|
It's that age old question, as old as time itself. Fine, perhaps not that long, but at least as long as intelligently and strategically designed head to head fantasy basketball teams have been around. I made the Finals in the GMTR readers league with a big ball strategy team. And who am I facing in the said finals? Nothing less than a pure small ball team. While the results of my matchup will not be an provide definitive resolution to the above mentioned debate; it has, at the very least, provided me with some insights that I felt I wanted to share with the many fantasy basketball fans out there, newcomer and hardcore alike.
The Small Ball Advantage 5-4
Small ball has an advantage over big ball strategy when it comes to head to head fantasy basketball. Assuming you're playing 9-category; small ball takes has an advantage in five versus big ball's edge in four. Big ball locks down FG%, Rebounds, Blocks, and more often than not Turnovers. Small guys tend to turn the ball over more. Small ball locks down Threes, Assists, Steals, FT% and Points. Yes, the guards and forwards inclined to be drafted by small ball teams do tend to score more.
And just in case you didn't know... Small ball wins ties. In the event of a tie, the team that wins the points category wins the tiebreaker.
Filling Up The Roster
Even if you just look at the spots you can fill on your roster with guys to lock down your targeted categories, small ball has the edge. Three guard slots, two forward slots (PF is excluded) and two util slots; that's a total of seven. Big ball, on the other hand, has two center slots, two forward slots (SF is excluded) and two utils; for a total of six.
Another thing to consider is that there are more small ball viable big men than there are small ball viable guards. Small ball has access to the likes Troy Murphy, Mehmet Okur, Andrea Bargnani, Al Harrington, Boris Diaw, Matt Bonner. That list expands if you have small ball PFs like Dirk, Gerald Wallace, Rashard Lewis. Big ball can grab Dwyane Wade, Monta Ellis, Rajon Rondo, Tony Parker.
To speak further about small ball, I thought it would be best if you heard from Nick Freilich, CP3 owner and team manager of "Skeeter/Obama 2012," my opponent. Interesting team name? Well his team is named after a street basketball legend named Skeeter Hammond, whom Nick made a short film about back in college. You can watch my worthy opponent's film making handiwork HERE. Anyway, he emailed me with a few words regarding his strategy.
Click Below to Read Further
Nick:
"Once I found out that I had the first pick, I knew I was grabbing CP3. With Chris Paul came enormous statistical advantages in assists and steals (we're talking 3.7 and 4.5 standard deviations from the norm respectively). Paul also gave me solid points and free throw percentage. His average three-point shooting could be easily appended with other players.
At that point, I decided to gun for 5 categories: steals, assists, 3s, points and FT %. This is a typical small-ball approach. However, I didn't just bias my picks toward small-ball; I ignored the other 4 categories entirely. I drafted as though TOs, FG%, rebounds and blocks didn't count. In a H2H league, I felt that so long as I could absolutely dominate the 5 small-ball categories, it simply didn't matter how terrible I was in the other ones. With this in mind, I drafted using a custom Basketball Monster projection where values were based solely on the 5 small-ball categories. So when I was at picks 24 and 25, and Steve Nash (11th overall based on the 5 small-ball cats) and Kevin Martin (3rd overall by the same measure) were still on the board, my choice was obvious. Granted, there was no guarantee that the projections on BM would be accurate, but I trusted they would be at least in the ballpark. This strategy I employed here was based on my favorite PITP post ever, "Draft Strategy: The First Bounce," in which you discussed locking down position stats and positions, giving as you own personal example of the "Double PG Bounce" the back-to-back drafting of Nash and Iverson. I simply took this approach to the extreme, and drafted from PG up to C in this fashion, naming my strategy "micro-ball."
The next rounds I landed Kevin Durant and Michael Redd (at this point I was aiming for guard-like players with forward eligibility). So after 5 rounds I had my PG, SG, G, SF and F spots filled, drafting solely based on projected 5-category projected rankings and my gut. Al Harrington was going to be a strong micro-ball center regardless of what team he was on, but his trade to the Knicks bumped his value considerably. Once I locked down a center, I went for the 'best available' micro-ball player and grabbed Peja. I figured he had one more decent season in him (turns out he had about half of one - thankfully I grabbed Rasual Butler when Peja went down). My other two major grabs were Zach Randolph and Andrew Bargnani (in the last round, no less). Bargnani, it turns out, is the perfect micro-ball center, and Zach was great to feed me some points and one steal a game.
This approach is basically the opposite of how I would draft a roto team, obviously, but H2H is all about being able to control categories from week to week. How did my strategy work during the season? I placed 5th during the regular season, was 13-8 in my H2H match ups, and was a combined 77-36-2 in the categories I aimed to dominate. Not too shabby, though I think I could have done better, especially in steals (9-12-2 was totally unacceptable).
If I had been drafting 12th, I would probably have grabbed Dwight Howard, punted TOs and FT%, and tried to go Jumbo-Ball. That said, I think micro-ball is easier to maintain, if only because the categories are easier to get off the waiver wire (esp. 3s and assists) than the big-ball categories are. (You might want to check this before posting it - I don't want to sound like a total idiot here). There is a glut of 2 guard-eligible players on the waiver wire whom you can insert in the utility spot to spike your 3s, and you can always find a Luke Ridnour or a Sebastian Telfair for assists if need be. (Or, you can do as I did during the last few days of the championship and insert the entire Golden State Warriors team into your starting lineup).
I will definitely be doing a 5-/6-category domination approach in the future, and I really enjoy small-ball as a fan, mainly because when your players screw up, it's okay! If you have Mike Conley Jr. and he's just chucking 3s, it doesn't matter if he misses 8 en route to making 3, because FG % doesn't matter. Same goes for watching Nash cough the ball up 7 times in a game where he also manages 14 assists. It's a pain-free lifestyle (that is, until Michael Redd blows his knee out). "
Well Nick was indeed spot on about it being easier to find small guy numbers lying around in the wires. So Nick, no you DON'T sound like an idiot at all.
So before this post ends up looking like a pure small ball pimpage post, we might as well address the elephant in the room. Does the Big Ball strategy actually stand a chance versus small ball?
Well I would like to think so. That's what I was going for in the first place. So, how?
Well in order to stand a chance, the big ball team needs to plain and simply try to steal away one of the cats that small ball has an inherent advantage in.
As a big ball strategist, your best bets would be to try to compete in the categories of points and/or steals; it's only in the rarest of occassions will your team stand a chance to win FT% or even treys.
My approach was to compete in steals and freethrow. If you are picky with your big men, FT% is a viable win. The guys on my team who shoot the most volume from the stripe are Dirk Nowitzki (my first pick), Paul Pierce (whom I traded my second pick, David West, for), and Yao Ming (my third pick). All of them shoot well from the line. I had the luxury of being able to grab Brook Lopez from the wires early in the season, yet another 80+ percent freethrow-shooting big man. My PG and G versus Skeeter was Mario Chalmers (for his steals) and Tony Parker, an obvious PG choice for big ball teams due to his more than respectable FG%. I knew from the onset that I didn't stand a chance to win points, because I was playing some low scoring guys like Mario, Al Horford, and Joel Przybilla.
I agree with Nick, that small ball is more low maintenance compared to big ball. I can really feel for all of those big ball teams that lost their Amares and Al Jeffersons this season. Losing a Michael Redd does seem to pale in comparison, once jusxtaposed eh? It was probably much easier for Team Skeeter/Obama to pick up the pieces.
Frankly, after all the dust has settled, I am inclined to go either small ball or a punt the points strat next season. Unless of course Fate steps in I land in that draft position sweet spot where Dwight Howard happens to land on my lap.
As I am editing this, getting it ready for publishing, I just found out that I did in fact win our matchup. Yes I am the GMTR readers league champ. I stole freethrow from the small ball team 82.2% versus his 80.6%, while barely keeping my lead in blocks 30-29 (I have Andrea Bargnani's 6-block night for making it so close). In the end, I owe my win largely in part to my first round pick, Dirk Nowitzki's 16-17 production the line the other night.
It was a close one. I would like to thank and congratulate Nick for a Finals match well played. Good game, man.
Conclusion
Even with Small Ball's inherent advantages, a Big Ball strat CAN win. It just takes a little bit more planning and patience.
Stay tuned folks for my year-end notes on selected players. Also keep hanging around as some of PitP's fans will get a chance to share their successes and woes over this season.
|
Subscribe to this comment's feed
Bloguin is the revolutionary blog network specifically focused on helping bloggers get the most out of their websites. We're currently working on building a large network of online communities and hope to expand our blogging coverage to include a wide range of topics. 
The Bloguin Network allows advertisers to promote their products and services to our ever-growing number of visitors. We offer both site-specific ad placements as well as the ability to run a network-wide campaign. If you're interested in working with Bloguin to meet your advertising needs, please contact us.
The Bloguin Network is always looking to expand. We're specifically looking for blogs in the sports, entertainment, and video games field, but are open to adding any type of quality site.. If you're a blogger and interested in joining our network, please fill out our application form.
The Bloguin Login gives you full access to everything our network has to offer. Your name and password will work for each and every one of our sites. Signing up is simple, and will allow you to post in all our forums, create member blogs, and access other cool features! What are you waiting for? Create an Account! 
I understand how categories work for roto, but I can't figure out why they are important for H2H. I would think you would want to draft the guys who will score the most points consistently week to week, since scoring will translate to the most fantasy points.