00-09 Keeper League Playoffs (START JUDGING)

[Miller4ever]

Granger's offensive game is very similar to Pierce's. He is a better shooter at the cost of being slightly worse in ballhandling, but neither of these guys is spin-moving into the paint on a regular basis. Granger and Pierce are both tough assignments, but Granger has the better inclination towards defense and that should wipe out any nonexistent advantage Pierce has on offense. Pierce was actually slower than his prime 27-year-old version. Just like MJ and Kobe lost a step after hitting 28, Pierce did too. His defense against Kobe was nice, but Granger is a different player than Kobe, and will be harder for Pierce to defend because Pierce will be forced to play more off-the-ball defense, which is not his strength, whereas Pierce is ball-dominant, which Granger can certainly disrupt on his end.

[lukekarts]

You must be a Pacer fan and not just a Miller fan!

[Miller4ever]

I know Granger is not all-star status now, but his peak put him in the top 5 SF's in the league.

[Snakebites]

Snakebites vs. Sam Bone

Perimeter:
starting: Lebron James 2009 (38), Allan Houston 2003 (30) Tracy McGrady 2003 (36)
bench: Kirk Hinrich 2007 (30) Andrei Kirilenko 2006 (12)

bigs:
starting: Jermaine O’neal 2003 (35) Theo Ratliff 2001 (20)
bench Andrei Kirilenko 2006 (18) , Kurt Thomas 2005 (23)

OFFENSE:

My rotation is presented in a unique way because this is a unique team, particularly out on the perimeter. The bulk of the ball handling will be handled by Lebron James (primary) and Tracy McGrady (secondary) with Kirk Hinrich providing support off the ball. We designed this offense to run through two devastating offensive powerhouses, and combined with elite shooters they form a tour d’force of playmaking, shooting, slashing, and outright dominance. Try to double team one of our superstars and you’re paying for it dearly, as our elite shooters (Houston and Hinrich) will feast of those double play opportunities.
We look at Sam Bone’s perimeter defense and we don’t really see any defender up to the task of guarding against either Tracy McGrady or Lebron, let alone having one to account for each. His players aren’t considered defensive liabilities in the regular NBA, but in this game talent levels are higher and there is a reason there is more of a premium on truly elite defensive players. Simply put: Sam Bone doesn’t have enough defense to stop my perimeter. My perimeter even against a strong opposing defense has been designed to be a nightmare. Lebron/Tmac is similar to Lebron/Wade, but with a smaller overlap in skill levels. In their respective chosen seasons, both players absolutely dominated the offensive end and will play of each other nearly unopposed to have a completely devastating impact on this series. Given their ability to score inside the paint and out, even the likes of Dwight Howard won’t be able to impede their onslaught (check out Lebron’s numbers against the Magic to confirm this notion, they don’t lie).
Up front, our offense plays more of a supporting role. We’d like to point out that Jermaine O’neal’s efficiency improved later in his career when he was paired with dominant offensive players, and his jumpshot will serve our offense well in terms of spacing and helping work in support of our elite players. AK47 also provides versatile offensive support, particularly as a passer, and Kurt Thomas gives us that mid range that is an optimal fit with our elite perimeter as well.
Outside of Dwight Howard and his backup Marcus Camby, looking top to bottom, we simply don’t see a particularly strong defensive outfit starting or off the bench, and given our offense runs on our amazing perimeter, Sam Bone simply doesn’t have the defense where it would be needed for him to stand a significant chance of impeding us here. Dwight Howard is an elite presence, but given the potency of our offense and its range, the the funnel-it-to-Dwight defensive plan that has found some sustainability in Orlando simply isn’t going to work against an offense of this caliber.

Defense: Simply put, our defense is more set up to handle his offense than vice versa. We have an extremely strong front court defense (indeed, this is our front court’s greatest asset). Jermaine O’neal won’t stop Karl Malone, but he has the talent and tenacity to put up a strong fight. No disrespect to Dwight Howard, but all that’s really needed to bother him is strength and the ability to hold one’s ground, and an elite defender like Theo Ratliff has both of those things in abundance. He’ll limit Dwight’s already relatively weak offensive arsenal and in turn force Sam Bone’s perimeter to do the job.
Looking at his perimeter, the first thing that strikes me is that Tony Parker isn’t exactly the right playmaker for this team of scorers. Karl Malone always functioned with a more natural pick and roll point guard, and while I don’t doubt the two players can play together, it might not have the same spark. Butler’s role in the offense, talented though he is, isn’t really all that distinctly defined either. Furthermore, our perimeter defense is anchored by Lebron James, an elite help defender who really announced himself as one of the better defenders in the NBA in his selected year, and Tracy McGrady, who also proved he could play solid defense. Kirk Hinrich is also a better defender than anything Sam Bone has off his bench.

Overall: Simply put, we have defense where we need it in this matchup, and Sam Bone doesn’t. My elite perimeter will control this series throughout while my strong overall defense will keep our opponent in check. Sam Bone has built a very solid team that has run into a very difficult matchup in which my team is well positioned to exploit his greatest weaknesses, and my defense is well equipped to handle his greatest strengths.

[Snakebites]

Snakebites vs. Warspite

Perimeter:
Starters:
Lebron James (38), Tracy McGrady (36), Andrei Kirilenko (20)
Bench:
Kirk Hinrich (25) Allan Houston (25)

Bigs:
Starters:
Jermaine Oneal (35), Theo Ratliff (25)
Bench:
Andrei Kirilenko (10), Kurt Thomas (26)

Pardon the shorter writeup, but most of the general material about my team can be found in the above writeup, so I felt no need to repeat much of it here.

Offense: This opponent has a stronger defense than our other opponent does, but very little changes here fundamentally. Even Gary Payton or Shawn Marion will have a great deal of trouble against Lebron or Tracy McGrady, let alone both in the game together at the same time. We also have shooters coming in who will always be playing with at least one of those two players, and will be able to feast on 3 point opportunities that come with playing with players like Lebron and Tmac. 3 pointers and free throws make my offense even more difficult to keep up with, and we have the size and speed to give even War’s unconventional perimeter fits. We firmly believe we have the two best offensive players in this series, and together with an extremely sound supporting cast outlined in the previous writeup (helped by War’s general lack of a defensive anchor), we feel our offense will run like a finely tuned machine against this defense, and it will be difficult if not impossible for War to bring the reigns in on it.

Defense: War’s greatest asset is his large perimeter that makes it difficult for conventional lineups to match up against. Unfortunately, my team also has the ability to follow that model, but bigger and faster. Lebron matches up effectively with Payton, and McGrady has the length to put a young and still developing Durantula out of his element offensively. Up front, Jermaine O’neal checks Antonio McDyess and at worst plays him to a dead heat, and War doesn’t have a player at center that is worthy of particular mention on offense.

Generally speaking, War’s perimeter is tough, but ours is tougher. War’s front court has some talent, but ours can match up with it defensively and produce similarly to it offensively. We feel our combination of players is overbearing for this team and we should be able to carry the day here.

[TMACFORMVP]

I had a whole team philosophy, little snippets of my writeup done. Then I accidentally closed the browser and lost everything. Here's the bullet form version:

- Our defense is anchored by our size in the paint. Shaq in '00 was at his ultimate peak not because he suddenly became a better offensive player (though he was a markedly better passer); but because his defensive impact was enormous. He anchored the best defense in the league by a decent margin, and will do the same for our team cutting off all dribble penetration to the basket. Gasol; defensively, uses his size well, and has been apart of very good defensive Laker teams, and two Memphis (!) teams that were top 5 in DRTG.

- On the perimeter, Billups was a very good team defender in his prime, and Ginobili has been one of the more impactful perimeter defenders in the league. If you're a fan of APM; check out this post from drza on the PC Board in the Top 100 List (#35):

Code: Select all

According to Ilardi's 6-year APM calculation ('04 - '09), the top-7 big minute wing defenders:
Ron Artest (5.09)
Shane Battier (3.92)
Thabo Sefolosha (3.75)
Andrei Kirilenko (3.51)
Manu Ginobili (3.24)
Tony Allen (3.23)
Bruce Bowen (2.95)

Englemann has a similar calculation from '06 - '11, and Ginobili is still in the top-10 among big minute wings in defensive APM (Deng, Tony Allen, Ronnie Brewer, LeBron, G. Wallace, Artest, Mbah a Moute, Iguodala, Lowry, Manu).

Note: I'm not trying to say he's as good as these guys, but
a.) The statistics do seem to do a good job of picking out the best perimeter defenders in the league, as almost everyone else listed are considered among the best defenders in the league.
b.) That Ginobili's team defense shouldn't be discredited; perhaps not as good as those guys listed, but certainly well above average.

- Peja's defense during his prime gets a bit too much hate, and he's an OK rebounder, but we're not gonna claim he's even good defensively, because in the grand scheme of the competition, he isn't. But what's been proven is that he can be masked defensively (the Kings for a two year stretch were a top 5 defensive team in the NBA). With our size in the paint, the perimeter defense from our backcourt, and guys like Christie, and Prince off the bench, we certainly have the personnel to have Peja in our lineup where his offense trumps anything negative he'd give us defensively. He's the only "meh" defender on our team, so with very strong defense coming from all positions, we still maintain the notion that we boast an elite defensive team.

- Our offense is special. Why?

1.) Shaq
2.) Shaq
3.) Shaq

He's the most dominant player in this era. He was unstoppable at the rim, and there was no defense that could stop him, 30/14 in the regular season, 31/15 in the post-season, 38/16 in the Finals.

4.) Efficiency/Fit

We wanted Shaq to have the room to make teams pay if they come to double team him (and if they don't, he's going to score, regardless of defender). Ginobili, Peja, and Billups all make over 2 threes per game, while shooting over 40% from distance(!). In fact, Gasol, Peja, Billups and Ginobili have a TS% greater than 60%. What's even better is, they might be arguably among the best in the league in terms of the ability to play either off or on the ball, terrific movement, sense of getting to the open spot, or being able to create and shoot off the dribble. Gasol from the high post, Shaq in the low block, with perimeter shooters all around the court, with ridiculous efficiency, and versatility, I don't see how the offense can be stopped.

5.) Turnovers

Note that no one in our starting lineup averages 3 turnovers per game. Shaq/Ginobili are nearly there, but below, while Billups, Peja, and Gasol barely turn it over two times per game. So, our team isn't going to turn it over; and it's a very high possibility our offense is going to get a great look and convert. Another note, with the opponent facing Shaq; it's likely they're going to be in foul trouble, and the rest of our team can take advantage of the penalty. Billups, Ginobili, even Peja and Gasol have shown they can get to the line at least 5+ times and convert at a very high rate (>80%).

- We also rebound well, with two very good frontcourt rebounders, and average to above average rebounding from the perimeter.

Overall, we boast an elite offense and defense that's headed by the era's best player. It's nearly impossible to double team him because of the spacing around him, and it IS impossible to try to stop him one on one. This will be the key in any series played.

-----

vs. RR9. He's built a fantastic team around a trio as potent as anyone in the competition (meaning, the entire four eras). But, there are some flaws we feel we can take advantage. Firstly, Ben Wallace does not require defensive attention, this makes Shaq a roamer, and our defense that much stronger. Then consider Rondo likely won't have the ball in his hands as much (w/Kobe and Dirk), Rondo is relegated to playing more on the perimeter, where he doesn't require defensive attention. Smith is better on the interior, but with our defense packing the paint, he too will be forced to the perimeter (and he isn't the sort of player to really understand the game, he'll basically take what the defense gives him); while having to chase around Peja for most of the game, we think our team can negate him both offensively and defensively. What does this mean? We put two solid defenders on their two best offensive players, but have the flexibility to come with help, and have a roaming Shaq on the weak-side.

We're not going to shut down players of that caliber, but if we can reduce the effectiveness with doubles and weakside shot blocking, then RR9's team lacks the adequate offense to outscore ours. Billups and Ginobili have shown to have had big playoff games against their counterparts, and Peja should stretch Smith out to limit his shot blocking, or kill him from the perimeter (again, one of the greatest scoring/shooting seasons of the decade, three 3's made per game at a 43% clip, and lot of them off the dribble or off balance - 2nd in the league in scoring). Shaq throughout his career has demolished Wallace (see the 2004 Finals where whenever Shaq got it; he scored [and he'll get it here], or even in the ECF in 2005 and 2006 [Miami Shaq] where Shaq had monster games against Ben Wallace and the Pistons]. I wouldn't expect an absolute peak Shaq would have troubles with Ben.

(What's funny is, I think Shaq actually plays BETTER versus the best defenders, sort of to prove a point thing; see: 2001 Finals versus Mutombo, or even in '95 versus Hakeem).

Ultimately, I think the lack of shooting from RR9's team gives us a lot of options defensively, and offensively we're too potent that they just don't have enough offense in the series to pull it out.

Best of luck RR9, may the best team win.

---

vs. bryant08. It comes down to matchups; bryant has built a very good team, and we've seemed to always have similar sort build teams by the end of the era. I think the perimeters are very similar in terms of role and production. I think Peja v. Melo would be a terrific matchup, both elite scorers in different sort of fashions, Peja is more off the ball, dangerous from the perimeter as opposed to the excellence from mid range and in with Melo. Deron should get the better of Billups, but Ginobili should get the better of Miller; either way we're talking about very similar matchups with a slight edge for bryant in the overall picture. Note: We should also have versatility off the bench to slow down Melo, while the same cannot be said to stop Peja (who was just as good).

However, the gap needs to be larger in order for bryant to win this series, because the frontcourt is where the advantage is at with our team. I thought Boozer was a very good pick, and DRob is EXTREMELY underrated for this era. Saying this, Boozer has been bothered in the past by the size and length of Gasol, while he's used that same advantage against him offensively as well. As much respect as I have for DRob, Shaq should be able to have a huge series as well. In '00, a quick check yesterday told me Shaq did roughly 28 PPG on above 60% against the Spurs in 00, and that's with Tim Duncan helping in the front court.

I think Shaq and Gasol should overwhelm their counterparts, while our perimeter will hang with bryant's. I feel we overall boast a more dynamic defensive scheme, with superior versatility and efficiency, coupled with the best player in the series; we feel that should be enough to fight off a tough one and win the series.

Best of luck bryant, may the best team win.

[CellarDoor]

Ugh, time just isn't opening up for me here. I'll post what I started 4 days ago and add minimal gameplans:

Point Guard:
BI is sporting two very talented combo style guards here. Arenas was a monster in his selected season playing as the best player, and I’m curious to see how BI uses him with Wade and Webber around. Nonetheless Arenas will see Harris and Gordon pretty well exclusively. The one great thing about Gil is that when the offense is being run through Wade, Gil will be lost. He’s never been an off-ball player or a slasher without the ball. One interesting thing is that in the five games Gil and Devin saw each other when Gil was Gil, he was held down a bit. Especially in terms of efficiency. Harris has the length and energy to bother him.
Shooting Guard:
Wade and Carter are two of the three (or four depending on Mcrady) best shooting guards of the 00s. Their primes obviously don’t line up as the freak of nature Vince I’m utilizing was gone by the time Wade got here. Despite that, I was surprised to find the numbers not that dissimilar. Wade scores a bit better on a bit higher efficiency, but he’s not thoroughly outplaying the Vince that whined his way out of Toronto and lost his athleticism. That’s going to bode very badly for Wade playing this Vince. Also of note is that all the time Bowen is in the game will of course be spent on Dwayne, and Chandler/Anderson will be waiting for him this is a playoff defense geared at stopping him, and it will slow him down and tip the scales in Carter’s favor most games.
Small Forward:
I’m sporting the final year of Hill’s monstrous run before the unfortunate ankle injuries. This flavor of Hill was just as unstoppable as always, as Warspite (Piston’s fan) pointed out, Michael Jordan and Magic Johnson. Jones played a lot of shooting guard earlier in his career next to Ceballos, so it’s difficult to really theorize from head to head match-ups. It’s generally accepted that no one stops prime Hill though. I don’t expect it to be any different here. He’ll penetrate, try to score, or when Mutombo overhelps as he’s known for, dump it to Chandler for the slam. Jones in this offense is strictly a spot-up shooter working next to Arenas, Wade, and Webber. I may even throw Hill on Wade sometimes and let Carter and Hill trade on/off.
Power Forward:
Webber and Brand interestingly enough pretty much just played their game against one another. Trading off outscoring one another. The big thing is Webber took four more shots to score his extra two points. I expect both to get theirs with Brand needing fewer posessions.
Center:
The battle of the defensive and rebounding beasts. Their primes don’t match-up, so the head to head numbers likely aren’t doing Deke justice. The bottom line here is that both of their man defenses are negated here by the fact that both are garbage men. I think Chandler may be a bit better finisher, but Deke never had a truly gifted passer around him to show off. This leaves their help defense. Both anchored top defensive teams, and both are excellent rebounders. We intend to take advantage of Dikembe’s love of the blocked shot to dump it off to Chandler for the slam at every opportunity, and with Hill/Carter driving the lane, there will be a lot of opportunities. We’ve already seen what happens to Chandler’s efficiency on potent offensive teams. He leads the league in shooting. Expect that here.

Offense: We'll run the PnR with both bigs and VC/Hill/Harris and the pick n pop with Brand. Hill and Carter are difficult enough to stop when they don't have finishers around them. In this case they become almost unstoppable (see their efficiency on their awful early 2000s supporting casts). As noted above, we don't expect there to be a noticeable difference between Carter, Webber, Wade, and Brand overall with Carter's underrated peak and unstoppableness to go with Wade's known peak and unstoppableness. Like my usual philosophy, your 4 and 5 players are basically just finishers. Harris has experience being effective off-ball in the iso Maverick's offense, and Gordon, Chandler, Bowen etc are used to not having the ball consistently and just scoring when called upon.

Defense: Mutombo is, like Chandler, a non factor, while Eddie Jones turns into Bowen on offense with the lack of touches (spot-up shooter) If we find that spacing is an issue we will simply nix Harris' time and play Bowen 32-36 minutes, offering us another defender to slow down Wade and Arenas as well. My team sports better help defense between the two players while BI has the best help defender. Both Brand and Chandler are terrors in the paint and alter shots. What's more, they're effective at doing without fouling, which is a very valuable skill when facing D-Whistle and Arenas.

Rebounding: BI's got a slight advantage overall. We expect Chandler to get outrebounded, but since neither are active offensively we expect it to be a close match-up. We expect Brand to outrebound Webber as he has in their careers, and Hill, Carter, Bowen/Harris should outrebound Wade, Arenas, Jones, but not by as much as usual.

Turnovers: My team's primary ballhandlers are notoriously safe with the ball, so even with the ball hawking perimeter I'm not as concerned about turnovers as most teams.

Alright, now i'm out of time. Best of luck BI.

[MJallday59]

Writeup coming tonight!!!!!

9-23

[Miller4ever]

BlackIce 2-0, Kees 1-1, Cellar 0-2

Other votes coming.

[-Kees-]

Snake 2-0, SamBone 1-1, War 0-2

War is the weakest here. Doesn't have the star power, and his bigs aren't great at creating. They also don't have a go to player at this point.

Snake takes the win because of his insane 1-2 punch in LBJ and Tmac. '03 Tmac may have been the greatest performance ever for a perimeter player, and we all know what LBJ can do. Houston provides great spacing. I also only see one solid defender on SamBone's line in Butler. So one of Tmac/LBJ will be taken by Parker or Allen, and that is a huge mismatch. SamBone does have an advantage in the post, but O'neal and Ratlif make that part of the game very close.

MJallday 2-0, Miller 1-1, Luke 0-2

What's funny about this matchup, is that each poster claims to have the best PG, when in reality, they are all similar. Paul has scoring, Kidd defense, and Nash playmaking, while Nash is 2nd in scoring and 3rd in defense, Kidd is 2nd in playmaking and 3rd in scoring, and Paul is 2nd in defense and 3rd in playmaking. Basically, I think the PG position is a wash all the way around.

I give this to MJ because I think he has built the most balanced team. Johnson provides scoring, Wallace defense, Nash shooting and playmaking, and Amare/Zo is a fount court that works well together. I think this team also might have the best star power. Miller take this because Roy and KG just beat out Iggy/Rip and Sheed. Granger is also a key part. Kaman is a weakness, but they still win.

TMAC 1-1, RR9 1-1, bryant08 1-1 (TMAC over RR9, RR9 over Bryant, Bryant over TMAC)

Unfortunate matchup for RR9 against TMAC IMO. Wallace's great D is limited because of the sheer size of Shaq. I think he will go for a monster series. Pau (other than this past year) has played good D against Dirk, and putting Smoove at SF is a bad move, as he can't space the floor for nothing, and therefore they can't take advantage of Peja's average D. Rondo also doesn't provide spacing which will hurt more.

I say Bryant beats TMAC in a close one. Melo will go insane with Peja on him, and I'm not sure how Billups will do against prime Deron. Robinson has the length and size to keep Shaq to his averages or below. Good spacing as well, and Odom brings length to face Gasol.

RR9 beats Bryant, as the matchups are better. I don't see Odom or Boozer stopping Dirk, and I don't see Miller stopping Kobe. I also think Smith is an ideal defender for Melo because of his size and quick hands.


Kees 2-0, BlackIce 1-1, Cellar 0-2

[Miller4ever]

TMAC 2-0, bryant 1-1, RR9 0-2

Extremely close, the entire division. Everybody has a strong team that is worthy of going to the next round.

Snake 2-0, Sambone 1-1, War 0-2

[Snakebites]

Miller 2-0, Luke 1-1, MJ 0-2

TMAC 2-0, Bryant 1-1, RR9 0-2

BI 2-0, Kees 1-1, Cellar 0-2

[lukekarts]

(Edited) I'm a little short of time to make comments here, but here's my votes:

Snake 2-0; SamBone 1-1, Warspite 0-2

tmac 2-0, bryant 1-1, RR9 0-2 (lack of writeup)

Kees 2-0, blackice 1-1, cellar 0-2

[-Kees-]

I know its a lot to ask...but 3 people have voted for BI over me, and I would love to know why (I respect the vote, just want to know why you chose his team over mine)

[Snakebites]

I thought spacing was too serious an issue with your team to ignore, Kees. There isn't one player in your rotation that demands serious respect from long range, and you need space when you have two primary players who operate offensively primarily in the post.

Also luke, I'd really like to know how Sam Bone beat me without a writeup against me.

[lukekarts]

That is a fair point but I assumed we were giving guys a free pass this round as MJ and RR9 didn't post Writeups and are picking up points?

Edit: I'll change my vote accordingly; Kees should probs do the same

[BlackIce]

Snake 2-0, SamBone 1-1, War 0-2

Miller 2-0, Luke 1-1, MJallday 0-0

Bryant08 2-0, TMAC 1-1, RR9 0-2

Bryant over TMAC was the toughest call. I think Shaq is the best player in the series and with all the shooting around him he is devastating, but David Robinson is no joke and Carmelo and Deron are better then their counter parts. Tough call, I may be wrong and I wouldn't be surprised to see TMAC win the series.

[MJallday59]

Snake 2-0, SamBone 1-1, War 0-2

TMAC 2-0, Bryant 1-1, RR9 0-2

Kees 2-0, BlackIce 1-1, Cellar 0-2

Will explain in a bit

[SamBone]

sorry guys had a deth in fam and though tmac was gonna cover my writeup. o well so glad wasted 2 months staying active

[bryant08]

Tough one, but I'm going to have to go with:

BI 2-0, Kees 1-1, CD 0-2

I think it's another very tough bracket, depending on how you see that matchup you could easily have Cellar winning both matchups. Yao/Duncan/Artest is a beastly frontcourt, and although I think Iverson would work alright here, I'm not a big fan of that backcourt. I think even using a guy a duo of late draftees would help this team more than Iverson and Hughes's defensive ability, perhaps a combo like Baron Davis and Michael Redd, or having both guards with major range. I think BI took a huge risk taking Arenas and I don't personally like it, but his team just works better for me. Mutombo doesn't have to change his game at all, Webber/Wade are the offensive juggernauts and with Arenas out there you can't offer much help on Wade if he needs double-teaming. I'm not a huge Eddie Jones fan either, but you can't argue that he's a very solid defensive player with big time range. And although Marbury is majorly talented I didn't see the need for him here, but BI literally nailed every other bench pick and has one of the best benches in the era for me. All those guys bring a different element in their limited minutes (ie. Rose and his alternate playmaking, Okur and his ability to space the floor, Bell and his defense/range). Very tough call, but have to go BI.