Pale Fire, that's a helluva book imo

I think looking at some "could have beens" would be interesting, although of course it's hard to know how the draft would have shaken down had people gone in different spots.

For example..

Jordan
Artest
Dalembert
Mark Jackson
David West

Me too, I grew up as a Nuggets fan (closest NBA team to my hometown out in western KS). I remember him dropping 9 points in like 15 seconds one time, lol.

Leave Antoine alone, *sob* leave him alone! Its not his fault he *sob* has a low TS%! Anyone *sob* would've had a low TS% on those Boston teams!

I haven't posted in this thread yet, but have been following very closely. Very entertaining stuff. But I just have to say, please, epeener, just stop, please.

I do well when I get a chance to play, but really I haven't played much at all this year.

Maybe he's just sick of arguing with someone who seems to argue solely for the sake of arguing. I know I'm sick of reading it. ****, if you weren't actually in this draft, I would have put you on ignore long ago.

This is interesting. Let me try to make a Jordan team:

PG Hinrich
SG Jordan
SF Kukoc
PF Kenyon Martin
C Sabonis

Somethin like that imo. Win first 4-5 titles and retire.

On that topic... I inherited my team, and I'm curious as to what directions people think it might have gone if, say, I took Mullin in round two instead

for ****s and giggles, my top five/bottom five teams. Excluding my own, which imo is in the top 5 or close to it... you know, being awesome and all.

Top 5
JoA - Admiral, Terry Porter, Mark Aguirre, Anal**** Green, Derrick McKey, Kyle Korver
Clark - Ewing, Nance, Blaylock, Houston, Caron, Dell Curry
horizon - LBJ, Ho Grant, Drazen, Okafor, Lever, Barros
Bobbo - Shaq, Eddie Jones, Coleman, Terrell Brandon, Ainge, Toney, Russell (still hate the DC pick and I'm not that high on his past 2, either, but still a great team)
capone - Dwight Christ, Tim Hardaway, Iggy, Steve Smith, Clifford Robinson, David Lee

I think epip's, franchise's, lurchy's, and some others are pretty close, too. Seadood's too but sorta wtf on the PG situation. hmm.. Seadood's maybe still top 5. Not knowing much about Phills isn't helping me any. Victor's team is kinda sexy too (all solid picks).

Bottom 5
FaDi - Drexler, Peja, Brad Miller, PJ Brown, Hedo, Ransey
BJL - Kidd, Richmond, Horford, Maggette, Sampson, Bonzi
Sammy - Yao, Melo, Finley, Bibby, Kurt Thomas, Mashburn
Shark - Chris Paul, Cummings, Rip, Gin Baker, Ratliff, Chuck Person
Nopair - Wade, Bynum, Chambers, Ellis, Gerald Wallace, Ben Gordon

to be honest, scanning the teams, there are less really bad teams than I thought. Zoidberg's might be worthy of bottom 5, and I'm not stoked on Cowboy's team despite my love for GP and Sheed. Dudd's and nath's aren't my favorite either.

I think HSP, nath, and flyingmoose did some solid later round drafting to pull wayward ships back on course. On the other side of that, I think GKA started out so strong but then missed out on some great opportunities but instead made a couple of key errors (Andre Miller, not too bad, Kenyon Martin.. bad).

edit: oops.. realized I missed a row on the "teams" tab. I don't think it changes much.. except maybe BigCat should be a bottom 5 team. yeah it is.

we need picks! just woke up and there are none. sigh

seems pretty clear that weaker teams are due to the reliance on current / recently retired players. correct?

About the first thing: Doc was v conservative with benching dudes who had many fouls. Even still, fouling out of 3 games is 3 more then other guys (who are able to not foul excessively)
And, Perk is not close to Biedrins - although we all said Biedrins went too high. Dalembert is a good comparison though and good counter argument.

to some degree, yes, but that's not the whole story. I think FaDi and Nopair both made "modern guy" mistakes, but their main weakness is just an odd assembly of talent. Well, Nopair's is probably health and a huge question-mark player, but beyond that.. you got a lot of undersized slasher types, no real strong defensive presence... just a hodgepodge of talented offensive players.

FaDi's team is just oddly put together. And Hedo and Ransey were both bad picks imo.

BJL blew it twice.. first with Horford, then he made a nice comeback pick with Maggette (steal imo), but then went ultra high risk with Sampson. Then a total enigma in Bonzi.

Shark's really ain't that bad and BigCat's is worse than his. Sorry Shark.

Sammy just seemed to pick a bunch of guys that I think are right at the bottom of their list of peers, ya know? With the exception of Yao, who's injury prone. I do like his past 2 picks, though.

"(still hate the DC pick and I'm not that high on his past 2, either, but still a great team)"

KC, really? I'm interested in criticism, mainly because:
Russell - I listened to people's critique that I didn't have a TRUE Sf (Eddie can play both but performs "better" in the 2 role) so I felt Russell could play for a long time/lots of minutes while doing nothing to hurt my team and providing + defense. I didn't want to have undersized wings at all times w/ Ainge/EJ, even though I understand the redundancy in this pick. Further, I felt that the roleplayers (good roleplayers, that is) of yesteryear were getting underrated, hence good value at the spot with taking Russell (as in I feel he's very similar to Posey, who was taken a round+ away)
Toney - People aren't commenting that much on picks now (too many arguments sidestepping the actual picks) but I thought getting a player w/ his scoring pedigree and "winning" mentality was nearly impossible to find. Given the fact he can play during crunch time and works off the bench, I felt people would like him - in my eyes he is like Barbaso, who was taken waaay before him.

Happy you like my team tho, I do regret my DC pick, especially trading up for him though.

"I think HSP, nath, and flyingmoose did some solid later round drafting to pull wayward ships back on course. On the other side of that, I think GKA started out so strong but then missed out on some great opportunities but instead made a couple of key errors (Andre Miller, not too bad, Kenyon Martin.. bad)."

I agree - I think in GKA's case, he got super busy and lost all focus on this thread so didn't have time to really look at players. His past picks have been dubious; I like the McMillan pick, but both the JR/Haywood are "meh" at best. HSP has impressed me most, since I thought he would have the worst team after blowing the 2nd round w/ Marbury.

I think nath's team is really good

Such a sick efficient offensive team.

See I thought the pick to make with this team would have been to either go with some balance and D up (Jermaine O'Neil) or just straight up offense (Al J). Could have also gone with Vlade but that's probably a little early for him.

Imagine, say:

Dirk
Al J
Kevin Martin
Josh Howard
Doc Rivers

This team would play no defense but score every time down the court.

bobbo,

Toney's health is my main concern. Ignoring that it's great value.

As for Russell, certainly a nice fit and I can't knock it too hard. I haven't even thought about it too much but I just have this inkling there are better guys out there.

Though if you did take Chris Mullin, you could angle for:

Dirk
Mullin
Ak47
Kaman
Heinrich

For the rather decent all white squad.

I'm afraid you've lost your way.

I kid, but I wouldn't do any pick differently except for Antoine. IMO the balanced offense and very good team defense of my starting 5 keeps me in the hunt @ this point.

I think 'toine will have some utility for me in the final analysis, just probably not 6th round worthy.

KC,

Ranking my team in your bottom 5 is upsetting, but I kindve expected it considering the kindve flack my first round pick got (Paul) and my Vin Baker pick in the fourth round was hated on by every Celtic fan in this forum.

Firstly - let me defend my Chris Paul selection. I think many of you are downplaying him because of where he got selected and who he got selected over (namely Stock)...regardless of whether you agree or disagree with the value of this pick - you have to appreciate what Chris brings to the table...an elite player who can carry a team on his back. There is no doubting that, regardless of who he was picked ahead of.

As far as being picked ahead of Stock and company...I had a tough time deciding who to pick with the 11th overall selection, and really weighed all the pros and cons and eventually decided Chris Paul was the best way to go. I think I explained my pick pretty well in my initial post...but then the issue arised of whether it was smart to take an unproven young player with limited experience. That issue itself can be debated on forever - but I think theres an exception to every rule...and Paul definitly fits the bill here. You cannot compare him to guys like Bynum, Wade, Horford or even Deron Williams (even though DWill and Paul get compared regularly in todays game). The reason for this is because Paul is a very different player - and elevated the level of his (as well as the rest of his teams level of play) like not many in NBA history have done before. Hes not some guy who just had a great season - he had a historic season!...which he steadily built up through his previous seasons. He put up numbers in only his third season (which he had steadily increased every year btw) that were only comparable to Magic Johnson. Thats right - not even Stock had a season quite like Pauls....but then the question arises... Wrong. Paul imo is an exception to this whole idea. What do u guys really think the chances are of Paul seeing any kindve major decline in production? Dont compare him to Wade (who btw is not washed up by any means)...Wade didnt even have a season close to Pauls. Chris Paul is (gulp) on the same level as a LBJ imo...I guess one more stellar year should help silence all the critics...4 years in the league should do - amirite? Is being a retired player THAT big of an advantage according to everyones eyes???

As far as Vin Baker goes - as stated in my initial post, I expect very solid production out of him in a limited amount of time. When I say very solid - I mean All NBA Team-type solid. Considering I took him in the 4th round - I thougth I got decent value for him...tbh - after Brad Miller got picked a few picks earlier - I was scrambling for a big man, and wound up picking Vin. Hes not all the different from other guys picked earlier like (Vlade comes to mind) - who also had a small window of prime play.

As for the rest of my team - I felt very good about the rest of my picks. Terry Cummings imo was of very good value. RIP is solid and a very good pairing with Paul imo (giving opposing defenses heart attacks just trying to keep up with these two cardio machines). Theo was great value - and I was surprised he lasted to the 5th round (171st pick)...ditto for sharpshooter Chuck Person in the 6th round.

Anyway - to be mentioned in the same breath as the other teams in the bottom 5 is absurd imo...I see you retracted that statement eventually - but I still dont get it. My team may not be the best offensive team, nor the best defensive team - but I strongly feel there is a very good balance there, and should be considered AT LEAST in the top half.

Yes, I felt this was necessary.

This would be a pretty good all-white team. Franchise started out so well with Stockton/Mullin, lets see if we can give him a better whitewash...
Petrovic in the 3rd
Smits in the 4th (he traded up 121/134, and this is where the Z rule was implemented as IIRC he at first took smits anyway)
Bogut as a PF in the 5th
Wally Z as a 6th man in the 6th

Would be:
PG - Stockton
SG - Petrovic
SF - Mullin
PF - Bogut
C - Smits
6th - Wally

Bobbo,

Earlier, were you saying "sure" to the donkament involving SE high-stakes players, the idea of an OT thread, or both?

Tuq, both.