Week 1 is in the books! It’s great to be officially into the grind of the season, emphasis on grind after I had to completely remake the back end of my roster. I’m hoping it’s more like True Grit than Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Damn you Tim Burton! You will forever be dead to me for ruining a childhood favorite. He’s the movie director equivalent of Nate Robinson.
If you’re new to Razzball, we take weekly look-ins every Monday into the REL Dynasty League (link below) to track the deepest of deep wires. It’s a weekly FAAB with all pickups becoming $1 keepers, and a great way to track the wires in your deeper leagues. I hope everyone had a great first week of action in their leagues this season, and may your deep dynasties prosper!
1. Slim – Razzball (8-1-0)
FAAB Remaining: $87 FAAB Moves this week: Anthony Tolliver ($6)
You know you had a good week when you win the category you’re punting. Lillard, Smart, and Wiggins did what they could to sink FG% but Galloway, Jeff Green, and even Marcus Morris were just good enough to make it a win. FT% could have been better but Lillard, Gallaway, and Burks once again did just enough to keep the category a win. Unsurprisingly Lillard led my team in 3s but it would have been Galloway pacing my team had I played him on the big Wednesday slate. Like I’m sure every week henceforth Lillard leads the team in scoring, but the big takeaway was Marcus Morris as my #2 scorer, with Clarkson and Burks also chipping in a goodly amount. Rebounding isn’t a strength which is plain to see since Marcus Morris led my team, but Porzingis was 2nd, followed closely by Steven Adams and Jared Sullinger, 3 guys that I did not expect to get so many minutes out of so soon. Assists as it turns out are another major issue for me. After Lillard there is very little as Smart and Jeff Green were the only guys to clear double digits, and barely at that. Steals weren’t too strong this week and I expect Smart to lead my team most weeks, but Lillard was 2nd on my team with 4, tied with my only rookie Porzingis, who had an incredibly strong opening week, and who as you may have guessed by now I am obsessed with. Blocks are going to be tough for me to win consistently, Adams gets 5 but 2nd on my team is Clarkson?!? That’s not good. The only solace I have is that 11 guys contributed to the category. TOs are a strength and hopefully Lillard can reign it in a bit but Smart with an 11:2 A:TO ratio and Galloway with a stellar 10:1 ratio were incredibly strong and it can easily be seen by their Y! ranks of 42 and 27 respectively.
Well, that’s the good. The bad is that Nurkic is still out and could be out for a while, Henson is nursing an Achilles and who knows how long it’ll be until he gives me 10 minutes off the bench again, and Wiggins having back spasms isn’t helping anyone. As for the guys at the bottom of my roster, Trevor Booker hasn’t done much but he got 28 minutes last time out and should easily maintain a 24ish minute role. Dante Cunningham only played 22 minutes last time out but he’s hitting his 3s and contributing across the board without hurting anywhere, a solid hold until the Pelicans get some of their injured players back. Although truth be told I see Cunningham simply as a placeholder for Nurkic. Archie Goodwin is only getting garbage time minutes because Sonny Weems and Ronnie Price took his job, but both are career backups and playing terribly, hopefully Archie gets his job back soon. Cleanthony Early couldn’t beat out Lance Thomas for backup forward minutes so he had to go. Sure I wanted RKelly, I bid $16 for him and more than anything I really wanted to make another urination joke but alas it twas not to pee. I settled on my 2nd choice, Anthony Tolliver. He played 30 minutes last time out, he’s a better defender than Ilyasova, and with Meeks down Stanley should get more minutes at the 2 opening up an even bigger role for Tolliver. He had 1.6 3s in 22 minutes for Detroit last year but more importantly he can chip in a little bit everywhere without hurting me anywhere (TOs in particular), and he does it from the much needed small forward position. I was a bit surprised that I was the only one who put in a bid.
This coming week I take my 1st place team, yeah that’s right, 1st place team up against Greg Kite, he’s got extremely high end guys at the top (Curry and Harden) but nowhere near enough minutes overall to compete with my depth. I fully expect to see my name at the top once again next week.
2. JB Gilpin – Razzball (7-1-1)
FAAB Remaining: $1 FAAB Moves this week: Jon Leuer ($29), Raymond Felton ($24), P.J. Hairston ($19), Lance Thomas ($12)
Well, an interesting week to say the least… I know I shouldn’t be complaining, but c’mon J.J. Barea! I’m up 8-1, and with 35 seconds left, D’Angelo Russell gets a steal in the final minute of the final game off midget magoo to tie up the cat. But there’s no way I should be whining, Breaking Batum needed all of 3 assists and 2 steals from Russell and John Jenkins to salvage a 3-6 loss, and Russell had one dime and that one final steal while Jenkins didn’t get off the bench. It was a stressful Sunday as Batum out-minutesed me by a boatload, and I ended up on the fortunate side of 3 3PTM, 1 AST, tied STL, and 5 TO. I have no problem winning AST and STL if I get more than two games from Rubio and LaVine, but it was probably a blessing in disguise as I won TO. And I had an unbelievable hero performance from Tyler Johnson, who was yet another guy I was going to have to replace after playing all of 1:28 through two games, but played virtually the whole second half in a crazy Heat bludgeoning of the Rockets yesterday and added 3 dimes and a 1 steal, pivotal for a W and T in those cats.
Yeah, I read your recap Yappers! Felton looks overweight and not obese, and his minutes look pretty assured right now. I think he’s your starter when Deron Williams inevitably gets hurt again.
Is using all your FAAB week 1 smart? Hell no! But what’s even worse is carrying 4 guys not doing anything on the bottom of your roster, and I’ve learned the past 3 years that the guys who stick in the rotation all season emerge more from week 1 than any other week. And I’m less worried about keepers as I’m going all-in for this season. A rebuilding team would have no reason to bid high on the guys I picked up, but I think they are all mainstays in their respective rotations all year, and gives me all 15+ minute guys other than Oubre. So yeah, that actually would’ve been 5 non-contributing guys. R.J. Hunter didn’t get off the bench, Nate Robinson didn’t make it through the week with a job, Jeremy Evans is clearly out of the rotation with Parsons back and barely played when Parsons played 11 minutes yesterday anyway, and Wilson Chandler is hurt and opened up a spot on IL.
The smart thing would’ve been to have a better back end of my roster, but alas, I needed Oubre in the draft! Gave me 5 $1 buys at the end of the auction, and nary a one is on my roster now. I have confidence in the guys I got, I think they stick all year, and I can now lay low with a fully contributing roster. If anything, I just want to salvage at least a 4-5 loss against I Ain’t No Jok(ic). He’s got a phenomenal roster after being in the bottom half of the league the first two years, after some very, very savvy rebuilding. Mr. Green looks to be a force of the league this year. If you need any advice on how to rebuild a deep roster, he’s your man!
3. Yappers (7-2-0)
FAAB Remaining: $61 FAAB Moves this week: Ryan Kelly ($26)
Before I get into the business du jour, I would like to thank JB and Slim for creating this league and having the privilege to play in it. I know how good a league is by how much I obsess over it, and my obsess quotient in this league is very high. With all of the new active managers in this league, I expect a tough battle defending my title. In the end I will need health and some good dumb luck. Like maybe C.J. Miles hitting around seven threes in the final game to nab the category by one.
So one lesson learned so far for me this year is “Thou shalt not declare Thine known $1 players (like Tarik Black and Chase Budinger) as keepers”. Had I not done so, instead of having $4 left over at the auction, I would have had $6 left to snipe off two better players. Like maybe Ryan Kelly (who was on my radar even then) whom I instead shelled out $26 of FAAB to nab once I figured out that Kelly was getting minutes and Tarik Black was not. But Ryan Kelly (being young, having some promise, and getting minutes) fits the profile of a player I would spend this type of FAAB money on, while say a Raymond Felton (with due apologies) just does not.
But hey, I at least am trying to mend my spendthrift ways of years past and exercise fiscal restraint, and I think I am showing some small progress. For the first time in three years, my guy was not the most expensive player of week one, and I do not have the least FAAB money left of all the teams. So as they say “One day at a time”.
Anyways in years past I made well under 10 total moves, and I should have enough FAAB left if used wisely. But I just don’t see moves on the horizon. Yeah maybe I could replace Chase Budinger. But I really do not want to spend more than say $5 for the task since he is getting at least some minutes and he would be the logical drop once Shumpert on my Injured List gets healthy. (No Joe Young would not be the drop, my plan for him is to exercise patience due for a first year player).
Speaking of Injured List, I do like how Yahoo is not using that designation for every toothache and hangnail. I feared this would be a method for underhanded managers like myself to abuse and expand rosters to 18 players per team. This just does not seem to be the case.
As far as the weekly matchup goes, it was closer than it looked, and a relatively heavy schedule on Sunday allowed me to clinch a couple of categories the final day. One comment on my opponent “No Glove No Love”. At the time I thought spending $56 for Karl-Anthony Towns was an overpayment. I was wrong, he is a future high first rounder. And his $2 Kent Bazemore pick in the auction looks brilliant.
4. Hardenoutherr4apimp (7-2-0)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
5. Kap’s Team (6-2-1)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
6. I Ain’t No Jok(ic) (6-3-0)
FAAB Remaining: $98 FAAB Moves this week: JaMychal Green ($0)
Ahhhhhh. It feels so good to get week 1 in the books. No more waiting for meaningful games as the season is in full swing now.
So far it seems like Holmes is the only guy on my team who’s not in the rotation at this point. Though Ajinca seems to have dropped down to about six minutes the last couple games, despite putting up a 7/5 line in 6 minutes last time out. I’m hoping his minutes pick back up next time out. My pickup of Monster Harrell last week looks pretty good as Terrence Jones, try to contain your shock, got injured! Crazy, right? Even crazier is that Dwight Howard missed a game too! What is this world coming to? Harrell could be in line for some minutes playing behind those guys and the still injured DMo.
I did manage to get off on the right foot with a 6-3 opening week win. 7-2 was within reach too if my trio of Raptors could have shot their normal FT%. Instead Demar, DeMarre and Jonas all shot under my teams .763 causing me to give that cat away. Four of the six categories I won weren’t really close, so it was a solid start no doubt. At the same time my team didn’t play great so there’s lots of room for improvement.
A showdown looms next week with JB. After facing each other twice last year and falling short the second time in a big matchup I feel it’s time to put it all together. Revenge week!
7. Scurry to the Left (6-3-0)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
8. Greek Freaks (6-3-0)
FAAB Remaining: $95 FAAB Moves this week: Quincy Pondexter ($2)
9. Foreign Affairs (6-3-0)
FAAB Remaining: $93 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
Well the U.S.S Titanic that is my roster has gotten off to a great start with a solid 6-3 win over The Nature Boy with no health issues to speak of, knock on wood. My team was strong in all the areas I was expecting it to be in though the strength of everyone elses ft% is concerning but will have to see how that goes. Mudiay and Kobe went and did what was expected with 19 to’s for Mudiay killing that area by himself and Kobe…..you better make sure I never lose points if your going to shoot 31% (6% worse then last years abysmal number) on 51 shoots every week.. though his % should increase if he stops taking nearly 10!! threes a game. I’m happy with what i’ve seen out of my rookies though and Willie looks like he has some Noel potential for giving me great steals and blks as the season goes on and he gets more minutes. As for the vets the Mavs getting Wes and Chandler back this early makes things look good for Cuban to try playoffs keeping Dirk from slowing it down, Zach’s been disappointing but that should right itself and….Lee…..why did I ever bother getting myself involved beyond Thomas with that Celtics team…that whole rotation is a disaster when it comes to minute consistency..going to have to hope things get better but not promising and with Gorgui stuck behind… KG and Prince!! untill the wolves stop that nonsense later in the year I’m a lot weaker in reb’s then I was projecting.
As for my FAAB moves I didn’t do anything this weak after happily grabbing Mario from the wire and Luke Babbitt before the week started. Babbitt’s 30 minutes last game and the Pelicans ghost town of a roster has me keeping him around for another week to see if there’s something there. Mario will be a nice end of the bench guy for me with his stls and asts and as JB and Slim have said on the pod could be traded this season so he’s got some solid upside worth holding onto.
I face last years runner up in Breaking Batum this weak and going off of last weeks numbers we would have been had a big old tie at 4-4-1 so its going to be a tough week, hopefully Hayward gets back in the grove and Gorgui gets more burn to give me that extra push I need.
10. Martyball – IFBL (5-4-0)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
11. HateUsCauseTheyAnus (4-5-0)
FAAB Remaining: $88 FAAB Moves this week: Lamar Patterson ($12)
12. Heat Apologist (3-6-0)
FAAB Remaining: $83 FAAB Moves this week: Toney Douglas ($15)
Well that didn’t go as planned, managing to grab loss out of the jaws of victory. Losing points by 3, steaks by 2, and ft by .003 was painful. I imagine if I didn’t lose a week from Parsons and Stauskas, I might have been more competitive in 3ptm as well. On the positive side, we had a 2:1 assist:turnover ratio, with the second most assists I believe. Winning turnovers on the week with max assists is an ideal I imagine won’t happen most weeks. Blocks are light, but losing a couple games from Bogut didn’t help. I look forward to having a full roster this week. For FAAB, I was looking at adding steals (and minutes), as the only blocks available on the wire was Dedmon and he got DNP’d yesterday. RKelly was an option, but I didn’t think I would bid enough for him. My #1 option was Douglas. He (hopefully) gets more fun than Ish, bringing a little defense to the Pel’s. Obviously an overpay, but I think the category he will give me the most is minutes, especially if Jrue gets injured again.
13. The Nature Boy (3-6-0)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: Gary Neal ($0)
14. High as Greg Kite (3-6-0)
FAAB Remaining: $98 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
15. Pete Nice – Razzball (3-6-0)
FAAB Remaining: $83 FAAB Moves this week: Damien Inglis ($0)
16. Hoopus Alleyoopus (2-6-1)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
My team is not good. I thought my team was top-heavy last year and looked to address that in the draft. I was ineffective.
I went into the draft with $37 for 6 spots and wanting some more assists and 3s. Well, after watching the few guards that were actually good fly off the board for more money than I had, it was down to Ty Lawson and Rajon Rondo. With James Harden hogging the ball down in Houston, and the fact that the man probably has a drinking problem, I didn’t want to rely on Lawson. Instead I decided to take the probably equally large gamble on Rajon Rondo. After 1 game, it looked like a disaster, but he has played great the past two games so maybe it will work out. However, that only left me with $16 to fill out 5 spots which is just not enough to avoid getting guys that get a lot of DNP-CDs. So welcome to the team Sam Dekker and Shabazz Napier!
My decision to keep Garnett is not looking good. Word around town was that he would play about 20 MPG and I figured it wouldn’t be a stretch to think he could get me 8-10 points, 6-8 rebounds and around one block per game. Not looking that way. My decision to keep James Johnson also looking bad. Keepers locked in early and I had no idea that he and his neck tattoos had been banished to the bench. My young keepers Vonleh, Adams and Anderson are not getting much playing time either which could be the death knell for my team. Not worried about Anderson as he can play and will be in for a minutes increase after the retirement of Manu and Duncan after this season. I will have to cut bait on the other two if they don’t start to get some playing time as this season rolls along.
I went 2-6-1 this week against Kap’s team. Was one block and two assists away from 4-5 so I have a tiny bit of optimism for my team. If Kyrie and Pek get healthy my team will be competitive. If not, this is going to be a long season.
17. Cigar Smoking Monkey (2-7-0)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
18. No Glove No Love (2-7-0)
FAAB Remaining: $96 FAAB Moves this week: Mike Scott ($1)
19. Breaking Batum (1-7-1)
FAAB Remaining: $100 FAAB Moves this week: n/a
Deep deep sigh. Week 1 could not have gone much worse for us. It started by being matched up with our worse possible opponent in JB. He literally beat the breaks off of us. There were several other teams that would of beat us handedly, and we struggled greatly across the board statistically. Only placing in the top half in 4 categories and top 3 in one. We can take solace in the fact that we would have beaten or tied 9 other opponents, but not as a result of our strength as noted above.
There are several players on our team that seemed to have limited upside as a result of situation… Looking at you John Jenkins. Is Carlisle really going to play fat Raymond Felton over Jenkins? So far the answer is yes, but we are betting that Carlisle reconsiders rolling… I mean running Felton out there going forward. Then there is “The Great White” hope in TJ Connell, our only angle here is that Philly realizes that Okafor is too good tank with D league players on the team and turns to college second unit all-stars instead to keep the win total down.
20. The Chosen Ones (1-8-0)
FAAB Remaining: $98 FAAB Moves this week: Richard Jefferson ($2), Steve Blake ($0)
