BEAST.
Big. Energy. Athletic. Shooting. Turnovers.
This was my tentpole strategy for H2H leagues, of which I’m in five of this season. Love to look back on them when the season starts and report on how things went!
My Most Drafted Players
Jalen Smith is in every league I have except the one that only has four player rosters. Nic Claxton is going to miss a bunch of time and is also not really very good. I was drafting Smith as a depth piece all preseason but apparently nobody else agrees? Well, gimme the middling points, decent boards, and solid 3 and D stats as my last pick. I think Smith is a better player and better fit with the Chicago lineup and keeps value all year.
Wow, did the Collin Murray-Boyles hype train ramp up fast! CMB went from a guy going after 120 in drafts to someone you needed to pick in the 7/8 rounds. I totally agree and have him in all five of my leagues. He fits the BEAST template perfectly.
Dylan Harper shows up in almost all my leagues too. There’s no ceiling to what he can do. Like, he could be better than Cooper Flagg. He’s probably better than anyone drafted this year long and short term.
Tre Jones is on all five, and I’m a little worried about it. Billy Donovan was a great point guard coach. Tre Jones is a point guard. The numbers were sneaky helpful last year, but will he be able to do it again this year? Worried about a dip, but where he was drafted I can afford to move on without too many regrets.
Naz Reid. That’s all. Stocks and threes and will be getting more minutes than in Minnesota.
Who I Missed
Bad luck, maybe, but I didn’t have a top 7 pick in any draft I was in, so I missed out on all the big names. Bummer, but it’s fine given who I like to build with anyway. So I didn’t get any of the super duper uber stars.
I really wanted a share of Cam Boozer but missed him everywhere. Next year, he can be a second-round pick. He’s as ready as a rookie can possibly be.
Scoring guards (LaMelo Ball, Jamal Murray, etc.) didn’t fit my team-building plan so I went for bigs instead of them in the second. My scoring is going to be an issue all season, but I did plan for it.
Paolo Banchero looks ready to have a big season and I was hoping to get him in several leagues. I didn’t. He seemed to go one round ahead of me every time. Gonna watch him finally flower into a star from the sidelines I guess.
Preseason hype guys: Players like Matas Buzelis, Day’Ron Sharpe, and Kel’El Ware got far too hyped up and were picked several rounds earlier than they should have been.
Rudy Gobert: Long a stalwart double-double guy with blocks, our relationship ended this draft season. It’s not you, Rudy, it’s me. I went big in the early rounds and had to fill in with guards and wings at about the time Rudy was picked. Hopefully we can still be friends.
BOLD PREDICTIONS
Moussa Diabate and CMB both rank higher on the player rater than Kel’el Ware and Day’Ron Sharpe, unless you’re in a league that counts apostrophes in names.
Dylan Harper is a second-round pick next year and Cooper Flagg is top-five.
Josh Giddey fails to return top-25 value as his points drop and rebounds are cut in half. A lot of his production was due to the scheme, and the scheme has changed.
Matas Buzelis cedes some minutes to Leonard Miller, making him a late-round player.
Nobody over 35 ranks in the top 40 in the player rater in season-long ratings.
Fantasy All-Rookie Team
- Cam Boozer, Rookie of the Year
- AJ Dybantsa
- Yaxel Lendeborg
- Darius Acuff
- Caleb Wilson, but not confident in him as the fifth. Morez Johnson could swipe his spot if he adjusts quickly.
Other than these guys there aren’t any rookies I think are ready to own to start the season.
Why is BEAST Dumb?
The strategy: Dominate RB, BLK, ST, TO, FG%, hope FT% is good, maybe PTS and AST, 3PM gonna be tough
The Issue: FT% is going to be a swing stat. And I forgot to get a G with a lot of attempts. Tyler Herro would have been PERFECT.
Another Issue: I may not be the only person doing this plan in a league.
So it’s a tightrope. Time will tell if I fall off into the abyss this season or make it across to the finish line safely. If it’s bad, we shall scrap it and try a new acronym next year.
Thanks for reading, good luck this week!
