S54: The March Toward Mediocrity

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Spurs are great. Nuggets also are great. Thunder and 76ers? Yeah, still great. Nuggets seesaw in and out of greatness, but they are pretty danged great this year.

Hawks suck. Jazz suck (not digiskunk’s fault). Raptors suck. Nothing new here. For the last decade or so these teams cannot help but suck.

Floating in between is everyone else, flashing from good to bad and vice versa. Not necessarily normal territory for the Bulls or Clippers, per se, as they are often pretty good. For them, mediocrity sucks.

And for the rest of us? That’s just PBSL, baby. So let’s talk about the middle of the road this year. Each of our hopes, disasters and surprises etched into the history of indices that only about 50 real people have ever cared about.

After sim 5, let’s work from the middle out, eh?

phpBB [video]

The Five Five-Hundred series
Indiana Pacers
18-18
.500

Indiana has always looked like a very middle of the road team to me (no offense Pauly!). The strange thing, though, is they never perform like a middle of the road team. Not the last 10 seasons, anyway, except for two seasons where a 40-42 in 2036 and a 43-39 in 2040 struggle to be any more middle-of-the-road than that (the only 2 seasons in the last ten without a playoff berth).

They rarely have more than one big star, and that star now is Mamadi Diakite, who to me, again, outperforms expectations. He doesn’t seem great; he just is. And the greatest Pacer has only played about half of their games this year due to injury, so it actually adds up. They would be a lot better with Diakite, but PBSL injury gods struck again and sent the Pacers back to the dead middle of the pack.

Right… I’m trying to do a format…

Hopes:
Re-signing the reigning defensive player of the year, Mike Burnham, seems like the ultimate complimentary piece to Mamadi. He’s still leading the league in blocks, but my boy Kenny Heard whacked him good recently.

Disasters:
Diakite not playing. Duh.

Surprises:
Jerry Tucker. Pauly was not the only GM after him, but he’s playing solid minutes off the bench backing up Gamez.


The Six Four-Hundred series
TIED
Los Angeles Lakers and the Brooklyn Nets
17-18
.486

Hopes:
LA had all the hopes. All of them. Danny bounced back; Caruso got better! Heard came back, Blakemore came over, and finally we cashed in our rookie pieces for our missing wing, Ferguson Olney. THEN we cashed in our final rookie piece Luigi Leathers for the best possible 6th man out there, Bradley Connell, on a reasonable contract.

Brooklyn sent out one of their key pieces, Ferguson Olney, in return for two young not quite ready studs from LA, Richie Cuevas and James Andrews. Brooklyn still has Fang Shuo and Kostas Antetokounmpo, though, so they’re not horrible without a missing piece. They’re just...average. Very average. But they have players to look forward to a few seasons later, once Kostas and Fang peak, who will play solid minutes behind them. The hope is the future with Olney gone.

Disasters:
Only LA. They pushed all their chips in and they are ridiculously average thus far. I hate it.

Surprises:
Nick came out of retirement kinda to take on all my trash so I could snag Connell. What a gentleman! But once this happened, other GMs saw their opening to do real work with Nick, beyond a salary cutting drive by, and suddenly the Pelicans will not be too shabby for the next GM who steps in and takes over.

RPF is probably just surprised he got not one but TWO good prospects for Olney. But maybe not. Right place right time.


The Five Five-Hundred series
Portland Trailblazers
19-17
.528

Hopes:
Lu Dort. Luguentz. His talent is as great as his name. Hopefully, with a key FA signing (Scot Bulter) and some nice acquisitions via trade (Lynch and Tasmin), this team that has been surprisingly mediocre for years might climb into legitimate contention.

Disasters:
Being mediocre. Honestly this team has looked top notch for many seasons now, but has thus far been unable to escape mediocrity (aside from one DC-less title run). It’s a travesty. This team should be one of the best and I cannot put my thumb on why they are in this article! LU FREAKING DORT!!!

Surprises:
Mediocrity. Ohh, the mediocrity...


The Five Five-Hundred series
Sacramento Kings
18-16
.529

Hopes:
Jonathan Lewis, now a long time King, has spent many years in the league as a top notch player. As he begins his decline, Killian Hayes and James Addington have stepped in. Those three alone are good enough to keep this squad above .500, but are there some additional moves yet to be made to turn this mediocre team into a contender? Probably. Scout the league for talent. Kings only need one or two more pieces to give others fits.

Disasters:
Most of their losses this year are very close games. One or two buckets. Shame...

Surprises:
Richie Plott is blue/blue. No seriously. Fake blue? Definitely. SuperDog is smart to bench him despite his color because he does absolutely nothing well very athletically, which makes him just a bizarre piece to the Kings’ puzzle. If only he never broke his leg...


The Five Five-Hundred series
Los Angeles Clippers
20-17
.541

Hopes:
Mamba hoped to be terrible, but he doesn’t know how to be terrible, so instead he’s just average like the rest of us humps. Outperforming lots of their counterparts, Dong Bone and Zeke Nnaji have really stepped up as stars.

Disasters:
They have to start Eric Huggins and Randolph Brown if they want any part of the draft lottery.

Surprises:
They’re not terrible. They’re just fine actually. And just fine ain’t great. Or terrible. It’s a surprise to get a yawn from this side of the Staples Center.


The Six Four-Hundred series
Cleveland Cavaliers
17-21
.447

Hopes:
After trading all their good players except BBJr (and arguably Eloy Tilton), Cavs had a reset in mind. It was a good idea. But they’re hovering close to around .500 which is a surprise to us all. Maybe all of their good pieces were holding them down? Somehow? Jlmarines is on pace to wallop his record from last year as he’s only 11 wins away from it with more than half the season to go.

Disasters:
We’ve dogged trades from this squad enough, and in the end it doesn’t really matter. He tried so hard.


Surprises:
BBJr. is playing like his contract expires next year, and it’s helping these Cavs win games.


The Six Four-Hundred series
Miami Heat
16-20
.444

Hopes:
He Hor. He’s their only hope.

Disasters:
Dennis Wolfgang.

Surprises:
Dennis Wolfgang.


The Five Five-Hundred series
Dallas Mavericks
21-16
.568

Hopes:
It has been said that, off in some distant land of horseplay, winds whispered “I really like my team this year…” The Mavs are on pace to go above and beyond mediocrity this year. Whereas their last winning record in 2036 was barely over .500, their best years in 2032 and 2034 with over 50 wins may not be such outlier records after this season. Mavs started hot and will finish as a playoff team almost definitely.

Disasters:
None really. I like this team too. But could you imagine if they had a more serviceable PG than Dudley Carner running their offense? Wowee wow wow wow. That 120ppg avg would go through the roof.

Surprises:
Dudley Carner is running an offense in Dallas that averages 120 points per game.


The Six Four-Hundred series
Orlando Magic
16-22
.421

Hopes:
This year was a reset from the get go, and the end result has been slightly better. Snagging Myke Henry in free agency, adding Jericho Sims and Antonio Blakely in the offseason as well, this team did not look like it was going to tank. They didn’t get to move Felicio which I think they really wanted to do, but they got decent returns on all their other pieces. They could have gotten more for Ronnie Reynolds from LA, but hey, what can you do?

Disasters:
Maybe it’s just me but I thought trading away Mark Adkison was a disaster. That guy was a steal in free agency, overlooked and underpaid. Well, not underpaid. He’s not great yet. But once that team option rolls around and he’s g/b or possibly even b/b and only getting paid $16M and you have bird rights on that solid PG too? Man. I would have held on, but that’s just me.

Surprises:
The little Blakeney that could. Everyone gawked at Ridenhour and Garland in the draft. Alleman got a whole article written about him. But Blakeney is the only one out of the draft to pop purple, and that brightens the future in Orlando greatly.


The Six Four-Hundred series
Chicago Bulls
13-19
.406

Sadly, the furthest from .500 is the worst of the bunch this year. An abnormal place for the garbageman and former commish. The Delmar era in Chicago came to an end, and when the new build got off to a better start this season than expected, it left gman in the lurch of what direction he should take. On the brightside, he’s the most likely to steer his team directly into the dirt for a decent draft pick next year.


And that’s that. A mediocre article about mediocre teams for a mediocre 6 points. Thanks for reading (or not).

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