2015-2016 NBA season

[C-Fan]

NBA season starts in exactly one week. What are you excited to see?

Here's a short list of stuff I'm excited for:

Can the Warriors defend their title? They brought back everybody of importance on their team, everybody is locked up for the next couple years so nobody is gunning for a contract, and they have one year with Kerr under their belt. Of course, they'll also have to deal with everybody gunning for them, and also the West is as loaded as ever.

How good can the Cavs be? They had an insane stretch when their Big 3 were healthy, and LeBron took them to a 2-1 lead in the Finals by himself. If they get a little health luck, how good can they be? On a related note, they haven't come to contract terms with Tristan Thompson yet...so they may have a rocky start.

How are the Spurs going to look with Lamarcus on the team? I have a feeling they're going to be one of the 2 best teams in the West.

Who will be Rookie of the Year? Karl Anthony Towns has to be the favorite, but it'd be cool if Mudiay blows up.

How crazy (personality wise) are the Rockets going to be? They lost Josh Smith, but they got Ty Lawson who is about the same level of crazy.

I encourage anybody to post their thoughts/questions/observations in this thread.

[Asmus]

It's gonna be a fun year. I like your list.

Here is a couple of questions I look forward to get answered:

Will this finally be the Clippers' year? They have had a pretty good but tumultous off season (Signing Josh Smith and Paul Pierce, resigning DeAndre Jordan with big drama and traded for The Eight Year Old) and like the previous years the pressure is on them to make finals. Can CP3 keep things under control in the locker room and everybody happy on the court? I am not sure.

Will the Knicks make play-offs? I honestly feel like they will right now. I like the team. I think Carmelo is gonna go crazy this year. There are still a bunch of maybes but I have a good gut-feeling.

In relation to that it will be interesting to see who of the (previously) injured superstars have lost a step and who will return better than ever - there sure are many of them.. Paul George, Derrick Rose, Chris Bosh, Kyrie Irving, Camerlo Anthony, Kevin Durant.. You could even throw Kobe in there..

[C-Fan]

Sounds like Tu Vu is getting together a fantasy league. Anybody here interested? Draft this weekend.

[C-Fan]

I've only watched 2 games this season so far, but hopefully I'll watch a couple more tonight. I've been following a bit by listening to podcasts and of course fantasy NBA. For fun and posterity, here's the team I drafted and some thoughts on them:

Anthony Davis: We did an auction draft, and I spent 80 bucks of my 200 total on him. What can I say? I bought the hype train. I think he'll probably finish a top 3 fantasy play for the season, but he's off to a rough start. Curry and Durant are definitely having better starts. My original plan actually was to target Durant, but when he went for 78 and I was able to get Davis for only 2 bucks more, I thought I did well. I'm definitely not giving up on Davis yet.

Skinny Kyle Lowry: Maybe my best pick on the season so far. Cost me only $21, which I thought was a steal since he was playing so well in preseason now that he's skinny. He's probably been my best player so far, though its early in the season.

Bradley Beal: 10 bucks. For points and threes alone, a good buy. He's been solid.

Khris Middleton: Off to a slow start this year, which has been disappointing. Not giving up on him yet though. Only paid 8.

Marc Gasol : Definitely overpaid for him at 37 bucks. Also off to a slow start, and now he's injured. I don't regret having him, but I regret paying as much as I did.

Danny Green: Maybe my most disappointing player? But looking back and seeing I only paid 9 for him, I should feel less bad. He tends to start seasons off slowly, so hopefully he reaches my expectations in the next few months.

Al Horford: Paid 19 for him, feel good about it. Maybe my second best player so far after Lowry.

Amar'e Stoudemire: My worst mistake draft night. I tried to drive up the price on him so Penske would overpay, but I overplayed my hand and bought him for 8. Cut him almost immediately. Huge rookie mistake for me in an auction draft.

Jusuf Nurkic. My second biggest mistake of draft night, since he was injured and I didn't realize it. Only paid 2 for him though. Already cut him.

Marcin Gortat: Can't believe I stole him for only 3 bucks! Basically a guaranteed 10/10 guy with a block or steal per game. Good foundation piece.

Michael Carter-Williams: Got him for 1 dollar. I think people were scared of him because of the awful shooting, but he hits a bunch of other categories and I needed a PG. He's injured now, but I was proud of this pick.

Ryan Anderson: Also got for a buck. Had a bad season last year, but was great 2 years ago, so I took a flier. So far he's been pretty good for 3s and rebounds, which is what I expected.

Ricky Rubio: My final pick of the draft, and only 1 dollar. Similar to MCW, his shooting percentage is historically brutal, but I thought he'd help a lot with assists and steals. This was probably my best pick of the night, since he's started the season on fire. He's averaging 17/5/10 with decent percentages.

First week of Fantasy I didn't do too well, since I didn't realize you could do 6 waiver moves a week. I thought it was 6 for the season, so I didn't play strategically. I'm hoping I can be more strategic this week with the waiver wire, and if the Brow and Green wake up, I'll be in better shape.

[C-Fan]

First week of Fantasy I didn't do too well, since I didn't realize you could do 6 waiver moves a week. I thought it was 6 for the season, so I didn't play strategically. I'm hoping I can be more strategic this week with the waiver wire, and if the Brow and Green wake up, I'll be in better shape.

Well, I was more strategic with waiver moves and that helped, but there's only so much you can do when 3 of your top 4 picks straight up have sucked. I lost this week 5-3, which puts me at 7 wins and 9 losses through week 2. Not what I'd hoped. I listen to NBA podcasts when I walk the dog every morning, and 3 of my top 4 picks are constantly brought up as disappointments so far (Brow, Marc Gasol, and Danny Green). That plus me blowing the Amare and Nurkic picks has really put me behind the ball. It's definitely made it less fun for me, since half the fun of fantasy NBA is rooting for your guys to have good stat lines each night. Any excitement I get from seeing Kyle Lowry (my lone good guy this season) have a solid game is dashed when Danny Green puts up some turd line like 4 pts, 2 rebounds, 1 block or some other such dross.

In other bad basketball news, my favorite sports website (Grantland) got shut down by their parent company ESPN. So now I have no new articles from my favorite NBA writer, and my podcasts are cut in half. Definitely not been a fun start for my fandom this season.

[Asmus]

Grantland
It is a tragedy. Seriously.

Can the Warriors defend their title?
They have been absolutely amazing. Curry is beasting. So, yes!

How good can the Cavs be?
I think they can be very good. Getting Love going now, with all the injuries is a good plan, but it could fall apart when especially Kyrie comes back. I still see them as favorites to the title.

How are the Spurs going to look with Lamarcus on the team?
The Spurs always look the same. Which is good I guess.

Who will be Rookie of the Year?
Karl Anthony Towns is the third player in the last 30 seasons with 75 points, 40 rebounds and 15 blocks within his first five career games. The previous two: Shaquille O'Neal and David Robinson.

How crazy (personality wise) are the Rockets going to be?
Nothing too crazy this far. I thought this was pretty fun

Will this finally be the Clippers' year?
I don't think so. Cavs and Warriors look to good.

Will the Knicks make play-offs?
It looks pretty good. Porzingis has been great. Loving all the tip back dunks. Sad that his name last night was Poorfingertips

Who will return better than ever - there sure are many of them.. Paul George, Derrick Rose, Chris Bosh, Kyrie Irving, Camerlo Anthony, Kevin Durant.. You could even throw Kobe in there..
PG is looking good. Rose is looking decent good but will never be MVP again. Melo is being Melo, Durant is being Durant, Bosh has looked good Kyrie hasn’t returned and Kobe is 200 best player in the league and misses more shots than he passes. It’s sad to follow.

I will update on my fantasy leagues after this week I think.

[C-Fan]

Nice thoughts Asmus. Here are my takes on some of those questions:


Can the Warriors defend their title?

Can they? Yes. Will they? I think they have a harder path than the Cavs. Getting through 3 rounds in the West is tough, whereas the Cavs can pretty much sleepwalk into the Finals.

How good can the Cavs be?

Love is looking gooood. I think his production will drop off a bit when Kyrie gets back, but I haven't seen anything that makes me think the Cavs won't make the Finals, and give anybody from the West a legit fight.

How are the Spurs going to look with Lamarcus on the team?
I haven't seen any games yet. Their record looks good though, so probably they'll be fine.

Who will be Rookie of the Year?
That's a crazy stat about Towns! I wouldn't be surprised if he gets it, but its still early. Okafor could turn out pretty good too.

How crazy (personality wise) are the Rockets going to be?

Lawson has been sane so far, but Harden breaking up with a Kardashian could have ripple cases.

Will this finally be the Clippers' year?
I agree. Getting out of the West is going to be tough for anybody, and I don't love their chances more than the Warriors/Spurs/Rockets.

Will the Knicks make play-offs?

Knicks look a lot better than the last few years, but I don't know they are a top 8 team even in the East. Are they better than: Cavs, Bulls, Wizards, Toronto, Atlanta, Detroit, Miami, or Indiana? Feel free to swap Milwaukee for Indiana, but still, I don't see them finishing better than the above teams.

Who will return better than ever - there sure are many of them.. Paul George, Derrick Rose, Chris Bosh, Kyrie Irving, Camerlo Anthony, Kevin Durant.. You could even throw Kobe in there..

Yeah, its sad to see Kobe this bad. But I never liked him, so whatever. I hope Durant can get close to a full season; he's already injured.

There's a Warriors-Wolves game on nba.com tonight thanks to TNT. Stoked about it.

[C-Fan]

Watched the last quarter of the Clips-Warriors game last night. Even when the Warriors were down 10 with 5 minutes to go, I wasn't worried. They just have too many threats. They're now at 13-0, which is nuts. I wonder when their first loss will come? Maybe the Bulls in their next one, or the Suns in a week. But I could also see them winning both of those and extending a long streak too. When I went to look at their schedule just now, it had this neat graphic showing the leading scorer/assister/rebounder of each game, and it really showed how key the Curry-Draymond pairing is: http://www.nba.com/warriors/schedule

In bigger news, I attended my first game of the NBA season on Wednesday night. I was in Salt Lake City for work, so I checked out the Jazz-Raptors game. It was a really fun time. I got to root for Kyle Lowry in person, which is neat because he's been the best guy on my fantasy NBA team this season. I also got to see this insane dunk in person, which is probably the best dunk I've ever seen live: Hopefully I'll check out a Nuggets game at some point this year. Or maybe a Kings game...I'll be in Sacto in January and that could be fun.

[C-Fan]

Warriors now at 15-0 to start the season. Their next game they can set the record for most wins to start a season undefeated. They're playing the Lakers, so I think there's a 95% chance they get it. Crazy.

In Fantasy NBA I finally dropped Danny Green. He was averaging 7/4/2. What a bummer. Dropped him for Deron Williams, who in his first game for me dropped a 20/6/6/1/1. Much better. I just feel like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders now I don't have to deal with Green.

Had my first winning week in Fantasy NBA. About time. This week I play Penske, which should be a fun opportunity to talk smack, but I'll be offline for most of the week since I'll be in San Diego for Thanksgiving with family. Oh well.

[C-Fan]

Had my first winning week in Fantasy NBA. About time. This week I play Penske, which should be a fun opportunity to talk smack, but I'll be offline for most of the week since I'll be in San Diego for Thanksgiving with family. Oh well.

Yeah, I was gone like 5 of the 7 days I could have adjusted my roster. I ended up winning 5-3, but definitely could have done 6-2 if I tinkered with my lineup. While its fun to tinker with the daily lineups (usually by having one or two expendable slots that you just rotate out players to maximize games played), I'm not seeing a lot of guys on the waiver wired who would significantly improve my team. I'll continue to monitor it, but at this stage I'm feeling pretty good about my current rotation. I'm glad I dumped Danny Green, and I'm glad the Brow and Marc Gasol are starting to wake up. A couple of guys I picked up off the waiver have been consistent enough that I've been happy just keeping them (Julius Randle and Jared Sullinger).

In other news, Kobe announced his retirement. He had a great career, and I know the extension he signed made him the highest paid player the last 2 years, but that has to be the worst contract in the entire NBA. He's shooting 7 3s a game and making 20% of them. He's shooting like 30% overall. Yikes.

[C-Fan]

Some quick hits:

I beat Rippin in Fantasy NBA last week. I won all 8 categories in a curb-stomp.

The Warriors are now at 22-0 to start the season. They're on a 7 game road trip, and I pegged the 2 hardest games as the ones against the Pacers and the Raptors. They beat the Raptors last night, and the Pacers are later this week. They could win that one too.

Nobody is talking about the Spurs, but they are 17-4 and have the best defense of any team in the past 30 years. Don't be surprised to see these guys in the Conference Finals, or even the Finals.

Took a peek at the standings, and was shocked to see how much better the East is this year than past years. In past years, the East usually had like 5 teams with winning records, and the bottom of the playoff race was a bunch of sub-500 teams. It's still early in the year, but as of today 10 teams in the East have winning records. In the West? Only 6 teams above 500. Yeah, this is skewed a bit since each conference plays more opponents in their own conference, but still.

Staying on the subject of records, I'm not sure which of these surprises me most: Miami at 12-6, New Orleans at 5-15, or Houston at 10-11

[C-Fan]

I beat Rippin in Fantasy NBA last week. I won all 8 categories in a curb-stomp.

Beat Tu Vu this week 7-1. My record against footbaggers in this league is impeccable...too bad I have to compete against non-footbaggers too.

My fantasy team is rounding into shape, though Brad Beal has been injured for ages. At this stage though I feel like I've waited so long, I should wait and see if he comes back OK. If I was to drop him, I should have done it ages ago.

For posterity, here is my current fantasy lineup, in rough order of how much I like them:

Skinny Kyle Lowry- my most consistent player, best bang for the buck for what I paid.
The Brow- Slow start on the season, but coming into his own.
Rubio- Kills my shooting percentages, but I love the assists and steals and crazy stat lines.
Zaza- paid pretty much nothing, and he's been a reliable 11/11 guy all year.
Al Horford- 15/7/3, but kinda boring.
Marc Gasol
Gortat- 14/10 guy. Not sexy, but reliable and cheap
Deron Wiliams- Got him for nothing, and he's been a great surprise. Like him even more, since I dropped shitty ass Danny Green for him, which was an amazingly good decision.
Julius Randle- Inconsistent, and the shitty Lakers coach doesn't give him enough minutes, but good rebounding numbers for a cheap guy
Ryan Anderson- Not the best, but nice insurance with the Brow. Like, when Brow is out or in foul trouble, Anderson gets the slack.
Khris Middleton- Thought he'd be better, but he's been coming on lately.
Jrue Holiday- Picked up as an injury replacement, and I've been nicely surprised. Picking up as the season goes on and he's getting over the injury. Also nice he can play both guard positions.

[C-Fan]

Played Asmus last week. Going into the final day, I held a 7-1 lead, with the closest category being field goal percentage. Then a blizzard hit the East Coast, postponing the Wizards game where I had two guys scheduled to play (Gortat and Beal), and Deron Williams shoots 1/9. Both those combined to make me lose the category by a fraction of a point. Don't like to complain about a 6-2 win, but that was a rough way to lose a category.

All-star weekend is drawing near. Overall the fan picks for the starters aren't too bad. In the East the only questionable one for me was Melo instead of Andew Drummond, but I'm not rioting over it or anything. Melo is fine. In the West it strikes me as unfair that Kobe is in, instead of somebody like Draymond Green.

[Asmus]

I am getting my ass handed to me in Ken and mine's Fantasy league. I win over those who have lost interest or just drafted crazy but I seem to loose to everybody who are still into it.

In my fantasy league with my Danish friends I am killing it.

My team:


Standings:


I think it's fine that Kobe get's a last All Star game.

I hope Boogie makes it. I have become quite the fan of that crazy young man.

I made have to by a shirt with "POR-SLING-DICK"/“PORZINGOD”/”GODZINGIS”/“DARTH ZINGIS”/"WORLDSTAR"..

Still watching a bunch of games. NBA is fun.

[C-Fan]

Your lineup in your Danish league is absolutely monstrous. Curry, George, I. Thomas, CJ, Towns and Kemba! Yikes. Only guy on there I dont like is Young.

Warriors crushed Spurs a couple nights ago, 120-90. Don't want to read too much into it, since its regular season and Pop hides his real strategies until the playoffs, but still. Curry is not afraid of the Spurs defenders, and I'm not sure what answers they'd have for him.

[C-Fan]

Won my matchup last week 7-1. The only category I lost was field goal percentage, and on the final night of the week I saw I held an unbeatable lead in all the other categories. I decided to sit Ricky Rubio in an attempt to improve my FG%, since he's historically such a bad shooter, and his other stats would all be in categories I had already locked up. So what happens? Rubio shoots 6 for 7, while the guys I did play finished 19/36. So had I not taken Rubio out, I probably win all 8 cats. Urgh. Guess I shouldn't complain too much about a week where I only lost one cat, but still, Fantasy is frustrating.

Playing Rippin this week, but I think he's already given up on the season. At this stage I'm not really sure its worth putting much effort into the league until the playoffs. Nobody does trades, so I'm really just making sure I take injured players off my team and keeping an eye out for good players who come available.

[Asmus]

I enjoyed All Star Weekend a bunch. I do have one problem though. This is not a dunk from the freethrow line.



Also way too much Kevin Hart...

[C-Fan]

Yeah, weird how rare it is to see a proper free throw line dunk.

I didn't watch much of the game, and what I did kind of turned me off due to the complete lack of defense. The Aaron Gordon dunks were pretty sweet though.

In Fantasy News, I've just been coasting. Marc Gasol was my second pick in the draft, and there's some weird rule in our league where I can't drop him because he was a top 2 pick. That's the dumbest thing ever. I wonder if I can trade him for a shitty player though, and drop him that way? Cause the top 2 pick thing wouldn't carry over to the new owner I don't think. Anyway, it looks like my whole league is just coasting until the playoffs. If I can do some small upgrades here and there before then, that's probably my best chance, considering I have the Gasol deadweight pulling me down. I need more nights from the Brow like his 59-20 he dropped on the Pistons.

[C-Fan]

I watched the Thunder-Warriors game Saturday night, and was real glad I tuned in. Easily the best game I've seen all year, and really one of the more epic games I can remember over the past few seasons. Durant clearly came in wanting to show he's as good as Curry, and he almost did. 37 points on lots of beautiful shots, but he fouled out in OT. And man, I wasn't even sure we'd make it to OT! There was a bad travel call against Curry towards the end that got me livid, but somehow the Warriors pressured Durant into a turnover, Iggy got fouled at the buzzer, and he sunk them both! Even when the Warriors were trailing in OT, I knew they'd win just due to that momentum. Curry tying the single game 3s record was just icing on the cake. Man, I hope these guys meet in the playoffs. What a game.

In Fantasy News, I can't drop Gasol because he was a top 2 pick. considering I have the Gasol deadweight pulling me down...

Great news! I was able to drop Gasol once they ruled him out for the season. Nice reprieve. Still need to do some maneuvering since I have a bunch of fringe guys, but I'd rather get a line like 8/2/1/1 from some fringe dude than another DNP from Gasol. Right now I have the second best record in my league, and feel pretty good about my team overall.

[Asmus]

I had a dream that Damian Lillard became the spokesman for the IPFA. He had started cross training with footbag after all star break and that is why he has been amazing ever since. He did 5 clippers back to back on a talk show.