For those of you just getting into fantasy sports and this is your first season of fantasy basketball or you have played in the past but have never been able to compete, here is a little guide to help you towards to success. The difficulty on your league depends more on the number of people in your league than it does their basketball knowledge. In a league of 8 teams, everyone should have 2-3 stars on their team, which means that there is less for each owner to keep track of. However, in a 12 team league each team will have 1-2 stars, so some teams will get lucky but others will have to pay attention to role players around the league. After you decide how big of a league you want to play in, you have to decide between a total points and a Head to Head (H2H) Category League.Depending on who the commissioner of your league your starting line up will consist of so many players at each position. Here is a little preview of what to do in each league.
Total Points League
In a total points league players are rewarded points for points scored, assists, rebounds, steals, made field goals, made free throws, and blocks while losing points for turnovers, possibly fouls, field goals attempted, and free throws attempted. (If it seems odd to you that you lose points for attempting field goals or a free throw don't worry about it, it didn't make sense to me at first either but it works out). This league will really appeal to people that are just starting off with fantasy sports as your focus should be to draft the best statistical players available and not worry about which stats they get their points from. According to ESPN, the top 10 projected players for Total Points Leagues this year will be:
1. Lebron James- no surprise here as the soon to be greatest player of all time is able to put up above average numbers in every statistical categorey
| Best in NBA Best in Fantasy |
2. Kevin Love- Pretty much Lebron with a little less points and no assists
3. Kevin Durant- Pure scorer that will provide some boards but also some turnovers
4. Al Horford- Not exactly the most well known player but racks up on boards and blocks
5. Andrew Bynum- Philly's dumbest trade in a while will provide you points, rebounds, and minutes.
6. Chris Paul- the Point guard isn't the greatest scorer but will get steals and assists at an above average rate
7. Blake Griffin- The high energy freak of nature who can't really shoot dominates the boards as well as scoring points (mainly from dunks, and his free throw percentage is not very attractive)
8. Dwight Howard- Rebounder/ Blocksmith will also provide points, and if you find yourself in a league that doesn't factor field goals made/field goals attempted this is the golden boy as he misses so many shots
9. Dwayne Wade- Lebron's second hand man appears to be on the tail end of his career but points up good points despite his lackluster FG%
10. Greg Monroe- if you are asking "Who?" then you are not the only one, you are going to get rebounds galore with decent scoring out of this center
Head to Head Category Scoring
This type of league is for the more serious/informed fantasy players. Each mach up is divided into 8 categories and whoever wins the most wins the match-up. The categories are Points, Steals, Rebounds, Field Goal Percentage, Blocks, Assists, Three Pointers Made, and Free Throw Percentage. The key to this league is to specialize your team so that you are strong in 5-6 categories, mediocre in another and below average in 1. If you try to make your team above average in every category you are gonna start seeing your team being getting blown out every match up. Here are a few hints for keeping your fantasy team a contender.
| Rebounding Ability makes him key player in H2H |
1. Free Throw Percentage and Field Goal percentage will be found with any good player so don't worry about necessarily worry about drafting these stats (and in reality think of every player not by his name but by his stats), a player that gets a lot of rebounds and scores a lot of points will likely get them from high percentage shots. These two statistics are simply bi-products of other stats.
2. You will see that some statistics match up with each other. Blocks and rebounds are often dominated by big men so a player that is good in blacks will often be good at rebounds but will struggle at shooting 3s and getting assists.
3. If a big man gets assists, he is probably the most valuable player on team.
4. If you aren't that familiar with basketball this is a little guide for what positions should give you which statistics. + next to stats that they should excel in, - next to ones they might provide you with
PG- FG%, FT%, Assists +, Points, Steals+, 3PM-
SG- FG%, FT%+, Points, Rebounds-, 3PM+, Steals-
SF- FG%, FT%, Points, Rebounds-, Blocks-, Steals-, 3PM-, Assists-
PF- FG%, Points, Rebounds+, Blocks
C- Blocks+. Points-, Rebounds+
Hopefully this will help with your upcoming Fantasy Basketball season whether you are a 10 year vet or a newbie. Remember to check your lineup everyday and search your league's rules for loopholes that will allow you to dominate.
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