Well, that's 30 years in the books. 30 years of fantasy basketball. I was 17 when it all began and 30 years later I still love the game, love following the stats, and love the idea of trying to build the best fantasy team possible. And it's all possible, year after year, because of this amazing group of dudes who share the same passion as me about the NBA.
So, as I have done in many years passed....here is my take on the JBL season that was.
As I dive into the team reviews, as always, please don’t take anything personal. It’s all meant to be in good fun. Sure, I’ll take some jabs at some teams and decisions but it’s just for the love of the game. I will do a team-by-team review and provide the yearly awards for each team. And to qualify for these team awards the player must have spent at least 50% of the season on your JBL roster. I think I will go with ‘MVP’ – which I will define as your team’s best overall player from a fantasy perspective. I will award an ‘Unsung hero’ award to a player who I feel overachieved for your squad. And finally, I will award the ‘Bust of the Year’ award to the player on your team that failed to live up to expectations (and yes, this honour does not require the 50% of games rule).
Without further ado, here we go…..
14th place – Idaho Udapimps
Where do I begin with this squad? Coming into the season, Idaho was poised for a breakthrough year. In the past 3 seasons, Idaho was coming off back to back 2nd place finishes and the year before that was a 3rd place finish. The youngster was ready and primed with 4 keepers (JJJ, Carter, Ingram, and Ayton) and was ready to take the final leap. To say things went off the rails fairly quickly is a bit of an understatement. Even though after the 1st week, Idaho was sitting in 2nd place overall and the sky was the limit. But that was as good as it got. It was all downhill from there. We all thought Idaho made a shrewd move early when he traded Westbrook/Nunn for Turner/Fultz. That deal initially looked to be in Idaho’s favour until Westy turned into a 2nd half monster and Fultz was lost to a torn ACL after just 8 games.
Idaho, like many other teams I will summarize here, was devastated by injuries all season. The Jaren Jackson Jr. situation was beyond comical as he was ‘almost ready’ for about 18 weeks and ultimately ended up playing just 11 uninspiring games. It’s seasons like this that make JBL owners shy away from players in future auctions.
Idaho shot for the moon and traded Milton/Biyombo for a then underutilized Hassan Whiteside. He got a couple of Whiteside gems but those were too few and far between and Whiteside was ultimately found out in SacTown and rode the pine. Idaho again swung for the fences and traded Conley and Turner for Stephen Curry. He had a MVP-type season but even his heroics could not prevent Idaho from falling to the basement.
The Idaho squad was littered with underachievers. And that’s a pretty typical statement when we are talking about the 14th place team. All good plans didn’t come to fruition. The list is long of players that didn’t live up to Idaho’s expectations. Wendell Carter Jr. was jettisoned from Chicago after not being able to figure things out. Lauri Markkanen regressed and even lost his starting gig. Gallinari was injured and coming off the bench in ATL. Aaron Gordon struggled with injuries and then his trade to Denver didn’t help his numbers.
There were a few standouts on this team. Ingram, Ayton and Dejounte Murray all had good years (and they didn’t miss many games). I also think Danny Green showed some good fantasy value in Philly.
Idaho will not have any keepers for next season and that means that guys like Ayton and Ingram will both be back in the auction. Good news for the rest of us.
A 14th place finish also means that Idaho gets 14 ping pong balls in the JBL rookie lottery in a supposed very deep rookie draft. Could Idaho win the lottery and tease us with another coin flip decision?? Remember the last one netted him Ayton over Doncic. And to think that coin flip ultimately gave Brussels Doncic who was the initial building block which resulted in a 1st ever title for Brussels this season. I’m not sure Idaho will remember this coin flip decision quite as fondly as Brussels is right now.
MVP
This one is clearly Steph Curry. He played 43 games in Idaho and averaged 34PPG, 5REB, 5AST, 1.2 STL and shot 49.0% and 42.5%. An absolute fantasy monster.
Unsung Hero:
Danny Green. I can admit that I thought Danny Green was done. I thought he was on the backside of the career and I didn’t think he would still be this valuable from a real life or fantasy perspective. He averaged 10PPG, 1.3 STL and 0.9 BLK for Idaho while shooting 41.5% from downtown. A very nice role player for this squad.
Bust of the Year:
Oh the choices. So many to choose from! I think, based on how Idaho typically values his players, that there a number of guys who could win this award. Lauri Markkanen? Wendell Carter Jr? Danilo Gallinari? Isaac Okoro (predicted by Idaho to win ROY)? With all the choices, I am going with Wendell Carter Jr here. He was a prized Idaho keeper and expectations were high. Not only in Idaho but also in Chicago. He failed to live up to those expectations in either place and Chicago even traded him away. That’s winner winner chicken dinner
13th place – Cali Fornication
Another team with pretty high expectations coming into the season. Cali was coming off a 5th place finish the year before and was hoping to improve on that this season. If you had told me at the start of the season that Patrick Williams, one of Cali’s prized rookies, would lead the team in Fantasy man-games played at 71, I don’t think I would have believed you. But the kid did, 71 games, mostly starts for Chicago too. So, while that’s impressive, it could also be part of the reason for Cali’s final plot in the standings. This Cali squad, whether deliberate or not, was another Punt Points team. Unfortunately, they also turned out to be a punt Steals and punt ATO team as well. Last year using this punt points approach worked out much better as Cali was strong in every other category. This year….not so much.
The heavy hitters of this Cali team – Kevin Durant, Anthony Davis, Clint Capela, and Victor Oladipo – just didn’t play enough games to make a big enough impact. KD only played 32 games for Cali. AD only played 36. Oladipo just 29. At least Capela played 63 and played them very well. His numbers were outstanding and he played a huge role, in my opinion, in Atlanta’s success this season. 15ppg, 14reb, and 2 blocks while shooting 60% from the field? Yes please. But overall, when you’ve got a lot of eggs into the basket – those eggs better not be sucky. Or something like that.
The rest of the Cali roster was filled with some decent role players (Royce O’Neale, Bruce Brown, Robert Williams) but may of them even underperformed. And I will say this, did Cali do enough to try and improve the squad over the course of the year? Only one trade. And that was a blockbuster of acquiring Matisse Thybulle from Brussels for Delon Wright. That was it. No other trades. And on the FA wire – did they do enough? Why was Otto Porter still on this roster at the end of the season? I tried looked up his games for the last month of the season – and, oh wait, he didn’t play for the last month! Tyus Jones? Tomas Satoranksy? Dario Saric? Was there nothing better on the wire to try something a little different?
Usually, the one silver lining of finishing 13th in the standings has to do with the ping pong balls you get in the next JBL rookie lottery. Unfortunately for Cali, he traded his 2021 rookie pick to Brussels so it will be Timmy hoping for one of Cali’s 13 balls to come out 1st.
Cali does get one keeper for next season. Who will that be? Is it the recovering Kevin Durant? Maybe one of this prized rookies – Patrick Williams or Devin Vassell? Will it be the Timelord in Boston who racks up the blocks? Will it be Capela for his sure-fire numbers? I think we all know it won’t be AD as Cali seems to have lost his shine of the Unibrow now. Lots of time still to decide but Cali will be starting from scratch pretty much next season. The only thing that makes this season worse is if that Cali ping pong ball comes out first in the lottery.
MVP
First off, AD qualifies because he played 36 games for Cali but he’s not the guy. KD only managed 32 so he’s not an option. And actually, I think the award is pretty simple. It’s Clint Capela all day, every day. I listed his numbers above and he is clearly worthy of Cali’s MVP.
Unsung Hero
There are a few options here since Cali’s team is really filled with role players who may have overachieved during the year. For me though, it comes down to the 2 Williams boys. Patrick or Robert. Both were better than I thought they would be. I didn’t think Chicago should have taken him at #4 but there he was starting games and producing decent numbers. And with Timelord I was just thinking he would be a 3rd wheel behind Thompson and Theis but we know that he forced his way into more playing time. Timelord was 8 and 7 with 1.8 BLK’s and shot 72% from the field. I’m giving this one to the Timelord.
Bust of the Year:
While I’m sure Cali ownership may vote for AD here my ballot is going to Victor Oladipo for a couple of reasons. First off, Oladipo was protected by Cali for $25 bucks. And what did he get for those $25 bucks? 29 games of crap. Sure there was 20-5-4 but 41 and 33 %’s are not good. And when you’re injured all the time – that blows goats. I think the expectations for Victor were super high and he failed to live up them.
12th place – Bangkok Fighters
To say the Kok always has high expectations is an understatement. The Kok believes his team will win one day. The Kok dreams about winning the title. And the Kok’s nightmare came true when Brussels beat him to the prize. The Kok will be buying Brussels a nice bottle of something from here until eternity unless the Kok wins a title or the JBL folds. I can say for sure I'm not folding it...
This year’s version of Bangkok was "alright". I actually had them ranked #7 in my pre-season power poll so I kind of liked this bunch. Guess that one was a bit off. This Kok team was built around 3 Bucks – Giannis, Jrue and Donte. Jrue Holiday probably had his best fantasy season is many years and he always seems to be in Bangkok. Giannis was amazing and despite missing 11 games still put up monstrous numbers. Not sure why he bothers trying to shoot 3’s and his frequent jacking certainly didn’t help the Kok’s 11th place finish in 3PT%. And Donte was a solid role player all year and contributes well in 3-4 categories.
When you look at the Kok across the 7 categories – he didn’t do anything great (steals was his best category at 7th) but he didn’t suck at anything completely (12th in blocks). Every other category was in between – which ultimately led to the 12th place finish.
Of course, like every other team, Bangkok was hit with injuries and losing Jamal Murray (aka The Headmaster) was a massive blow to the Kok. Pun intended. He lost man games from Hunter, Wiseman, Siakam, Kleber, and others. I’ll give Kok credit, he certainly threw everything he had at the league as Bangkok saw 36 players call the Kok home this season. That’s a big number for the Kok. Of course, some of those shots in the dark included Troy Brown Jr, Dwayne Bacon, Justise Winslow, Torrey Craig, and the crappy version of Jaxson Hayes. But hey, at least he was trying. I think if Jamal Murray had stayed healthy that the Kok could have found himself a spot or two higher in the standings.
That said, a 12th place finish is the best place to finish if you are in the 9th to 12th slots. You get your 2 keepers AND you get 12 ping pong balls. We also know that the Kok will be shooting for the 1st ever back-to-back-to-back lottery wins (Zion and Wiseman). We’ll see where he lands this year.
Now, for those 2 keeper spots, we already know about the Kok’s infatuation with Anthony Edwards. The kid was pretty amazing down the stretch and Rick has to hope that he continues to improve and shoot the ball at these higher numbers. The hiring of Chris Finch in Minny, while doing nothing for their porous defense, at least helped turn around Edwards game. Throw in that the rookie played in all 72 games and you can clearly see his upside.
That said, let’s do a quick comparison:
Player A: 19.3 PPG, 4.7 REB, 1.310 ATO, 82 steals, 35 blocks, 41.8% FG, 32.9% 3PT in 72 games
Player B: 15.7 PPG, 5.9 REB, 2.159 ATO, 79 steals, 18 blocks, 43.5% FG, 35.1% 3PT in 51 games
Player C: 13.0 PPG, 3.0 REB, 3.359 ATO, 77 steals, 28 blocks, 47.2% FG, 40.9% 3PT in 58 games
These are 3 rookie guards that will likely all be keepers. I’ll let you guys figure out who is who – but that should be pretty easy I think. Assuming they all improve on these numbers in year 2, we should see some pretty big smiles on JBL owners faces. So who would you rather have from this player group? A, B, or C?
The question for the Kok then is who is going to be that 2nd keeper? For awhile there it looked like DeAndre Hunter for $7 would be a nice option but he hasn’t been able to stay healthy and now with Bogie’s arrival in ATL and the competition from Reddish, Snell, Hill, and others I’m not sure there is a big path to minutes. Now, if ATL trades or moves on from John Collins then maybe Hunter is worth the risk. Is Wiseman for $20 a worthy investment? Not sure about that. But also that would mean that the Kok has had the #1 rookie pick for 2 years and neither Zion or Wiseman are still on the team, What about Keldon Johnson for $15? I guess that depends on what the Spurs do this offseason. Could the Kok just bring Jrue Holiday back for $44 bucks? You know that Jrue will likely be a Kok target at auction so the he could simply remove any drama and just sign him now for likely market value.
Anyways, enough about the Kok. He’s definitely got some added pressure now that Brussels has beat him to the JBL’s ultimate prize.
MVP
There isn’t much here to debate and I’m not going to try and justify anyone other than Giannis. The numbers speak for themselves.
Unsung Hero x2
The surprise here for me is Keldon Johnson. I didn’t think this kid would be a fantasy impact at all. Little did we know that LaMucus (as the Kok calls him) turned up to training camp as a 57 year old aging power forward. Keldon was a key FA signing for the Kok who played 64 games for him and averaged almost 13PPG with 6REB while shooting 48% from the field. Some really good production from an unexpected source.
Another unsung hero of this roster was Joe Ingles. In his 35 Bangkok games, he averaged 13ppg, 5ast, and shot 46/44. Really good numbers and I think he should be NBA 6th man of the year.
Bust of the Year
There is only one option here for me. Hassan Whiteside. A $34 dollar venture that went sour really quickly. He only played 7 games in Bangkok before being shipped out to Idaho.
11th place – Maui Ribs
What can you say about this Maui squad? It was beautiful. Bold. Bashful. Brilliant. A team built only of players whose last names begin with the letter B. A theme team idea that had never been done and came into play before the season began. Did the Godfather know this was going to happen? Yes. Did the Godfather maybe provide some advice to Maui on his quest? Maybe.
How did the idea come to fruition? It began in essence after seeing that Maui’s best 2 keepers at the start of the year, appeared to be Davis Bertans and Lonzo Ball. And maybe a random comment of ‘what if the team only consisted of players with last name starting with B?” So, the next step all came down to the rookie lottery. What if Maui was able to get LaMelo Ball and have the Ball brothers and 3 dudes with the last name starting with B? After the rookie lottery, where Bangkok won the 1st overall pick again there were some definite doubts it could happen. Maui had the 2nd pick and it was all about waiting to see who the Kok would take at #1. If Ball went 1st overall to Bangkok - the theme team idea may have died right there. Alas, Kok took Wiseman and that left LaMelo for Maui and the theme/dream team was born and on track.
Maui is an original JBL member. 30 years in. They’ve been located in many places before they found a forever-home in Maui. Remember Lubin My Pole? Remember the Fanny Bay Fillies? All good - but nothing beats some Maui Ribs.
When a theme team is born there are usually some key players that are absolute must haves in order for it to work. In this case, with only B players available - one would think that Jimmy Butler, Bradley Beal, and Devin Booker would all be must drafts. Well, just to make things a little more interesting, Maui decided to only get 1 of those guys! And Jimmy didn’t disappoint. Sure, he missed some games - but he was every bit the fantasy star we know he can be (ie. 108 steals in 52 games). That said, having Beal and Booker definitely would have helped in the scoring department.
Maui successfully drafted an entire roster of B players and I’m not sure many other owners knew what was happening at the time. Godfather knew but that didn’t stop me from stealing Darius Bazley away from Maui when he needed another player. In case you don’t believe in karma, that decision clearly shows it does exist as Bazley was jettisoned for scrap parts way too late into the season. Maui - you are welcome for not being saddled with that percentage killer.
Maui suffered an early blow losing his only true source of rebounds in Thomas Bryant very early in the season. This team became focused on steals, ATO and 3PT% where they finished 5th, 5th and 2nd respectively. Without many Bigs in the B name category - Blocks, FG% and rebounds were always going to be tough. Maui wound up 14th in all of those categories.
All that said, Maui got some really nice years from Brogdon, Miles Bridges, RJ Barrett, the Ball brothers and the late season additions of Khem Birch and Oshae Brissett. Injuries to previously mentioned Bryant, Bagley, Beasley, Barton, and others hurt this team and it pretty much goes without saying that all JBL teams were impacted by the covid season. Guys like Bertans and Bledsoe did not perform well and since the theme team was in effect it’s not like Maui had endless FA options to replace these guys. Or many trade options. Not that he’s ever been a massive trader it goes without much surprise to tell you Maui didn’t make any deals this season.
Maui’s 11th place finish, while it doesn’t get any accolades or trophies will be remembered in Maui though as there is some pride in knowing that he limited himself to drafting from a list of just 47 players while the rest of us were open to 300+ players. And while doing that, Maui still beat 3 other teams. Is that more of a win for Maui or a loss for the other 3 teams? Now, that said, if you were going to build a team while only selecting players with a last name starting with a certain letter - I do think that B is a pretty good, if not the best option. So congrats to Maui for pulling that off and staying committed for the entire season. Well done. Shame on the 3 of you that fell below the Maui-line. Finishing 12th to 14th wasn’t bad enough - it just got worse since I am reminding you that you finished behind a B-named theme team.
Now, who will Maui be protecting to go along with his 11 ping pong balls? LaMelo certainly appears to be a top option as the likely ROY winner. What about his teammate in Charlotte - Mile Bridges who would be a cool $6 bucks? Is the Canadian RJ Barrett in the mix? What about Brogdon? Or what if the Pacers trade Myles Turner and they continue to play Oshae Brissett? In his 21 games for the Pacers he averaged 11 and 6 while shooting 48/42 with 19 steals and 20 blocks. A sleeper option to keep an eye on.
Maui has had some strong years based on his lottery success. Remember this is team that’s had Anthony Davis for 5 years, Porzingis for 5 years, Oladipo for 5 years so the lottery luck could be about to strike again for Maui. Pairing LaMelo and another top rookie could be the start of another contending Maui squad. Did you know that in the last 19 years that Maui has finished in the money (top 4) nine times!! 9 times. But still no JBL title. Maybe JBL 31 will be that year?
MVP
This is another tough one but I am going with Jimmy Butler here. 21-7-7 with 2.1 steals! Big production.
Unsung Hero
There’s a couple of options here that I like. Desmond Bane was a nice find of the FA wire who shot 43% from downtown. Khem Birch and Oshae Brissett were great late season finds as well. But the unsung hero of this squad, for me, was $1 dollar Miles Bridges. He started the season coming off the bench for Charlotte since they added Gordon Hayward in the offseason. I think we all thought he would be bench fodder for them. However, some injuries allowed Bridges to play more minutes down the stretch. In fact, over his last 30 games he averaged 16PPG, 6REB, 0.6 STL, 0.9 BLK while shooting 51% and 42%. Very impressive.
Bust of the Year
This one has to be Davis Bertans. Another keeper who failed to live up to any expectations. He signed a big offseason deal and now he sucks. Outside of the 39.5% from downtown he failed to really help out Maui in any other categories.
10th place – Chilliwack Offs
To say the Wack didn’t live up to expectations is an understatement. As we know, Benny put a lot of this eggs into a couple of baskets. Big dollars invested in Karl Anthony Towns and James Harden to pair with keepers Ja Morant and De’Aaron Fox led to high hopes for this squad. Unfortunately for the Wack, Harden showed up in a fat suit and wanting out of Houston….
Pre-season rankings even had the Godfather very high on this team. Maybe that was the kiss of death.
Just like other teams the Wack was never fully healthy. Between Harden wanting out of Houston and then injury and covid issues in Brooklyn and KAT missing some time due to covid restrictions this team was never fully healthy.
Benny made some moves and acquired Norm Powell for Al Horford. Initially this looked like a big win for Brussels as Horford was on fire for the young OKC team. Then the deal swung to the Wack’s favour as Norm Powell went off and Horford went to the bench for the tanking Thunder.
Seoul and Chilliwack made their annual trade and swapped underperformers Lord Covington for Buddy Hield. Both seemed to come out of their early season funks right away and Buddy ended up playing 61 games for the Wack and averaging 17ppg while shooting 40% from downtown. Pretty even deal when you look at the numbers.
Despite Buddy’s 3pt% heroics, the Wack finished dead last in that category and also struggled in Points (13th) and Rebounds (13th). With Buddy (40% and Powell (40.6%) bombing away from downtown and making a lot of 3’s, I was a little surprised to see this team finish last in the 3PT% category. The rebounds was more obvious as the Wack’s top rebounders were Bam (8.7) and Harden (8.0) and Ivica Zubac (7.2). I do like Zubac as a #2 center and he actually led the Wack in games played as he appeared in all 72 games for the Clippers and the Wack this season.
As the season progressed and the Wack’s hopes of a money-run began to fade, he re-acquired Bam Adebayo (and LaMarcus Aldridge) from Golden for KAT and Richaun Holmes. Unfortunately for the Wack, Aldridge only suited up for 4 games before announcing his retirement. However, the prize of Bam for one more keeper season was enough for the Wack. He will likely now pair Bam and Morant as his 2 keepers for the 21/22 season. The only wrinkle, is James Harden actually a better keeper than Morant? Hmmmm.
I stand behind my lofty projections for this squad at the start of the season. They were poised, on paper, to be a top team. But I think the Wack can blame Fat Harden for the comedy of errors and injuries that ensued over the course of the year. The Wack can take some comfort in the season as at least he beat the Kok and Idaho and won a couple of side bets. However, this 4-time JBL champion has suffered through a dark stretch over the last 8-9 years and this 10th place finish is not overly inspiring as they head into next season.
MVP
Wow, who would have thought it would be this hard to figure out a team’s MVP? Ja Morant was nice but I expected more. De’Aaron Fox was pretty darn good too. James Harden? Bam? You know I am very fond of Bam but I’m going with Harden. Despite missing a lot of games he still put up monster numbers in Brooklyn. And think of this, Harden played 20 fewer games than Bam but still almost scored the same amount of points (1,197 to 1,083).
Unsung Hero
For me, it’s Derrick Rose. All of us thought he was done. Why do I say that? Because Benny won him at auction for $1 buck. So not a single other owner thought he was worth $2!! Rose was active in 42 games for the Wack and put up almost 15PPG while shooting 46.5% and 38.7 and his ATO was 2.740. Great year for Mr. Rose.
Bust of the Year
It comes down to 2 aging veterans here – Rubio or Favors. I expected more from both of them. Favors AVERAGED 5 and 5 with 1 block. I expected more. Rubio, despite Minny being without D-Lo for long stretches only shot 39/30 while averaging 8ppg was also disappointing. Take your pick gents.
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