Thanks for posting your lengthy retrospectives ashamael and dBKC. I enjoy few things more than digging into the thought process of other people. It was especially interesting because you both took very different approaches than I did. I spent like two hours crunching the numbers of my teams after I generated the rotations. I plan to post something later after my early meetings wrap up.

I've had so many of my target players snagged right before they got to me that I feel like most of my team is made up of 2nd choices. When it comes to drafting, I almost always just take the best player available at the time, and then use position flexibility to place them in the lineup accordingly. Sometimes that means I draft 3 or 4 power forwards in a row and spread them out across SF, PF, and C. Regardless, I just draft the best player available at the time and let the players who fall to my draft spot dictate who that is. Not thrilled with the 11th pick, as usually the middle ground is no mans land, but feel lucky that I was able to still get Barkley at 11. He should have gone 3-4 spots higher IMO. The only time I don't draft the best player available is when I already have 45 min per position (225 min per position for this league), and then I draft the next best player in line that's available for the positions I still need to fill minutes. I only draft the best 45 minutes per position because garbage time is usually inconsequential and I can stretch my good 45 minutes per position into 48 when needed. What determines best player available? It's the one with the highest total "alpha" multiplied by their mpg. "Alpha" is how much more a player costs per minute with usage factored out. For instance, there are 42 players who give you 35.1 mpg, some only cost $5.22M and one costs $9.57M (Lebron). Some of that salary difference is because there are both low usage players and high usage players who play 35.1 mpg, but most of that cost difference come from all the other stats that cost money in the SIM --> 1 more point of DEF, 1% more DREB, 1% more efg% 1% more steals, etc. The average cost for a player who plays 35.1mpg is $6.91M. How much a player actually costs above (or below) the average is their "alpha". The highest alpha is the best player per minute according to how the SIM determines salary. Multiply alpha by number of minutes they play and that gives a players value added for their time on the court. The higher the better. I've got a formula that factors usage out of salary, so I get an "alpha" that doesn't take into account high volume shooting (usage is expensive in the SIM, but I don't evaluate a players alpha based on usage. So Allen Iverson is expensive because usage costs money, but if you factor usage out his his salary, he'd be cheap in the SIM. I use the usage-adjusted salary to determine alpha), just efficiency and hustle board stats. For this league I add a players top 5 seasons together to get their overall worth. And pick em!

That is a really interesting way of looking at things pexetera. The way people break down the players fascinates me. Thank you for the insight.

Posted by robusk on 6/5/2020 12:26:00 AM (view original):

Posted by longtallbrad on 6/4/2020 10:50:00 PM (view original):

Posted by copernicus on 6/4/2020 10:18:00 PM (view original):
I smoked actual cigarettes well into my 40s - dont want to smoke anything now so gummies all the way for me

I guess I just haven't opened the right sort of cabinet. Haven't tried gummies. My first experience was brownies (and they were delicious!). None of the dudes I was with had any experience what they were doing. I snarfed three (or four?) brownies in the parking waiting to proceed toward an open-air performance of Def Leppard (Heart as the opener). By the time I got through the security I was convinced I had morphed into a flat (not kidding, two-dimensional) Charlie Brown, wobbling my way across the endless lawn which in turn had become a sprawling, billowing version of the gameboard of LIFE. I spent the entire concert hugging my knees and rocking back and forth, trying to convince my friends that I couldn't breathe (because flat) and that every cop on the scene was looking for me. I hallucinated hideously for twelve hours. Don't try this at home, kids. I became a cautionary tale.

That used to be me when I would lose control on flower.

Edibles produced by professionals are a really dialed in experience and a qualified budtender should be able to steer you to one perfectly tailored to your desired experience (mine is I want to have about 2.5 hours of really enjoying food based programming/NBA (in the old days) before having a delightful 8 hours of sleep, so 17% each of indica and sativa in a 5 mg dose... this is some weakboy ****).

this - I live in Los Angeles so we have legal and regulated - I have preferred brands for varying moods and modes

By round:

1) So my top three initially was as follows:

Kareem
Karl
Shaq

Since Kareem was gone, I sprung for Karl Malone. Easy to see why. 15,000 minutes out of the gate. All super efficient with great passing and decent boards, 6 efficient usage points, etc.

2) This was where I decided what kind of team I wanted to have. Despite the fact that ash went full Nick Young on me, I do kind of think that my lack of minutes on this pick was vindicated only a few picks later by Hassan Whiteside. Oh well - it's all good.

On value, the number one guy on my board was Manu. Would've been safer, for sure. Could've had my 3&D guy with high usage right away. Makes sense. But, as dBKC alluded to earlier, point guards. Did I want to get stuck hunting for the same high usage point guards as everyone else? Who was going to be my second super efficient scorer? Did I need 4 or 6 points of usage here? (Yes.) After Kemp and Gobert went off the board, I made a decision to take myself out of the point guard market altogether and have passing by committee. To get some immediate offensive boards, efficient scoring and absurd passing all at once, in an opportunity I wouldn't have had again, I summoned Nikola Jokic, and I have zero regrets. I mean, I'm averaging 22,244 minutes per team anyway, so who cares if my second round pick had a rest season?

3) Need a solid two way guy here. I've addressed DReb% and passing a bit already, so I can afford to take Serge Ibaka here. Easy.

4) I will need approximately four low usage combo guards, and someone to be my best passer when Jokic is off the floor. In retrospect, this looks like a somewhat insane reach on value, but this was the kind of pick that made things easier for me later. DReb%, 70-90 D, 20-45 3PAr, 12-20 Ast%, and very low TO% even for 0.5 Usg point guy. Enter Andre Iguodala.

5) The thing I'm most nervous about here is finding good backups for Malone and Jokic. I need at least three great backup seasons. Said player needs to average at least 8 OReb%, 22 DReb%, 8 Ast%, 52 eFG%, 25 Usg% and not turn the ball over as much as Jokic or Malone. Such players were mostly gone in the 1st round. I couldn't believe he was still here so I snagged Carlos Boozer and never looked back.

6) This was an interesting debate. I had Paul Pressey on my mind. I thought about Conley. I don't like drafting high turnovers for a 2 point guy. Pressey only has one acceptable eFG% year. Love the D and boards but I'll pass. As I said a few days ago, outside of 16-17 and 12-13 Conley, none of these other Conleys are acceptable to me. Same thing with Jrue. I know there will be low minute Ibaka backups later. My biggest need is someone to carry the passing load with Jokic off the floor. This player does that efficiently with low TO% and more passing than I even really need. He could start with Iguodala or come off the bench. I do like Charlie Ward here but there's one team that needs closer to 19 Usg% later on, and Ward doesn't give me that. Enter Jose Calderon.

7) Jason Terry was atop my short list before I realized Boozer was available, so it was heartbreaking to see him go. I didn't really want to start Calderon and Jokic across all five teams, and I didn't need to. With Jokic, I could go for a moderate passer again who plays better defense. An efficient one, obviously, who doesn't turn the ball over so much across five seasons and maybe gives me 8-11 DReb%? This describes Jeff Hornacek's variety of seasons and I'm all for it.

8) Could I make a pick that backs up Iguodala and Ibaka with high D, passes well enough, gives me 12 DReb% at the 2 and 3 and enough usage and OReb% to back up Ibaka too, but not too much that he can't back up Iggy? No, right? This seems impossible. I'd need at least 2400 minutes and - Rodney McCray????? Never thought I'd see the day. Granted, he gives me less than 10 3s across five seasons, but I've addressed that pretty well so far. The perfect backup to give me plenty of flexibility for the rest of the draft. I am pretty much done and can now start to get some better minutes here.

9) A possible 2 or 3 who rebounds well enough, plays good D across five seasons, makes a lot of 3s with enough usage and doesn't turn the ball over that much is Rashard Lewis.

10) I still need a starter for my worst team. This is OK because this player only needs one standout season. Was looking at Webber and somehow thought Vucevic was still around. I need some OReb%, too, more of it to go with my Malone and Boozer seasons here. Since this has sort of morphed into my throwaway worst season team, but I want to give it something of a chance, I decide that the two Zelmo Beaty seasons fit my criteria. If I can eke out 35 wins with this one, I'm happy.

11) I need about 8 minutes behind Malone that don't suck on defense but still have enough usage. Delighted to pick the internet era's favorite big galoot, Boban Marjanovic. We need more Tobias yelling at Boban at SoulCycle right now.

12) I need more season for that last team. I don't have a great McCray season for it. Had a high foul option on the board, looked at Derrick White, but since I needed 3s and lots of passing, Fred VanVleet came across my radar and spawned a whole conversation about jazz which warmed my heart. Obviously the right decision.


Result:
Hornacek / Calderon
Iguodala / McCray / VanVleet
Ibaka / Lewis
Jokic / Boozer / Beaty
Malone / Boban


Super fun, super happy with it.

I won't bore everyone with the gory details here, mostly because work is busy today and I still have ODL evals to do. But I usually view players in terms of minutes adjusted values, where I account for the value they will bring adjusted by the minutes I expect them to play. I expect most people do this, I probably just have a more efficient way for querying the data. Anyway, my general approach to team building is achieve the minimum target of minute adjusted USG, DREB% and AST%. While I am doing that I am trying to 1) maximize Team eFG 2) maximize enough defense and positional flexibility where I have three defenders on the court at all time who can provide very good to elite defense that cover all five position 3) minimize TO% 4) minimizing MID% 5) minimize fouls/game... all in that order. With this particular league, I didn't want to shuffle a bunch of jumbled player seasons. Of the twelve players I drafted, nine have five seasons I am happy with as measured against my goals, one has one really fun season and four manageable ones, one has only four seasons but they are good and a final one only has a single season. My fouls for a couple of my teams ended up a little higher than I wanted. I actually put a lot of emphasis on not getting my usage too high because I really wanted to funnel shots directly to my best players.

The first couple of rounds I left the draft come to me and picked the best players available. Rounds 3 – 6 were flexible players I could plug into various roles. Every round after that was plugging the gap. I slapped a color association on players so I could keep track of which I was plugging into which teams and last night (I knew my twelfth man would be there), I crunched the final numbers. My teams come out as follows (blue team is the outlier fun team which leverages the 96-97 Grant Hill season):

Team	White	Rust	Gold	Green	Blue
Minutes	19600	19600	19600	19600	19600
Start Lnp Cum Usg	106	108	106	107	109
Min Adj Cum Usg	106	104	105	107	106
Min Adj Usg Pnts	13.4	13.2	15.1	13.2	13.9
Min+Usg Adj Tm eFG%	53.5%	55.6%	53.0%	54.1%	53.9%
3PM	462	493	402	553	365
Min+Usg Adj PER%	17%	18%	15%	21%	12%
Min+Usg Adj MID%	41%	39%	42%	39%	41%
Min+Usg Adj PNT%	42%	43%	43%	40%	47%
F/G	17.19	18.82	18.47	19.15	17.32
Min Adj Cum OREB%	30.1%	31.0%	28.7%	30.9%	30.3%
Min Adj Cum DREB%	85.6%	85.4%	86.2%	85.1%	92.6%
Min Adj AST%	60.3%	61.5%	64.0%	69.0%	75.4%
Min Adj TO%	13.3%	13.1%	13.4%	13.4%	13.6%
Min Adj STL%	1.8%	1.6%	1.8%	1.8%	2.0%
Min Adj BLK%	1.8%	1.8%	1.5%	1.8%	1.8%
Min Adj Tm Def	72	73	69	72	68

Jesus. I’m over here going “this guy gets buckets. Draft!”

I went back and forth between 77-78 Artis Gilmore and 76-77 Artis Gilmore. Right now I have 77-78 version on there. It hoses my healthy TO%, but it improved everything else except for DREB%.

do we just rest the guys we dont play or are we ok to draft minis and rest them instead - I'm developing 9 man rotations mostly so would just have 3 roster slots set on rest in any event

I’m figuring out my teams by doing this while my wife stands there laughing at me

https://imgur.com/YXaF9tR

XD

Posted by dBKC on 6/5/2020 2:27:00 PM (view original):
I’m figuring out my teams by doing this while my wife stands there laughing at me

https://imgur.com/YXaF9tR

Hahaha. Throw back!

that looks like Cambria quartz

Posted by pexetera on 6/5/2020 2:32:00 PM (view original):
that looks like Cambria quartz

Couldn’t tell you. This is a jazz thread. I’m not really in to rock.



I’ll see myself out. Sorry.

it's my hobby business. i get to play with big saws. hence my old nic, sawtech7