2019-2020 NBA Season

[C-Fan]

Hard to believe the new NBA season starts in just one week!

Thoughts/predictions/hopes:

This offseason had more upheaval of NBA superstars than any in recent memory.  Westbrook left the Thunder for OKC, Paul George and Kawhi left their teams for the Clippers, Anthony Davis went to the Lakers, Durant and Kyrie left their teams for the Nets, Kemba left Charlotte, Chris Paul was traded to OKC, Jimmy Butler went to Miami, etc.  Insane amount of movement from the superstars.

The Raptors rested Kawhi a ton last year (load management) and it paid off for them in the playoffs.  I expect many other teams will learn from that, and stars will be rested more this year than in the past.  That makes it riskier to buy tickets to games and probably also impacts the fantasy outlook of several players.

Zion looked incredible in pre-season, and with the Pelicans wanting to run the fastest paced system in the NBA, the sky is the limit for him.  I want to see this guy play in person... he seems like a young Charles Barkley or Larry Johnson, which is a ton of fun.

I'm really curious to see how Curry plays this year.  The last time he played without Durant, he was MVP two years in a row.  This year Durant is gone and Klay will miss most of the season too.  I wouldn't be surprised to see him average some crazy amount of 3 pointers and points.  Should be fun to watch, though I do think the Warriors will be a dumpster fire on defense.

I'm excited to see the Sixers this year.  They have a starting 5 with 3 players that are basically 7 feet tall.  That's insane.  If Simmons ever learns to shoot beyond 5 feet...

Onto some wildass predictions:

Most Improved: Zach Lavine.  I could see Jaren Jackson Jr. getting attention but he's a second year player so I feel those guys should all be disqualified, since all rookies improve in their second year.  If LaVine stays healthy and is the focal point of the Bulls offense, I could see him win it.

Rookie of the Year: Zion. Barring injury, he'll have the most opportunity to impact his team and the Pelicans will be decent.  Feels like a safe bet.

MVP: I have a weird feeling it could be Jokic.  There are a lot of superstar duos on teams that will do well, but the fact that they share the load probably splits the credit between them.  Like, if the Clippers are really good and both Kawhi and PG have great years, I doubt either gets a lot of MVP love or they split the votes/goodwill for their team.  There are a few really good players who are the sole pillar of their team, but whose teams might be bad/just OK (Warriors with Curry, Blazers with Lillard, etc.).  Then there's Denver, who has a legit shot at having the best record in the league, and where it all revolves around one guy in Jokic.  Could he average a triple double from the Center spot?  Who knows, but should be fun to see.

Defensive Player of the Year: It'd be neat to see Giannis step up a level and win this.  I wish Embiid could get credit for his trash talk in this category too, but even with it he also has a shot at it.  

I don't know if my normal NBA fantasy league is happening this year, so I've taken the liberty of doing some auction drafts in random public leagues for the fun/experience of it.  I may even manage a couple of them this season since I got some real fun teams.  I'll touch on that in a future post. 

[Asmus]

Most improved:
As I told you. I don't think your predictions are that wild. Only one is Zach "Avalanche" Lavine winning MIP. I like that bet. I am sticking with it. Fun really wild one could be Markelle Fultz.

Rookie:
Zion did get injured. He might still win. But here is my wild prediction: RJ Barrett from my beloved Knicks. He will get plenty of opportunities and a lots of eyes on him playing for the Knicks. And he opened his NBA career with 21 PTS, 5 REB & 2 STL. Barrett is the second-youngest player (19 years and 131 days) with 21+ points in his first career NBA game – LeBron was 18 years, 303 days. That's good.

MVP:
I like your Jokic bet. For wildass prediction I will be going with Dame Dolla. I think the playoff success last year was good for him and he will take a step up this year. I also don't think they will be half bad.

DPOY:
I think Embiid will win this and it will be because of him playing next to Horford who nobody ever appreciates enough and who everybody always say about "Nobody ever appreciates him enough".

[C-Fan]

Barrett for ROY isn't crazy. The Knicks do have every incentive to give him as much play time as he can handle. His first few games have been promising for sure. I also think Ja Morant could take it if he does well with enough playing time.

Lillard for MVP also isn't crazy. Being the clear cut best player on a good playoff team is helpful, and Dame has been that a few years running now.

Embiid is somebody I wouldn't bet for or against, for anything. I wouldn't bet against him for MVP or DPOY because he's straight up talented enough to win both in the same year. I also would never bet for him for those, because his health is just too much of a wild card. He's already injured this year! Here are his games played by year:

2015- 0
2016- 0
2017- 31
2018- 63
2019- 64
2020- ?

Given he's missed one of the Sixers' two games already, and may miss today as well, that makes me worry.

I'd like to do a breakdown of my fantasy team soon. I've had some bad injury luck already (Bagley played 1 game then was ruled out for 6 weeks, and Jrue played 2 games injured and then was ruled out for a few games), which cost me my first matchup of the season. That said, I'm still very optimistic about my long term outlook. KAT and Trae Young especially have put up monster lines, and while Davis has been relatively quiet so far, I expect he'll round into form soon.

[C-Fan]

NBA season is about 16% done already.  Not a huge sample size, but enough to get an idea of some trends.  I'd say the biggest story line so far has been injuries ravaging several teams.  That plus a few suspensions for PEDs.  Here's a non-comprehensive list off the top of my head of stars that have missed most/all of the season:

-Steph Curry.  Broken hand, out for 3 months.
-Zion Williamson.  6-8 weeks.
-Marvin Bagley. 4-6 weeks.
-Deandre Ayton.  25 game suspension for PEDs
-John Collins.  25 game suspension for PEDs
-Brandon Ingram.  Missed 4 games and counting.
- Kawhi/Paul George.  Lots of missed games for rest.

In some cases these teams have been able to pivot and replace the injured players with good enough production from others, and not have their records impacted much.  Notably, the Suns' Aron Baynes has been a most improved player candidate this season.  In other cases, having the star player go out with injury has basically incentivized certain teams to tank the season entirely.  The Warriors have the worst record in the NBA at this point of the season, and look like they may just tank the whole season in the hopes of starting next year with a healthy Klay, healthy Curry, and freshly minted lottery pick.

Beyond the real world implications of all these injuries, fantasy NBA has been an unpredictable shit show as a result as well.  Going into the season I had planned on playing in 2 leagues; one with strangers and one with Tu Vu and Asmus. In the strangers league, my team was built around Curry and Davis, with Jrue as my 3rd star.  Curry broke his hand and Jrue had a very slow start, so I abandoned that league entirely.  My team in Asmus' league had a rough start too, and I lost the first 2 weeks of the season before rebounding and winning week 3.  

That team is anchored around  KAT and Brow, with Jrue and Trae Young as my next tier of stars.  KAT was on fire to start the season even getting MVP buzz...and then stupidly got in a fight with Embiid.  So counting the ejection and suspension, he missed 3 games for no good reason.  Trae also had a crazy good start, but then missed a couple games with injury.  I also have Bagley in this league, and have held onto him despite him missing so much time.  At this stage I think my best hope is for Bagley to come back strong, have better injury luck, and hope to pick up somebody good on the waiver at some point.  But yeah, bad start on the fantasy season for me so far. 

I haven't been watching many games so far on TV, but I do keep up with highlights.  Hoping I can watch some games on TV in the next few months.  I have a wedding to attend in Atlanta in February, so maybe I can figure out a way to go see the Hawks play.  Collins will be back by then, and Trae definitely seems like somebody who'd be fun to see play in person.

[C-Fan]

Regular season is about 23% done now. There's still some early season noise in the data (e.g. the Lakers have played a super soft schedule, and now are about to enter a super hard stretch in December), but a few big items also look pretty clear.

Harden hasn't been impacted adversely by Westbrook's arrival. Westbrook looks comfy being the distant second banana
AD and LeBron fit well together.
The Clippers bench is good enough that they can win with either Paul George or Kawhi, and don't need both at the same time. They are particularly scary with both at once.
This looks like a good rookie class, even without Zion so far.
Ratings are down across the board.

  My team in Asmus' league had a rough start too, and I lost the first 2 weeks of the season before rebounding and winning week 3.  

I think I've now won 4 weeks in a row, putting me at 4-2 for the season. Given how brutal the first couple weeks were, I could be in way worse shape. My real plan is just to tread water until the playoffs, and then hopefully some of the injured guys I've been carrying/acquiring are rounding into shape at just the right time then. I've carried an injured Marvin Bagley all season (he played one game), and I just rolled the dice and picked up Victor Oladipo off the waiver wire. If those guys get back in shape by April, my team could be really dangerous.

  I have a wedding to attend in Atlanta in February, so maybe I can figure out a way to go see the Hawks play.  Trae definitely seems like somebody who'd be fun to see play in person.

I really really want to see Trae in person, but I likely won't have enough free time on that trip to catch a game.

[C-Fan]

The NBA trade deadline was today. As of last night, I was worried it would be a pretty dead one as there had only been one big trade, and it didn't really involve big names (Capela for Robert Covington basically). Thankfully, today produced a few more high impact ones. There was a lot of reshuffling an repackaging of assets, so I'm going to give my thoughts on final results and not the weird interim steps that happened (e.g. players getting traded and immediately waived or re-traded).

Rockets basically swapped Capela for Robert Covington. Kinda neat, as now the Rockets don't have any players taller than 6 foot 8. Its like they've pushed their chips all in on small ball. I'm not sure how much this moves the needle for them, though I can understand them wanting to upgrade wing defense more than post defense. I do kinda hope they face Denver (Jokic) or the Lakers (Davis) in the playoffs, to see how they try and defend against a center with true size.

The Heat upgraded maybe the most of any team. They lost Justise Winslow and Dion Waiters, but neither of them had played hardly at all this year. Same for James Johnson. Getting Iguodala and Gallinari in return would appear to elevate them to contender status in the East. Assuming Iggy is still great defensively that is.

Detroit moved Andre Drummond to Cleveland. They didn't get much back, but considering Drummond was leaving in free agency this summer, at least they got something. From a Fantasy NBA perspective, I ran to pick up Christian Wood on the Pistons, since now they basically have no choice but to play him big minutes.

The Wolves traded Wiggins for D'Angelo Russell. Seems like a big upgrade for the Wolves purely from a talent standpoint. Almost as importantly though, DAR is BFF with KAT, so that may motivate KAT to stay in Minnesota and maybe even try harder.

The Clippers got Marcus Morris from the Knicks. I haven't watched him enough to know how much this moves the needle, but it feels significant that the Clips added "win now" players while the Lakers haven't.

Very interested to see how these moves impact the playoffs.

[C-Fan]

Between Commissioner Stern's death, Morey's pro-Hong Kong tweet that alienated the Chinese market, Kobe's unexpected death, and now the suspension of the season due to Coronavirus, this is easily the weirdest and worst NBA season I can remember in my 30-ish years of being a fan.

[C-Fan]

Mid-April is usually notable for me basketball-wise for two reasons:

The regular season ends, so playoff matchups are getting set and we're all getting excited for the NBA playoffs (basically the real season).
Fantasy NBA playoffs are wrapping up.

Due to the COVID-19 shutdown of the NBA season neither of these are happening now. Of more basketball concern, is there's a decent chance neither may happen at all. And of course, we're all very aware that in the grand scheme of things basketball doesn't matter at all when viewed in the greater context of what's driving all this.

For my own personal sense of closure on the Fantasy NBA season at least, I thought I'd jot down some thoughts on my season.

Even if the COVID pandemic hadn't hit, I wasn't going to win my league this year. Part of that is due to the team I drafted (more on that later), but part of it is due to the structure of the league itself. The league is made up of 10 teams, which are arbitrarily split into 2 divisions. The way the playoffs work, is the best 2 teams in each division compete against each other, and then the winners of those matchups meet in the finals. In theory this isn't a bad set up, assuming the divisions are somewhat balanced. But that's completely arbitrary, and in my league this year it worked out so the 5 strongest teams were all in one division. Literally the 5th best team in the East Division had a record that tied the 1st best team in the West Division. I was in the East, and while I had the 3rd best record in the whole league (3rd out of 10), that also meant I had the 3rd best record of my Division. That meant that I would not get to compete for the title, while 2 teams in the other Division with much worse records would. While that's obviously unfair, I wouldn't have been in that situation to begin with if not for:

The team I drafted didn't work out well. I had super high hopes for my team, since I thought I got 4 franchise guys at the top of my team and I picked well around the fringes towards the end of the draft. Let's take a closer look.

The two pillars of my team were supposed to be KAT and Anthony Davis. I felt KAT was a sure bet, since he missed so few games over the start of his career, and I expected him to put up huge numbers with such a weak cast around him. Davis felt like more of a gamble since he had an injury risk reputation and often people playing with LeBron take a statistical hit. As it turned out, Davis was very reliable and pretty much what I hoped for at his pricetag. KAT on the other hand had the worst year of his career, missed the most games of his career, and generally seemed disinterested. There was no way to predict that, but it definitely put me in a bad place to have my top guy have a career worst year.

My next two picks I was most excited about were Trae Young and Jrue Holiday. I basically thought they were both franchise guys, but a lot cheaper than the top tier of names like KAT and Brow. Jrue had an OK year, but not as good as I hoped. I can't complain for the production I got at the price I paid, but he didn't exceed expectations either. Trae on the other hand was as good as I'd hoped, and almost compensated for how bad KAT was.

My 5th most expensive player, who I would have put just behind that top 4 in terms of franchise fantasy potential, was Marvin Bagley. I think he played like 4 games total. If I had to point fingers at a player that killed my season, it's probably him.

My fringe picks were all pretty good in terms of production, especially compared to price tag. Where I got killed, was just unexpected injuries. Jonathan Isaac and Kelly Oubre had season ending injuries and I lost them for nothing. I had Spencer Dinwiddie and Caris LeVert for $3 total, but had to cut them when they hit injuries because I couldn't carry them with my top 4 underperforming. My only fringe guy who didn't get injured and was great was Shai Gilgeous Alexander, but even he couldn't save me after KAT and Bagley killed my team, and injuries buried me.

Its notable that even with my horrid luck with my team, I still had the 3rd best record in my league and could have beat anybody in the playoffs if the divisions structure wasn't so unlucky. I'd like to do Fantasy again next year, since I think it's statistically impossible for me to have worse luck.

I wanted to get into the cap impacts of COVID, but running out of time. In a nutshell though, it's interesting how some NBA salaries are straight up numbers (bench guys mostly get paid a fixed dollar number for a fixed number of years) while superstars are paid a percentage of team revenue. So a max level player would get X% of the team revenue, which in normal years is way more than a fixed number a bench guy would get. But in a weird year like this where China pulled its market early on and then COVID suspended the season and maybe the playoff (and playoff money), a max player still gets the same percentage of team revenue, just that the revenue itself is much much smaller. So a guy like Giannis, who is a max level player and an MVP, may end up getting in the neighborhood of $80 less over the course of their contract due to these circumstances they had no control over. How crazy is that?

[C-Fan]

It's been 2 months since the season was suspended, and still no real clarity on whether the season will be canceled or come back in a shortened playoffs at some point. The NBA has done one smart thing though: every night they livestream on YouTube a classic game with no commercials. Usually its a game from the past 5 years, so the stars are familiar. Even though you know the outcome of the games, its still fun seeing Steph catch fire, or a crazy comeback, or a buzzer beater. I've tuned in for a bunch of them, and I'm sure it's helping the NBA keep fan interest from disappearing completely.

I'm guessing my Fantasy season is over. There are 3 possible scenarios I can foresee, and in 2 of them you can't run fantasy NBA. The one scenario where Fantasy could close out the season is, in my opinion, also the least likely one.

NBA cancels this season, which means Fantasy NBA is by extension also canceled.
NBA resumes the season, but goes directly to a truncated playoffs. During a normal playoffs, the best 8 teams in the East and the best 8 teams in the West compete while the other half of the NBA's season is over. I wouldn't be shocked if a truncated playoffs involves fewer teams (maybe top 4 teams of each conference only) playing shorter series (best of 5 instead of best of 7, maybe even best of 3). In any scenario where the NBA goes direct to the playoffs, fantasy is over since at least half the players aren't playing.
The NBA resumes its regular season for a handful of games as a warmup for the playoffs, then goes to the playoffs. This is pretty unlikely for a lot of different reasons, but if it happened you could run fantasy for that remainder of pre-playoff games. But yeah, if you're a team with no chance of making the playoffs, why would you risk playing your players for meaningless games that puts them at risk?

[C-Fan]

If anybody is watching Game 1 of Jazz-Nuggets, look for me in the virtual stands as a virtual fan. I'm wearing glasses and a yellow shirt.

[Asmus]

Hahahahah. I just PM'ed you about me seeing a guy who looked like you. I guess I was right. Well spotted to myself.

Great game. Overtime now.

[Asmus]

Murray is on fire btw

[Asmus]

Tiny C-Fan (or V-Fan) at the top in the middle.

57 from Mitchell! Most in Utah Playoff history and the youngest to ever do it.

[C-Fan]

Tiny C-Fan (or V-Fan) at the top in the middle.

Ha!  Yep, that's me!  It was an interesting experience to say the least.  We had two feeds running simultaneously, one of the live game feed and the other of our cheering section.  That meant the actual quality of the game feed wasn't great.  The enthusiasm of the fans in my section also varied wildly, and of course we didn't know each other.  Some of the other virtual fans were fun and participated in free throw psych out routines, but others didn't.  We also had a chat box going, but we were all assigned generic usernames (PGPDHDHD FAN #44) so you couldn't tell who was typing, or develop relationships that way.  Still, I'm glad I had the chance to participate and I'm glad that at least I brought some enthusiasm to the table.

As for the game itself, I really enjoyed it.  I was really excited to see Michael Porter Jr. and Bol Bol play, since they're both young players we got at much deeper points in the draft than we should have.  Bol Bol didn't play at all, which isn't shocking since it is the playoffs.  MPJ had a hot start but then cooled off a lot and had to be pulled.  Donovan Mitchell just killed us...it seemed like every time he came down the court he was either dunking on us or raining 3s.  It was like watching NBA Jam.  I was still a bit surprised that he ended up with the 3rd highest playoff scoring game ever (after Jordan and Elgin).  It was also cool to see Jamaal Murray pretty much match him in a duel in the last half and OT.

While there are lots of new wrinkles with the playoff bubble, one question already appears to have been answered even after just one day.  The playoff intensity is still there even without the crowds.  At the end of the day, that's the most important thing.

[Tjuggles]

I'll have you two (Ken and Asmus) know that today I was chatting with a friend who was telling me how the NBA is doing virtual fans, and was able to tell them this story about you two! Great stuff.

[C-Fan]

Yeah, it's pretty neat that the NBA is still involving fans despite the challenges of the bubble.

I also think we're all kind of taking for granted how well the NBA has executed the bubble. It's been over a month, tons of players, tons of staff, and not a single positive case. It's jarring to compare with other leagues like Major League Baseball who have had multiple outbreaks.

I also want to shout out both the players and the NBA league for the social justice work they've done. The fact that players were willing to carry out wildcat strikes OF PLAYOFF GAMES is one of the bravest and most patriotic things I've seen in sports in my lifetime. I was so proud of them, and it's awesome to see concrete actions come out of it like arenas being turned into polling locations for November.

John Oliver has a good recap from the 13 to 16 minute mark here:



I still think one of the LA teams wins the West. Out East, it looks like it'll be the Heat against either the Raptors or Celtics. If I had to rank them in terms of strength, I'd put the Celtics first, followed by Heat, followed by Raptors. But anything can happen really.

[Asmus]

LET*S GO NUGZ!

[C-Fan]

Looks like I was a year too early with this prediction. But I was eventually right, for the right reasons.

Onto some wildass predictions:

MVP: I have a weird feeling it could be Jokic.  There are a lot of superstar duos on teams that will do well, but the fact that they share the load probably splits the credit between them.  Like, if the Clippers are really good and both Kawhi and PG have great years, I doubt either gets a lot of MVP love or they split the votes/goodwill for their team.  There are a few really good players who are the sole pillar of their team, but whose teams might be bad/just OK (Warriors with Curry, Blazers with Lillard, etc.).  Then there's Denver, who has a legit shot at having the best record in the league, and where it all revolves around one guy in Jokic.  Could he average a triple double from the Center spot?  Who knows, but should be fun to see.

[Tjuggles]

Nice, Ken! That is impressive. I suppose I'm pointing out the elephant in the room, but I suppose all that is left to do is grab Doc and Marty, and find last year's Ken...