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The Clippers are going to be good this year. There’s no other way to sugar coat it. I spoke about them here a little bit, and I believe that the length of this team is going to be a force to be reckoned with. This is a team that has been successful in the past, with one of the keys being the shooting from JJ Reddick. Well, JJ is in New Orleans after two years in Philadelphia, but the point is, there is a new JJ in LA, and his name is Landry Shamet. Now, I went out of the way to single Shamet out in my team preview, but here I will take a deeper look into what he can do for your fantasy team.

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The Player Rater is a tool to evaluate the performance of a player with only one number. This is not a perfect tool and will not guarantee victory in fantasy, but this is useful to help improve and evaluate your team.

In each category of scoring, a number is calculated to represent the average total in that category. If a player has the average, his rating in that category is 0.00. The numbers represent how much a player is above or below the average.

If the rating is positive, that player is an above-average fantasy player in that category. If the rating is negative that player is below-average. The sum of all ratings in each category gives us a number (the PR), and then we rank the players accordingly.

I have not included turnovers, as the evaluation in PR is very controversial in my opinion, so if you’re in a league with turnovers, you must keep in mind this.

If you have any question let me know.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Back when I was a youngun and not lazy as hell, I used to play in a pickup basketball game, mostly of men 10+ years older than me. There was an older guy, Lou, who came to play in full gear. Wrist bands, knee braces, slicked back silver hair. He would bring up the ball, run the point, fake passes that fooled nobody, wave his finger around like he was running a play, the whole kit and caboodle. The only thing he lacked were rec-specs. He even hit the occasional flat footer from the top of the key. When Lou scored, the whole place sighed, making the defender feel like shit. At the end of the game, Lou would take off his shirt, wipe down his sweat, make you feel like you’re in a public pool locker room, zip up his nylon jacket, and wish everyone a good evening. He also cursed like a trucker and set the most illegal picks known to man.

Kind of like this guy

Something about Lou Williams reminds me of good ol’ Lou. When Williams comes off the bench, you know he’s shooting, but you can’t stop it. He takes some shots that make you close your eyes, yet, he’s draining them. He plays every game like it’s a revenge game, and his stat line somehow never disappoints. Williams is 17 points, 2.8 rebounds, 3.4 assists, and 2.2 3PM per game, shooting 45% from the field and over 90% from the line. Those are useful numbers. It makes no sense to me whatsoever that he’s available in leagues across America. We’re talking about a guy with multi-positional eligibility, who’s been unconscious from all over the floor, especially the last week or so, and he’s not virtually owned. Now, maybe, just maybe, the only reason why I have him as my man pots and pans this week is because I wanted to write about my boy Lou from back in the day, but, please, go out and pick up Lou Will asap, because dude is going Jon H-A-M every, single, night.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

isojoe

Listen, as a Hawks fan I have a special place in my sports heart for Joe Johnson. It’s special because of this strange dichotomy I call reluctant gratitude. The Hawks sucked. Hard. For years. And gave up far too much to get him, but once Joe Johnson arrived in Atlanta back in the ’05-’06 season the Hawks became a legit playoff team, with Johnson ascending to perennial All-Star level. Yet that damn contract (only to be rivaled by Allan Houston from 2001 as potentially the worst of all-time) handcuffed Atlanta into the nothingness that is the perpetual second-round, upper-middle tier of the NBA. It was awful.

However, Brooklyn came along and washed our bored tears away when they gulped down his albatross contract to usher in the new era of Atlanta basketball (still perpetual upper-middle tier, though). But when you think about it, that’s just what Joe does: usher in the next chapter for a franchise. Well, that and play incredible (dribble) ball-stopping (dribble) isolation (dribble) basketball (five more dribbles, contested shot with 3 second left). It started in Phoenix as Mike D’Antoni and Steve Nash began their revolutionary 8-second offense, then shifted to Atlanta for the next seven years where he made six All-Star teams before becoming the epitome of the catastrophe that was the Brooklyn Nets post-prime project alongside Kevin Garnett and Paul Pierce. And now? Smack dab in the middle of the Rockies, Joe’s the biggest free agent signing the Utah Jazz have locked in for the past 10-15 years. At 35 years old he’s shooting 49% in 31mpg during their first five contests. Could it be that a new era is beginning in Utah with all of their young talent (and without Gordon Hayward as of yet)? They just crushed both the Spurs and then the Mavs, and I’m getting quite jazzed about the makeup of this team. Could they reach the playoffs for the first time in 5 years? Well, probably. Joe’s there now. It’s time for a new era.

And for this week…four games for the Jazz. Here’s the 7 Ahead for Week 3!

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Geez, open the triage, we might not have any beds open in our Fantasy Basketball Infirmary after this weekend!  Way to sully the excitement of players debuting on new teams…

I guess an injury that made a lot of people surly is a year with no more Sully.  Stress reactions have been claiming lots of games lately, and Jared Sullinger will be shut down for the year with lingering issues in his foot.  I blame Brad Stevens!  Gives me stress reactions…

The Celtics have been anything but consistent with rotations, but Kelly Olynyk should be primed for a little consistency whence he’s back from his kankle.  Right now it’s Tyler Zeller manning the 5 with Brandon Bass at the 4, and those three should split most of the big man minutes.  Zeller’s nice %s with the big man stats can be usable on a lot of teams and Bass, who went 15/5/1/0/2 on 7-11 FG in 40 minutes last night always seems to be underrated.  Olynyk of Nazareth is the guy to own, but he’s not miles ahead of the other two.  I wouldn’t mind a spec add for any of the bunch, but not dropping anyone of too much value.  Here’s what else went down over an injury-plagued weekend of fantasy basketball action:

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