The Big SFNBAFD Running Diary – Part III
by Homer Simmons
The draft considerably slowed down during the last days and so did my columns. Informed circles already talk about Simmons being ‘bigdoged’. Anyway, this is round 3:
Pick 33 (Barea): Luol Deng
Barea has two picks + Dwight Howard and decides to go for the All-Unclutch-Team 2011! Don’t get me wrong, Martin and Deng will thrive next to each other and next to Dwight. Exactly as long as you can give the Ball to your pivot. Or, to say it more clearly: Who in god’s name is going to score for this team in the last 5 minutes? If Luol Deng and Kevin Martin is your one-two-punch in crunchtime, you have a problem.
Pick 34 (Rainmaker07): Carlos Boozer
Team Rainmaker has good wings but no big so the direction was obvious. Unfortunately all decent two-way bigs were gone at this point so the choice falls upon Carlos Boozer. I will spare you with all the jokes about Boozer’s defense or how he quit on the Bulls last year but I really need to ask you this: What are the odds of Boozer and James running away from Rainmaker city leaving the fanbase shattered in tears? Dan Gilbert is laughing right now.
Pick 35 (The_Gr8): Joakim Noah
Noah goes off the table surprisingly early given his injury problems last year. But looking at the Hornets it makes sense: You’ve got more than enough scoring with Nash and Nowitzki but you want to protect Dirk on both sides of the floor (see Chandler, Tyson), you want somebody with a defensive mindset and you want a center who is fast enough to grab a rebound, toss it to Nash, run the floor and finish the alley-oop. Good pickup, I would like this team if it wasn’t for the fact that it was constructed by the commish using his evil commish powers. At least Steve Nash won’t lose another playoff series based on weird ejections.
Pick 36 (NightHawk): Tony Parker
Tony Parker, Kevin Durant, Marc Gasol. I really struggle to find a common theme here but all picks were decent pickups at the time and serve needs for Team Backpack. The only pity is that Eva Longoria isn’t included in that package anymore. Anyway, a speedy veteran playmaker is a nice pairing with Kevin Durant. Parker might actually get KD the ball in spots he likes, similar to what Eric Maynor sometimes did for the Thunder. Yes, I picked on Russell Westbrook again.
Pick 37 (Irenicus): Danny Granger, Pick 38 (G-SUS): Andre Iguodala and Pick 39 (Fuffie): Gerald Wallace
Wingapalozaa! Three Teams pick with a similar pattern here: In Round 1 they all picked superstar scorers (Dwyane Wade, Derrick Rose, Kobe Bryant) and all added a Big in Round 2 (Tyson Chandler, Al Jefferson, Al Horford). Now all feel the need to pick borderline all-star Wings to round out their big three:
Irenicus picks first and chooses a decent scorer and allrounder in Danny Granger. I see the reasoning here (Wade needs spacing) but wait a second and I’ll tell you who would’ve been the better choice. It is not Andre Iguodala although he fits nicely into Team G-SUS who desperately needs some kind of defense. And it’s also not Gerald Wallace who gives Team Fuffie a Slasher next to 2011 Kobe Bryant (Come on Lakers Nation, hate me, torture me, burn BSPN flags. But it’s true, Kobe Bryant is old.)
All those guys are understandable, decent pickups. But honestly, Joe Johnson is a better player than all of them and would’ve been a wonderful second option on any of those teams (yes, G-SUS still needs a second option. Al Jefferson is not the answer). Especially compared to Danny Granger I would pick Joe Johnson every day of the week. I guess people forget that Johnson’s monster contract is not an issue in THIS league.
Pick 40 (Bulls 4ever): Monta Ellis
In Round 2 I asked who on this team is going to make 15-footers. Now they have Monta Ellis, a guy who at least believes that he makes every shot he takes (and he takes a boatload of them). I am not sure what the plan here is but wasting the best point guard defender on the planet because the guy next to him cannot guard Yi’s chair doesn’t sound like a good plan to begin with.
Pick 41 (bigdog8): "Nene" Hilario
Anthony – Randolph – Nene. Did I say Team Bigdog tries to outscore and outrebound everybody else? Call me Nostradamus.
PS: You now have three guys without discernible passing skills and with a tendency to move as much as a solid rock when they don’t have the ball. How to find decent Guards to even get the ball into the hands of those three is beyond me.
Pick 42 (Mav007): Joe Johnson
You have Pick 10, Pick 24 and Pick 42 and end up with CP3, the Dwarfslayer and JJ? Mav007 is my preliminary DSG (Draft Steal God) of this draft. Look at those three: You’ve got the offensive leader (Paul), the defensive Anchor who is most comfortable as a third option on offense (Bynum) and a second option that does lots of things well but nothing on an elite level. Looks like a very good team, right? Plus it will be great to see Chris Paul having a wing on his team who can actually score in isolation and create for others when CP3 is trapped. Oh right, we will never actually see these teams play. Damn.
Pick 43 (madferit): Stephen Curry and Pick 44 (cudi): Eric Gordon
Team madferit and Team cudi draft according to Team needs. Madferit needs a pass first Point Guard who can run the Pick and Roll with Amare and get the ball into PP’s hands and cudi needs a wing scorer to complement his monster-Pick-and-Roll. Solid pickups, for both you can argue that there are better options (most notably Jason Kidd and Rudy Gay) but in the end both could win those arguments.
Pick 45 (Mango): Lamar Odom
I really like this team…but did anybody tell Mango that Lamar Odom’s strengths are his ability to defend modern 4s and his above-average ball-handling and shooting compared to other 4s? In other words, Odom cannot play the 3 anymore. Much less guard elite 3s.
And Odom also doesn’t answer the question “Who is going to score for this team?”. Strange choice by Mango here.
Pick 46 (Sm0kE): John Wall
Sm0kE apparently doesn’t understand the rules here. Wall has unlimited potential but as of now he is a high-turnover, low-percentage guard who is often-injured. I also don’t know how he meshes with Ginobili and Gasol. The only hope is that nobody with a clear mind watches the Wizards anyway so the voters might just see “No. 1 Pick”.
Pick 47 (Vash): Rudy Gay
Vash gets another injured player to complement Andrew Bogut. Wait, we are not here to determine the “All-Hospital-Team 2011”?
Pick 48 (Sefant77): Josh Smith
Eff’ You Mode continues. Josh Smith can play the 4 and nothing else. Kevin Love can play the 4 and nothing else. Josh Smith cannot shoot jumpshoots but loves to do it anyway. Russell Westbrook cannot shoot jumpshoots but loves to do it anyway. Can you see the redundancy here? After the jump we’ll see if sefant can destroy his team even more.