Non Championship Decade Draft - R1 - wackbone vs durantbird*

[durantbird]

Here is a quick list of what you need in your writeup.

1. Specific years for each player on your team
2. Rotations and minutes for each player
3. Reasoning as to why your team will win and/or why people should vote for you.

Do not vote in this thread until both managers have submitted their writeups. Once the writeups are posted, I will add a poll, and the team with the most votes after 24 hours will advance. EACH MANAGER SHOULD ALSO VOTE FOR THEIR OWN TEAM IN THE POLL - IF YOU FAIL TO DO THIS, YOU ARE SIMPLY GIVING AWAY A VOTE. If the votes are tied, we will decide the matchup via AI vote.

You are not required to state or explain your vote, but you are free to comment in the thread if you want to.

If writeups aren't posted within 24 hours, we will vote solely based on the players they have drafted (and any rotations they have posted on their roster page).

[durantbird]

PG: Deron Williams 08' - 13.6
SG: Eddie Jones 98' - 12.6
SF: Andrei Kirilenko 08' - 7.6
PF: Kevin Durant 23' - 18.3
C: Hakeem Olajuwon 88' - 17.5

Bench: Jason Kidd 09' - 7.6
Bench: Royce O'Neale 20' - 5.1
Bench: Maxi Kleber 21' - 5.5

87.8/88

PG: Deron Williams 38 / Jason Kidd 10
SG: Eddie Jones 30 / Jason Kidd 18
SF: Andrei Kirilenko 24 / Royce O'Neale 16 / Eddie Jones 8
PF: Kevin Durant 38 / Andrei Kirilenko 8 / Maxi Kleber 2
C: Hakeem Olajuwon 38 / Maxi Kleber 10

vs

Magic Johnson (38) / Delon Wright (10)
Dan Majerle (34) / Doug Christie (14)
Charles Barkley (12) / Herb Jones (24) / Doug Christie (12)
Karl Malone (22) / Charles Barkley (26)
Artis Gilmore (32) / Karl Malone (16)

Matchup
- Defensive assignments: Deron vs Majerle, Eddie vs Magic, Durant vs Barkley, Kirilenko vs Malone, Hakeem vs Gilmore.
- We match up well here. Hakeem is going to be huge against a Magic-Barkley-Malone-Gilmore team. Brooklyn Durant has more post presence than earlier iterations, meaning he can be a good counter to Barkley, while they don't really have an ideal Durant defender. Hakeem is there to correct any mistake. We also have a highly switchable squad that features several big defenders who match up nicely against his size, including AK Durant EJ Hakeem O'Neale Kleber, and Kidd who can log some minutes comfortably on Magic.
- Deron-KD-Hakeem is a very capable trio who complement each other extremely well, with EJ and Kirilenko as perfect fourth-fifth options. We also feature a great bench, with Kidd as the best bench piece in the game.

[wackbone]

Karl Malone - 1999 - 16.3 FGA - MVP, All-Def 1st
Charles Barkley - 1990 - 14.9 FGA - 2nd in MVP
Magic Johnson - 1990 - 14.4 FGA - MVP, 38.4 3P% on 3.5 att
Dan Majerle - 1993 - 13.4 FGA - All-Star, 5th in DPOY, 38.1 3P% on 5.3 att
Artis Gilmore - 1983 - 10.8 FGA - 8th in MVP
Herb Jones - 2024 - 7.7 FGA - 5th in DPOY, 41.8 3P% on 3.6 att
Doug Christie - 2003 - 7.0 FGA - 5th in DPOY, 39.5 3P% on 2.3 att
Delon Wright - 2022 - 3.5 FGA - 37.9 3P% on 1.5 att
Total: 88/88 FGA

Rotations:
Magic Johnson (38) / Delon Wright (10)
Dan Majerle (34) / Doug Christie (14)
Charles Barkley (12) / Herb Jones (32) / Doug Christie (4)
Karl Malone (22) / Charles Barkley (26)
Artis Gilmore (32) / Karl Malone (16)

Writeup:

Helluva squad as always db, best of luck.

Defensively we will start with Magic on Deron, Majerle on Eddie, Barkley on AK, Malone on KD, and Gilmore on Hakeem. Herb will also see significant time on KD off of the bench. Christie can guard Deron as well which allows Magic to guard AK/Royce.

We don't have the fit that db has, but we have more talent. We have 3/5 of the best players, with MVP Magic, MVP Karl, and 2nd in MVP Barkley, while db's top 2 are 1988 Hakeem and 2023 KD. Both are already/still great players, but I'd argue not near their peak. We then also have All-Star Majerle and 8th in MVP Gilmore, with Herb and Christie as high-level 3&D support.

There are 12 minutes in which we "only" have 2 3-point shooters on the court, the other 36 minutes we will have 3 3-point shooters. This gives my stars room to operate and space out the defense. AK and Hakeem both provide rim protection, but both also have difficult individual assignments - meaning neither can just roam the paint willy-nilly. Combine that with several shooters and they can't just pack the paint.

[durantbird]

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Voting is open. Team owners please vote for yourselves

[durantbird]

Durantbird advances