How It Went Down

By now the fantasy football season is about half way complete, if you don't included the playoffs. This is a very important aspect to keep in mind, especially if you're record is worse than 3-3. Now, before I go any further, some of you readers who are still coming to this page is probably asking yourselves where the $#@! has he been these two months? Posting out of no where when it's about to be week 7? Well, to be honest, I was about to give up on writing and finish up my biology degree. But something weird happened. Apparently some of you guys like my blog and sent me e-mails about returning. Thanks for that. Secondly, I had to write a paper for my Psychology class and it was so seamless, so easy, so... it just flowed. It took me like 15 minutes to crank out 1000 words. It put a smile on myself. Plus, even though I hadn't been taking fantasy football as seriously as I should have, I did something for the first time, and I had to share.

For the first time, I got my feet wet and tried daily fantasy sports. To be more specific, I tried FanDuel for the first time. I was a little skeptical about the whole daily fantasy sports situation from the jump, even though I had heard about it a few years ago. The reasons being is for one I didn't like the salary cap game. I had played it a few times back in the early 2000s but not in a daily fantasy format. Secondly, I didn't want to get caught up in losing money playing daily fantasy. For a long time I had felt that Daily Fantasy was kind of like playing the lotto or something, or entering into Publisher's Clearinghouse or something like that. Even though it had always been in the back of my mind to do it, I let it slip by for a while. This year however, it was very difficult to pass up. FanDuel and Draft Kings both upped their marketing efforts this season. Every commercial is either for FanDuel or Draft Kings. Not to mention, I had some peer pressure too. So I decided to give it a go. For my first week, I sucked dramatically, but now that I got my feet wet and I have an idea of what I winning team looks like, I've become even more intrigued. I entered at the last minute, but this week I'm going to make sure I do a little more research so next week hopefully I can win something.

Speaking of research, that's something I definitely haven't been doing. Usually just like everyone else, I'm on different websites, watching or listening to different fantasy football podcasts/shows, reading Matthew Berry's Love/Hate column, downloading apps and all kinds of things to make sure my lineups are good for the upcoming week. I've glanced at Berry's column a couple of times this season, but mainly for entertainment as I've developed a habit of not paying attention to these so-called experts. Apparently, I'm no expert either, so I should start doing a little more research on a weekly basis... not only for informational purposes, but also to network with other fantasy football people. There's so many though, including this blog, to choose from. I'll probably stick with the mainstream sites such as ESPN, Yahoo and NFL.com, but if any of you who are still reading have any good links feel free to let me know.

I usually talk about some teams that I'm currently running and while I do intend to continue doing so, I won't cover every league. Just Roughing the Picker and the other one... the one with my friends from Dillard whose league name I can't recall... oh yeah, it's Coast2Coast Ballers. Anyhoo, In Roughing the Picker this week, I had a fabulous trade set up to receive Peyton Manning and send over Brandon Marshall and Latavius Murray. Now, I know Manning hasn't been "Rocket Laser Arm" this week, but I believed that when it cam down to it, and Denver was ever behind, it would be Peyton Time. That hasn't happened yet and this could be the reason why my peers decided to veto the trade. No one has come clean and admitted they were the ones who vetoed the trade, but they way I see it, it may have looked like I was giving up too much for a declining Manning. However, I feel I was getting the better of the trade because regardless Manning is still Peyton Manning, top 5 quarterback in the league. Plus, even though Marshall has been consistent, Murray has not, so I thought it was a fair enough trade. When the trade was vetoed Saturday night, it threw me off because Manning was supposed to be on my team by the 12:01 a.m. Sunday morning. The trade was vetoed, and I ended up having to pick up Colin Kaepernick. The Kaepernick pick actually worked out, but I still ended up losing by 5 freaking points.

The other league Coast2Coast Ballers, I'm in a 3-way tie for third place. This league is funny because I started off 4-0. A couple of weeks ago my Samsung Note 3 was stolen and this shut down my whole operation. I rely on my Note 3 for everything, including hotspot as I do not pay for internet service in my home. Without my Note 3 I was helpless... well not totally because I could always jump on when at work, but at work I'm unbelievably busy working the graveyard shift. I'm not trying to use this as an excuse, but things haven't been right ever since. Mr. Hindsman, my fantasy football rival, made a comment about me going on a serious losing streak, and I hate to say it but he might be right. I've lost the last two weeks putting me at 4-2. The problem? I think it's I have too many Green Bay Packers on my squad. I got Rodgers, Lacy, Cobb, and Richard Rodgers who I should've benched this past week. In fact, everyone except for Rodgers could've been benched. Cobb isn't taking advantage of Jordy Nelson being injured, and Lacy is injured himself. I'll make some adjustments, but these studs are turning in duds early on in the season. The Packers have a bye this coming week, but I'm going to have to figure out what to do with these dudes. Richard Rodgers is most likely gone, but I'll most likely hang on to Cobb and Lacy... for now.

Fantasy Football Drafting Season

The first NFL Preseason game is less than a week away, finally. Fantasy Football is upon us once again, finally. PhantasySteez is about to get more interesting, finally. Sometime this month, PhantasySteez turns two years old. To be honest I have ambivalent feelings about this two year anniversary if that's what you want to call it. While I have enjoyed writing about fantasy sports, the "business side" of running a blog is bananas with all that SEO marketing terminology and ranking. Also, I noticed that my enthusiasm for writing about fantasy sports fades a little during basketball season and almost completely during baseball season. I wrote about how fantasy football is the most popular of the three major sports last year around this time, and that is probably the most vague yet accurately true post that applies to me personally. I have seen an increase of material on the other two fantasy sports, especially from a Daily Fantasy point of view. However, personally I enjoy writing about fantasy football more than fantasy baseball and basketball, even though I like to play all three fantasy games.

With that said, I have already drafted two teams for this fantasy football season. I started out with a mock draft but that was the first and last mock draft I've done this season. I wrote a post about why I prefer to just draft a real team over doing mock drafts (this was actually the first post on this blog). This hasn't changed my in my views and as my friend Victor realized yesterday, real drafts are way more fun than mock drafts. When you do mock drafts, you know it's not real and it's like you're just waiting for it to be over with. With real drafts, it's more serious and there's a little more competitive banter. You know you're going to be jarring with 9 other guys for the next four months, so there's a little more conversation, trash talking, and competitive spirit in real drafts. It's even better in person, but we'll get to that later after I have my draft for Roughing the Picker.

Later on this week, I'm going to get into player rankings and all that other good stuff (we usually don't do that at PhantasySteez, but change is good). But before I get into all that does anyone even pay attention to preseason rankings? Of course they do, but how does preseason rankings dictate the way you're going to draft? Depending on what type of player you are, you're living by preseason rankings, you're drafting your favorite players, or you're going against the grain of what all these expert are saying and just drafting the players you want. After completing two drafts, and trust me I know that's not a lot, I would say all three of these drafting traits play a big role in the outcome of your draft. I'm sure it's this is not the case for everyone, but for a majority of people I'm sure an average draft strategy sounds something like this:

You spend a reasonable amount of time reading magazines and looking at websites where there are player rankings. The rankings from these various sources may slightly differ, but for the most part these lists are damn near identical. As you study these rankings you're looking to see where your favorite players or players who did well last season are ranked. Afterwards depending on what you see, you're like "these guys don't know what they're talking about," and you decide you're going to do the exact opposite of whatever those guys are suggesting. At the end of the day you pretty much have a mental picture of what you want your team to look like.

After you've daydreamed your ideal squad, the next thing you're usually worried about is the draft order. Most people, including myself, have nightmares about what position they will have in the draft. Naturally, you want to have the number one pick, but nine times out of ten you won't get that pick. It is widely believed that you want the first or last position because you with the first pick you can get the best player available and with both first and tenth picks you will have two consecutive picks which can be used to a major advantage. Some prefer the middle of the pack where your picks come a little quicker, but some such as myself hate this position. This year it's become more apparent that no matter which position I get, my team seems to look somewhat identical. This goes back to the me having a mental picture of what I want my team to look like. No matter where I drafted, be it 3rd or 6th respectively, I still managed to get either the players I wanted or someone close to that player. Of course some jerk took a few picks that I wanted, but when you compare my two teams, the core of my squads are very similar. No matter where you draft, you already have a preconceived thought of how you want to put together your team and there's a good chance you're not going to deviate from the strategy (unless you've had too much to drink during the draft).

Similar teams, but one squad has more players

In the end, it's important to make sure you regardless of whatever strategy you employ in the draft you get a team that you are satisfied with. It's also important that regardless of the outcome of your draft you own up to your picks and not try to blame your weak squad on someone else. It kind of ruins the game when you have those cry babies who want to blame their fantasy blunders on advice they took from fantasy experts. No one is holding a gun to your head and telling you to draft DeAngelo Williams or anyone else. It's your decision, and that's alone is what's going to make your fantasy football season your own unique experience. As always, send me a line on Twitter @donofalldons. 

Reflections of Fantasy Baseball Thus Far...

I've been asked by several people if I was playing fantasy baseball this season. Most people think I've kind of abandoned my teams because I haven't really been discussing it too much. Truth is I've been spending a lot of time playing fantasy baseball this year than I have in years previous. I've been spending more time making sure my players are in the correct lineup and very active in free agency and the trade market. In fact, this has probably been the most active I've been playing fantasy baseball than ever and I must say it's truly because of the team I co-manage with my boy Victor. Out of my four leagues, I have to monitor this league differently because of the way the league its set up. The scoring settings in this league is crazy, so I've had to adjust and make some serious changes to the team. This has made fantasy baseball a lot more interesting than in previous years also.

With my other three teams, I've kept up with them but only because of my team in the league South Side Champs. This league is a points league but the point system highly favors the pitching. Initially I didn't realize how the scoring system would impact the game and I didn't consider this when I was drafting my players either. Originally, my team was a offensive juggernaut with a supporting pitching squad, but I found this formula was not working. In this particular league, the points are set up in the pitcher's favor. You get a point for every inning pitched and two points for strike outs. On the flip side if a batter strikes out it's negative one point. At first I didn't think it had much impact, but I noticed we were always playing catch up trying to come from behind at the end of the week. No matter how may batters performed it seemed like it was extremely difficult for my offensive players to score over 5 points a game. The average points scored on offense was like 2 points a game, and I'm being nice with that statistic. Meanwhile, the starting pitching was averaging about 30-40 points a game.

After talking with Victor, we decided that we needed to make some serious changes. We were 2-4 and the competitive fantasy spirit inside of us could not accept such a disappointing display of fantasy gamesmanship. I started to look at other teams with winning records and one thing stood out to me. These teams had only one batter, but three or four pitchers on the bench. Our bench was opposite having three or four batters and maybe one or two pitchers on the bench. It was then that I realized where we were going wrong. Of course you would want more pitchers on the bench than batters because pitchers score more points and the more pitchers you have the more points you can potentially earn, especially since starting pitchers don't play everyday which makes it easier to rotate you bench. After sharing this with Victor, we decided that we would work free agency. This worked to a certain extent, and that's mainly a contrast of playing styles between Victor and myself. Victor gets his fantasy kicks from finding rookies who get his first start and dominates. He does this in fantasy football and tried it in our league, but this often came back to bite us in the ass as most of the times these rookies gave up like five homeruns and got us negative points for their first start.

We did get a couple of okay pitchers from free agency like Ubaldo Jimenez, Dan Haren, and just as recently as yesterday Mike Pelfrey, but I felt like we still needed someone who will get us those strikeouts on a consistent basis. I felt like our immaculate offensive players should be able to get us an ace of a pitcher via trade if it was packaged nicely, so I started looking for suitable trades. I listed some pitchers who I liked and because I'm weird, I decided to pursue them in alphabetical order. The first pitcher on the list was Madison Bumgarner who was owned by the leader of the league. Nornally, I don't make trade proposals to the league leader but going back on my theory that our offensive player should be able to land us an ace, I presented him with Kolten Wong and Alex Rodriguez for Bumgarner. It took the guy a few hours before he responded with a counter trade that I'm still kind of lost on where it came from, but it's better than the original offer I presented. He offered us Bumganer, Julio Tehran and Kole Calhoun for Jose Bautista and Johnny Cueto. It was like a scenario out of the Godfather, it was an offer we couldn't refuse. The cold part about the trade was it took three days for the trade to be completed and I got a start out of Cueto before he left and I got a start from Bumgarner and Tehran after the trade.

Sluts Mayweather and Fantasy Baseball

This my first post as a 33 year old. That's really not important, just thought I'd throw that out there. Throughout my busy schedule, I find time to play fantasy baseball. I wanted to get into some of that Daily Fantasy Baseball action, but just haven't had the time for it so I've stuck with the traditional Yahoo platform. Most of the time I forget to do my lineups or I forget to check back for any players who got scratched before the official lineup was turned in, so I miss out on a lot of points. This was definitely the case this past week as I trailed most of the week against this guy in this league I'm in where there are a lot of custom settings which you can take advantage of if you strategize and execute at the right moment.

As I said earlier, I usually forget to change my lineups on a daily basis. Usually by the time I think about it, most of the games are already played and I have guys in my lineups who didn't play and guys on my bench who did play. This past Sunday in this league I was 1-2 and I had been determined not to go down to 1-3. I had decided that I was going to try to work free agency and possibly even put together some kind of trade, but I've been so occupied lately all I've had time for is to change my lineup. Crazier part is in this particular league, my team is co-managed by my boy Victor, but for some strange reason he's busier than me these days.

This past week we had been trailing against the opponent all week, but we were slowly creeping back as I had done a much better job with the lineups in the latter part of the week. I was checking the lineup Sunday morning and I realized that we had come within single digits of the lead and I had a feeling that we had a chance to be on top by the end of the day. My plan was to pick up a pitcher that was starting that day since I had three bum pitchers who were hurting the squad. The problem was I was very indecisive on who to add. I waited a few hours, which was longer than I should've, and all the available pitchers who were starting had already played. I was left with Joe Kelly and Adam Warren. I knew Joe Kelly was kind of underperforming so far, but I had never even heard of Warren, so I went with Kelly. I added him an hour before his game started, and here's where the beef comes in.

When I play fantasy football, my boy Victor and I often refer to the term slut or slutting when it comes to how you pick up a player from the free agency. This move I made was a prime example slutting for the victory. This league is set up for same day pick up, meaning if I add a guy today he's on my team today, not tomorrow like in most standard leagues. My opponent thought he had the victory in hand because I was out of players and he still had Brian McCann to play, but I used my slut move and added Kelly. This pissed him off and by the end of the day I had come back and won the match by less than a point.

In this situation though, he didn't get slutted, he got Mayweathered. He got out played by a better fantasy baseball player. I was able to take advantage of a rule that most of the other players have probably overlooked or didn't realize what kind of effect that rule can have on your matchup. I found a way to win, and he got bullsh... Mayweathered. If you catch my drift. Funny thing about it, Joe Kelly sucked balls Sunday night and only got me a whopping -0.33 points, so even if I hadn't of  made the slut move, the guy still would've lost.

Fantasy Baseball:

I want to start off by first congratulating my good friend +Stephanie Smallsen who won my NCAA bracket group. She had the audacity to pick Duke over Kentucky and it paid off. Who would've thought Kentucky wouldn't even make it to the championship round? Steph's friend Dayna did, and she came in second. I'm not buying into the whole Canadian girls dominated my group, but at the same time, congratulations. I'm going to come through on my part of the bet and hook up Lil' Smallsen... I might cop this weekend, if not, definitely by next weekend.

It comes in pink too...

Now, on to the PhantasySteez. Fantasy Baseball is in full effect and this year already has it's little intricacies that is making me feel some kind of way good and bad. First of all, is it me, or did fantasy basketball end the same day fantasy baseball started? I know I was in the last day of the fantasy basketball championship game on Sunday, I also was starting Jon Lester and Anthony Rizzo on the first night of fantasy baseball. How ironic, yet how convenient. Last year I remember the two seasons overlapping each other and and I really didn't pay too much attention to my fantasy baseball teams until after fantasy basketball was completely done. This year, the transition was almost seamless and I'm fully locked into fantasy baseball at the beginning. I had thought that the fantasy basketball playoffs started early, but this way I can turn all my attention to fantasy baseball, which is a good thing since I have a problem changing my lineup on a daily basis.

I joined four different leagues in which I participated in three of the drafts. The one draft I didn't participate in was due to the fact that the ESPN Fantasy Baseball App does not allow you to draft using the app. I'm a mobile device guy, so drafting through the app would've been super ideal for me, but because of this I decided to only have the one team that I had to auto pick on the ESPN format. The other three teams are on Yahoo where I was able to draft all my teams using the app. Towards the end of one draft, I had posted a message in the chat room with the web address for this blog and instantly someone replies, "omg, why do we care." Now, was I wrong for the shameless plug for my website? Better yet was I wrong for the response I gave? Either way, I can't wait until I play this guy so I can show him what's really good with that phantasy steez.

This season only one of my leagues is a stat category league. The other four, including the one ESPN league, are points leagues. This format intrigued me because it's the standard format used in fantasy football and I thought it would be a good way to get my boy Victor more involved in fantasy baseball. What is screwing up my whole little experiment and grinding my gears about this format, and really about the stat category format too, is offensive production. Even though I did look at the scoring system for these leagues, I didn't take into consideration how it was set up. Most of my leagues are set up similar with some differences, but it what's killing my offensive production are strikeouts. Naturally if you don't get hits you don't get any points, but in these leagues you get -1 point for a strike out. If a player goes 0/4 and has 2 strikeouts, that's -2 points. So far this early in the season, a good number of my guys are going 0/4 or 1/4 but are getting more strikeouts than hits.

On the flip side, the pitching situation is just as crazy because you get -1 point for every earned run. Luckily this hasn't really hit me because these leagues seem to favor pitching. For example, in one of my leagues you get 3 points for every inning pitched and 8 points for a save, but you don't get any points for at bats. In another league you get 10 points for wins and no hitters, but the only offensive category you get 10 points for is grand slams. Any team would have a better chance of scoring a win than scoring a grand slam. How does this balance out?

Nonetheless, I like the teams that I drafted. Most of my teams are balanced, but the team I'm sharing with Victor is deep offensively and has a sleeper pitching staff. It's going to interesting to see how this season plays out.

SportsTalk

This past Sunday in San Francisco, actually it was in Santa Clara, WrestleMania 31 was held at the Levi's Stadium. I haven't watched wrestling since I was 17 so I didn't know anything about the event until yesterday when everyone on my Twitter timeline were tweeting about how this was perhaps one of the best WrestleMania events in a long time. Technology today is proof that you don't necessarily be at an event to experience how awesome it is, as Twitter is still on fire about WrestleMania. Even though I no longer watch wrestling, if I had the opportunity to go to a wrestling event it would be WrestleMania. WrestleMania is like the Super Bowl of wrestling, it's the most pinnacle event in wrestling. It's a strategically planned and produced wrestling venue that has generated legends in wrestling and has elevated the sport to it's current status over the last 31 years. This year didn't disappoint we exciting matchups, a pretty good performance from Kid Ink, and a special appearance from Rhonda Rousey. I wasn't a Rousey fan until Twitter blew up about the Vegeta t-shirt she was wearing. In my opinion, any woman who is up on game on that Dragonball Z steez is marriage material. It was epic to have her there with the Rock, Triple H, and Stephanie McMahon, even though when I first heard about the situation, I was a little worried for Stephanie. Thought she was gonna be hospitalized or something.

Over 9000!!

The NCAA tournament has also been epic this year. The Final Four starts on Saturday and for the first time since 2008, three #1 seeds have made it this far. Kentucky is still alive and are two games away from taking it all and going undefeated. They almost lost on Saturday though to a tough Notre Dame team who actually made it a very interesting and close game. Notre Dame lead most of the second half, but Kentucky shut them down defensively down the stretch for the victory. Duke and Wisconsin advanced also, but the surprise team is Michigan State. Tom Izzo has somehow gotten his #7 seeded team one step closer to the National Championship and what makes it so interesting is that he always seem to do it when his team isn't highly seeded. This year they're #7 and they have a tough matchup against Duke. If anyone is going to beat Kentucky (which I highly doubt), it'll probably be Duke. Coach K's squad is solid, as is all four teams in the Final Four, but Duke's team looks to be more of an all around team to challenge Kentucky than the other two teams, Wisconsin and Michigan State. Wisconsin has a good team with probably the best player in Men's College Basketball, but Kentucky has the best team. It'll be a good game between Kentucky and Wisconsin, and the Michigan State/Duke game will be good also, but in the end, I'm still sticking with Kentucky.

Baseball season starts on Sunday and there's a few interesting things going on this preseason. Alex Rodriguez is back from suspension and it looks like after not playing in about a year and a half, he's going to come back to be the everyday DH hitter. The DH stands for designated hitter and this player only bats and does not play offense. This player usually hits for the pitcher who does not bat, and this position is only in the American league. The national league does not use a DH hitter. Many people had questioned whether A-Rod would come back to be a productive player, but it appears that he has exceeded Spring Training expectations and will be in the daily lineup when the season opens.

Sidebar: This segment started as a suggestion and at first I was going to name it SportsSteez GT in order to give some credit to the person who suggested it, +G. T. Niña . During writing this post SportsTalk came to mind, because that's basically all I'm doing, and I thought it's more simple than SportsSteez. This could be changed or modified, depending on how many SportsTalk segments there are out there on the world wide web.

The NCAA Tournament Brackets: The Greatest Fantasy Game of Them All!!!

Over the past two weeks, I've been majorly distracted by the NCAA Tournament. All I've been doing is watching college hoops, and the weird part about it is that I have actually stayed awake during these games because usually I fall asleep watching TV. I haven't even made any progress on the new SportsSteez GT segment (Spoiler Alert) mainly because along with watching these games I've been caught up in my bracket. I'm not winning my group, but I'm tied with my friend Stephanie who I have a bet with, so that's all I'm really worried about.

I was talking to my boy Victor (who is also in my group but he's not doing too well) when I had an interesting thought about the whole bracket situation. I asked Victor, "Could filling out brackets be one of the greatest fantasy games of all time?" It didn't take him long to agree, but he asked me if filling out a bracket could even be considered a fantasy game. I figure why not, it's basically the same concept as all fantasy sports with the exception of you're picking teams instead of players. You pick who you think is going to advance just as you would pick who's going to start in your lineup in the other fantasy sports. In most online platforms, you get points when the team you picked advances, just like you get points when your player scores a touchdown, hits a homerun, or drains a three pointer. So why wouldn't we consider the brackets as a fantasy sport?

Filling out brackets also provides us with the same extracurricular fun that comes along with fantasy sports. There is usually some kind of bet or pot that is involved with fantasy sports. Whether it's an office pool or a group of friends that came together for the group, usually money or some other attractive prize is on the line. Plus, bragging rights is always up for grabs in fantasy sports and the brackets are no different. We all know whoever wins the your bracket group is going to be talking major trash until next March. Also, when you're in a group with other people, you're likely to watch the games and/or interact more with those people in your group about the game just like in the other fantasy sports. I know this to be especially true in fantasy football where many groups get together to watch NFL games.

I believe there are multiple reasons why the brackets should be considered one of the greatest fantasy sports of all time. Starting with the length of the games. In most fantasy sports, your fantasy season is going to last the whole regular reason of the respective sports. In most cases, you're talking about 16 to 36 weeks depending on if you're playing fantasy football, baseball, or basketball. The NCAA tournament lasts for about three to four weeks, so you really don't have time to get cute. Actually, you can get cute all you want when you're picking your teams, but once the tournament starts, you're stuck with your picks. When the tournament starts you can't change your picks like in other fantasy sports where you can edit your roster through free agency or make trades. Your picks are truly your picks and your bracket lives or dies with those picks.

Strategizing for the brackets is definitely one of the reasons why filling out brackets is so intense. Many people haven't watched a lick of college basketball all season and are just picking teams they are familiar with. Some people have bizarre methods of filling out their brackets such as picking teams whose team colors are blue and white, or random selection. There aren't major publications or draft kits floating around where so called experts are suggesting who to pick. There are sports reporters and so called bracketologists, but they'll be the first to tell you that anything can happen in the tournament. You always have to look for upsets because these upsets will bust your bracket so quick. Many people including myself will tell you one of the best ways to strategize for the brackets is to watch and pay attention to the conference tournaments that goes on right before the big dance. Watching these games are a good way to see which teams are hot and also have a good momentum going into the tournament.

So now let's imagine (and in some instances remember as this scenario has probably happened to most of us) that you just filled out your bracket, it's the end of the first weekend and you're feeling absolutely overwhelmed by your bracket. Some of your picks lost and you're thinking "I knew I should've picked UCLA." Then you realize that you can't pick UCLA for the next round because your picks are locked for the whole tournament. You start panicking because you realize your bracket is completely screwed and there's nothing you can do about it.  However, this weekend isn't the end of the game as the game lasts for the whole tournament. So you're watching and waiting week after week, hoping your remaining picks can pull out a victory. Yeah, I think filling out brackets should definitely be considered the greatest fantasy game of them all.

Fantasy Basketball Playoffs

The Fantasy Basketball Playoffs started last week and the reason why I'm just now getting to it is because all my teams had byes last week. One of my three teams didn't even make it to the playoffs. I was off two games from sixth place. I guess I'll play in the consolation bracket, but my other two teams are on fire. Even though these should be easy victories, anything can happen on that PhantasySteez.

The two teams I have that made the playoffs both came from leagues that I was invited to by friends. In my boy Big Mike's league, I finished the season in first and had a bye last week and in Stephanie's league I finished second with a bye last week. In Mike's league, a couple of months ago I traded him Kyrie Irvin and Kenneth Faried for James Harden and Jonas Valanciunas. Since the trade I moved up from fourth to first. I won Mike's fantasy football league, and I'm looking to win his basketball league after coming in second last year. Weird part about this league though, Mike has two teams, and they're both in the playoffs.

 In Steph's league, I've been stuck in 2nd since December and whoever it is that is in first has held on to the top spot since the season started. I find this interesting because of two things. First, there are only six teams in the league. When Steph created the league, she invited enough people to have ten teams, but not everyone accepted the invitation, probably because most people are only used to playing fantasy football. Secondly, of the six teams, I think only three players are actually participating. I know this because the transaction list is hella low, there's been no trades, and free agency is crazily stocked with key players who can get picked up at will. Regardless though, I can't catch this dude who is first place. Looks like I'm going to have to take him out eventually, if I can get past whoever I have to play this coming week. I don't have any master plan or anything, I'm just not going to get cute with it.

I wrote a post during the fantasy football playoffs about not getting cute with your lineups during the playoffs, and the same principle applies here. Trade deadlines should all be passed and by now all the sleepers have awaken and most likely are owned by other players in your league. I honestly feel like unless someone is coming back from injury, there really isn't much need to be looking for somebody to pick up from free agency (unless you're in a league like Stephanie's where there are key players available because the league is only six teams deep). The reason I think like this is because I've spent most of the season adjusting my team just as I'm sure most of you have also. At this point of the season I've been fortunate enough to have team that can produce in just about every stat category. Messing with that would be foolish. Even if someone gets injured, I have key players that can come off my bench. If you're in the playoffs, you should too.

March Madness

Unless you've been living under a rock, you all know that March Madness is in full effect and the brackets have been released. Aside from neglecting responsibilities such as work, school, and anything else you would normally occupy your day with to watch these intense college basketball games, many of you will be filling out your own brackets for various pools or groups or bets or whatever. Now, filling out brackets isn't necessarily considered a fantasy sport, but shouldn't it be? When you think about it, it's almost the same thing with the exception of you're picking teams instead of players. A lot of online platforms score your picks, just like you would get scored in a regular fantasy game. And in most cases, the winner is usually rewarded somehow and is talking major trash until next year. Sounds like a fantasy sport to me.

Brackets are interesting because they're so unpredictable, it's very difficult to predict a perfect bracket. The brackets are broken down into four tiers of 17 teams and the higher ranked teams play the lower ranked teams. The tournament is single elimination, so once you lose, you're out. There are always upsets and these games are the ones that can screw up anyone's bracket, including those experts who sometimes refer to themselves as bracketologists.  Most people usually put their marbles on the #5 vs. #12 game as that has been where the most upsets have occurred, but it can happen anywhere within the brackets. They usually call these underdog teams the "Cinderella Team," presumably because that team was invited to the "Big Dance," but wasn't expected to do anything.

This year most people including myself are running with Kentucky to take it all. The Wildcats are undefeated and victory should be certain, but for some reason it doesn't seem like it's guaranteed. I was watching SportsCenter this morning and my two dudes Stephen A. Smith and Skip Bayless were talking about how Kentucky should take it because there aren't any other teams who are on Kentucky's level. I agree, but keep in mind what I was talking about earlier with the whole upset situation. There aren't many teams who can pull off this kind of upset, and it won't really get interesting until the Final Four. Depending on how you pick your brackets, you probably have Kentucky, Wisconsin, Duke, Virginia, Arizona, Gonzaga, or maybe even Oklahoma going to the Final Four. All of these teams are very efficient on offense, but what separates Kentucky from this group is their immaculate defense. They have tall, athletic guys that has bought into the team concept of defend first. As we all know defense wins championships, but if anyone is going to take out Kentucky, it'll probably be one of these teams.

Even though I am a UCLA fan, I'm kind of confused how they got in. They did not have a great season but they got in as a #11 seed. They were on the bubble and in the Pac-12 tournament they lost to Arizona in the semifinals. For the first time ever, I did not pick UCLA to get out of the first round. With my luck, UCLA will be the one who scores the upset, but I doubt that. They're playing SMU and I have them going to Sweet Sixteen. Also, don't sleep on Northern Iowa. They have a #5 seed and even though that's considered a decent rank, should they win people are going to throw the Cinderella tag on them because they are not from a powerhouse conference. Interesting people got them going as far as the Final Four. I have them losing to Villanova in the Sweet Sixteen.

I'm not going to sit here and tell you who to pick because as I said earlier, the brackets are so unpredictable. That's why they call it March Madness, anything can happen at any moment. John Calipari, coach of Kentucky, is already talking about how they could lose, but it's very unlikely. I do know one thing, my friend +Stephanie Smallsen picked Duke to win. Good pick but not good enough my friend. Stephanie and I have our brackets on ESPN.com and we would love if you joined our group. Click this to join: LA to BC Worldwide. The password is champions.

SportsSteez

Around here at PhantasySteez, I like to say that PhantasySteez is getting better everyday. This post is prime example of that statement as this post is not about fantasy sports. No my friend, this post is about real sports. You see, I was proposed by one of my blogging buddies +G. T. Niña to create this segment so that she could appear to know what she's talking about when she goes to barbecues. We kind of tossed around ideas as to what to call it such as "Sports for Dummies" and "Sports for Girls," but when I shared the idea with some of my Facebook fans the ladies didn't really like the idea. While I took their opinion into consideration, I decided I would still do the segment. I haven't really decided on the title yet, but I dig the concept.

Today, March 15, 2015, is one of the most important days of the NCAA Men's Basketball Season... SELECTION SUNDAY. Selection Sunday is the day when the NCAA committee selects 68 teams that will play in the infamous March Madness Tournament, or The Big Dance (I could've swore it was 65 or 66 teams, but it's like the let more teams in every year). The winner of this tournament wins the coveted NCAA National Championship. This year is interesting because there is one team, Kentucky, who is going for a perfect 40-0 undefeated season. I think they have a good chance, I have been watching college basketball all week and they have the most complete team from top to bottom. Any team can be beaten though, and if any team has a chance I would say that it is probably Wisconsin, Arizona, or Duke. Also, don't sleep on Northern Iowa University and SMU. I haven't seen much of Northern Iowa, but SMU is solid and their coach Larry Brown is known as the Godfather of Basketball. Anyone who knows me on a personal level knows I can never count out a true Don. Sidebar, +Stephanie Smallsen my bracket is coming for YOU!!!!!!!!!

Hasn't this year's NFL Free Agency been crazy? Who would've thought DeMarco Murray would end up with the division rival Philadelphia Eagles? Who would've thought Patrick Willis would retire from the San Francisco 49ers? Who would've thought the 49ers would get Reggie Bush. Let's talk about that for a minute because I thought Bush would end up with my New England Patriots, but instead he's going going, back back, to CALI CALI. This kind of fits because I believe that Carlos Hyde will be the feature back but Reggie Bush will come in and do what Reggie Bush do; catch the ball out of the backfield and make people miss. This should be interesting as I can't recall the last time the Niners had such a player. This will definitely help out Colin Kaepernick as he won't have to make so many ill decisions, he could just dump the ball off the Bush!

In the NBA, it's all about Steph Curry. Curry is the man. He makes shooting 3s look like a walk in the park. His game on Saturday was prime example as it was his birthday and he was doing what Steph Curry does best; making it rain. Curry is probably going to win the MVP over LeBron James and James Harden aka The Beard. I've always been a low key Curry fan ever since he played his college hoops at Davidson. His shot has always been incredibly wet and he doesn't just shoot jump shots, he can take you to the hole too. It looks like this could be the year for the Golden State Warriors as long as Curry stays healthy. The have the best record in the West right now, but you never know because anything can happen in the wild wild west.

Well, that's enough for now, I gotta write another post soon before the NCAA tournament begins. This was fun though, but I gotta think of a legit name for this segment. I would love your feedback on this, I'm not scared of negative critism. Hit me up, comment on my blog, hit me up on Google+, or Twitter @donofalldons.

Absent Minded

Is this really the last week of the fantasy basketball regular season? I've been so absent minded as of recent it's been ridiculous. Not only did I neglect the fact that this is the last week of fantasy basketball, but I've also been forgetting to set my lineups until about 5:00 p.m. westcoast time (pacific time). I was tired. I spent all yesterday sleeping, watching college basketball and keeping up with the NFL free agency. So when I finally thought about looking at my teams, players I had on the bench were already playing. No bueno.

You know it's funny because those hardcore fantasy guys hates when players are absent minded on that Phantasysteez. I was in a fantasy basketball league where I was basically taking over a team that was deserted. When I inherited the team I went straight to work in free agency as half of the team was injured. After that I must've forgot about the team for like two days. I went in to find out that I was no longer managing that team. Now, what I ask is was it really necessary to drop me after two days of inactivity? Is fantasy sports really that serious? Or am I just absent minded?

If this is the last week of the fantasy basketball regular season, two of my three teams are good. The third team is in a must win situation. I'm in 7th place and I'm only one game behind the guy in 6th place. Right now I'm up in the stat categories 6-3 and the guy in 6th is 4-4 against his opponent. All of my bench players are injured; Tyreke Evans, Jamal Crawford and Paul George who I stashed. I got an outside chance to lock up that final playoff spot, but I should make a move, probably un-stash George. Kemba Walker is coming back today, he is available and I should consider picking him up, but who knows. I've been so absent minded lately, I might not get to it until Sunday.

Random Phantasy Thoughts

I heard Blake Griffin might be coming back this weekend and I'm wondering how that will affect the Clippers. They have been surprisingly good running behind CP3, DJ and Jamal Crawford. Unfortunately though, it looks like Spencer Hawes did not have the impact that many including myself had anticipated.

I'm part of this fantasy basketball group on Facebook and it's an okay group to be in, but at the same time it's kind of weird. I like it because it's a very active group, but most of the times the only thing the people are talking about is silly trade proposals. It makes me think, should a player really be that active when it comes to trading players? And I'm not talking like a handful of trades in a season, I'm talking about like 2-3 trades per week. In the fantasy basketball and  baseball, that's a lot of trades. I'll have to touch on this later...

The Chicago Bulls are looking like their headed towards a downward spiral. First the lose Rose, who lasted longer this season than he has in the previous two or three, and now Jimmy Butler is out for about six weeks. Who do you think you're picking up for in replacement. I'm not sure myself, I don't have either one of them on any of my squads. This week, I haven't done a lot of pick ups. But if I run into something, I'll expand on it later.

Lastly, just to touch back on the whole trading situation and weekly pickups, I do think that it's absurd to completely change the dynamics of your team with multiple trades every week. I also am very bad with weekly pickups in fantasy basketball and fantasy baseball because I like to ride with my players. I like to think I draft well so I just rotate my players. If someone is injured or is consistently inconsistent, then I'll look for a pick up or a trade, but for the most part, I roll with my picks. Am I wrong for this?

Impervious Moves...

...Well not really, but I thought it would be a good headline for a scheduled post. I decided to start doing scheduled weekly posts so that I can be more consistent. I'll probably do 2-3, and Impervious Moves will come out on Sundays or Mondays. Hopefully, I'll be able to integrate it with all three sports.

I was going through my fantasy basketball lineups this morning and I noticed that over the last two months I have pretty much been stuck in the same position in the standings for the last two months in all three of my leagues. This particular league I was looking at is a 12 man league so free agency is usually scarce but I felt it necessary to make some changes. The first thing I did was drop Kyle O'Quinn and if you really just paid attention to what I just wrote you probably have the same thought I had: Why did I have Kyle O'Quinn on the team? I remember picking him up when he was somewhat productive, but obviously that didn't last too long. In fantasy basketball, you can't sleep on players who aren't producing as I had done, yet I'm wondering why I'm just floating around in 7th place. So he got dropped, and I picked up James Johnson and Paul George. With James Johnson, he's an interesting guy to have because he's producing off the bench and the players on the Toronto Raptors have been playing like they're in tank mode or something. Paul George, I had to stash him. Even though there's no definitive return date, we have a pretty good idea that he'll return around mid to late March, just enough time to make a playoff push. Other than that, I was a little worried because I also have Eric Bledsoe and P.J. Tucker on the squad and I don't like the Suns' situation at guard, but I'll keep it like that for now.



In the next league, I had actually dropped from 2nd to 4th place. Blame it All-Star Weekend I suppose as I didn't know when Yahoo! started restarted the fantasy season. I want to say it was Thursday, but I know there were NBA games on Tuesday. Anyway, this squad is primarily made up of drafted studs and amazing pick ups. There was only one player on the squad I saw as problematic and that player is Rajon Rondo. Rondo was just okay in Boston, but since he got traded to the Dallas Mavericks he's kind of disappeared. First he was inconsistent, then he had that orbital injury thing, and now he's back to being inconsistent. I went to free agency and I saw that Khris Middleton was available. He may not be a huge name in the real NBA but anyone who's been playing fantasy basketball this season and is reading this should be as shocked as I was when I found out he was available. So I picked him up and to my surprise I had an open roster spot. I went back into free agency and I found Mo Williams. I've always been a fan of Williams and he's been balling lately since he got trade to the Charlotte Bobcats. He had a 50 point game last season and I think he should remain productivity throughout the rest of the season.

In the last league, the easiest of my three leagues, but I'm in second place, I knew I was going to find someone good. There's only six players in this league and I think only one other guy and myself are still playing. I've dropped players like Dwight Howard and Kevin Love in this league and nobody picked them up. I'm never worried about finding players, but I'm still in second place. My concern was Brandon Knight. I had just picked him up right before All Star Weekend but he was still with the Bucks. Now that he plays with the Suns it makes me feel some kind of way. I picked up Robert Covington who could end up pick up of the year if Hassan Whiteside doesn't get it. I told you I knew I was going to find someone good.

Some Fantasy Baseball Links

We all know about sites like ESPN and Yahoo where you can get a ton of info and news for fantasy baseball. These sites are all good, but I wanted to highlight some smaller sites and blogs that can also be a great source of information for fantasy baseball.

Smart Fantasy Baseball
I found this site to be interesting because it's all about stats and analytics. If you're into that kind of thing, this is the site for you. The guy who describes himself as a nerd  has a niche for using Microsoft Excel spreadsheets to calculate winning, standings gain points (whatever that is), how to create your own rankings, and all kinds of interesting nerdy fantasy stuff.

Dear Mr. Fantasy
I like this site because it's kinda what I want PhantasySteez to be one day. Only difference is it is fully dedicated to baseball. The site though is eye-pleasing with news, merchandise, cool pics, MLB news feed, and it has a PODCAST. That's what I want for PhantasySteez, a podcast.

Pro Fantasy Baseball
This site is a resourceful site that can help you prepare for the draft and keep an eye for upcoming players. This site also has a PODCAST (yeah, I'm going to mention that for every site that has one).

Fantasy CPR
This site covers most fantasy sports including college basketball and hockey. The pictures are cool and honestly, I think it's ran  by Sports Illustrated, but either way it's worth checking out.

Maybe one day I'll put these on it's own dedicated page, but maybe after I get links for all three sports. One thing for sure though, I want a podcast.

Draft Prep

Baseball season is next and mock drafts and leagues are opening up on most fantasy sports providers. Usually I don't do mock drafts but being that I needed to do more research for this season, I thought mock drafts could help with this. So I've participated in a couple of mock drafts and I've come up with some interesting observations.

My friend Victor has been reluctant to try fantasy baseball because he's somewhat confused on how the lineup works and most importantly, he's confused about the draft strategy, as am I. The thought of a fantasy football draft can seem daunting but it's not as intimidating once you've realized two things. First thing is to remember that just like in any fantasy sport, your primary goal is to put together a fantasy team that has a solid core plus a decent amount of productive role players which combined forms the ultimate team that will dominate throughout the fantasy season and playoffs with minimum maintenance. Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against picking up players from free agency throughout the season, but why when you can draft the potential studs for the season? Free agency is a weapon for players who are trying to climb position. Why climb position when you can draft a first place team right? Second thing to remember is unlike in most fantasy sports, the talent is abundant in fantasy baseball. Of course there are studs like Mike Trout and Clayton Kershaw, but there are so many talented players in the MLB that you'll find yourself in the later rounds of your draft and you'll still be able to find quality players instead of players you know you're just going to drop later on.

Okay so there's more than two things to remember and the last thing is the unique position that is the pitcher. I think pitching confuses a lot of people because of the way it's set up. In most leagues that I've played in there's one spot for every position except for outfielders and pitching. Naturally there are three positions for outfielders, but there are eight spots for pitchers and all eight of there spots are starting.  So it's important to keep a balance when drafting so you won't end up with strong hitters but weak pitchers, and vice versa. To make things more interesting, you want to make sure you have a good mix of starters and closers because starting pitches rarely gets you saves and closing pitchers rarely gets you wins.

As far as the draft though, it isn't as long as I had figured it would be. On average during these mock drafts I've spent about an hour completing the drafts, which isn't bad considering you're drafting nineteen starters plus five or six bench players. My strategy which I like the most is to alternate each pick between hitter and pitcher so that one pick I'm drafting a hitter and the next pick I'm drafting a pitcher. This is where draft position comes in play because this strategy definitely works better if you have one of the top two picks or the last two picks. In most fantasy sports these four spots are advantageous and the same is true in fantasy baseball. These spots allows you to alternate between hitter and pitcher and being that your picks are close, you have a greater chance to get the best two available players at those two positions. When the pick was closer to the middle the strategy didn't go as planned and some picks I was able to stick with the plan, but for the most part I ended up just picking the best player available. It didn't come out too bad, but if I had my preference like in most drafts, I want either the first two or the last two picks.

Some last little things to remember, every draft is different because I'm sure there's gonna be someone who is not taking the draft serious at all and is screwing it up for everyone. Also, outfielders are the wide receivers of fantasy baseball. There are many of them, so don't get the urge to draft your outfielders too early. #PhantasySteez

The Liebster Award

So the other day I was checking out the stats for PhantasySteez, you know things like how many visitors I have and things like that, when I notice that I had a new comment on my post. It was weird because no one ever leaves comments, usually they hit me up via Twitter or Google+ but this was an actual comment. It was from my good friend Stephanie Smallsen who authors Meet the Smallsens and she had nominated me for the Liebster Award. Naturally, I didn't know what the hell the Liebster Award was so I googled it and I found out it's an award for bloggers who have less than 200 followers. It's nothing that's recognized by like the bloggers association (if there is a such thing) or anything like that. In fact, I'm not even sure if you actually win anything. However it's a good way to expose PhantasySteez and link up with other bloggers, so I decided to participate.

The Liebster Award is directed towards blogs with smaller followings, as a way to help get their name out there in the blog world. One can only be nominated by a previous Liebster Nominee, and in order to be considered, a nominee's blog must have less than 200 followers. I heard that this has changed to 1,000 followers, but for the sake of whatever I'm going to nominate those with less than 200-1,000 followers, if that makes any sense.

11 Facts about Marcus Nickerson

1) I've lived somewhat of a nomadic lifestyle. I'm from Los Angeles and have lived almost everywhere in Los Angeles, and I've also lived in New Orleans, Oklahoma City, and Birmingham, Alabama.

2) I love sandwiches, burgers and Mexican food.

3) I have a half sister who is 10 weeks older than me. I met her for the first time in 2003.

4) Earlier in life, I wanted to be a scientist or a scientist.

5) I don't watch much T.V. unless it's sports or SportsCenter. Actually, I've been trying to watch a little more of it just for social purposes.

6) Speaking of sports, I love sports. Even soccer.

7) I like conversation and hanging out, but I really like hanging out and talking to myself. I'm like 70% introvert and 30% extrovert.

8) I don't have any tattoos or piercings because I'm scared of needles. I hate going to the doctors to get shots.

9) I went to Dillard University from 2000-2002 and studied Biology. These were some of the greatest times of my life.

10) I used to be a DJ and even though I wasn't that successful career wise, I was good and sometimes I still get calls for gigs.

11) Last but not least, I love music... all kinds of music. Hip-hop, R&B, Rock, EDM, Reggae, Classical, some Gospel, all kinds.

Questions from the person who nominated me, Stephanie

Stephanie and I in Santa Monica/Pacific Palisades

1. What inspired you to start a blog? I was hanging out with one of my partners in crime and we we're getting wasted. I took out my phone to check my fantasy football team and I thought to myself, I could start a blog about this. Starting a blog was something I had always wanted to do but I didn't have any idea of what to write about. So the next day when I sobered up I went straight to work on the blog and thus PhantasySteez was born.

 2. If you could be a journalist - what magazine/newspaper would you write for and what would you write about? I'm supposed to be finishing school majoring in journalism or English, but that's a different story for a different day. I digress, I would write for ESPN and I would probably be like a fantasy sports analyst or a contributor to ESPN the Magazine or the website.

 3. Would you rather do a post that was all words and no pictures, or all pictures and no words? It really doesn't matter to me. I know some people have blogs with no pictures because I guess it gets tracked easier by the web crawlers. My blog does have pictures, but I think I have one or two posts without pictures.

 4. If you could take a weekend, a week long and month long vacation - what 3 destinations would you visit? There's a lot of places I want to go, but if I had to pick three, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, and Amsterdam, Netherlands.

 5. Big city girl with a never ending job and socialite parties - or small town girl where you shop online and grow your own garden? Substituting girl with guy, I'm the city guy with a never ending job and socialite parties.

 6. What's your go-to for takeout/delivery when you're too lazy to cook? A hamburger joint, not fast food, but a real hamburger restaurant.

 7. Do you have a signature dish that you swear you're the best at? Nope. I can't say I'm into cooking, but I'm okay at it.

 8. What inspires you for your home décor choices - do you have a theme? I like plain, earthy and bold settings. Something that's not too fancy, but at the same time shows off that grown and sexy steez.

 9. What book should every child read, and what movie should every child watch? Every kids should read the Chronicles of Narnia, the original one. Every child should watch Kids, but probably not until they get in their early teens.

 10. What does your ideal Sunday look like? Church, sports, an alcoholic beverage, a plant to burn, and if applicable the person I'm dating.

 11. What blog post of yours were you most proud to write? All of them. I'm proud of all my posts because it gives me the motivation needed to continue doing whatever it is I do.

My nominees for the Liebster Award are...

Jordan Walker of Aphrodite+Kidd 

G.T. Nina of Nuestro Futuro: Dia y Noche

Anna-Maria Winter of On The Edge
David Stein of David's Place
Rakesh Reddy of Rakesh Reddy
Charlotte Brokenbow of Turropia
Pink Owl in Black of Pink Owl in Black
Justin Jackson of Smo Struggles
Nashia Anthony of Makeup and Beauty Mayhem
Louise Linddal Klarskov of My Creative Corner
Sydney Kuezner of Sydney's Life In Pixels

My Questions for the Nominees...

 1) When you were younger, what did you want to be when you grew up?

 2) What motivated you to start  your blog?

 3) Where do you see your blog in the next 2 years?

 4) Do you write your blog for fun, or are you deep in blogging with SEO and affiliate marketing and all that other blogging stuff?

 5) Does a bear shit in the woods and wipe his ass with a white rabbit?

 6) Do you like sports? If so, who's your favorite team(s)?

 7) If you could live anywhere in the world, where would it be?

8) What do you like to do for fun?

9) Have you ever written a guest post for someone else's blog?

10) Is it true that whatever happens in Vegas stays in Vegas?

11) What rhymes with orange?

Well, it's been a fun. Once again thank you Stephanie Smallsen for the nomination and the connect. I had to find people to nominate because amazingly I only have two friends who blog. If you've been nominated before,  I didn't mean to waste your time, but hey, could you share my blog with your peers? I'd really appreciate it. Good luck to all the nominees should you choose to accept.

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Fantasy Stud or Flavor of the Month?

One day Hassan Whiteside decided to he wanted to improve his NBA2K ratings and he had a monster game getting a triple-double with 12 blocks. Ever since he has been buzzing in the fantasy basketball community. I've heard mixed reviews and different impressions from players and experts, and for the most part the verdict on Whiteside is split down the middle with some believing he's this year's fantasy player of the year and others saying he's just the flavor of the month.



Surprisingly, this is Whiteside's third season in the NBA, but only his first with the Heat. He spent his previous two seasons with the Sacramento Kings where he was virtually irrelevant. This season he probably would've been irrelevant also, but when Chris Bosh got injured, Whiteside got more minutes. When Bosh came back a few weeks later, Erik Spoelstra did not reduce Whiteside's minutes and he has benefited from the time. He played 14 games from the time Bosh got injured up to but not including the triple-double game and during that span he averaged 6.8 rebounds per game and 2.4 blocks per games. The next four games from the triple-double game to now he's averaged 15.5 RPG and 4 BPG. With all 18 games together that puts he's averaging 8.7 RPG and 2.7 BPG since Bosh got injured. He's also averaged 20 minutes per game since Bosh first got injured. I don't take Whiteside as much of a scorer, but if needed he can also drop some close range buckets. Now keep in mind that these stats do not include the games before Bosh's injury where Whiteside was getting garbage minutes.


Numbers don't lie and by looking at these stats he's not about to blossom into Anthony
Davis no time soon. However, despite what some fantasy players and analysts are saying, I believe that Whiteside has some incredible upside from a PhantasySteez point of view. He may not be a top scorer but he isn't going to take many shots either, not to mention that the shots he do take will be high percentage shots. He only seems to be getting better with more game time and it shouldn't be long until he's averaging double digit rebounds. Especially in stat category leagues where it's essential to keep a balance team in all applicable categories, Whiteside could be that piece you need to improve some of your rankings.

Who You Should've Picked Up This Week

Even though injuries occur often in the NBA, some of these injuries can be for a few games, some for a few weeks, some for the rest of the season. There were a few significant season-ending injuries that occurred over the last week, and even though it's Thursday, here are some players who got injured and who you should've picked up or handcuffed to replace them.

The most notorious injury has to be the torn rotator cuff (shoulder) of Kobe Bryant. As we all know, Kobe has stayed injured since late 2013 when he tore his Achilles. He tried to come back last season only to play six games. This season it looked like he was going to survive the whole season with him sitting out multiple games in a row in a preservation effort. This still didn't work because he's out for the season. When I found out about this injury, I immediately went hunting for Nick Young, who was available. Swaggy P currently is injured with a sprained ankle, and most people will probably take his recent benching as a red flag. I think you should ignore these two factors because Young will definitely benefit with Kobe being out. Young will be the #1 option offensively and being that he usually comes off the bench and is the second leading scorer on the Lakers, with him starting he should be a must start in all leagues.

Obviously the Lakers will miss Kobe Bryant, almost as much as the Charlotte Hornets will miss Kemba Walker. They're saying that he'll be out 6-8 weeks, but if you do the math that puts him back in the game late March or early to mid April. I was having a discussion with a fantasy basketball group on Facebook and while some people are just going to stash him, many are looking for a good trade. Just like the Lakers, the Hornets are near the bottom of the standings, and just like Kobe, Kemba is the team's leading scorer. The only difference is that unlike the Lakers, the Hornets do have reliable scoring options other than Kemba. Brian Roberts is replacing Kemba and his production should increase, but I expect for either Michael Kidd-Gilchrist or Lance Stephenson to pick up the slack and take advantage of Kemba's absence.

Crazy part of these injuries is these guys are all the leading scorers of their respective teams, including this last guy, Brandon Jennings. Yes, Brandon Jennings is the leading scorer on the Detroit Pistons, who is also near the bottom of the standings. Jennings is out for the season with a torn Achilles and it looks like D.J. Augustin is replacing him. This has the potential to be the sleeper pick up of the season if this is the same D.J. Augustin that we saw last year when he played for the Chicago Bulls. If you recall, Augustin replaced Derrick Rose last year when he got hurt for the season. He excelled as Rose's replacement and could've won the sixth man award. The Pistons also have Jodie Meeks who could see an increase in minutes and production, but if Augustin can provided a spark like he did for the Bulls last season, then he should be the player who benefits the most and the player who should be added to your roster.

Why Not?

I've been pretty quiet on that fantasy basketball steez, but I've still been somewhat active. I was going to shut down PhantasySteez only because I had a little bump in the road with my website. So I had cancelled the service and I had thought this would also shut down my domain and the www.phantasysteez.com. However, it's been like three weeks and my site is still up. I even called up the company to confirm that my services had been cancelled, and they told me that it had been cancelled and should be down after the 22nd. Well, today is the 23rd and phantasysteez.com is alive and well.

Back to basketball. This year I have three teams. I'm not going to get in depth with every player I have on each team, but I feel like two of my teams are above average. The team I have in my homeboy Big Mike's league, I have a fairly decent squad that shouldn't be slept on. But the other day I was setting up my lineup up I was noticing that my team was unbalanced. I was heavy at guard with Stephen Curry, Damian Lillard, Dwyane Wade, Elfrid Payton, and Rajon Rondo, but I was also light at center with just Amir Johnson and Rudy Goebert eligible for the position.

I figured I could come up with some kind of way to get a center and maybe even a shooting guard for one or more of my point guards. Everyone in this league has been quiet all season, so I didn't have any insight of how everyone else in the league was thinking. I looked at Big Mike's team and I noticed he had Jonas Valanciunas. I had Valanciunas on my squad last year and even though he is underrated in my opinion, I felt like he could help balance out my team. I also noticed Big Mike had James Harden and I figured I could probably scoop up both if I was crafty enough.

I decided I would send him a trade offer which on paper looked insane but when you really sit down and look at it, it makes a lot of sense. I offered Big Mike Damian Lillard, Dwyane Wade, and  Rudy Gay for Jonas Valanciunas and James Harden. Even I had thought to myself how could you trade away three players for two? The answer is quite simple as I feel as if Lillard for Harden is fair and I also feel as if Valanciunas for Gay is legit.  Throw in Dwyane Wade and it makes the deal sweeter for him while I get what I want plus I also get rid of a player who is often injured or just not playing.

A few days had passed and I had forgotten that I had even sent over a trade proposal when yesterday I was checking my e-mail and I saw the message about my proposal being rejected. There was another e-mail with a counter offer which was very similar to the original offer but had Corey Brewer instead of James Harden. I quickly rejected the offer with a reply of "are you serious?" I got a message about an hour later which went something like this:

So this morning I ended up resending him the original trade which he most graciously accepted. The trade doesn't go through until Tuesday, so I'll finish up the week and start next week's with these guys and then I'll have the two players I wanted. I think I might need to make one or two more trades to complete my team. I also think I could've probably used Elfrid Payton in that deal instead of Damian Lillard. What do you think? Let me know. Hit me up on Twitter @donofalldons. Google+ +Marcus Nickerson.