Basketball Free For All

If nothing else, Dallas Mavericks billionaire Mark Cuban is certainly not gun shy about making major moves and shaking up his roster. After a disappointing 2008-09 campaign, Cuban declared that nobody was safe from being moved.

Despite the declaration, Dallas’ core stayed intact with Dirk Nowitzki, Jason Kidd, Jason Terry and Josh Howard all still around. With the season just around the corner, the 2009-10 Mavericks are substantially similar to last season’s model, with versatile forward Shawn Marion and big man Drew Gooden being the main additions.

This was supposed to be a sleeper piece on Marcin Gortat or Brandon Bass. However, the Orlando Magic ended up locking down both players for very reasonable prices, which seemed to be one of the major themes of the summer of 2009. Man, it would have been awesome to finally see the Polish Sledgehammer unleashed. But it was not meant to be.

With Erick Dampier slowing down and showing his age (34), the Mavericks clearly needed an addition or two to the front court. What the Mavericks needed most was athleticism on the wing (Marion) and scoring from the paint (Gooden). Scoring in the paint is not exactly Dirk’s specialty, as he is much more of a jump shooter than Gooden.

If given minutes, Gooden has shown that he can produce and be fantasy relevant. His career per-36 minutes averages are 15.4 points on .471/.732 percent shooting, 10.1 rebounds, 1.4 assists, 1.0 steals, 0.8 blocks and 2.1 turnovers. Light on the blocks and not a great field goal percentage for a PF/C player, but useful nonetheless.

In the Mavericks-Magic preseason game, Gooden showed how he can play a big role in limited minutes. He had 18 points and 6 boards and a block while shooting a high percentage in 22 minutes. Granted it is only preseason, but that also means that Gooden should most likely see more minutes as guys like Kris Humprhies, Jake Voshkuhl and James Singleton should not be seeing nearly as much court time during the regular season (they played a combined 47 mintes against the Magic).

Starting status doesn’t matter for fantasy basketball. What matters most is the distribution of minutes, as minutes are a prerequisite to having fantasy value. With Dampier approaching senior citizen status in the NBA while also being almost completely offensively inept, Gooden has a solid opportunity to carve out a 30+ minute per game role for himself.

In recent years, Gooden has not played alongside such a talented group of players. Say what you will about his age, but there are few floor generals as talented as Kidd. Throw in Dirk, Terry and Marion and Gooden should be seeing a lot of open looks as players double off of him. Drew is most effective as a complimentary, scoring big man off the bench, which appears to be exactly how Coach Carlisle plans on utilize him.

With the Mavericks looking like the legitimate third seed in the West (with the Lakers and Spurs taking the top two spots), Gooden looks like a solid late round pick (Buser Sports ADP of 170 and a Yahoo! O-Rank of 194) for managers looking to efficiently solidify their points and boards from a center-eligible player.

For those of you who think Emeka Okafor will be the only new significant contributor for the New Orleans Hornets this season, think again!  Joining the big man in the middle in the starting lineup will be Julian Wright.  With the team in desperate need of some youthful athleticism, he is poised to have a nice breakout in 2009-10.

Julian’s first two years in the NBA were pretty uneventful as he mainly participated in garbage time.  However, some of you may remember towards the end of his rookie year, he showed some glimpses of his potential.  In particular, during the 4th game of the playoffs against Dallas, Julian came into the game and helped deflate the Mavericks momentum with his energy and hustle.  The Hornets went on to finish off Dallas and then almost knocked off the Spurs.

Subsequently, last year, many Hornets fans expected to see Wright emerge as a major cog in the rotation.  Sadly, it didn’t happen as the wrath of young player hater Byron Scott buried him on the bench.  Many fans expressed their concern over the course of the 2008-09 campaign and pointed to losing young promising talent like J.R. Smith and Brandon Bass.  Then, somewhat surprisingly, rumors started circulating that Wright was going to become a starter this upcoming season, and at the start of training camp, it became official:

“Right now Julian is the starting three, ” Scott said. “It’s his position to lose. He’s comfortable and he has a lot of confidence in himself. I think he knows we have a lot of confidence in him.”

Source:  Nola.com

So why the sudden turn around Byron?  Have a change of heart?

I seriously doubt it as I think the issue was two-fold.  First, a lot of it boiled down to hard economics.  The Hornets were stuck between a rock and hard place this offseason as they needed to get better but were well over the salary cap.  Why else would they deal Tyson Chandler (a CP3 favorite), Rasual Butler (for a 2nd round pick) and Antonio Daniels (decent veteran backup PG)?

Second, they had just gone through a season in which the immovable Peja Stojakovic wasn’t physically 100% for the majority of the season.  Consequently, the only obvious solution was to play him less minutes in order to help maintain his effectiveness.

So now the Hornets have to fill both the starting SG and SF positions.  One look at the remaining roster and you’ll see why the Hornets appear to have the “wright change of heart.”  Besides our sleeper candidate, they could have gone with Devin Brown (do you really need an explanation), James Posey (easily his best role is off the bench) and Morris Peterson (someone not a rookie needs to play SG).  It’s no surprise why the Hornets have a ton of confidence in the youngster.

Good thing for fantasy owners is this kid has some game.  Despite not having solid support his first two seasons, his career per-36  minute averages are 11.7 points, 6.9 rebounds, 2.1 assists, 2.0 turnovers, 1.6 steals and .8 blocks.  His field goal percentage is a hefty 49.4%.  His FT shooting and 3 point contributions are dismal but let’s not completely write them off considering he still is young enough to improve upon them.

The biggest question will be whether the aforementioned line serves either as a baseline or a ceiling.  In the past, the Hornets have made a mistake of treating Wright like a number of their other wings – a shooter with an experienced IQ.  Guess what – he’s NOT that type of player.

Instead, think Gerald Wallace – a high-riser with amazing all around athleticism and excellent length (6′8”) and wingspan (7′1”).  I believe that the Hornets will finally realize his strengths as they can’t bury their heads in the sand anymore.  They’ll have to rely on his above the rim game with Tyson in Charlotte, his excellent rebounding numbers for a wingman and very good vision to hit a number of excellent Hornet spot up shooters.  When you couple this opportunity with what many scouts consider a good work ethic, you can see why Wright has all the makings of a special sleeper.

With Yahoo! Fantasy Basketball up and running early this season, there is plenty of time to examine the data and prepare for drafts and the upcoming season. One important aspect to consider before drafting and assembling the perfect fantasy squad is position eligibility.

Each season is different and each season certain guys gain extra eligibility at a position you normally wouldn’t expect. Likewise, there are players that for some reason or another are missing a position eligibility they had last season or that they should have. Each fantasy sports provider has its own quirks and nuances and uses different criteria to make their position eligibility judgments. Make sure and examine your own provides list carefully.

Or, if you use Yahoo!, just continue reading. Your welcome.

Before getting into the nuts and bolts, take a step back and do some cursory research. Find out what the criteria are used to determine and assign position eligibility for your specific provider. The criteria will be laid out somewhere on their website. Or again, just continue reading.

Initial position eligibility for each player was determined based on past participation and information supplied by NBA teams during the off-season.

Players are eligible at one or more positions during the current Yahoo! Sports Fantasy Basketball season depending upon their real-life participation.

All position eligibility requests are reviewed by Yahoo! Sports and confirmed with our NBA sources. Due to the nature of the review process, we’re unable to comment on each individual player request.

Source: Yahoo!

So the eligibility is somewhat based upon real life and is subject to Yahoo!’s discretion. The Yahoo! Help page also lays out how position eligibility can be added throughout the regular season. This is also important to note because the eligibility is supposed to mirror real life to a certain degree. So when you see position changes in real life, Yahoo! is supposed to mimic that change as well.

Updates are made during the regular season based on changes to the lineups and official team rosters. Players don’t lose position eligibility when moving from one real-life position to another. So, if a forward starts to play regular shifts as a center, he’s eligible for the remainder of the season as a forward and a center.

New positions are added when it’s confirmed that a player’s primary position has changed and that the change is not expected to be a temporary one.

When a player has earned eligibility at a new position, it will be displayed wherever player positions are shown.

The key to Yahoo!’s in-season updates is that new position eligibility is to be assigned based upon permanent changes to a player’s primary position. With that in mind, don’t get too bogged down in the details. Just something to keep in  my mind as you review the position eligibility list. I definitely recommend perusing the list for yourself as different changes will stand out to different managers.

I reviewed the top 250 players (according to Yahoo!’s O-Rank) examining only their position eligibility. I compared their assigned eligibility to a combination of last season’s eligibility and my expected position eligibility for each player. Not exactly hard science. Then, each player was classified into groups.

Here are the results.

The Rookies

This season’s first pick overall, Blake Griffin (SF/PF), also provided the first eligibility surprise for rookies: small forward status. Griffin seemed a lock to gain power forward status but also could have been though of as a longshot for center eligibility if the Clippers decided to play small ball.  Small forward status is just icing on the cake as he is not pigeon-holed into the “PF only” category.

The next group of rookies contains players that obtained eligibility at both guard positions. This group includes Johnny Flynn (PG/SG); Stephen Curry (PG/SG); Tyreke Evans (PG/SG); and James Harden (PG/SG). Some of these are more surprising than others. In particular Flynn and Harden are both surprising but for different reasons; Flynn surprisingly gained shooting guard eligibility and Harden gained point guard eligibility.

The next two players’ eligibility was very surprising indeed. Both DeMar DeRozan (SG/SF/PF) and Terrence Williams (SG/SF/PF) were given eligibility at shooting guard and both forward positions. This means these two guys can be played at shooting guard, guard, small forward, power forward, forward or utility. Now that is versatility.

Other notables: Jordan Hill (SF/PF) and David Andersen (SF/PF).

Single Position Only

Of all the fantasy stars out there, no one gets overlooked and undervalued more often than Dirk Nowitzki (PF). That is scientific fact although no scientific studies were actually undertaken. Normally, it wouldn’t be surprising that Dirk only obtained power forward eligibility with his well-known preference to play the four and not the five. However, with Shawn Marion (SF/PF) on board, there is widespread speculation that Marion might spend some quality time at the four with Dirk at the five. Stay tuned and keep an eye out for added center eligibility for Nowitzki.

In an about face, the next guy is one guy people can’t stop talking about and overvaluing. As of now, Gilbert Arenas (PG) is slated to be have point guard eligibility only. While not entirely unexpected, it is important to note that and not rely on Agent Zero having dual guard eligibility.  In fact, it is probably a good idea not to rely on Arenas for anything.

Everyone’s hottest sleeper of the summer, Anthony Randolph (PF), has been given only eligibility at the four. This is surprising because of Randolph’s real life versatility. It is compounded by the fact that Anthony plays for Coach Don Nelson, who is known for his unconventional lineups and could potentially play three (or more) positions. For a system, that is supposed to mimic real life, Randolph having power forward eligibility only is certainly an airball on Yahoo!’s part.

Other notables: Kevin Garnett (PF); O.J. Mayo (SG); Trevor Ariza (SF); Shane Battier (SF) Kenyon Martin (PF); Yi Jianlian (PF); Keyon Dooling (PG); and Jose Juan Barea (PG).

Bonus Time!

Every season, there are a certain number of players that maintain eligibility for a certain position when the probably shouldn’t (bonus!). That is a great thing, because the more flexible your squad is the greater your chances of building a championship caliber squad are. This season, Kevin Durant (SG/SF) has maintained his shooting guard eligibility even though he has played almost totally at the three since Coach P.J. Carlesimo was fired early last season after a rocky start. The switch also coincides with the Durantula’s ascent to fantasy god status.

Similarly, Memphis’ Rudy Gay (SF/PF) plays almost exclusively at the three so the power forward eligibility can be viewed as an added bonus. With new addition and black hole Zach Randolph around, Gay will most likely spend even less time at the four next season (Darrell Arthur should also be picking up scrap minutes behind Z-Bo).

Other notables: Emeka Okafor (PF/C); Udonis Haslem (PF/C); and Darrell Arthur (PF/C).

Big Men with Small Forward Eligibility

This season, there is a group of big men that received small forward eligibility. For some, like Utah’s Paul Millsap (SF/PF), it comes as a surprise. If anything, Millsap should have eligibility at power forward and center, not small forward. But you can only hope that Yahoo! fixes that during the season, which would make Millsap extremely versatile with SF/PF/C eligibility.

Other notables: Tyrus Thomas (SF/PF); Jason Thompson (SF/PF) and Brandon Bass (SF/PF).

Point Guards with Shooting Guard Eligibility

The final group of players is guys who have eligibility at both guard positions. Most of these guys should come as now surprise, including the newest Timberwolf, Ramon Sessions (PG/SG). He should see some run at the two guard alongside rookie lotter selection Johnny Flynn. The real mystery is how Flynn walked away with eligibility at both guard positions but it’s usually a good idea to never question a good thing.

Other notables: Allen Iverson (PG/SG); Rodney Stuckey (PG/SG); Lou Williams (PG/SG); D.J. Augustin (PG/SG); and Rudy Fernandez (PG/SG).

A roundup like this is a useful reference but cannot subsitute for actually sitting down and reviewing the position eligibility list yourself. Take careful note of where eligibility assignments differ from your own opinion of position eligibility and keep these issues in mind when drafting.

The next step in breaking down the pre-draft data is scouring the Yahoo! O-Ranks and average draft position lists to see which players are being overvalued, undervalued and slept on.