looks to be the only one that could realistically gain value and even gain value in the off season for a before the season trade… thanks continued Splitter and Lee nagging injuries…

On a developmental note Shumpert’s starting to get back into the swing of things over the last week, Young has been sent to the D-league so hopefully I’ll get to see more film of him that not sitting on the end of a bench… waves at Bennett… and I continue to have issues evaluating Wiggins based on my personal bias for him and the fact that he seems to play better when Lavine’s out there instead of Keven Martin or Tayshaun… which you know… maybe shouldn’t be happening as much as it is.

I go against Yappers this week, I expect a through trouncing from him headlined by my three ex-players in Zach, O.J and Plumlee, I regret the Deng trade but not the Zach one because hes starting to get a whiff of last years Deng to him with this year being all that’s left. Turnovers and fg% with a lucky break in ft% are the only cats I have a chance to challenge him in this week so lets hope I win 1 at least and don’t get swept… watch Mudiay swoop back in at the end of the week to kill me in all three lol.

 

15. Hoopus Alleyoopus  (36-43-1)

FAAB Remaining: $71  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

16. The Nature Boy  (35-45-1)

FAAB Remaining: $80  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

17. The Chosen Ones  (31-50-0)

FAAB Remaining: $18  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

18. Pete Nice – Razzball  (28-52-1)

FAAB Remaining: $83  FAAB Moves this week: n/a

 

19. No Glove No Love  (24-57-0)

FAAB Remaining: $94  FAAB Moves this week: Tyler Zeller ($1), Jarell Eddie ($1)

 

20. Cigar Smoking Monkey  (23-58-0)

FAAB Remaining: $100  FAAB Moves this week: n/a