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.

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.

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.

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.

40 Days of Phantasy Silence Broken

That barber killed my hairline

The last time I posted in this blog, it was about 40 days ago. Well today is actually the 40th day, but you get the point I'm trying to put out there right? It's been a very interesting 40 days in real life and on that PhantasySteez. Trust me, it isn't that I've lacked content or anything like that. I had plenty of excitement with my fantasy basketball squads, fantasy baseball and NCAA brackets, which I didn't do because I turned my brackets in too late. It's more of I've completed a major transition in a lot of areas. One of my mottos is "I'm trying to make my next move my best move." Most people wouldn't understand as in most cases, your best move may be unconventional to others outside of the situation. I relocated, and I'm not talking about moving like around the corner or anything like that. I moved to the other side of the country, Sweet Home Alabama. Yeah, talk about a major transition. I've been here for a week and I'm still trying to get adjusted to living in Roll Tide/Auburn nation. I'm still trying to find a decent barber who won't massacre my hairline like the guy did in that picture of me. However, deep down inside I feel like in the long run and for many different reasons, this move will be the most beneficial for my personal goals and for that PhantasySteez.

As of today...

Over the last 40 days, the PhantasySteez has seen a lot of interesting action. Let's start with fantasy basketball. Today is the last day of the season in Yahoo Fantasy Basketball and to my surprise, both of my teams are playing for the championship. In my main league, The Syndicate, I'm playing against no other than All the KING'S Men. And just like all season, she is kicking my ass. One thing I must point out in this matchup is Kevin Durant and Russell Westbrook, both of who are on my team. The Oklahoma City Thunder didn't play much this week. In fact, their first game of the week wasn't until Thursday. They had three days off, and I couldn't get any production from Durant and Westbrook. Meanwhile, All the KING'S Men was just racking up points. If you remember, LeBron James is on All the KING'S Men and while the Thunder were resting up, the Miami Heat played Monday and Wednesday. Also, Dwyane Wade didn't play in any of those games which meant more production the LeBron. The Heat played in 4 games this week while the Thunder only played in 3. I can't forget to mention that the rest of my guys decided to just play average. I think my depth at point guard killed me though as my rotation seems to be stuck because I really couldn't make any interesting lineup changes. I'm just gonna chalk this one up as a lost and settle for second place.

At least it looks like my other random team is going to win the championship, unless something weird happens by the end of today. Honestly, I can't tell you much about this team. Jamal Crawford and Wade have been injured so I didn't really have to change my lineup much. One thing I can say is somewhere within these 40 days I picked up D.J. Augustin and he has been a pleasant surprise. I was about to lose last week when Augustin went off for 33 points. That helped my team come from behind and land a spot in the championship round. Should I win, I'll be content, but winning the Syndicate would've been much more satisfying.

Last, but definitely not least, baseball season started last week. Originally during the last 40 days I wanted to do a preseason write up and talk about draft strategy and all that good stuff. I got caught up with this transition and working and linking up with certain people and plotting and scheming on the low. I got probably 3 different drafts of fantasy baseball content, but they never got done. I did however manage to draft a fantasy baseball team but of course not without some minor discrepancies. I wanted to make sure I drafted my team instead of using the ever non popular auto draft. The problem was I really didn't know anything about how to draft a fantasy baseball team, who should go first, when to draft pitchers, which positions where more important, just to name a few. I tried to get some advice and cooperation from my good friend Vic, but I had to remind myself that Vic likes those sleeper picks and most of the time I don't really agree with his draft style. Also, he wasn't playing fantasy baseball because he says it's to much work as baseball players play just about everyday. I tried to argue with him that it would be just like football because when football season is in, he's constantly managing his team, every day every hour. Only difference is you play everyday instead of just Sundays. He didn't do buy it and suggested that I purchase a fantasy baseball magazine.

After studying this magazine for a couple of days, I felt like I was ready to draft my first team. Not thinking at the moment, I scheduled to draft at 10:30 p.m. If you know me, you know I'm usually in bed at 9, so by the time the draft started I was really tired. I had the number 5 pick and I lasted the first 5 rounds, after that it was a wrap and unfortunately, the remainder of my team was auto drafted.

The next day when I woke up and reviewed my half-drafted team, I really didn't know how I felt about the team. My first pick was the reigning NL MVP Andrew McCutchen. My next two picks were Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander, the first two pitchers I drafted. I didn't know, and I still don't know if this was a good move or a bad move being that they both play for the same team. At fourth and fifth I picked Adrian Gonzalez and Matt Carpenter respectively, then I crashed. The first thing I noticed was that while I was wide asleep, auto draft picked up Aroldis Chapman. Chapman is one of the top closers in the league, but as we all know he took a line drive to the dome during the preseason. He'll be out for a minute, but he is expected to return around late May, possibly in June. Luckily, I didn't have to drop him and I was able to put him on the DL list. As Vic suggested, I picked up Francisco "K-Rod" Rodriguez has gotten a save for me and has an ERA of 0.00 in 2 innings pitched. Trevor Rosenthal has been my main closer though with 2 saves, 3 strikeouts and a 0.00 ERA also. As far as my batters go, I can't really say much right now. Honestly, I don't know who some of these guys are like Leonys Martin, Domonic Brown, Wilson Ramos (who I already had to replace due to injury) and Kendrys Morales, but it looks like my team should be well-rounded as far as getting points in every stat category.

Overall, I think this major transition will result in a very positive way for PhantasySteez. It give me a chance to get PhantasySteez to a different level by having more access to information and having the ability to network with other fantasy players/gurus. I look forward to the opportunities that my current situation presents. I must admit, this fantasy baseball season is very interesting as far as keeping up with players and strategizing, but in the end we'll see how this fantasy baseball season goes.

All the King's Men

This week should bring about a good matchup in my fantasy basketball league, the Syndicate. It's #1 vs. #2 as this week my WestCoast Lakers takes on All the KING's Men. Last time I wrote about this matchup she was in first place and I was in second. During that week she had some key injuries and I was able to slip past her to take claim to first. This week I don't expect it to be that simple.

Her lineup is beasting in most matchups this season. I see she picked up Rajon Rondo who was on the free agency until about a week after he came back. To compliment Rondo she also has Damian Lillard, John Wall and Trey Burke. Those are just her point guards as she also has Klay Thompson, Andre Iguodala, Andre Drummond, Blake Griffen, Greg Monroe and David Lee. I don't know if this can be an advantage or a weakness, but she has several players who play for the same team with Thompson, Iggy and Lee playing for the Golden State Warrior and Drummond and Monroe both playing for the Detroit Pistons. To me though, the main ingredient, the determining factor in this matchup is LeBron James, who is on her squad. James didn't play yesterday with a broken nose. Yet, he seemed absolutely fine shooting one handed threes from the bench in his suit Sunday. I'm not sure what's the standard injury time for a broken nose, but I couldn't imagine that it would keep him out all week.

Between the two of us, we own the top two players of fantasy basketball with James being on her team and Kevin Durant being on my team. It's no wonder why the two of us are just crushing the competition as these two players have dominated all season and one will be crowned MVP of the NBA. But just like there's a little bit of "controversy" with James, something I will need to watch when it comes to Durant this week also. Russell Westbrook was injured and while he was out Durant took full advantage. Durant stepped his game up in every way and pretty much carried the team on his back. Westbrook came back last Thursday and everyone is wondering how Durant will perform now with Westbrook back. I don't think it'll affect Durant too much. Durant won't have to take as many shots, but he already makes almost everything. If it does negatively affect Durant, I'm not worried because I purposely stashed Westbrook on my bench while he was injured specifically for when I play All the KING's Men.

Speaking of all the king's men, I'm glad I didn't listen to some people and tried to trade Dwyane Wade. During the first half of the season Wade didn't play every game. He would sit a game or two and when he did play he had average games but not Dwyane Wade type games. Recently however, Wade has been playing has been back to normal looking flashy averaging 20 points and 8 assists a game over the last week. If you have him, keep him. He'll definitely be a factor when the fantasy playoffs roll around.

A Trade That Effects My Teams

The over hyped trade deadline has passed and while no major moves were made, there was one move in particular that could have impact on my fantasy teams. Spencer Hawes has been traded from the Philadelphia 76ers to the Cleveland Cavaliers. I was hoping we could get him to come to the Lakers, but I guess that was just wishful thinking. The reason why this is interesting to me is because I have him on both of my fantasy basketball teams. I wonder how this move will effect him on the Phantasy Steez.

In my first league, the Syndicate, I picked up Hawes after missing the draft and feeling like a needed to pick up a center. In my random league I ended up drafting Hawes as a back up center. Even though Hawes' stat line isn't that impressive, to my surprise he has been a pretty good all around player from a fantasy point of view. He's averaging 13 points and 8 rebounds a game. Where his fantasy values comes from is his field goal percentage and the fact that he can hit the 3.

Hawe's is joining a very interesting Cleveland Cavaliers team. The Cavs have been pretty active during the season trading away Andrew Bynum for Luol Deng, and now with a new general manager he was itching to make a move before the trade deadline. Also, word on the street is the working environment in Cleveland is not ideal. The Cavs have Kyrie Irving, Luol Deng, and Dion Waiters, just to name a few. Hawes could have an immediate impact on this squad, but then you have to wonder what will happen between him and Anderson Varejao.

Varejao is having one of his better seasons this year averaging almost 9 points a game and 10 rebounds. He's owned in about 74% of Yahoo leagues. Right now he's injured but when he comes back he will resume the starting responsibilities. This could hurt Hawe's value directly as he will be going from a starter to an off the bench guy, not getting the minutes he's used to getting on the 76ers. Best case scenario would be if Mike Brown figured out how to utilize both of them, maybe by moving Hawes or Varejao to power forward. I don't know how long Varejao is going to be out, but I'm going to  have to come up with a back up plan just in case.

All Star Break Moves

There isn't another NBA game until Tuesday, so that gave my guys about four off days. My team sure could use it because I got four dudes, Mike Conley, Russell Westbrook, Kevin Martin and Andrew Bogut who are injured right now. Of the four, Conley is on the Can't Cut List. I wouldn't think about dropping or trading Westbrook. I'm feeling 50-50 ish on picking up someone for Martin. When it comes to Bogut, he might be getting the axe this All Star Weekend.

Bogut has been dependable for the few weeks I've had him on the team. However, since I picked him up I've been waiting for him to get injured, which he has. One advantage for Bogut is he leads my team in rebounding, probably why I picked him up in the first place. Martin has been dependable most of the season.  He's fourth in 3 pointers made and second in free throws made on my team. The rest of his stats are mediocre.

When I looked at the free agency list, two names stuck out to me immediately, Kyle Lowry and Robin Lopez. Both Lowry and Lopez have been pleasant surprises this season. In my opinion, neither one of these players should be in free agency as Lowry has become somewhat of a top point guard in the East and Lopez looks better than ever on his new team the Portland Trail Blazers.

I decided that I would take a closer look at these "injuries" of Martin and Bogut. Martin is going to be out for a couple of weeks and I probably could get more productivity dropping Martin and picking up Lowry. Actually that last sentecne is an understatement. I will get more production picking up Lowry for Martin. On my social networking sites I asked Kyle Lowry or Kevin Martin. I didn't get any response on Twitter but on Google+ it was an unanimous decision Lowry over Martin. So now I have Lowry on the squad.  I'm still struggling with releasing Bogut, the leading rebounder on my time. The problem is I haven't gotten any recent injury updates on Bogut. Even though Robin Lopez's scoring has improved,  Bogut has nearly 150 more boards than Lopez. I guess I'll keep him on the team for now, but he could end up getting moved before the end of the week.

Morning Glory? Not Exactly

I woke up early this morning, a little earlier than usual. As I thought about everything that was going on in my life, I felt good and confident. I felt like writing, but about what? I got on the bus on my way to work and I checked on my fantasy basketball teams so I could change my line ups when I noticed I lost in both of my leagues yesterday. In my main league I'm still in first place but in my random league I've fallen to second place.

The lost in my random league isn't that significant. I had a slim margin between myself and the person in second place. I won my matchup as far as winning the majority of stat categories, but with me only winning 5-4 and the person ahead of me winning 6-2, he took a one game lead over me.

The lost that interests me the most is the lost in The Syndicate. This lost was significant for two reasons. First, it is only my second lost of the season. Secondly, the lost was to one of the better players in the league. This was our third time playing each other this season in what I think have been epic battles. When the league first started and the draft was complete, I was fussing about David's Team because in my opinion he had one to the top 3 teams. I remember telling Big Mike that he had the Dream Team of Fantasy Basketball. What made matters worse was that I played him week 1. I wasn't too thrilled about playing him week 1, especially since I had missed the draft and my team was auto picked. To my surprise, it wasn't that bad. In fact, I ended up winning by just a few points. Crazy part about this victory was I was losing the whole week and I somehow managed to sneak up on him that Sunday.

The second time we matched up was week 8 and this time it was nothing like week one. I won the match by 241 points. There was two things that I can attribute to this win. First, I had Russell Westbrook in the lineup. As you all remember, Westbrook didn't play his first game until a few weeks after the start of the sesason and when he came back he was lighting it up. I didn't have Westbrook available the first time I matched up with David's Team. Secondly, Michael Carter-Williams got injured during the matchup for David's Team. I didn't really know who Carter-Williams, but I sure knew who he was after week 1.

Last week was somewhat similar to week 1. All week it was pretty much neck to neck. There were a few lead changes, but it remained close throughout the week. On Saturday I slept though. I was watching college basketball and sometime around 1:30 I decided to change my lineup for the day. I was too late because the Milwaukee Bucks were already playing and I had Brandon Knight on the bench. I believe this was a critical mistake because my other two players on the bench, Mike Conley and Westbrook, are injured and I needed to start as many players as I could. Sunday morning I was down by a few points and even though I had Kevin Durant, who went for 41 points yesterday, it wasn't enough. Durant did his job, but Rudy Gay and Spencer Hawes didn't show up... especially Hawes as we witnessed Blake Griffen hold his own slam dunk contest against the Philadelphia 76ers.

So, right now I'm down but I'm not out. I'm still holding down the #1 spot for now, but I know real soon imma have another matchup with All the Kings Men. On the bright side though, I play Big Mike this week. Perfect matchup to bounce back from a defeat...

Don't Sleep

So I was supposed to post this yesterday, but when I'm at home people bother me. When I'm at work people bother me. So, this post is a day late. If  was working for a major publication, this would be totally unacceptable, my editor would probably demote me to mail room clerk or something, and I would end up a starving writer. I got to grind harder. Excuse the pre-rant, just a little vexed. Yeah, that's it. Vexed.

Anyway, something rare happened yesterday... I mean Sunday. Well, rare might be a little overkill because it might not be as rare as it once was at the beginning of the season. Unusual, yeah, I'll go with something unusual happened yesterday... I mean Sunday. I got to watch some NBA action. Now that football season is near completion, the NBA puts games on regular TV on Sundays. Sadly, this is how I will get to watch some games until my diabolical plan reveals itself. Not only am I going to be able to watch games but these are nationally televised games which usually produces a good match up. Yesterday, I mean Sunday, I was treated to the San Antonio Spurs vs. the Miami Heat in a "NBA Finals rematch" followed by the Los Angeles Lakers vs. the New York Knicks.

I was quite interested to see both games because I had players from both games on my fantasy basketball
team. In my main league, The Syndicate, I didn't have any players in these two games, but in my back up league which I randomly joined and I didn't even name the team, I had players from the Heat, Chris Bosh and Dwayne Wade, and from the Lakers, Jodie Meeks and Nick Young aka Swaggy P.

Now here's where it gets interesting. I don't have cable or internet at the house so I rely heavily on my Galaxy Note 3 for just about everything. My Note 3's battery life is stupendous. I can have it in frequent use and still get about 10-12 hours battery life. If I'm just idle with it or using it occasionally, I can make it last for about 20-28 hours without needing to charge it. Of course these estimates are exaggerated, but point is my phone lasts longer than yours. This weekend, I left my charger at work. This created an interesting situation because the Note 3 has a very unique looking charger. I doesn't take the standard micro USB plug that most Samsung phones take. The plug for the Note 3 looks like two different plugs in one.

Galaxy Note 3 Charger Plug

On Saturday, I came up with the great idea to use an external battery charger that I had for my last defective phone where the port on the phone was broken. This worked but I had two problems, first it took forever to charge just the battery and then the second time around I ended up breaking the charger. So yesterday morning, I mean Sunday morning, I needed to charge my phone again and I figured if I could just use the standard micro USB charger in the section that looks like a micro USB port, if that makes any sense. It worked!! I love this phone/mini tablet. It was right before the first tip off when I discovered my old charger would work, but I figured I would just let it charge without turning on my phone because I had a feeling it would take longer to charge with the old charger, which it did. Also, even though I had Bosh and Wade on my team, I figured that I had them starting. Plus, with Wade and his current knee situation, I wasn't too worried if he was in the game or out. Lastly, I low key didn't want to be bothered, but that's another story for another day.

I had Chris Bosh and Dwyane Wade on the bench Sunday

I was wrong. I had both Bosh and Wade on the bench. Sad part about it, I didn't turn my phone on until after the game. My assumption was wrong, I made an ass of myself. Coming of the bench, Wade's stats were below mediocre at best. Bosh had a decent game with 24 points and 5 rebounds. At least I had him in the game on Thursday when he had 31 points and 6 rebounds against the Lakers. That wouldn't be enough though as I ended up losing in this stat category league 2-7 where I lacked in field goal %. free throw %, rebounds, assists, steals, blocks and turnovers. If anything, I could've used Bosh yesterday to get a better field goal and free throw percentage. I definitely slept on Bosh, who has been having above average games since Wade only plays every three games. Bosh is taking advantage on that "Y'all Must've Forgot" steez.

The next game was the Lakers vs. the Knicks, which I thought as a Laker fan we had a chance to win. To me, the only difference between these two teams was that the Lakers play in the Kung Fu Strong West and the Knicks play in the East where with a losing record is good enough for a playoff spot... Well, not for the Knicks. But Melo was coming off of a 63 point game and he followed that up with 35 points against the Lakers. Meeks kind of did his job scoring 24 points but the Lakers' leading scorer Swaggy P only had 13 points. I'm not sure what exactly happened, I fell asleep during the game.

I got blew out

Even though I was able to retain first place, I lost badly last week. I had always assumed that I needed to upgrade at the center position with rebounding and blocks kind of like I need to upgrade that position in The Syndicate. However, losing 2-7 tells me that it's not just rebounding and blocks. While many of the the of the categories I lost in where by small margins, the one that concerns me the most is the assist category. There was a 35 point differential in the this category. When I look at my guards, I don't have many superstars at the position outside of Wade, who as I mentioned earlier is not playing every game. Out of all the guards I have though, the only other point guard I have is Jamal Crawford. The rest are all shooting guards who are also eligible to play small forward.

Once again I slept. You see, I had Jordan Crawford on my squad two weeks ago when he was still playing with the Boston Celtics and starting at point guard. In the middle of the week he got traded to the Golden State Warriors with the return of Rajon Rondo. I dropped Crawford because I had a feeling that his production would drop coming off the bench. Where I messed up is replacing him. I picked up Meeks to replace Crawford which sounded good at the time, but Meeks doesn't play point. From a scoring standpoint it was a good pickup, but from an assist point of view it was a horrible decision considering my lack of point guards.

So now it looks like I have to look for a guard, a point guard in specific to get my rep up. I'll be looking but if you have anyone in mind let me know. Leave a comment or e-mail or something, because I as you can see, I really don't know what I'm doing.

Taking Over Control

In a very interesting yesterday, I went to the season-ending fantasy football meeting for my main league, Roughing the Picker. It was at the same place we had the draft, Buffalo Wild Wings in Torrance, CA. It was cool, but I'll admit it was a bit awkward for me. Awkward may not be the correct word, but for now I'm going with awkward. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed myself and it was good getting with the fellas. However, it was kind of awkward because for some reason I couldn't recognize everyone, and people were coming up to me giving me dap, and I knew I had just played these same guys in a grueling fantasy football season, but I couldn't put a name to a face. Weird part about it was they knew who I was. Knew my team. Knew my blog. But then again, maybe the reason why I was out of zone was because I was deeply worried about my fantasy basketball team.

Last week in my main fantasy basketball league, The Syndicate, I was matched up against the league leader, All the KING'S Men. I already lost to this chick once. Yeah I said it, I lost to this CHICK once. Again don't get me wrong, I don't have a problem with females on that PhantasySteez. In fact, I love it and encourage. I can't wait to teach 2 Cs how to play. I'm just saying, I've already lost to her once. It's my only loss in this league this season, so I was kind of anxious all week. I mean, this girl has what's turning out to be a fantasy dream team. check it out...

This lineup has wrecked havoc in the league. Highlighting her squad is LeBron James, John Wall, Damian Lilliard, Klay Thompson and Blake Griffin. My team is highlight by Kevin Durant, Rudy Gay, Deron Williams, and Russell Westbrook. As you can see, the two of us have the two most dynamic players in the NBA, but in my opinion, the rest of my squad are role players. Also, let's not forget that Westbrook is injured, so is Deron Williams, both who have been in and out all season. Not to mention I had to find someone to replace Ryan Anderson who was out all of last week and probably for most of the remainder of the season. 

I picked up Jonas Valanciunas to replace Anderson, and I had came up with this grand scheme to drop him on Sunday for another center. My theory was to start more players than she, as she only had one player for Sunday. But I was sitting there at Buffalo Wild Wings while the winner of our fantasy football league was presented the trophy and we went over rules, I was worried about my fantasy basketball team when I noticed something. First thing I noticed was that I was winning on Sunday morning with four players starting to her one. But then I wondered how was I able to overcome such a fantasy basketball juggernaut. The answer is simple...

In the screenshot above that I took today, she has Jrue Holiday on the bench, but yesterday she had Holiday starting. Holiday has been injured since last Wednesday in the fourth quarter and is expected to be out for at least a month. My worthy opponent failed to notice this and kept him in the lineup. Isn't that cute? She could've picked up someone like Kyle Lowry, Nick Young, Reggie Jackson or Darren Collison. She didn't, I scored more points. I won. I claimed first placed.

I Got Russell Westbrook and Al Horford On the Same Team

Fantasy Football is over, and yes I lost in all three of my main leagues, Roughing the Picker, Coast2Coast Ballers and Thieveland Ohio. Congratulations to Mr. Hindsman who did end up winning the Coast2Coast Ballers league. I like how Big Mike had to confirm that I didn't win...

Yes, I didn't win. The leagues that I did win championships in were just random leagues that I didn't pay as much attention as I did with my three main leagues. However, when it comes to our fantasy basketball teams, the roles are reversed my friend...

Even though I'm way overdue when it comes to managing this team and writing this post, I must make some adjustments though as there are still many weeks left in the fantasy basketball season. I could easily slip down a few spots before the All-Star break. For some weird reason, I have both Russell Westbrook and Al Horford on the same team. Both Westbrook and Horford got injured last Friday. Westbrook is expected to be out until after the All-Star break. Horford is done for the season.

At this point, I'm not too concerned with replacing Westbrook. I think I already have a lot of guards on my team already with Mike Conley, Deron Williams, Brandon Jennings and Brandon Knight on my squad. My squad is PG heavy so I should be able to hold out until Westbrook gets better. However when it comes to Horford, I'm not that deep when it comes to center. I got Spencer Hawes, Ryan Anderson and Horford as eligible centers. I was already feeling that this position was the weakest link of my team, and now I have to replace Horford, who ironically is my team's leading rebounder and is out for the rest of the season.

When I looked at free agency it was kind of difficult to decipher who had the most value because of two reasons. One, I don't really watch much NBA, and secondly there aren't as many resources when it comes to fantasy basketball like there is in fantasy football. After going over who was available in free agency I had narrowed it down to two players: Andrew Bogut and Robin Lopez. At first neither of these two seemed too appealing to pick up, but I looked at the stats over the past two weeks and I decided to go with Bogut. Bogut had accumulated the most rebounds over all the other available centers in free agency in a two week time period. In most of the matchups that I've had so far, my team has come short in the rebounding department. I still may  have to consider dropping one of my guards to pick up another rebounder though.

Fantasy Football Championships and Abruptly Switching to Fantasy Basketball

I went to a Christmas Eve party with my sister a few days ago.  Hanging out with my sister can be interesting because it always seem like the most random occurrences happen when we get together, and this night was no different. Besides the fact that we were in Compton and there were children running around everywhere, I wasn't too much into the party. Me being me, I was just laying back in the cut plotting on the low.  I was thinking about ways to improve my blog.  More importantly,  I was thinking about ways to improve my PhantasySteez.

Now when I started this I let it be known that I am not some type of fantasy expert, just a regular guy and my fantasy football record for this season proves that. I started off with 15 teams. Six of those teams went to the playoffs. Three went to championships.  One of those three teams lost.  Another team won and was crowned champion.  I still have one active though in an ESPN league with a two-week championship game.

Going into the second week of this championship game I have a 32 point advantage advantage against my opponent. I actually just put in Colin Kaepernick this week. He started off as my starter, but for the past five weeks Tony Romo has been my starting quarterback. It looks very doubtful for Romo this week so I had to bench him.

I already took out the Detroit Lions defense for the Cincinnati Bengals defense.  Starting the Lions D was an experiment I tried last week when they played against the New York Giants. They did earn me 10 points last week, but for right now I'm going to stick with the Bengals D against the Baltimore Ravens. Come to think of it, I might have to reconsider because the Ravens are fighting to get into the playoffs. I'm going to have to do more research, something that I haven't been doing because I've been playing fantasy basketball. I think I've found a way to incorporate the fantasy basketball into PhantasySteez, but for now I'll just give you a small synopsis of whats going on.

So I have these two fantasy basketball teams which I may have mentioned in previous posts, but I never really got into it. I don't really play fantasy basketball, but when my boy Mike invited me, I took it as another way to get my rep up on that PhantasySteez. Besides, I was getting mopped up in Mike's fantasy football league, so I figured why not. I went ahead and picked up another random league just to compare. Like I said I don't really play fantasy basketball, so there was no need to go all out and draft 15 teams like I did with fantasy football.

I only have 2 Fantasy Basketball teams

I'm doing a little better than I expected. Both squads are in 2nd place. The scoring formats in these leagues are different. In Mike's league, you have to win a majority of the stat categories to get a win. For example, if I win 6 out of 9 stat categories by the end of the week, I get the W. In the random league, you the stat categories you win goes towards your record. For example, if at the end of the week I've won 6 out of 9 categories, my record is 6-3. Interesting, but we'll see how this plays out now that I'm about to fully transition to fantasy basketball.