GMTR Mock Draft Rounds 6+7

Round 4 - Ray
Round 5 - Nene
Round 6 - Andre
They rhyme! Really, that's all you can hope for in a fantasy draft. And I was unbelievably lucky, too. How many words in the English language rhyme with the "Ay" sound? Not many I believe, only slightly more than rhyme with orange and silver.

Round 6 may be my first truly questionable pick. I was at the point where I was looking at my team - I liked where I was going so far, a mix of big and small players anchored by Chris Paul who will cure what ails ya. Right now, there were 3 or 4 teams playing pure small ball strategy, and 2 to 3 teams with strong big leanings. I wanted picks in these 2 rounds that could counteract both types of teams. At this point in the draft, there had been 17 point guard eligible players picked (Yahoo league, so this includes Dwyane Wade and Brandon Roy). I knew that I needed a PG here who could give me assists. After the run on PG's at the end of round 2, I didn't get another PG to shore up assists. Anyone I get at 96/97 (rnds 8+9) would pull in more negatives than I wanted in fg% and/or TO's (think Raymond Felton). I had so far built a solid FG% and TO team, so I wanted that type of PG going forward to get me dimes.

Now in this draft, as a group we have been scared off by a lot of players forcing them further down from what you've been seeing as average draft positions elsewhere. Boozer, Camby, Pierce, Marion - plenty of people just don't want them. Part of this is because this league we're drafting in is a no move league; who we draft is on our roster for the entire year, so you want those 80 game/30 minutes per types. Now with Andre Miller, you'll get the 82 games - he's the league's ironman right now, and probably gets more tail than AC Green. But that's not important right now. I think a lot of dudes and dudettes are scared off by the Portland backcourt sitch, as Steve Blake is there, Roy gets serious minutes, and Rudy Fernandez will get his time too. Will Miller get the minutes he had last year on Philly? No. Will he get more than 24? Yes, and I see something in the 30-32 range, which should give him the opportunity for plenty of assists. His FG% is good for a PG, but that entails the fact he is not a huge 3 point shooter. His steal numbers are average at best, but he can get you the 3 or 4 steal night every once in a while. I left other PG options like Mario Chalmers and Russell Westbrook on the board, fully aware they wouldn't make it back around. I think this pick of Miller was safe, but not exactly game changing. We'll see how it goes.

Now to start off the seventh round, I wanted a good splash pick. Yes, Boozer and Camby are still on the board at this point. And good blocks guys will be off the board soon as teams move into the specialist picks. And there was one guy who I wanted to get so I could follow all year, Anthony Randolph. His last month of the season in 08-09 was incredible. With Brandan Wright going down, he should be the main man as power forward in Oakland. He got 1.2 blocks per game last year - that was in only 18 mpg. Think of the blockingness if his minutes double, which it could. Heck, he got 41-1/2 minutes in a freakin' preseason game last night! I want to see what he does outside tonight in Indian Hills - maybe some Rucker-esque slams and 3rd row putbacks. Barring injury, he's going to be a fun guy to watch, and if he blows up, he can give me top half of the draft value, which, of course, is how you win your leagues.

I'll also say that around the time of these picks is when Basketball Monster went live again for the 09-10 season. So perhaps I'll be overthinking the next few picks, paralyzing things by analyzing things. Don't worry, the numbers won't work out where I pick Sebastian Telfair.

I'll keep review picks I make through round 13. Head back to Give Me the Rock for more round analysis by Erik of GMTR and Points in the Paint fame. He's been so good on recapping that he's practically influencing future picks (not mine... well, maybe). We are witnessing fantasy observer effect, a veritable Schrodinger's Cat of fantasy hoops. Maybe something good can come out of it, and we get Heisenberg compensators to allow for the creation of transporters.