Martyball still illin’! A 6-3 win keeps him 6.5 games ahead of the pack, but Slim had a monster 9-0 win to vault him into 4th. Reppin’ Razzball well! Unlike me… Built for the future! I could us a Back to the Future right now… Another week with some big FAAB bidding and the playoff seeding looking like a 7-team race for 6 spots – here’s how week 10 went down:
1. Martyball – IFBL (66-22-2)
FAAB Remaining: $80 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
2. Barking BassetHounds (59-28-3)
FAAB Remaining: $69 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
Ah the ups and downs of a fantasy season. Two weeks ago I was calling my team “craptastic” in this space. Last week was probably as good as it gets en route to an 8-1 victory. Puhleeze can I just transfer last week’s line to the playoffs.
Highlights of the week. Maybe we can start with $1 CJ Miles leading my team with 77 points and 16 treys. Or new FAAB acquisition Thabo Sefolosha doing exactly what I picked him up for leading my team with 8 steals. Or maybe JR Smith coming back from his injury issues (leaving only Danillo Gallinari out) and getting big minutes. Lowlights..none really. Well maybe one.
In hindsight I wish I had left at least two positions open for FAAB bidding at auction time. Hassan Whiteside fits the profile of one I would have made an aggressive bid on. But there were just no openings as I am happy with my three $1 players (I even thought of dropping Boozer or Nene for him but rejected the idea as too risky). Even worse, he went to a strong competitor (Slim). Why couldn’t some of the others in on him increased their bids by just $5. Oh well, lesson learned. Next year I will remember to allocate at least two slots for FAAB at auction time instead of the one slot I did this year.
3. Scurry to the Left (59-30-1)
FAAB Remaining: $98 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
4. Slim – Razzball (56-33-1)
FAAB Remaining: $38 FAAB Moves this week: Hassan Whiteside ($23)
How about something a little different this week. How about I take this time to discuss a few players in detail. Let’s start with Andrew Wiggins. Over his last 2 weeks (6 games) he sports a line of .510/.688/1.2/21.2/4.3/1.8/1.3/0.8/1.7. Let’s not dwell on the FT%, it’s going to be fine. What makes a player a top 25 player is usually 3s/steals/blocks. The great ones get over 4.0 combined, however in LeBron’s rookie year he combined for only 3.1, Durant combined for 2.6. Both shot around 42-43% their rookie seasons (Wiggins currently sits at 41%) then jumped to 47% their 2nd year and never looked back. Maybe this is just a good stretch of games for Wiggins, or maybe he really is one of the greats whose learning curve might actually be ahead of those other two. Scary. I never expected him to return my $38 investment this year but right this second I wouldn’t bet against it.
There’s got to be someone else to talk about before we get to Jusuf Nurkic. Hmm… Corey Brewer has been great with his new team but he’s a veteran, I’m not too surprised. DellaV is getting a ton of run with so many Cavs down, I was going to drop him for the upside of Cleanthony but c’est la vie, I could only afford one of the two guys I wanted. I would make the guy an offer but after robbing him of Cory Joseph right after he was picked up last year I imagine the owner has gotten a bit reluctant to trade with me. Biyombo with decent enough blocks is just what I need but he doesn’t have much upside anywhere else and he’s going to fubar my FTs eventually. I can’t have 2 guys doing just that. Whose the other guy I speak of? Non other than his replacement, the OG FT killer himself, Mr. Whiteside (emo joke!) In his 4 D-League games this year he, ♪“came out of his cage” for 22/15 with 5 blocks in 28 minutes per game, 82% FGs and a very low FT volume. How many blocks does he have in his past 5 NBA games? ♪“I just can’t look it’s killing me, and taking controooooool.” A:12. He was a popular target apparently with 6 teams bidding $17 or higher, which had never happened in this league until now. So I guess those managers are probably all full of, ♪“Jealousy, Turning saints into the sea, Swimming through sick lullabies, Choking on their alibis.” There isn’t much else to say, ♪“But it’s just the price I pay, Destiny is calling me, Open up my eager eyes, ‘Cause I got Mr. Whiteside!”
Finally my favorite time of the post, time to talk some Nurkic. I hear he’s pretty good. Last 3 games of .500/.750/0/37/28/3/4/10/3 in 23.7 minutes per game is absurd. His ridiculous per-36s are actually getting better, and the cherry on top? 1 foul in the past 2 games combined, about 45 total minutes. If you haven’t seen the highlights of his recent play here you go, this guy’s youtube channel is one of my favorites by the way. Nurk (as the Denver announcers call him) isn’t doing this versus poor competition. The past 2 games were against the Gasol brothers and Nurkic didn’t just hold his own, he was the better player. I’m not sure he’s been entirely unleashed but Mozgov is arguably the worst starting center in the league right now so I feel confident saying that it’s just a matter of time. How’s that $16 investment looking now? Is it better or worse than Larry Sanders for $17?
5. Kap’s Team (53-35-2)
FAAB Remaining: $98 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
6. Youth Movement (52-37-1)
FAAB Remaining: $62 FAAB Moves this week: Joe Ingles ($7)
And so begins more drop into obscurity. A 3-6 loss, with several categories up for grabs on Sunday, and a drop from 4th to 6th. I think I would have won 2 more categories, but lost one more with the roster I had before my big trade. Of course, Slim jettisoned past me in the standings. Not much more to say about this week. I have a chance for a win for the week, if I manage my minutes correctly. I will reiterate… if anyone is looking for young, cheap talent, I am always willing to deal. I will always negotiate, but I need to know who you want from my team. Slim and I went back and forth for the better part of a week before our blockbuster.
7. Breaking Batum (51-38-1)
FAAB Remaining: $59 FAAB Moves this week: Jimmer Fredette ($0), Johnny O’Bryant ($0)
All things considered, we’ll take a 4-5 loss. If we’d had Jefferson (or even Shumpert for that matter), we’d have likely won the matchup. Or if, you know, Rose didn’t shoot us out of FG%. Our opponent had the 3rd worst FG% this week, we were just dead last. Looking ahead, we would’ve lost to Slim 4-5, with most counting categories being very close.
8. Hoopus Alleyoopus (47-43-0)
FAAB Remaining: $30 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
A nice 6-3 win over someone ahead of me in the standings. Going to need outcomes like that to fight my way into the playoffs.
I was right about my franchise cornerstone Andre Drummond taking off without dead weight Josh smith around. Drummond put up 13 PPG, 18.7 RPG, 2.3 APG, 1.7 SPG and 2.0 BPG in 3 games last week. The guy is a freak and also maybe the worse free throw shooter in league history, except for the late Andris Biedrins.
In your weekly Jameer Nelson report, Jameer put up a gaudy 4.5 PPG with .5 3PG, 3.5 RPG, and 4.0 APG while shooting 17.6% from the field. Someone take this old dog out back, please. I can’t watch his stat lines suffer anymore.
9. JB Gilpin – Razzball (43-46-1)
FAAB Remaining: $18 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
The struggle is certainly for real! I lost 4-5 to a dead team. He’s got some unreal guys in there though (Butler, Hayward, Gorgui, Mason Plumlee – figures I’d get this team when Plumlee is this hot). Lost the %s, TO, Reb, & Blk. .015+ FT, 4 Reb, and 4 Blk give me a 7-2 win, and Serge Ibaka had a 13 rebound/1 block 2-game week. Basically, an AVERAGE 3 game Ibaka week wins it for me 7-2. And ultimate insult to injury – I benched Austin Rivers for two games earlier in the week because I’m a pompous ass (I was up 7-1-1 on Friday) and wanted to chase ratios – and he had, you guessed it, 5 rebounds in those two games. At least I have a young team built for the future… And you just can’t win with two superstars (Kawhi and Rubio – well Rubio in a 20 teamer expands “superstars” haha) out.
That said, I’m still going to try… I shot all my FAAB I had left at Hassan Whiteside, but didn’t get him. Here’s to hoping Charlie Villanueva can play 10 minutes a game. Makes no sense that Dallas would give him a little bit of a look, Charlie V plays great, and he goes back to near DNPs. Whatever.
10. Pete Nice – Razzball (41-48-1)
FAAB Remaining: $40 FAAB Moves this week: Chris Copeland ($5)
11.The Nature Boy (41-48-1)
FAAB Remaining: $88 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
12. Team Tough Guy Town (40-47-1)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
13. SethDaSportsMan (39-51-0)
FAAB Remaining: $22 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
14. Like A Josh – IFBL (38-51-1)
FAAB Remaining: $85 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
15. ChazTop–KevinBottom (38-51-1)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
16. High as Greg Kite (33-47-1)
FAAB Remaining: $50 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
17. Ben – RotoGold (36-53-1)
FAAB Remaining: $50 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
18. Cigar Smoking Monkey (35-54-1)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
19. The Struggle is Real (29-61-0)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
20. Mr. Green – Nowhere (28-60-2)
FAAB Remaining: $24 FAAB Moves this week: Cleanthony Early ($23), Justin Holiday ($9)
This week there were some good young players available on the wire, so I decided to make a move in the FAAB market. I watched Justin Holiday on the weekend and he looked impressive. He seems to be able to do a little of everything, and despite the fact that he plays on a stacked team, the coach seems willing to give him a legit rotation role. I like the upside there. My other add was Cleanthony Early, and with the Knicks in the tank he could get a good look the rest of the way. I probably overspent on him (double the next highest bid), but I didn’t want to just barely miss out on him. To pick those guys up I had to drop Bazemore, who was buried in Atlanta, and Roberson. I may have just been the first owner to drop a player with a full time starting job in this league*. Roberson gets no usage though, and he really wasn’t showing me anything with Durant and Westbrook back. Time to move on.
My other big move was that I traded for Oladipo last week (giving up O’Quinn and Wroten), and he has been just what I hoped so far. Small sample size alert, but he’s been a top 5 player the past week, and I have no doubt he will keep it up*. It seems to me that O’Quinn as a PF, which he’s been starting as the last week, has some issues and he’s probably better suited as a C. Unfortunately for him, the Magic already have Vucevic there, and when Aaron Gordon comes back even the PF spot will be crowded. I also, knock on wood, get DeRozan back this week, for 2 games anyway.
Looking back, my team was comatose last week. They did nothing! Nothing! The key takeaway from my matchup though, was that Barking BassetHounds are REALLY good. REALLY GOOD! I think they may just be my pick to win it all this year*.
Which brings me to my next point. I should know who’s good in this league since I have played (almost) every good team there is so far in my first 10 weeks (8 of the top 9 teams). My opponents thus far are 101 games above .500! So far I’ve only had one easy matchup, and that was the week I missed half my games due to injury, so I got killed anyway. I’m not going to look, because if I’m wrong I won’t be able to write this part, but I’ve played the toughest schedule to date of any team in the league*. The rest of the way though I only have 2 tough matchups, which I say with the utmost respect to my future adversaries. My opponents the rest of the way though, are a combined 72 games under .500 and if you exclude Martyball they are 116 games under .500! Time to drag this team out of last(!) place, and it starts this week!
* probably wrong…
