Note: closed polls immediately show up on the “Polls Archive” page, so you’ll be able to track voting there as we move along. I’ll make a new post every so often, as to avoid getting multiple pages deep in terms of comments. If you have an active conversation going in the previous post(s), by all means keep it going – just start new conversations here.
The methodology will be simple – I’ll post a poll with eight or ten players to choose from, and the player with the most votes gets the nod for that position. The plan for now is to leave polls live for 24 to 48 hours – if there is a run-away winner, we’ll come in on the short side, and if it’s close between two or more players, we’ll leave it open a bit longer. As for settings, assume whichever you personally prefer – the rankings should skew towards whatever settings the consensus uses, as well.
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sheesh it’s a coin-flip....
B-Roy just keeps getting better and contributes across the board, so i’ll take him for the keeper league staple. kobe is hard to pass, but long term prospects have me looking to the NW. DH is too big of a liability for my style of play, so it was really down to roy/kobe/dwill/harris for me.
Went with Deron. If you have Deron or CP3 on your team, all you need are a couple more decent sources of assists and you’ll have assists locked down all season. He puts up some great lines.
I am curious to see where amare ends up
.. now that he is playing with goggles lol
had to go with dwight howard. he is just too dominating. although ive always felt that big men are deeper than guards (only two guards in double figure assists) his potential to get you 20/20 in any given night is too good to pass up.
Since the Suns are eliminated. Should i worry about Grant Hill’s numbers taking a big hit?
Dwight’s clearly going to run away with #6. However, if Amare doesn’t get #7, I don’t know what to say.
I must admit I am at a complete loss as to why Deron Williams is getting so much love. As good a basketball player as he is, he still can’t crack the fantasy top 25. Tack on a limited upside (a bit more scoring and better FG%, mostly), and you have a guy who has no business being selected ahead of, say, Brandon Roy or Dwight Howard (H2H).
Al Jefferson needs to be on this list, too. I’d pick him ahead of Yao, ahead of Dirk, ahead of Harris…
Cant crack the top 25? Which rankings you looking at? Deron is currently 11 by Basketball Monster, and 9 (by averages) on ESPN’s player rater. He’s also still young and increasingly ‘the man’ on a pretty decent team.
I wouldnt put him ahead of Dwight either, but there is nothing strange about him placing in the top 10.
Yahoo! standard scoring, or BasketballMonster based on standard 9-cat. Obviously, Deron gets a huge boost if you’re playing in a league where turnovers aren’t a factor.. but I don’t think you’re in the majority if that’s your scoring system. My own ranking for Williams is based on an assumption that he will curb the turnovers a little and slide back to a Chris Paul-esque 3.0 per game, which does generate some extra value. Toss in a return to quality shooting (~50%) and he merits a pick in the range of 8th overall. But even then, I’ll take Roy ahead of him – there’s so much more potential there, particularly since Portland plays a very slow pace, so nowhere to go but up.
fair enough. I’d agree with all that.
i agree with crawly. al jefferson needs to be on this list. i would definitely pick him over yao, who has uncharacteristically been healthy this season. jefferson has improved every year, and is likely to get even better considering how young he is.
I made my case for Deron. I can equally admit that I’m at a complete loss as to why Dwight is getting so much love. With my 1st pick, I don’t want to draft someone who has two major flaws. He shoots 11 FTs a game at under 60%, and 3 TO a game for a big man is pretty awful.
Deron and CP3 are the only players averaging 10+ assists a game.
There are 11 players who average 10+ rebounds a game.
Brook Lopez.. A ROOKIE! Is ranked higher than Dwight on the season.
There are 18 centers ranked higher than Dwight, even my friend Al Harrington. 18 other centers!!
So that alone should be a big enough reason as to why Dwight shouldn’t be the #6 overall pick.
Once again, I’d rather draft a more complete player who isn’t a burden on multiple categories, and then draft someone like Brook Lopez or David Lee a few rounds later.
The difference between dwight’s rebounds and all of the other 10+
rebounders with the exception of david lee and troy murphy (you
couldn’t predict those rebounding numbers at the start of the season
anyways) is the same difference between kobe/diaw/iggy etc as those
10+ rebounders.
I’m not sure what that has to do with anything. The point is that there are only 2 players in the entire league who average 10+ assists… Deron and Chris Paul. Every year there will always be plenty of guys who rebound 10+ a game.
You failed to address the fact that there are 18 centers ranked ahead of him.. Including a rookie, Brook Lopez, who could become a 10+ reb/game player himself.
If you go by the numbers alone.. And take away the name “Dwight Howard”, he’s not worth the #6 overall pick.
I was trying to distinguish dwight howards rebounding compared to
other 10 + rebounders just because a player can average 10 rebounds
does not compare with dwights 14. Another way of looking at it is
where chris paul and deron are the only ones who are considered to
average alot of assists since they are the only ’10+’. Whereas you
nash who is distinctly thought out to be completely away from them
(just in ast) when he averages 9.5. If anything it seems like people
are leaning on the double double aspect or double digits rather than
the numbers themselves.
About the 18 centers ranked ahead of him i suppose you are playing
roto you can view dwight that way, but does that mean Jamario Moon
should be drafted in the 4th rd next year? The rankings can be
picked apart carefully depending on H2H/Roto and Volume/%’s and they
clearly do not apply do dwight in that way unless you are insisiting
those 18 centers ahead of him should be drafted before him as well.
The value of a guy like Dwight also depends on league size. In deep leagues, you have little chance of winning all cats and the successful teams are the ones that reinforce strengths and punt weaknesses. In this case Dwight is great to build around, firstly because he contributes more to Blks than any other player does to any cat, (and comes close to doing the same in rebounds). Secondly, there are actually a large number of good players that are let down by their poor FT shooting- think LO and Iguodala. When building around dwight, these guys are worth less to others than they are to you, so you can create a very formidable team. Sure, u might only win FT once in the year, but you wont often loose in the defensive stats.
my order:
kobe
roy
dirk
williams
howard
harris
i think this is where we are starting to see settings bias play a part. if you play roto for the most part, there’s no way you are picking howard here. i’d rather have roy than deron
Yeah I would have no problem with Roy going #6.. I think Roy/Kobe/Deron should be the next 3 picks, in any order.
Then a healthy Amare, and after Amare.. Possibly Dwight.
I would probably avoid dwight until maybe the third round in roto
my picks:
kobe
roy
dh12
amare
dirk
If we had the draft today, I’d pick Chris Paul at #1, but after watching this year’s playoffs, I’m sure I’d be swayed towards LeBron. Chris Paul staying at # 1 throughout the year was amazing and remarkable.
#6, I’d go with Kobe because he is the Black Mamba (shoots daggers) and still got it. Remember, people wrote Jordan off when he first retired. BRoy is the next Kobe. Chris Bosh would come in after Kobe and Dirk. Dwight is interesting because he’s Dwight, but I wouldn’t pick him unless he improves his FTs a bit. For whatever reason, I’m still not a big fan of Deron. He’d be at the bottom, but doesn’t deserve it.
Buser think i should keep Grant Hill for the rest of championship week?
same question, but for Barbosa. Just what will these crazy suns do?
i haven’t seen indications that they are going to shut people down
Some tough calls. In the League Final, and for tomorrow I will def start Deron, Conley, Iggy, A-dolph, and DH12. Which 3 would you take from this lot:
LO@Por, AK47@SA, Haywood@Tor, Landry@GS, Outlaw(LAL), Big Baby(Mia) Barbosa@Mem
the cats I’m targetting to win the week are OR, DR, ast, blk, stl, ast/TO. The last 2 are probably the most critical, and I have an outside chance at pts and FG% too.
any opinions?
i’d go with odom, haywood, and barbosa
yeah, thats what i went with. Nice to have it backed up thou, thanks.
Buser, any opinion of the baseballmonster projections? Looks like they’re trying to make the baseball part of their site more advanced, like the basketball side. Their projections are way different from what I’ve seen elsewhere, but I’m a huge proponent of their hoops stuff. Curious what you think.
to be honest i rarely use projections for any purpose, but knowing the guy that runs that site i’d give his as much credence as any. the best way to approach it is to aggregate projections from mutliple sources, to account for the ups and downs
howard and kobe were far enough ahead of the pack that i added them both to the rankings
roy got my vote for #7 but i can see an argument for just about anyone included in this poll
I’m looking at another tough night in my fantasy leagues finals. We are both playing full full-lineups tonight and are competitive in every category of our thirteen. (standard + FGM/3P%/TO’s/DQ’s)
My line-up/opponents line-up
G: Steve Nash G: Baron Davis
G: Kevin Durant G: Kelenna Azubuike
F: Troy Murphy F: LaMarcus Aldridge
F: David Lee F: Antwan Jamison
C: Dwight Howard C: Brook Lopez
U: U: Andres Nocioni
U: U: Andrew Bynum
I have five players with games tonight for the two open utility slots:
Steve Blake vs LAL
Mike Conley vs Pho
Anthony Randolph vs Hou
Brandon Rush @Atl
Jason Thompson @ LAC
I need one more three-point shooter to match his four. I am probably taking a red-hot Conley on that front for his great match-up. The last spot I have reserved for one of my two big men, Randolph and Thompson.
Here is my quandary: Thompson and Randolph are both high risk plays for me due to their high-foul rates but Thompson has a good match-up and Randolph has multi steal/block potential.
What’s the verdict?
i’d go with randolph because of those D stats, but both should be productive
I need some lineup help for tonight as well, I’ve got a full boat in the championship matchup and it is fairly close in multiple cat’s right now. Cats are FG% FT% PTS 3PT REB AST ST BLK TO. We start the following – PG SG G SF PF F C C UT UT.
Here’s who I got:
Felton
Durant
Conley
LeBron
Josh Smith
Hawes
B. Lopez
Perkins
Murphy
Russell Westbrook
Calderon
Gay
Anthony Randolph
E. Gordon
I have a pretty sizable lead in 3′s (31 vs 13), but everything else is pretty close right now. Help would be greatly appreciated.
http://basketballmonster.com/teamdifficultyrankings.aspx
i cant decide to leave Big Z in tonight or not. The players said they wanted to play and they are fighting for home court…but he only got 20 mins last game. i have a feeling he wont get more than 20 mins against a team like philly tonight…anyone else have any insight on the situation.
http://news-herald.com/articles/2009/04/08/sports/nh729494.txt
if you’ve got another good option, i’d use it. if there’s one guy they will try to get down time, it’s z
**please keep the transactions inquiries in the weekly rundown if at all possible**
Matt, I heard Boozer missed Friday’s shootaround. I could replace him with Brook Lopez or Anthony Randolph. What are your thoughts about that, too risky? Boozer vs. Millsap for minutes worries me.
Just realized I posted in the wrong thread.
Awfully sorry, got thrown off by the last question.
My bad!
not a huge deal, obviously, just trying to keep things on-topic in here
i see that sloan missed the shootaround, but boozer appears to be fine and slated to start tonight
http://www.sltrib.com/jazz/ci_12116171?source=rss
deron the pretty clear favorite so far, and can’t necessarily knock that. we may be moving on to the next round pretty quickly
By the way.. where is david lee?
he’s got a few ahead of him, but he’s not too far down the list
Question,
Should I drop Lee for Lamar Odom? Some guy just dropped him for bynum and i can pick him up for his last game on the 14th, but I’m not sure if he is going to get minutes. The reason for the Lee drop would be the waiver wont process until the 13th so I still get Lee’s game tonight, but then I bank on the fact that lee wont play big minutes in the last game of the season, where I can play younger players like Will Bynum and marreese speights.
Plus I only have like 3 guys playing on the 14th, so it would give me 4, whereas I have like every player playing on the 15th,
What do you guys think? I wouldnt do it if the consensus was that Lee will actually play in the last game of the season.
what gives you the idea that lee won’t play?
hmm, not sure, guess just wondering if he would play or sit the last game, but you seem to have answered my question.
do you think that andre miller, danny granger, or joe johnson will play the last game of the season?
Also is Haywood a good add at this point? He had a pretty good line the other night.
Where’s the loyalty? Lee is probably one of the main reasons why your team is where it is, and you’re actually thinking of playing Speights over him on the final day???
What a shame.
Lee is a competitor and will play. 15 mins of Lee would outproduce 30 mins of Speights anyways.
yeah i dont see any of those guys not playing just because they aren’t making the playoffs. haywood is certainly a reasonable add for big-man stats for his final two games
Haha, the loyalty lies in me winning not in playing guys who are going to ride the pine, and thats the reason why I asked, dont worry, he’ll be in my starting lineup, just got burned in last years finals because I played people who didnt end up playing, and had guys like speights on my bench who had big games because their coaches let them run.
Thanks for the advice, it might be a lost cause at this point tho
Oh yeah and do you guys think it would be a good idea to add sheldon williams?
Might add him for deandre jordan (camby and kamen just came back for some odd reason) or speights, (hasnt been getting major minutes but could have a massive game on the 15th) or Rodney Carney (not sure if he’s even going to play again this season)
Thoughts??
Thanks in advance everyone, without this site, probably wouldnt have made it this far…
it’s safe to drop any one of those 3 players at this point
It wasn’t long ago that Amare was a top five lock… I would still consider him around 5-10 if Shaq gets traded. Otherwise… :\
While we’re talking about Phoenix, is Nash even worth playing, much less holding on to, for their last three games against non-contenders (Min, Mem, GS)?
Bosh > Amare
Numbers are almost identical, Bosh is about 2 years younger, Amare has had a major knee injury, and Gentry should be fired.
it’s going to be a very interesting off-season in phoenix, that’s for sure. as for the rest of the way, i think nash is still worth holding on to, as he’ll do more in 20ish minutes against those defenses than most guys on waivers will do
Drastic times call for drastic measures…
I just used all four of my moves for the week.
Brandon Rush for Erick Dampier (blocks if i’m lucky)
Ramon Sessions for Eddie House (three’s if i’m lucky)
Steve Nash for Hakim Warrick (anything, please hakeem)
Steve Blake for Josh Howard (i don’t care if you just clinched! give me twenty to thirty good minutes!)
The four players I dropped I don’t expect to use again for the remainder of the season. I dropped them for tomorrows game, giving me totals of 7/7/1/7 (of a possible seven players per day) compared to my opponents 4/7/2/7.
I already gave a slight lead in almost all the categories except after tonight I lost nearly all hope of winning TO’s. I hope this doesn’t kill my percentages. Wish me luck!
*ahem*
already have a slight lead.. hehehe
I am looking for the hottest players going into the end of the season
in 3PTM/pts/rebs/blks with guys like hawes, marc gasol, morrow,
mason being at the top available on the waivers. Are there any
other players under the radar that are worthwhile steaming that can
produce in those categories?
maybe somebody like jared dudley, but with those options being already out there i’m not sure you need too many under the radar names
Glad to see Roy and Jefferson getting some love. I think we’re due for a re-vote after these two guys – good chance that a lot of us would vote for Bosh or Amare over Dirk. Good to see Smith and Wallace on the list – but I’m lost as to why Devin Harris is here, he’s no better than Calderon or Mo Williams. I know he had a breakout season, but he shoots poorly (44%), is only OK from the line, his range isn’t great (0.9 3pt / game), turns the ball over a lot (3.1 / game), and is really not much more than a 3-category contributor (points, assists, steals) with injury issues (64 games last year, 68-70 this year). I know there’s some upside here, but he’s still not a guy I’d even consider before the middle of the second round.
yeah the poll resets after every vote. looks like both roy and al jeff will be added to the list this time around
don’t overthink what the options are unless the guy you’d vote for in a particular poll is missing
i guess josh smith is the ‘obvious’ choice for #14, but i’m really starting to wonder what’s going to become of him. seems like al horford’s expanded defensive game put a damper on smith’s blocks this season, but he was down almost across the board and his FT% absolutely tanked. does anyone care to guess as to if/when smith puts it all together (again?)?
2012, his next contract year? even if he’s not an elite shot blocker, his steal numbers still put him amongst decent fantasy names. zaza is expiring, keep an eye on who the hawks tap for backup duty.
i forget that his numbers were technically very good this season if you were punting FT%. it’s just that he’s a guy who went in rd 1 of my industry drafts, with multiple people saying ‘great pick!’ after he goes, and i’ve never been on board with that. he’s a coin-flip to me, but i guess the risk is worth the upside
he just wasn’t an 2+ swat guy, which is what everyone expected. it doesn’t seem like he’ll ever average a three per, but the fact that he’s settling for fewer long twos meant he gained in TS% despite a double digit drop in FT%. i worry about him trending down in boards due to horford much more than anything else. ultimately, his value lies in either a punt situation (he gains 50 spots on bbm w/o FT%) or someone else drafting him too soon. i’m working on an primer for next season using exclusion stats to rethink adp, and in one scenario he projects to a mid second rounder. i’m not sure round one happens for him again.
I think Yao is undervalued due to his injury concerns. But if healthy he is one of the few dominant centers dwight, al jeff, yao, duncan. I guess with his age he’ll probably drop but i’d take him over j-smoove
i’m sure plenty of people would say he’s ‘properly’ valued because of injury concerns
you can argue a few different players here, yao included
He is young but he reminds me of Kirilenko. I think there is no upside his 07-08 numbers are his ceiling.
His FG% is better this year I guess if he stopped jacking up 3′s he could help his numbers a bit, but hustle guys, even ones with incredible defensive stats, need to complement stars on a fantasy squad not be the core player
whoa whoa whoa, at 1.3 3pa he’s no b. diddy. he took fewer threes this year and shot them at a much better percentage, as well. it’s the long twos that really hurt him. as a “hustle guy” he compliments dwight’s game quite well. al jefferson or timmy d? how about wade, a guy who hits 76% at a high volume, but still puts up great stl/swat numbers and turns it over like it’s his day job? seems like any of those guys would be complimented by smoov.
I know billups is getting up there in age but he still has probably 4 good season left i think he should make the poll once harris and gasol get put on the board. Maybe even Mo, young and looking good on the cavs.
yeah billups almost made it this round, but calderon has essentially the same fantasy impact and is 5 years younger
He doesn’t score or shoot the 3 as well but yea he has potential for growth and more trade value in a keeper then billups
I’m a nugs fan so a little biased i guess
Also i know melo had a down year but over the last month he is .483 – .857 – 26.8 – 5.5 -3.2 – 1.4 -0.2 and is only 24
The following are seasonal stats for two players, PG1 and PG2.
PG1 (26): FG% .437 FT% .819 3PT 64 PTS 1459 REB 231 AST 472 STL 112 BLK 13 TO 209
PG2 (26): FG% .467 FT% .911 3PT 180 PTS 1425 REB 273 AST 321 ST 69 BLK 9 TO 176
For those of you who haven’t guessed, PG1 is Devin Harris and PG2 is Mo Williams. Now, could someone *please* tell me why so many of you are voting for Harris as the #14 pick? Are you really willing to pay a full round’s premium to get an extra 150 assists and 45 steals, at the price of vastly inferior percentages, 115 fewer 3PT, higher TO, and higher injury risk? Is someone seeing an upside to Harris I’m missing?
I, for one, am passing on Harris at 14 and waiting for Calderon around 16-17 or Joe Johnson (27) / Mo Williams in the 20s.
i’m not big on harris that high, but those stats don’t show that harris is getting to the line six more times per game. people are paying for “upside” because mo has an established value and harris is perceived to be rising. i don’t buy it, though, as he’s simply the beneficiary of increased minutes and his per production isn’t drastically different.
Harris may get to the line more often, but according to BasketballMonster, Williams still provides a more significant positive impact on FT% than Harris, as does Calderon, as does Joe Johnson. This is the second time I’ve been somewhat confused as to how much love a PG is getting because of scoring and a sexy AST number (see: Deron Williams), so I guess at least people are being consistently irrational (-;
Can’t edit comments, so just a quick correction, Johnson does not provide better FT% value (I was looking at the wrong line in BM), but he does of course provide better overall value.
tough to argue with that. it’s real close on a 9-cat per-game basis too. per BBM, devin was 44 and mo was 46
my problem with Harris, is that the dude has only come close to 80 games once in his 5 years in the league. He has a serious glass jaw. I’ll take the steady goodness of Pau, with or without Bynum (who cud also be put in that glass jaw cat).
I went with Harris here and he’s basically a tossup with Gasol. Personally, consider it a Shawn Marion rule, but I’m really weary of selecting franchise guys in a long term format who aren’t close to that in real life like Josh Smith. I’d also rather have a number of guys over Danny Granger, especially Brandon Roy and Deron Williams. I’d put him closer to the back end of the top ten., he needs to do more before I’d take him over established young superstars in a keeper.
I can understand and respect those who prefer an “established” franchise player over a roto-friendly option – having been burned with Marion this season myself, even more so (I did get Granger in the second round, though). I am completely at a loss as to what makes Harris a “franchise guy”, though. He’s been in NJ for a season and loose change so far, has constantly been injured, has probably been a second fiddle even then (to Vince Carter), and has no history of putting up franchise-caliber numbers – this is his first season scoring over 15 points / game, and he has yet to average more than 7 AST per game in his career. Wouldn’t guys like Joe Johnson, Kevin Martin, or Andre Iguodala be better alternatives if that’s what you’re after?
Martin and Iggy aren’t franchise guys. I do like Joe Johnson but honestly, my comment was mainly directed at taking Granger #5 over Brandon Roy. About Harris, I think saying has yet to put up 7 AST per game in his career when he currently has 6.9 is really nitpicking. He’s going to reach 70 games played this season and I think he needs multiple years of less than 60 games played before calling him constantly injured. I also just generally prefer to build my teams around point guards and find it hard to pass on a guy who has a few years of experience in the league and now is finishing his first full season as a major player who put up an impressive overall line and is a major impact guy on FT% (nearly 9 attempts at over 80% this year), steals (pushing nearly 2 and has always been really quick and a good defender), flashed some potential in February at shooting 3′s considering he only started taking them last year, and just general improvement after a second year of experience as the future of his franchise that can provide slight improvements in areas like FG% and AST, nevermind the 20 PPG which is never easy to get from guys who get assists.
From the other options, Ming, Wallace, and Butler are all bigger injury risks and older, Calderon is clearly better on paper than real life because Raptors fans would love to get rid of him (see the RealGM Raptors board) and is a big risk not to be productive long term, Lewis is somewhat up there in age, Martin is solid but Harris’s numbers are harder to find, and I don’t trust Smith. Pau Gasol is completely legitimate though, really surprised it isn’t a tossup between him and Harris.
I mainly try to filter out the guys who seem to really rely on their athleticism without enough basketball knowledge to back it up beyond 28 ie Steve Francis and Josh Smith has alot of red flags in that area.
Some fair comments, but I’d set the bar a little higher than 60 games at this end of the draft. Harris’ games missed by year: 6,26,2,18,12. For me, he’s only had 2/5 years with acceptable time loss. You could take a punt in H2H and hope he doesnt go down at a crucial time, but in Roto the injury tendency knocks him down significantly for mine.
how is caron not getting more votes…the guy has put up great numbers all year. On top of scoring he gets rebounds and assists and lets not mention all the steals.
probably because his numbers were a little down this year, expectation that Gilbert will cut into his scoring and assists, and the fact the guy has never got through a full NBA season in his life. But I expect he’ll be in the mix soon.
yeah i think a lot of it is that he’s always hurt at the end of the season, too
When is Bynum gonna show up on the keeper list? I know his past 2 seasons have been injury riddled, but his potential to be a top center can not be overlooked. I rather have Bynum over Kevin Martin and rashard lewis hands down.
I’d question whether Bynum would get as much hype if he wasnt playing for the purple and gold. Think I could take Lopez before Bynum and not loose much sleep over it.
we’re getting closer to both players being options
Whats your take on Beas? is he just producing in because it’s garbage time/games now or is he finally putting it together?
well his past few games certainly qualify as garbage time production, but i like the way the heat have handled him this year and i think it will bode well for him moving forward. his per-35 minute averages this season:
19.4 pts, 0.5 3pt, 7.6 reb, 0.7 stl, 0.7 blk, 1.5 ast, 2.1 to
not too shabby for a 20-year-old
Not really related to this column but i was curious on your take. I was reading Bill Simmons MVP countdown article and he noted that Kobe was definately in the top 15 players of all time. So my question is where does he rank on the all-time list in comparison to Shaq?
I was thinking it could vary depending on if he gets the title this year but just wanted to hear peoples feed back.
Thanks
they are probably in a very similar area in terms of all-time rankings, in the mid-teens
glad to see simmons give chris paul some love and note that pau gasol has been massive for the lakers
Very important question regarding Yahoo! scoring. When max games played are reached, or actually when you have one game left before the max in your UTIL spot, and have two players going in your UTIL spots on the up coming day, do you get credit for stats of both players???
yep, you get both players’ stats