Sim League Report: Where Are the Fans? – by NOLa.
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The opposite of my historical writeups, this article was not about anything in particular but to jab about something that made no difference whatsoever (my second favorite types of articles). In our old forum we had a Trash Talk media section that would generate you no points, but it was all about banter. This article fits just that. The pictures are no longer available, but it was just a screenshot of the teams attendance section on the index where it shows capacity and % attending. I noticed at the time I had 100% attendance, and certain others did not, so I decided to share with the league!
Is Mike Conley worth TWO top 5 draft picks? – by Conroy
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Back to back trash talk style articles! Back in the day it was not uncommon for a wild Conroy to appear to talk trash about GM ballsohard. You have to love when GMs who don’t write many articles take the time to just go in for a few paragraphs to make their thoughts known on what Conroy thought was a trash trade.
Top 25 Under 25 – ballsohard and JNR
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Good stuff as always from these two, they made an article that everyone loves: rankings and talking about your team. Almost every team got a mention here and everyone get genuinely excited for rankings, and each one got a small writeup from one of the two writers.
There Is Still Honor in Honorable Mention: An Under 25 Addendum – IamQuailman and RPF
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A reaction to the above writeup where Quail and RPF decided to give a small writeup and ranking to the honorable mentions. I love writeups in reaction to another, and this was a goodwill one. Gave more writeups to more teams which everyone likes.
For trades, I couldn’t find one in particular that had many reactions, but I did find this one.
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Knicks/Bucks involving Mike Conley. Gotta love this is what sent Con-boy over the edge. Also:
Narrator: he did not
Now that we have that out of the way, let's get on with the show. I apologize for this just being one season, I wanted to do two but between the time it took to write this up plus the time I took looking up funny articles, I decided to keep it short and sweet.
2012-13: A Familiar Foe
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“I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying.” —Michael Jordan
BACKGROUND
You can’t start a historical writeup for this season without acknowledging the drafting of the best player that has ever graced this league: Anthony Davis. The draft lotto was one of the most anticipated lottos the league has had, likely only rivaled by the 2003 and 1996 draft classes, but what was different about the 2012 draft class was there was really only one true superstar. That’s not taking away from Lillard, but the 96 and 03 class was stacked with superstar talent that made strategic tanking worthwhile because even if you didn’t get the #1 pick, you were likely to get a player that would be All NBA. The jewel of this class was Anthony Davis, and if you didn’t get the first pick it was a huge blow to your team. I would know, I drafted John Henson with the 8th pick.
Before getting into the season, some brief background on why that Anthony Davis pick was basically a deathblow to an original creation draft team, the Seattle Supersonics. The season before this draft the Sonics traded future picks including their 2012 1st for Kevin Martin. To remind older GMs and educate the newer guys, Kevin Martin by name doesn’t sound like a great return if you’re thinking in real life, but Kevin Martin was a former league leader in points and multi-time All NBA 1st and 2nd team player. The Sonics already had Blake Griffin who was very promising, so adding a potential #1 scorer was a good return for a future pick if things worked out in former GM DarthVegito’s vision. Unfortunately it didn’t, and I forget what exactly happened. It’s possible it just didn’t work out as well as he had hoped, but the Sonics didn’t finish at the very bottom of the standings. They were slotted at #7 pre-lotto, and it was just one of those very fortunate jumps for the Detroit Pistons who had also traded their own 2012 pick to the Knicks. The Sonics would eventually be relocated to Oklahoma, with the Seattle faithful wondering had the team drafted Davis if the team would still be in Seattle.
Let’s just say Anthony Davis will have an impact on the league in future years, with the only thing holding him back being an inactive GM.
Going into the regular season, the East would be dominated by two teams: the Philadelphia 76ers and the Atlanta Hawks. The 76ers were relatively unchanged from the prior season, sticking with the core of Tyson Chandler, Tracy McGrady, and Amare Stoudamire. The biggest change for this team going into the new season was the development of Ramon Sessions, DeMarre Carroll, and Taj Gibson, all 3 either starting or playing significant minutes, and Ramon Sessions’ improvement as a starting PG was much needed for a team with dominant scorers. WigNosy and the Hawks made one big move that paid off immediately in trading for Carmelo Anthony. The Knicks and former GM InnerGI went all in for the 2012 lotto in hopes of getting Davis, and even had two top 5 pre-lotto picks (their own and the Pistons, hilariously enough). Carmelo gave the Hawks another 25+ ppg scorer to pair with Rudy Gay, and Jeremy Lin also received a nice TC bump that allowed him to be a decent starting PG for the team. Joakim Noah much like other bigs of the Hawks remained with the Hawks and was a key piece for the team.
The only other team out East that looked to be potential competitor in the playoffs were the Miami Heat, who returned their core of Al Jefferson, LeBron James, and Brandon Jennings. While the team was solid, it was clear this was a competition between the 76ers and Hawks, with the Hawks narrowly obtaining the 1 seed with 65 wins over the 76ers who won 64. The East wasn’t stacked with teams that could compete, but they arguably had the two best teams in the league going head-to-head.
Moving to the Western conference it was slightly more competitive in terms of number of teams that were attempting to compete. The Clippers strangely enough actually looked on paper worse than the prior season with a lot less depth, but they still had Durant and Delonte West, and a now boosted Roy Hibbert to lock down he anchor. If this team was going to compete, it was solely due to leaning heavily on Kevin Durant. In the Pacific division, they were challenged by the Sacramento Kings, Golden State Warriors, and the Portland Trailblazers. The Kings and Warriors were attempting a similar build with stacking their teams with good-to-great 3 point shooters and a dominant big down low. The Kings with Granger, Randy Foye, Darren Collison, and DeMarcus Cousins tried the method of no true superstar but a cast of good players that should fit. The Warriors still had Curry and DeAndre Jordan, but also added fellow big Zach Randolph to give them more presence down low. Finally the Trailblazers were being led by rising star Derrick Rose who was teamed up with Ron Artest, a formidable backcourt that was one of the strongest in the league.
In the Midwest division, the Timberwolves and Spurs were battling it out once again, with the Spurs hoping to make a repeat Finals visit and the Wolves hoping to lock down the #1 seed and advance in the playoffs. The group of Chris Bosh, Kyle Lowry, Luol Deng, and Tim Duncan gave the Wolves a scary defense that was led by MVP candidate Webber. The Spurs returned basically the same lineup that got them to the Finals the season before.
The Clippers ran away with the division being led by Durant’s crazyy efficient season averaging 37-8-3 on 67.7% true shooting. They also narrowly edged out the Wolves in the conference standings by 1 game as well, 59 wins to 58.
Aside from the competitive teams, just how good was Anthony Davis as a rookie? He averaged 21 points, 9 rebounds, 1 assist, 1 steal, and 2 blocks per game. The league was put on notice, but for now let’s move onto the playoffs!
THE PLAYOFFS
It was expected and there was no surprise just how dominant the 76ers and the Hawks were on the Eastern side of the playoffs. The 76ers swept both the #7 seed Boston Celtics and the #3 seed Miami Heat, with most expecting the Heat to be competitive after last season’s results against the 76ers. The Hawks also swept both the #8 seed Pacers and the #5 seed Cavaliers, meaning both teams just demolished all their divisional foes in the first two rounds of the playoffs. The 76ers and Hawks were set to face each other in a huge matchup that ultimately saw the 76ers dominate them in an almost embarrassing fashion. While a couple of games were close and the series started 1-1, the defining moment was game 4 in Philadelphia that saw the 76ers wallop the Hawks 94-56 to take a 3-1 lead. The Hawks responded back winning game 5 but the 76ers shut the door on them in game 6. That game 4 was unprecended for WigNosy and I haven’t checked all his playoff games, that has to be his single worst performance for a game. The Hawks shot 28% from the field and put up a measly 5 points in the 3rd quarter. This dominance made it seem as if the 76ers would roll through the Finals no matter the opponent they would face.
Out West there was more excitement. The Clippers survived two straight Game 7 matchups, first against the #8 seed Nuggets and then against the #5 seed Warriors. Home court proved valuable as the Clippers only won Game 7 vs the Warriors by 1 point, and were only in trouble against the Nuggets due to Durant being injured for the first 4 games, and only averaging 12 minutes a game vs the Nuggets to close out the series. They would face the #6 seed Portland Trailblazers after they had dispatched the #3 seed Spurs and #1 seed Timberwolves. While Ron Artest was a difference maker, it was Derrick Rose who became a star for the team, averaging nearly 30 points and 7 assists per game. Unfortunately for the Blazers, they were no match against Durant. The series started 1-1, but the Clippers reeled 3 straight wins to advance them to the Finals and set up a rematch vs the Philadelphia 76ers.
2013 FINALS
Make no mistake about this rematch, this was Kevin Durant vs the 76ers all the way. Somehow with limited depth and only one other serviceable player in Delonte West, the Clippers leaned entirely on Kevin Durant to lead them to the promise lands for their first ever championship, but standing in their way was a three headed monster of Chandler/McGrady/Stoudemire.
Game 1 in Philadelphia saw the 76ers bully the boards and cause 23 turnovers for the Clippers, putting in an extra 20 field goals than their opponents and even shooting an extra free throw. The game was sloppy from both Durant and Hughes who together turned the ball over 13 times. For the Clippers, 22 assists to 23 turnovers spells doom for whoever has that stat line and the game wasn’t even as close as the score indicated 107-91. The 76ers defense once again put on a show.
Game 2 saw a flip of the results. The Clippers barely came away with the victory 97-94 after taking care of the ball and causing the 76ers to commit sloppy turnovers, finishing with 17 assists and 20 turnovers. After the first sim it looked like we may actually have a series on our hands.
Games 3 and 4 saw a move by the 76ers to put McGrady and PG and move Sessions over to SG. In game 3 in Los Angeles, the 76ers shot lights out on 58% shooting and held Durant in check somehow, winning the game by 15 points. McGrady, Chandler, and Amare all scored over 20 points that game and were able to cruise. Game 4 saw a near repeat of Game 2 for the Clippers. The 76ers coughed the ball up more times than they assisted in a score and the Clippers shot over 50% for the first time in the series. While Durant didn’t put up monster points, his incredible 11-14 shooting was efficient, and the team as a whole shot very well shooting 40-76 and also attempting 23 free throws to the 76ers 8. Homecooking and favoritism was never proven.
With one more game left in Los Angeles and a guaranteed game to happen in Philadelphia, the Clippers absolutely needed Game 5, and their defense this time rose to the occasion. While the Clippers still turned the ball over more times than they assisted, they were able to hold the 76ers to 41% shooting. An interesting lineup changed happened for the 76ers too, with Sessions coming off the bench and Carrol sliding down to SG and Amare moving to SF. Taj Gibson made the start at PF, perhaps with the 76ers hoping to get Durant in foul trouble against Amare. Despite Area scoring 40 points, the rest of the team struggled, with most of the blame going to Chandler shooting 6-18 against Hibbert.
With Game 6, the Clippers were able to do what was thought of as improbable and defeated the 76ers. It was a defensive game with both teams shooting only 40% from the field each, with the difference being turnovers. The Clippers took care of the ball while the 76ers turned it over 22 times, giving the Clippers an extra 13 shots while attempting relatively the same amount of free throws. Despite holding Durant to no monster games in the series (he was putting up 40 and 50 point games vs the Warriors and Blazers) and only allowing the Clippers to score more than 100 points in one game, it was the rest of the team that took good shots and took care of the ball in their wins, the ultimate “don’t hurt the team, just give the ball to the star” type of game plan.
Durant would be crowned playoff MVP and win his first and ultimately only (spoiler alert) championship, but it was redemption for former GM aburns, and it would be 20 more years until the Clippers would once again return to the Finals stage and bring home trophy number two, but that’s a story for another historical article when it comes time.
