So here we are.Opening NHL weekend (for most of the league).Time for me to go through some thoughts from preseason, the Europe games, and since I didn’t pick my sleepers before most drafts, I figured I’d also give you the names of some guys who are probably still available in your league who would be worth picking up.
First, lets start with the opening games in Europe.If you read any other fantasy websites you’ve probably already heard about Tyler Kennedy and Filip Kuba.If you haven’t, go pick them up right now.Injuries on the Penguins allowed Kennedy to play on a line with rising superstar Evgeni Malkin, and he took advantage.All he did was score two goals in the first game, including the overtime winner just seconds before the game went to a shootout.After two games he’s a healthy +2 and has 5 shots on goal.And if your league counts game winning goals, as mine does, he’s already shown he’s capable in that category.
Kuba looks like he’s going to be a beast on the blue line.He played over 25 minutes in both games overseas (close to 30 in one) and ran the point on what could turn into a solid power play.In 2 games he picked up 3 assists, 2 on the power play, so if your league counts power play points that’s a big plus.He only took 1 shot in the 2 games, but that won’t be the norm.He’s taken more than 100 shots in 6 of the last 7 seasons (2005-06), so he will shoot the puck.I don’t think his 3 points or his ice time were a fluke, and you should drop your worst defenseman for him right away.
I know I didn’t get a post in on my sleepers before most of you drafted, so here are some guys I’m high on this season that may still be available in your league.
R.J. Umberger – C – Blue Jackets
He had 50 points with the flyers last season, and now moves over to Columbus to center Rick Nash’s line.As long as he can hold his spot on that 1st line (and I don’t see him having too much competition there), he’ll put up numbers.Nash is ready to have a monster season and so you want anyone on the ice at the same time as he is.The only caveat with Umberger is that if he gets knocked off Nash’s line, get rid of him.The wing depth on the Blue Jackets is lacking, so he will have a lot more trouble contributing if he’s not on the ice with Nash.
Chris Clark – RW - Capitals
The Capitals captain was coming off a 30 goal season last year only to succumb to injury.First he nearly had his ear torn off by a puck, and if that wasn’t enough he injured his groin and was limited to 18 games last season.But he’s back healthy and ready to contribute again.Clark starts the season on the Caps 3rd line, where will play alongside veteran Michael Nylander and Tomas Fleischmann.He’ll also play on the Caps 2nd power play line with Ovechkin (who’s on both PP lines) and Mike Green.As long as someone wins a faceoff, the Caps 2nd PP line is as good as most teams’ 1st.Keep an eye on Clark to have a big year, and he gets penalty minutes too (43 of them in 18 games last season).Finally, if Viktor Kozlov gets hurt (he comes into the season with a nagging groin injury), Clark would take his place on the Caps top line playing alongside Ovechkin.
Alex Goligoski – D – Penguins
Here’s a guy who was 2nd in scoring in the Calder Cup playoffs in the AHL last season (2nd overall, not among defensemen).Now he’s on the big club, and could have a big impact to start the year.He’ll be running the point on one line of a dangerous Penguins power play while Sergei Gonchar is out with the injury.The Pens power play actually looked to be in trouble until Goligoski scoring the only goal of the Penguins 2nd game with just 2 seconds left in the 3rd period with the man advantage.He has all the tools to pick up points from the blue line until Gonchar comes back.If he plays like he’s capable, he could also make a real statement towards running point on the 2nd power play line even when Gonchar comes back.
Eric Fehr – RW – Capitals
**Deep Leagues Only**
Fehr is a talented forward who’s succumbed to injuries the past few seasons.Unfortunately he got caught up in a numbers game this season with the Caps and will likely be a healthy scratch early in the season.Keep an eye on the team though, because if a forward goes down Fehr would likely take their spot and then would be worth a pickup.He has all the tools to put together solid numbers this season if given the chance to skate as a top 6 forward.
Great players will carry you in Fantasy NBA more than any other fantasy format. Why?
This article will explore FG% and FT%, two stats that can and will ultimately be determined by the player on your team who takes the most shots.
Here are the top 10 players in field goal and free throw attempts per game last year:
FG Attempts/Game 1. LeBron James, 21.9 2. Kobe Bryant, 20.6 3. Tracy McGrady, 19.8 4. Carmelo Anthony, 19.2 5. Allen Iverson, 19.0 6. Baron Davis, 18.6 7. Dwayne Wade, 18.4 8. Joe Johnson, 18.3 9(t). Richard Jefferson, Jason Richardson, 17.9
FT Attempts/Game 1. Dwight Howard, 10.9 2. LeBron James, 10.3 3(t). Corey Maggette, Allen Iverson, 9.7 5. Kevin Martin, 9.5 6. Dwayne Wade, 9.2 7. Kobe Bryant, 9.0 8. Amare Stoudamire, 8.7 9(t). Chris Bosh, Richard Jefferson, 8.3
Shot and Free Throw Attempts per game ultimately end up being the reason why your player who takes the most shots (who, hopefully, is your best player) will end up being the major determinant of your team FG and FT%. Unlike baseball, where most everyday players will end up with between 550-650 ABs during the season, not all NBA players will take the same total amount of shots. Dwayne Wade, at 9.2 FTA per game, will take more foul shots during one game than 350 NBA players take in one standard (3 game) week -- and no, not all of those 350 guys are the 10th-12th men in rotations.
How should you exploit this to your benefit? Whichever star player you end up building around needs to be surrounded with complimentary talent to reinforce or negate their shooting tendencies. If you have someone like Dwight Howard (~60% FG% on 12 attempts per game, 59% FT% on 11 attempts per game), you need to surround him with guys who, at the very least, are going to match his total number of FT attempts in a week (or year) and shoot ridiculously well while doing so. And you're going to need several of these guys to balance out that FT%. Also you'll need to look for guys that don't shoot too many field goals per game, unless you want to diminish one of D-Ho's greatest strengths (FG%).
If you do this successfully, you can essentially let one player carry you in either percentage (or 1/8-1/4 of the standard fantasy NBA categories).
Turnovers are generally represented in NBA fantasy leagues as a negative stat -- you want the fewest number of turnovers per week in a head-to-head format or fewest turnovers on the season for rotisserie. For leagues that include Turnovers, most just treat it as a standard stat compiling category. Turnovers are bad, players that turn the ball over a lot are bad is the thinking behind that category, I suppose. The other way to represent TO is to use Assist/Turnover ratio, which at the very least is interesting because it measures successful plays against unsuccessful plays.
There are two main reasons why MLTS hates Turnovers as a stat in Fantasy NBA:
1. Players who turn the ball over a lot tend to be players that touch the ball a lot. As the number of touches a player gets increase (which at least represents confidence on the part of the team that this player can do well with the ball in his hands), the number of chances to turn the ball over increase. There are players that are adept at not turning the ball over, one of the best in the league being Chris Paul, but, in general, turnovers are a tax on being good at basketball. Since we're really only concerned with using good players on our fantasy teams, this is an unnecessary limit on value.
2. As turnovers are a stat that is often represented as something you want the fewest of, it naturally favors owners who aren't very active or totally inactive. In a competitive league, it is frustrating and detrimental to the overall competition to have someone benefit from inactivity.
So what should fantasy owners do to combat this? Ignore the stat. Players that have possession of the ball can generate the following outcomes: A made shot (points, FG%, FT%), a rebound (of their own miss), an assist or a turnover. Five potentially beneficial things vs. one bad thing. Players who don't have possession of the ball can rebound, block, steal or not turn the ball over. 3 beneficial things and one non-action.
Points per game is a useless stat. You heard me right.
Fantasy NBA usually revolves around 8 or 9 categories. The major difference between leagues is whether or not a turnover metric is included. FG%, FT%, 3-Pointers Made, PPG, RPG, APG, SPG, BPG are the 8 categories that owners should concern themselves with. Even if your league uses turnovers as a 9th category, ignore the stat (future article). This article is going to discuss why you should largely ignore PPG as a stat when building a successful fantasy basketball team.
Every NBA game has a final score that is based on points scored. Players that receive the most media attention in the league are largely excellent scorers (Kobe, LeBron, DWade, etc). Because of this, undo attention is placed on points scored by fantasy owners. Why? 1/8 (or 1/9th) of your team's success is a function of how many points it scores. Blocks, steals, assists, rebounds and 3 pointers all carry the same weight as total points scored.
The reason why points scored is largely irrelevant compared to those other stat compiling categories (I'll explore FG% and FT% in later articles) is because of the relative rarity of blocks, steals, assists, etc., compared to points. Lets look at this from a perspective of points and blocks, taking a look at the 2007-2008 league leader in each category and then looking at the number of players who registered 1/3 of their output in the category.
LeBron James: 30.0 PPG Marcus Camby: 3.6 BPG
# of players with 10.0 PPG: 131 # of player with 1.2 BPG: 36
Pretty striking difference, don't you think? Almost 4 times as many players have 10 ppg as opposed to 1.2 bpg.
Consider this: 12 of the 36 players averaging 1.2 bpg don't average 10 ppg. 12 players who are below 131 other players in points per game in the NBA acquire blocks, the rarest stat in fantasy basketball, at a higher rate than virtually the entire league.
Everyone in the NBA can score. Not everyone can block shots, steal the ball, get an assist or rebound. The key to finding value in fantasy basketball is to realize there are a select few stats, BPG and SPG in particular, that are incredibly rare on a per-game basis. The players who are ultimately extremely valuable, are ones that can get the common stats (PPG, RPG, APG) while acquiring blocks and steals at a high rate.
The Cardinals will be without Anquan Boldin who is recovering from the vicious hit he took against the Jets in Week 4.Boldin-less, MLTS likes Larry Fitzgerald a ton in this game and figures that the Cardinals might try to run the ball a bit more.Expect WR Lee Evans to have a huge game for the Bills against an Arizona secondary that was exposed, nay, molested by the Jets last week.This game probably comes down to whoever makes the most mistakes.Kurt Warner can’t throw 3 INTs and fumble 4 times if Arizona is going to win.
MLTS Pick:Buffalo, under.
Start:Arizona skill players, Lee Evans, Trent Edwards, Marshawn Lynch.
Sit:Buffalo is a pretty good defense but none of the fantasy matchups are overly terrible for Arizona.
CAROLINA -9.5 Kansas City, O/U 38.5
Fresh off of stifling Michael Turner, expect the Carolina run defense to do the exact same thing to Larry Johnson this week.Speaking of LJ, he obviously is a reader of MLTS (an angry one at that) as he’s responded to being called out in this space with huge fantasy performances in weeks 3 and 4.Carolina operates a more traditional running scheme to the one that the Broncos tried to sneak by the Chiefs last week, expect Carolina running backs to approach the numbers that Oakland (or Atlanta) put up on KC earlier this season.Stewart/Williams may not be as good as Run-DMC, but they’re adequate backs and will both have nice games.The Carolina passing game is also better than the Atlanta and Oakland aerial attacks.
MLTS Pick:Carolina, over.
Start:Carolina.Dwayne Bowe, Tony Gonzalez.
Sit:Larry Johnson (The hate train keeps on rolling), The Kansas City Quarterback.
Chicago -3.5 DETROIT, O/U 44.5
Don’t worry Chicago fans, the Cubs and White Sox may be on the way out of the MLB post-season already, but the Bears get Detroit this week!This game might be surprisingly high scoring.The Bears defense has been dominant against the run so far this season; Rudi Johnson/Kevin Smith should only start in really deep leagues.However, the Bears have been incredibly bad against the pass.And Nate Vasher will be out for this game.Look for Kitna, Megatron and Roy Williams to have big days against the Bears (especially since they will have had 2 weeks to prepare).Expect Matt Forte to carry the load offensively against the Lions – he could easily put up a 200+ yfs, 2 TD kind of game.Kyle Orton has also been surprisingly competent this season, he’s a definite must start in most leagues this week (unless you have a Manning, Brees, McNabb, etc).The Chicago defense will get scored on, but they will probably also make it to the house on an INT or fumble recovery.
-17 is a monster spread.Reports indicate that Carson Palmer will be out against Dallas, former Harvard QB Ryan Fitzpatrick will get the start this week for the Bengals.In case you needed a reminder of how dysfunctional the Bengals are, Cedric Benson was signed to their roster this week.If NFL games were decided by comparing each team’s propensity to be involved in a) drunken boating, b) felonies involving drugs, nightclubs and/or strippers, 3) mailing in your season, the Bengals would end up being the 2008 version of the 2007 Patriots.Anyway, Dallas moves to 4-1 this week.Look for Dallas to put up about 40 points in the first half and then sit all of their important players.17 points is a lot to cover.
MLTS Pick:Cincinnati, over.
Start:Dallas.Chris Perry (RBs have done well against the Dallas D), TJ Houshmandzadeh (One would assume a QB from Harvard would know to target his best WR).
Sit:The artist formerly known as Chad Johnson.
DENVER -3 Tampa Bay, O/U 48
Denver needs to rebound in a big way this weekend.Tampa has a pretty solid defensive unit, the best one the Broncos have seen so far by a lot.Ronde Barber has been exposed by lesser WR than what the Broncos will throw at him, though.Look for Royal and Stokely to further expose the aging, Super-Bowl Champion Barber.Denver has too many weapons for Tampa to stop them all game.Tampa’s offensive outlook figures to be a good one this week.Earnest Graham continues to be the master of big runs in garbage time and, in case you missed it, the Broncos gave up 200 yards to Larry Johnson last week.Brian Griese should easily be able to find the holes in the Denver secondary, making Antonio Bryant a solid play this week.
MLTS Pick:Denver, over.
Start:Bucs O, Denver passing game.
Sit:Denver running game (see Michael Turner, Ryan Grant vs Tampa this year).
GREENBAY NL Atlanta
This game looked a lot better for Green Bay before they lost Al Harris and half of their D-Line to injury.Green Bay comes into this game beat up on offense, too.Their success hinges on Aaron Rodgers being healthy – it seems he will be available for this game.Upgrade Michael Turner a little bit in this game, though he shouldn’t post the gaudy numbers he put up in week 1 and 3.Matt Ryan and Roddy White might have decent games against the GB secondary but I’m not really liking their chances since they’re on the road, away from the Dome they play so well in.So much of this game hinges on who Green Bay has available though, it is hard to say how it will turn out.
MLTS Pick:Green Bay
Start:GB Offense (downgrade Driver and Jennings if Rodgers isn’t going), Turner.
Sit:Norwood, Ryan, White.
Indianapolis -3 HOUSTON, O/U 47
Peyton Manning coming off of bye vs Matt Schaub at home.Schaub obviously reads MLTS and was infuriated by seeing us air his terrible road stats last week.Indianapolis still comes into this game really beat up and will sorely miss Bob Sanders this week when they’re trying to stop Steve Slaton and Texans’ TE Owen Daniels.Speaking of tight ends (insert double entendre here), Dallas Clark has more TDs against the Texans than any other player in the NFL.Both of these defenses are pretty shaky, expect some big fantasy days from the usual suspects on both teams.
MLTS Pick:Indy, over.
Start:Every offensive player.Try to convince your non-Texans to join the Texans this week for fantasy purposes.
Sit:uh…
JACKSONVILLE -4 Pittsburgh, O/U 36
Game of the week candidate?Last time these teams met, the Jags knocked the Steelers out of the playoffs.Unfortunately for the Steelers, they’re coming into this game beat up from their Monday night game with the Ravens – Mewelde Moore is going to be their starting running back.Yes, he was #4 on the depth chart before this week.He should be a solid fantasy play, expect the Steelers to use him in the passing game a fair amount.Jacksonville is back in the thick of things with two straight wins.They’ve still got a beat up offensive line, though.Look for the Steelers to be as physical as they were against the Ravens.I’m giving the nod to the Jaguars because of health reasons – Pittsburgh might not be able to be effective for the whole game due to injury.
MLTS Pick: Jacksonville, over.
Start:MJD.Moore.Steelers passing game.
Sit:
New England -3 SAN FRANCISCO, O/U 41
Who shows up for this game:Randy Moss, the malcontent or Randy Moss, the best WR in the NFL?You have to think that the Pats will try to get their passing game rolling early and often vs San Francisco, especially after seeing what Drew Brees and New Orleans did to them last week.The personnel may be different, but Bill Belichek knows the Mike Martz offense well enough to contain it.This could end up being a pretty lopsided game.
MLTS Pick:NE, over.
Start:Frank Gore.NE WR.Cassel.
Sit:O’Sullivan.SF WR.
GIANTS -7 Seattle, O/U 43.5
Yes, Seattle will be using actual NFL players to catch passes this week.No, it won’t make a difference.In the rare situation that both teams are off bye at the same time, expect this game to be well played and well coached on both sides.The Giants are going to have some problems moving the ball without Plax, but they’ve had plenty of time to plan what they’re going to do without him.Expect a healthy dose of all three Giants RBs and a possession-style receiving game.The Giants defense is really good; expect to see Hasselbeck on his back plenty of times this game.
Schwartz pick:Seattle, under.
DB pick:Giants, under.
Start:Giants RBs and Defense, Julius Jones, Bobby Engram.
Sit:Both QBs, Giants WR.
PHILADELPHIA -6 Washington, O/U 42.5
NFC East rock-paper-scissors game continues.Washington is fresh off of a great win against the Cowboys whereas Philly is left scratching their heads over their loss to the Bears.Reports are positive about the health of Brian Westbrook, I’m really hoping that he’ll be available for this game.If he is available, I’d expect Philly to test the Washington run defense, which held up against Marion Barber and the Cowboys in limited action.Like most NFC East games we’ll see this season, this game is going to come down to turnovers and field position.
MLTS Pick:Eagles, over.
Start:Philly O, Redskins passing offense.
Sit:Portis (Philly has one of the best Run defenses in the league).
San Diego -6.5 MIAMI, O/U 45
The good news? San Diego has given up a TD to every tight end they’ve faced so far this season.Congrats Anthony Fasano!Miami should be able to move the ball through the air if Brown or Pennington is throwing it.The bad news?San Diego has had adequate run defense and has a tendency to make you pass the ball by putting up a lot of points quickly.The Miami secondary is a pretty big mismatch for Phil Rivers, et al.This game is going to come down to the Miami offensive line opening big enough running lanes for Brown/Williams, something they should probably be able to do.Expect some more offensive trickery from Miami, since they’re coming off of bye.
MLTS Pick:San Diego, over.
Start:San Diego.Fasano, Brown, Williams.
Sit:Pennington.
Tennessee -3 BALTIMORE, O/U 33.5
The two best defenses in the NFL face off this week.MLTS is giving a slight edge to Tennessee because Baltimore is coming off of a short week (against a Pittsburgh team that left them pretty banged up) and TEN RBs are healthy.Flacco looked good against the Steelers last week and the Ravens gave him an effective game-plan.This week will be different, the TEN defensive line is incredible and their secondary is tops in the NFL.Kerry Collins hasn’t made any major gaffes yet for the Titans – expect that to change unless he exercises extreme caution against a dangerous Ravens secondary.Big defensive plays should lead to some interesting short field opportunities for each team’s running game.
Schwartz Pick:Baltimore, over.
DB Pick:Tennessee, over.
Start:Both Defenses, TEN RBs, McGahee, Ray Rice.
Sit:Both QBs, all WR.
NEW ORLEANS -3 Minnesota, O/U 46.5
New Orleans can win this game one way and one way only.They’re going to have to attack the Vikings through the air.As such, look for more Reggie Bush, NO Wideouts and less Duece McAllister.On the other side of the ball, the Vikings come into this game needing to win in a big way.Gus Frerotte shouldn’t handicap them too much this game, as the NO defense is terribad.Adrian Peterson should have his best game of the season so far, anything less than 150 yards and 2 scores should be a disappointment.
