Okay, so I blew it with getting my "evals" in before the season. Big deal. This is just some silly fake basketball game, and we're all idiots for paying $50 per Savage Draft to play it. (Well, to be clear, I didn't pay $50 for this iteration of the Savage Draft; as defending champ I am playing this one on the house. I figure I have a couple months to remind everyone else that I'm defending Savage champ before I fall back into mediocrity.)
The truth is that what keeps us coming back to the Savage league - well, other than sheer stubbornness - is the community. This is a good group of users, and we treat each other well and have a good time together. Without the genuine camaraderie I feel for people in this community, I would have quit this time-suck a long time ago. (Well, I technically did quit it once already, so I guess I would have quit it on a more permanent basis.) But enough being nice. Because I'm not here to be nice. In my evals I want to be mean. I want to tell you about the picks I didn't like. In the spirit of my favorite annual NFL preview series, Drew Magary's "Why Your Team Sucks," and in homage to the classic Chappelle's Show sketch, welcome to the Player Hater's Ball.
1. amerk1180 - Wilt Chamberlain, Klay Thompson, Donyell Marshall, Jarrett Allen, Bob McAdoo, Mark Price, Kevin Johnson, Cedric Maxwell, Buddy Hield, Gordon Hayward, Paul Silas, Marcus Smart
Hey, it's Peggy's least favorite client. Congrats, you blew the easiest choice in the draft by taking Not Lebron with the first pick. Obviously Wilt is great but he puts you at a position-flexibility disadvantage right off the bat, unlike Lebron who fits will with literally anyone.
Klay is overrated; all he does is shoot threes and defend, he sucks at everything else. And most of his seasons he can't defend PG without taking a huge hit.
Price and KJ as the PG platoon - combined with Klay, you're basically tanking any chance you have at a rebounding advantage. You realize Wilt and McAdoo aren't going to hit their RL rebounding numbers in this league, right? And you realize Klay can't effectively cover this duo's meh defense, especially not when he's backed up by Buddy Hield, right?
Paul Silas is the emergency pick someone always makes in this draft when they realize their defense sucks and everyone who has good defense and is any good at all has already been picked. But he can't fix your defensive woes and he can't shoot straight.
Wilt is going to enjoy being on this team as much as you enjoy going to an LPGA tournament.
2. 20ks - LeBron James, Kevin McHale, Buck Williams, Andrei Kirilenko, Robert Covington, Chris Andersen, Deandre Ayton, Jose Calderon, Tom Boerwinkle, Carmelo Anthony, Jameer Nelson, Caldwell Jones
Can't hate on Lebron; he's the perfect pick but trust me when I say from experience that you CAN screw a Lebron build up. One way to do it is overloading on fouls and turnovers. Enter Buck Williams, who seduces people with his efg%/defense/rebounding but will hurt your team in lots of ways you'll have trouble figuring out. He's got the "bad chemistry" trifecta: a bunch of fouls, a bunch of turnovers, and limited position flexibility.
Bob Covington is a great glue guys and can fit in well on a lot of Savage teams. Of course that makes a lot more sense when you pick him in rounds 7-8, not when you reach for him in Round 5 and deny yourself what you really needed (a low-usage, clean-ish board lord, which you never really got)
Why do people always insist on putting someone like Jose Calderon on a Lebron team? He brings way more assists than you need while unnecessarily hurting defense and rebounding. (I'm assuming he's playing next to Lebron, not backing him up, which would make zero sense.)
Who is backing up Lebron? I guess it's Melo with a side of Jameer Nelson. Melo has the usage to back up Lebron, but he can't play PG. If Lebron is playing more SG than PG I don't get it.
Tom Boerwinkle has one good season and I don't see how it fits with the rest of this team at all.
Overall it feels to me like a team that will be less than the sum of its parts. I don't see how the rotation fits work.
3. albiband0 - Giannis Antetokounmpo, Joel Embiid, Chauncey Billups, Draymond Green, Alvin Robertson, Domantas Sabonis, Zion Williamson, Blake Griffin, Eddie Jones, Larry Smith, Chris Gatling, Doug Christie
I guess we should take it easy on albi; what should we expect from an Italian trying to understand basketball? It's like trying to teach Elon Musk how to make a funny meme.
Giannis at #3 is a reach, IMO, because the dude barely plays half a season most of the time. It makes you do something silly like reach for Joel Embiid in the second round. Now you've addressed one single position through two rounds, and it's a long time until that third pick. That's how you end up with a thoroughly mediocre guard rotation built around Billups and Alvin Robertson.
I have no clue what you were doing for the PF position next to the Giannis/Embiid duo. You needed guys who could grab a lot of offensive boards without hurting you elsewhere. Instead we get Blake Griffin and Domantas Sabonis tanking the defense and bringing way more usage than needed. Hard to understand that one.
Doug Christie is a freakin weirdo who once sucker punched Tar Heel legend Rick Fox in a preseason game. Guess you thought Draymond would be lonely without another cheap-shotting head case on the team.
Your team should be about as successful as Roberto Baggio taking a penalty kick. Hope you enjoy watching the World Cup this year albi!
4. tarheel1991 - Steph Curry, Tyson Chandler, Pau Gasol, Jimmy Butler, Mike Conley, Paul Millsap, John Henson, Samuel Dalembert, Greg Monroe, D'Angelo Russell, Matt Barnes, Jordan Bell
Speaking of guys who don't play a ton of minutes - Curry in the first!
The only thing weaker than Steph's ankles is Gasol's rebounding. It's like I was trying to build an all-finesse team here.
I know others wanted Butler in the fourth, but are we sure he's actually good? In the age of super-efficient superstars Butler is a dinosaur who can't hit a jumper to save his life. I feel like he's a favorite of hipster NBA Twitter but they suddenly forget their love of analytics when discussing him. (Speaking of NBA hipsters, it feels like this whole team is an exercise in "_______ was so underappreciated!!" think-pieces.) Seems inevitable that he will ISO this team out of playoff games while Steph throws his hands up in frustration.
Paul Millsap is like Savage brussels sprouts. "They taste great if you toss them with olive oil and salt and pepper then cook them with bacon and onions!" Yeah, well so does damn near anything. Millsap is fairly flexible and won't hurt you. In other words, he's about 11,000 minutes of "meh." He might not hurt, but does he really help?
The last four picks might as well have been pulled blind out of a hat.
I tried so hard to build this team without an obvious weakness that it feels like I forgot to build it with an actual strength.
(More to come later. You'll get it when you get it, I have an actual job you know.)