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Whew boy so many trades. Can't believe that Bam be traded for the 10th pick. I think he made an all-NBA or all-defense team in the last year or two? Sad that my boy Jokic left the Nuggets, and will be interested to see how Michael Porter Jr. does on the Ravens.
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Jun 6, 2020 15:16
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Chapter 7, 2023-2024 Season, 2023 We start off the season on a really positive note, by blowing out the Hawks by a nutty 44 points, and then facing the Utah Jazz 3 times over the course of five days, splitting that series 2-1 in our favor. I've been putting Bilic on the best perimeter player of the opposing team, and he's been fire, holding opponents under 40% shooting on the year. I try doing this to Dallas when we have our year's first meeting. (Which, very astute observers will notice is featured on TNT)  God drat it. oFG% isn't the best measure in the whole world, I get it, because it doesn't account for everything, hence the years of Svi as our team's best defender. Which is nearly true this year, too:  This is technically our best defensive line-up going by that measure, but it's clearly false. For one, Gobert is nowhere to be seen, and for two, there is zero chance that Floyd is a good defender. Other teams literally take more shots against him than they otherwise would, including bad ones. I'm still questioning Svi consistently getting numbers like these, but gently caress it. The two I am confident are correct are Ralph Miller and Bilic. Hell, maybe Svi. If I were making my own defensive line-up, based on the data I can see, it'd be Wright/Mykhailiuk/Bilic/Miller/Gobert ......and... uh... I guess I'd be praying that Wright can score all of the points by himself, because that's an ugly team for offense. oFG% doesn't take into account the opponents you're defending against, so you can get screwy figures, is my point. That said, the more minutes you play and the better opposition you are put up against, the better of a rating it actually is. Bilic has started every game this season for us, and has held opponents to less than 40% shooting. He is sixth best in the league at this, and the only starter other than Emmanuel Terry from the Bulls in that top 6, and I deliberately put him against the team's best perimeter player when I remember they have a really good one that's not a SF  To whit, he's got a better oFG% than everyone on this list except for Emanuel Terry. He's got a better +/- than everyone here except Giannis, who he is tied with, and he holds opponents to 7% lower shooting. His counting stats are lower. These are all excellent defenders in real life, but... they're not backing it up in this simulated year. DPOY is bullshit in 2k, is what I'm saying. He should be no lower than third on this list, and he's not on it at all. We close the year 23-6, which is the second best record in the league, and that gives us a #2 in the power rankings.  As for the Mavs....  Their point differential is nuts. Almost twice us and the Jazz, and we're significantly better than the people behind us. Putting it another way:  They currently have the league's best offense and best defense per 100 possessions. We're first on offense in literal games, but only like, top two thirds for defense (which is a hell of an improvement, mind). We're the best team in the league at shooting the three and top 10 in defending it (Sasha Bilic is hugely important to our team) And even though I tweaked sliders a little bit, Luka is still going insane, putting up, well, video game numbers. But it's not like he's alone:  Porzingis is having an MVP caliber season in his own right. Teams with two MVP candidates tend to be pretty drat good Shout-outs to Ja and Ayton. Standings:    Betting that Jokic is regretting his choice to sign with the Clippers. He's doing worse across the board than he has in previous seasons. As for the Jazz,I heavily underestimated them. I wrote them off as a bunch of temps:  Those are pretty good temps. That's probably the second or third best front court in the league, after us and maybe Phoenix. They have former sixth man of the year Terry Rozier III starting with Harden, and Donovan Mitchell is almost a lock to win this year's sixth man award, as he's scoring like 24.5 points. Aaron Holiday is in the running too, managing to put up close to 18 points a game.    That's not the only thing I underestimated. I fell for one of the classic blunders---thinking that CP3 wouldn't matter because he's old. To amend my previous assessment: It turns out, he moved the needle for Orlando. Keep in mind Orlando lost their best player in this off-season. Toronto being really bad might look surprising, but it's still really early in the season, and, well  They've done most of it without their best player (Can't believe Avengers: Endgame wasn't nominated for an Oscar, expected to miss 2-4 months), and the other two guys who have missed significant time with injuries are their second best player and their starting point guard. OOF. We've got time to worry about contract extensions, but the only players that matter/would be affected are Wright and Gobert:  Gobert, sadly, looks like he wants to opt out of his player option and test free agency, which will almost certainly involve him getting a 10 million dollar pay cut for next season, but in theory, it might make the rest of his contract higher than he otherwise could have scored. Gobert regressed two points in the offseason, and I burned one of our camps on him to freshen him up. I spent the other one raising Bilic's potential. The other player is, once again, Delon Wright, who continues to be good for us.  And he's been willing to resign since opening day of last season. For whatever reason, he loves it here. He only makes 7 million a year now, so he's asking for a raise. I'm personally inclined to give it to him for a few reasons: 1)He's having the best season of his career 2)He's actually won the starting spot over Powell 3)Salary increases league-wide every year. Compared to people at his skill level, he's only making more than guys still on their rookie contracts. Compared to other veterans, he's underpaid by roughly 3 million dollars (or about half of what he's actually asking for, raise-wise). 4)He's also out performing most of those similar quality players. 5)If 2-4 stay true, he'll want a bigger raise if I let this get to the window. This is already over half a million higher than what he was asking when the year started.  So, I'll leave it up to a vote: Do I extend Wright early? And for how long? Veryslightlymad fucked around with this message at 04:58 on Jun 7, 2020 |
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Jun 7, 2020 04:51
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I say extend him early, maybe for 2 years? The length, I’m unsure on; but he’s been really good for our Honu.
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Jun 7, 2020 06:42
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It's hard to get a read on these sort of things just looking at stats and mood and so on, but.... If 2k modeled "team captains", and if the theoretical 2k that did didn't do the laziest thing possible (which they would) and make your best overall player Team Captain (therefor it'd have been Vanvleet -> Bol -> Gobert -> Bol), and you, the player got to determine it (like in FIFA) Delon Wright would have likely been our team captain since the first season. Maybe Holiday or Floyd would be, because apparently there are badges that make other teammates better simply by being on the court, and these two have the offense version of the badge, and Gobert has the defensive version. (Payton also had one of these) It's just very hard for me to find fault with a guy who's overwhelmingly positive in the locker room (for... whatever that matters---I have chemistry effects turned on, and while the things that disrupt it are cranked down to almost nothing, the actual penalties for when they are disrupted are way, way up) and he's pretty good at everything.  That doesn't really read like a career year, and it's not in scoring (raw) or rebounds (raw), but it's easily his best year in assists (as you can see by this, he is tied for leading the team), and it's also his best shooting year in FG%, 3PT%, and FT%. Also worth noting: If you take a glance at Floyd's numbers, I'm honestly not sure how he's not in the fan vote for All-Stars this year. That field goal % is nuts. It's too bad he's "only" an 80something FT shooter, or else he'd be in the exclusive 50-40-90 club. (Presently, Windler is in the probably rarer 40-50-90 club, but I suspect that's completely unsustainable. )
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Jun 7, 2020 07:30
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I figured it out/I cracked the code. This is why Svi is such a good defender in 2k. Tendencies. Those last five are, from left to right, Hard Foul, Pass Intercept, Steal, Block, Contest Shots
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Jun 7, 2020 11:03
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Two years seems fine. We've got that Spanish kid who can slide down to shooting guard coming out next season so two years lets us see what the new kid can do and potentially move Delon based on that.
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Jun 7, 2020 16:32
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Thordain posted:Two years seems fine. We've got that Spanish kid who can slide down to shooting guard coming out next season so two years lets us see what the new kid can do and potentially move Delon based on that. This makes good sense, get Delon on a 2-year and see where we are after that. You might also see if he'd bite on a team option third year?
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Jun 7, 2020 19:15
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Belated comment on the 3 players overseas cap: I would just like to point out that technically, Honolulu's entire team is overseas, at least during home games! (Ba-dum-ching.) Actually, now that I think about it... let's say that the NBA decides screw it, we're expanding to Honolulu or Anchorage (bribed by Hawaiian Airlines / Alaska Airlines?). How would this affect the schedule? My suspicion is the game schedules games like "normal" with these expansion teams, I highly doubt that the game coded anything like this in for crazy hypothetical scenarios, but in the real world... well, the NFL just renegotiated their contract with the player's union, and the player's union added in explicit limits on the number of London or other international games. Flying out to Hawaii is basically just as far as to London with the same grueling schedule / jet lag issues. I'd have to think that the players union would demand some special schedule. Instead of the usual 3 or 4 game series, play all the games at once - i.e. the Honu stays home for an entire month and plays four 7 game series with four visiting teams who each get all their season's Hawaii travel out of the way with a week-long stay and 2 travel days on each side. Then the Honu spend the next month traveling about the Continental States doing away games, then another month-long stretch at home. I really doubt 2k implemented this, but it'd be cool if they did! Also, I have to ask. Exactly what kind of offseason training brings out untapped hidden potential? Training a specific skill, sure, you do drills on that skill, but there's a bit of a mystic air to improving your potential... maybe biking to the top of Haleakala to see the sunrise and contemplate on life and basketball, or the like.
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Jun 7, 2020 19:40
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ReWinter posted:This makes good sense, get Delon on a 2-year and see where we are after that. You might also see if he'd bite on a team option third year? I should have. I've frequently added team options to guys that I'm on the fence about. Chapter 7, 2023-2024 Season, Through the All-Star Break  I did, however, manage to extend him with a front-loaded contract, so if he starts to decline with age, it won't hurt us so badly, and this should also help with our cap situation later. Gearing up for the all-star break, I find myself frequently squishing other teams, just huge blowouts, including at least three by 44 points, and one by 46 points. Here's one of the 44 point blowouts:  My favorite part of this is William Floyd went off for 43. He could have had 0% shooting, and so long as he kept his assists, we'd have still won. That said, this is an example of a basic game against a team. Keep in mind that Phoenix is good.  We still won by not-quite-30. Not pictured: Delon Wright didn't score (or attempt a shot!) but had 11 assists. (Out of our team's 24)  That's four times an all-star, baby. Congrats to first timers Bryant Lowe (from the Knicks) and Bagley III (who is on... uh... the Thunder, now.) Also, 20 time All-Star, LeBron James. Enormous snubs to John Collins and/or Andre Drummond. Cleveland's doing really well for themselves. Also no CP3, despite Orlando being #1 in the East. Also no Porzingis, who was not injured. He was an MVP candidate earlier, what the gently caress, All-Star Committee. Sadly  Literally the game before the all-star break, this happens. Also, that's gross, Bol, I'd have stomped your toe, too. Also, tragically Bagley III gets injured. The two are replaced by Jimmy Butler (WHY?! He's not even the best player on his team!) and Clint Capela (Also, why?!) instead of any of the guys I just mentioned. Horrible. (Incidentally, I'm not blaming 2k for this. The real life all-star selection processes often gently caress up this way) Some players who didn't get selected merely think they're a snub:  Pascal Siakam here doesn't understand why no one wanted him to play, despite still suffering from his broken leg that he's had for most of the season. I guess he just wanted to be included or something. The trade deadline passes, and I make zero trades. I do, however, spy this nugget while I do my due diligence and search:  (Again, I did not make this trade) gently caress you, game. THEY get to have a trade exception that expires after one year, but I don't?  I STILL REMEMBER, YOU BASTARDS.I'm still second in the league, it's just... we've got our work cut out for us.  15 straight weeks. Fifteen. (One of the other Power Rankings actually had us on top last week, but only last week) However, the main news after the All-Star break is everyone's reaction to a huge announcement: 
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Jun 7, 2020 19:57
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SnowFire posted:Belated comment on the 3 players overseas cap: I would just like to point out that technically, Honolulu's entire team is overseas, at least during home games! (Ba-dum-ching.) I actually haven't noticed any seriously weird back-to-backs.... The ones that have a home game on the second day at least have the common courtesy to have the first away game be a team in the West, usually in California. Which is still a five and a half hour flight, but not so bad. I'd screen-cap if I noticed something like "Play in New York" -> "Play in Honolulu". I did have a week earlier this season where I had one game. Given how poorly so much of this game is modeled, I don't think it models travel time/location at all, but it wouldn't actually surprise me if that was one of the few things they did pay attention to, based on the (so far minimal) evidence I've seen. In real life, the San Antonio Spurs have an extended road trip when the San Antonio Stock Show and Rodeo takes over their arena for about three weeks. So they'll have nothing but away games during that time period. It's frequently during the all-star break, though, so they can get away with it only being like, 6 games instead of like, 10 or more. The Bulls used to have something like this for when the Circus came to town, but that is no longer a thing. Untapped Potential is just feeding a young *Disclaimer Royal Jelly may actually contain gelatinized mescaline
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Jun 7, 2020 20:15
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PREVIEW: Tomorrow I have to watch some games. One of our players did something that made me seriously consider trading him in the off-season. Just... furious with the dude. Even the AI coach benched his rear end.
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Jun 8, 2020 10:06
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Has LeBron topped the all-time scoring list yet? Cause if not imma need you to override his retirement.
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Jun 8, 2020 20:22
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loving love Fiona Apple posted:Has LeBron topped the all-time scoring list yet? I highly doubt it, but I can check. Can't fault Kareem for being the GOAT.* *(Please don't actually make me figure out the GOAT. One of the joys of basketball is the sheer number of ways a player can excel.)
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Jun 8, 2020 22:08
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Chapter 7, 2023-2024 Season, End of Season and Playoffs The Honu come out of the All-star break with a vengeance, winning a ton of games en route to the playoffs. Bol Bol, perhaps frustrated that he missed his fourth All-Star Game, is especially motivated, and starts dropping some big numbers.  Look at this. We won by 67 points. Please remember that, by this point in time, Milwaukee is still a good team. By the time the playoffs roll around, they're actually first in the East. During this time, we finally face the Mavericks again, and finally, finally solve their team, scoring a decent victory by stifling Doncic to "Only" 26 points and a triple double.  By finally conquering the Mavs, even Boenisch recognizes us as top of the league.  During this time Bol Bol is actually mentioned as a possible League MVP  I mean, he won't get it because Luka Doncic is still alive, but it's nice to be in the conversation. Can I take a moment to mention again how much help Bilic is? He's like a Slovenian cross between Bruce Bowen and Mr. Bill. Basically, I just stuff him on the best perimeter guy of the opposing team, and grind him to dust.  I'm pretty pleased when he's made Rookie of the Month for the West in February One of the only teams to defeat us during this stretch is the Lakers in our final meeting with LeBron James during his retirement tour. As if to show this upstart expansion team that's so dominant in his last year that they still have a long way to go, he also drops a triple double on us.  So long, LeBron. (Since it was asked, I will post some tidbits about LeBron's legendary career after this lengthy update, along with some of my thoughts on the King)  By the time the playoffs roll around, we are one game behind the Mavs. Second overall in the league.  Oh, hey, he didn't technically average a triple double this season. That's a relief.   Holy....Shamorie Ponds is a real guy, currently signed with the Toronto Raptors G-league affiliate, stupidly called Raptors 905. He actually played 4 games for the Raptors in real life this season before being waived in January. So in this 2k file, he stuck around the G-league long enough to get noticed and signed by the Clippers and then made Rookie of the Year. Good for him!  A foregone conclusion. Yeah, you're starting Harden and Last year's Sixth Man of the Year...... Mitchell was upset he wasn't an all-star this season, and with those numbers, could have been, really.  This load of Horseshit is DPOY, despite my non-candidate DPOY holding opponents to a lower percentage and having a higher +/- on the year when it was all said and done. What a fraud.   This is the guy the Mavs hired to replace Rick Carlisle. I believe he was at the time the Assistant Coach of the Pistons, and not particularly gifted, but hey, who needs to be when you have Luka Doncic? NBA Teams: First  Second:  Third:  Bol, an MVP candidate at the end of the season, got totally snubbed, and will remember this.   Gobert but no Bilic. Also, man, whoever faces the Sixers in the playoffs sure has their work cut out for them. Three all-defense first team guys on the same squad. Emanuel Terry should be first team with Bilic. (How the Bulls are so bad with him and the A+ defender A.C. Lowe on the same squad is beyond me   In my head canon the McCaws are siblings. Despite both being on the all rookie team, neither played in the playoffs. Only the Knicks' Tyler and our Bilic would get significant minutes, both starting at the 3 for each team, since the Knicks' usual starting SF is out injured.       Poor New York... their best player is basically out. this was supposed to be the coming out party for their young squad. They still manage to snag two games off the Sixers. Bilic stays down for longer than I thought, but I activate Mykhailiuk to take his place against the Thunder.  We lose one game to the Thunder, but it's a close one. Bilic returns toward the end of the series, and they're closed out with no problem.  Bilic gets a deep bruise on a collision with someone, just a freak accident, and probably not someone losing their cool and punching him. On a whim, I activate Windler against the Suns to take his place, since I notice our scoring is way down.  It works very, very well. Windler basically carried our series against the Suns, and performances like this one carry us past them in a six game series. On the other side of the conference, I see that the Jazz tried their damnedest, but couldn't squeak by those drat Dallas Lukas.  We win two on their floor, they win two on our floor, and on a whim, I activate Windler again for the fifth game for extra scoring punch  He completely whiffs it, but we manage to hold Luka under 30, which I guess means we win? I thank Dylan for disposing of the Suns and move him back to the bench for game six and somehow, someway.  We take the conference. Three playoff series in just four years split 2-1 in our favor, and Dallas/Honolulu now has a Rivalry rating of 97. We're considered one of their biggest rivals and they're considered our only Rival. This isn't the last time we've seen these guys. Our opponents in the finals are the Philadelphia 76ers. I make a decision here: The entirety of the Sixers is really good, anyone here can beat us, but they have a weak link, and that weak link's name is Ben Simmons. Technically the best player on their team? Naw, fam. Be real. Ben Simmons has no range. This simulated season, he put up an historic shooting percentage, but it's a mirage, it's all in close, dude didn't even attempt a three. My game plan is to stick Bilic on him, pressure him more than he can handle outside, and then run him ragged into Gobert and Bol, hopefully taking him out of the series entirely. If Embiid outplays my bigs, I'll live with it. If Josh Richardson or De'aaron Fox or Tobias Harris go off, then you'll have that sometimes. But to lose in a playoff series to Ben loving Simmons? Unforgiveable.  Bol's ready.  Bilic is relishing the chance to shut down one of the most efficient shooters in the league. Also, see what I mean about "Mr Bill"? What is up with your face, my dude? Game 1 goes exactly as planned, and we stun the sixers out the gate:   Bilic makes it so you gotta score up close, but if you're up close, you gotta go through Gobert. Good game, Sixers. Game two goes to the Sixers, and Simmons manages to adjust and show off some truly excellent passing, largely running plays for Fox and Richardson to chew me up. I hope the real Simmons does this if anyone ever takes the same approach I did---he's got some serious vision, so I don't want to be too critical of him, but I maintain it's my team's best chance of championship victory. Game three I will summarize with this image of Mfiondu Kabengele posterizing Frank Kaminsky while Fox and Simmons stare off confused into the distance.  Picture that like, 6 times, but with more open dunks. Thanks, Kabengele. Game four.... game four is going well for us, we're keeping things neck and neck, and I start to realize that William Floyd is easily the most selfish basketball player I have ever witnessed. He just does not pass the ball. All of his assists are last second bailouts. My team has something I now call a "Floyd Assist" where he'll jack up an absolutely terrible shot instead of passing, but Bol, Gobert, Kabengele or Olynyk will grab a rebound and manage a putback. If I had less speedy big men, I'd be absolutely doomed. But check the box score for game 1. 11 for 30 shooting? Check game 4, which, spoiler alert: WE LOST.  8-26. Just enough of his shots seemingly go in that it's hard to notice at first, but once it's seen it can't be unseen. This kid does not pass. In my frustration, I'll watch him run fast breaks and not pass properly to the finisher. I'll watch a player run a simple give and go, and successfully cut to the basket, and instead of posting to the wide open guy under the basket, he'll jack up a contested 14 footer. His selfishness is unreal. Even when Kobe hauled a team with Smush Parker to the playoffs and he had a reason to be that selfish, he wasn't that selfish. And he doesn't defend, either. Floyd completely shot us out of this game. Even the AI controlled coach has enough of his bullshit and moves him down to the bottom of the 9 man playoff rotation and sticks in Holiday for game 5.  Which we win. Floyd performs better on his leash and is given his spot back on the starting lineup. We open up game six with a sequence of blocks from Bol, just exerting his will on the series.  Embiid starts to realize that his team is getting overwhelmed. Floyd starts doing his utter bullshit again in the second half, after largely being an actual point guard in the first. The Sixers start climbing back and I make a vow that, regardless of what coach says, if I lose game six, I'm deactivating him and giving every single one of his minutes to Dylan Windler. Eventually, through some stroke of fortune, or maybe the in game coach* says something, but Delon Wright starts handling bringing the ball up court and Floyd is only involved in plays if he's supposed to shoot a jumper, and to his credit, he hits basically all of those. (*despite my ID being shown on some of the match-up screen shots, that's because I have to load both Home and Away jerseys for my team before I can actually not be invisible in the game. All of these games with screen shots are entirely the AI playing itself.) Bol swats away two more shots, including pinning one Simmons layup right to the glass and I wish I could have screen capped it, because it was beautiful and the statement.  Perfect from the line in game 6, too. WE DID IT.  That's how you close out a goddamn series. 9 blocks between our bigs. Shoutouts to Kabengele being an absolute beast on the boards the whole series, hell, maybe the whole playoffs.  Why's that little poo poo holding the trophy, they better not have named him MVP  >Phew< OK, good. They gave it to Bol. Ladies and gentlemen, your 2023-2024 NBA Champions, the Honolulu Honu. BACK ROW: Sasha Bilic, Mfiondu Kabengele, Kelly Olynyk, Norman Powell, Ralph Miller FRONT ROW: Aaron Holiday, Rudy Gobert, William Floyd, Bol Bol, Delon Wright NOT PICTURED (despite being present): Sviatoslav Mykhailiuk, Dylan Windler, Jimmie Sharp, Fred Valentine  What is up with his face. The other procedureally generated characters look pretty OK.  SOMEONE ID THAT KID   (Delon Wright and Norman Powell were both on the 2019 Raptors and are two time champions) Whew. Four years. I'm no Las Vegas Knights, but gently caress it, I feel pretty drat good about that kind of turnaround.  We knew LeBron was done, but I gotta say, this was the first list of retirees so far that I scrolled through and felt unspeakably old and sad. Most of these players are younger than me.  No one signed Payton II and he hung 'em up. I wish he'd have taken his player option. He could have been a champion, but now he's a footnote. Also retiring this season are former Honu players JaVale McGee and Ish Smith Pour one out for a real one, though  Obviously he made the Hall of Fame.  This, though, this right here is some bullshit. In the real world, maybe one day the Lakers retire James' jersey. His story there remains untold. In this world? gently caress no, they wouldn't. As legendary as the player himself was, he didn't do anything for this team. They didn't retire Pau Gasol's jersey when he retired in this game, and frankly, Pau did a hell of a lot more for the Lakers than LeBron ever did. That is nonsense, and I'm irritated I don't have the option to override it. Everything I would actually override as a player I am not allowed to. God drat it, 2k.  There is a brief period of happiness in Chicago as fans finally realize they'll never have to deal with Jim Boylen again. .............It's only a brief moment, though. Hey, remember this? quote:
In the past, I focused on Chicago getting Phoenix's pick and it being safe with what they acquired from Cleveland in that draft. Hey, whatever happened to that 2023 Chicago pick anyhow? Well, Chicago had a top ten pick in last year's (2023) draft, the one I traded out of, so their pick became unprotected this year. ....wait a second... quote:
     (Also, check out OKC getting two of the top 5 picks despite making the playoffs. Unreal.) So yeah, NBA Champions, and I have the third overall pick in the draft. Will I ride this hot streak to utter league dominance, or will I pull some serious Darko Milicic type poo poo? Time will tell. But with a core of talented players largely on the right side of 30, excellent chemistry, a top 5 coach, more help coming from overseas, the third overall pick in the draft, two more picks later on in the draft...... .....is there anything that can stop this upstart young expansion team from one of the smallest markets in the league?  ........................................................................................................................................ Oh, that's just mean spirited.  It was you, wasn't it, Cuban? You salty bastard. I knew it was you who made this proposal.
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Jun 9, 2020 10:49
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Dang, what a ride. A balanced team can really pay off, I guess and the actual events of the playoffs all seem fairly reasonable.  Except for the end. The idea that 25 teams would be in favor of abolishing the salary cap is ludicrous. In the real world, there'd be maybe five teams that would vote yes on that - even most big market teams wouldn't be eager to open Pandora's box to have their salary costs go absolutely insane. Even if you wanted to say that maybe a couple teams get caught up in the euphoria of "we made a deep playoff run and are only one piece away!" so they vote against their fiscal interests, I don't see how that proposal even gets to double-digit votes, much less the two-thirds majority needed to pass.
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Jun 9, 2020 13:42
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I'm a little terrified. I have no idea what contracts will look like. The tax room is like 500 million. Iunno if I have that crazy rear end figure or if I have the approximately 100 million I have seen somewhere regarding Honolulu. The game doesn't make it clear at all how much I actually have available to spend. A big part of my success is I have guys like Windler, Wright, and Kabengele working for way less than comparable players. I assume that advantage is about to leave. I have no idea how this changes trade rules, if at all............ We're in wild country. There's votes to raise the cap or the tax threshold, too. It's very weird that it goes for the most dramatic vote. I'm trying to figure out how the league would restructure for this. Would smaller teams just fold? Move to bigger cities? If it didn't just expand, I could see an argument for a very rich city proclaiming they can just buy a good team and expanding again....... It's stuff to consider over the next couple of seasons. ..........if they vote the cap back in, imagine the clusterfuck of the people stuck in pre-cap contracts
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Jun 9, 2020 14:11
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I'm going to guess based on how 2k has seemed to program things thus far that barely anything will change.
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Jun 9, 2020 14:36
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First off congrats on building a winner so quickly, simultaneously nasty in the paint while also being deadly with threes is a hell of a pretty system too. Secondly I am  at the coming clusterfuck.
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Jun 9, 2020 14:43
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Bol and Floyd winning a championship isn't too surprising, though I am surprised at the number of misses he had for you. He never misses when I go up against him!
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Jun 9, 2020 20:39
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INTERLUDE: LeBron James (Plus vote at end) Since there were a lot of folks curious as to where LeBron wound up after calling it a day, I thought I'd post the important pieces of his history, or at least the ones that really stand out:  The main one asked about was points. Did he beat Kareem in points? And the answer is "Resoundingly" LeBron finishes a storied career with a points total that seems almost insurmountable, shattering the previous record by over 4,000. That's over 10% higher than the previous #1. A record that will stand the test of time. Or so it's believed.  He did not pass Kareem in field goals, which goes to show the strengths that James had in scoring. Perhaps the difference is made up for by how many threes he launched, clocking in just under Ray Allen  Or maybe it had to do with his many trips to the line, second in free throw makes only to Karl Malone.  Or maybe you just get a lot of opportunities when you've got more miles put on your body than anyone else.  Or more games than almost anyone else.  Maybe at times you had to drop 40  Hell, maybe 50  Who knows. It's not like the man's game was selfish, or that he ever thought he was the team's only option. His vision put him fourth in all time assists.  And while he's far down the list of career rebounds, he got enough boards in his day to be the fifth all time in Triple Doubles  And his defense was no weakness, either. Look at him, just barely inching past the Glove  (Stockton's two records are the hardest I feel to break for individual career counting stats----being as durable as Stockton was and as productive into old age as he was and putting up big numbers in two of the harder categories.... I expect a lot of these records to be broken over 80 years, but I feel like Assists and Steals won't be) Not every record in the books is a badge of honor, though.  BONUS: Did you know two Honu/Former Honu are on the all-time list for a seasonal record?  Check out Ryan Arcidiacono taking the #2 all time spot for three point field goal percentage, all the more impressive because he had to do so under two different coaching systems (he played significantly more minutes for Toronto). His place wouldn't last long, as Dylan Windler slid into that spot just one year later. As a bench Gunner, Windler is absolutely lethal from range. I was a little stunned that he wasn't in the 3pt contest this year, but hey, at least Floyd won. In the end, though, I think people ask, and will always ask: "Was LeBron James the greatest basketball player of all time" (currently, they ask "is he?") And the beauty of basketball is the myriad of ways that you can dominate this game. Maybe you can be good at one thing, or another thing, or, like LeBron and some of the true greats, nearly everything. Who you play against matters. Who you play with matters. What the league looks like when you come and when you go matters. Your footprint after you leave matters. You have to take a lot of different things into consideration when you're trying to narrow down a league of transcendent talents down to, not just the best now, but the best ever. If we take two random people's top ten lists and compare them, I guarantee you, on average, they'll have three or four players the other person doesn't and be completely appalled that they aren't on the other list. But.... at the same time, not everyone will begrudge the choices the other person made. Basketball is music. And there's an infinity of ways to make a beautiful sound. It's a pretty meaningless way to stall on my own answer. So, I'll ask myself again. Is LeBron James the greatest basketball player ever? MAYBE. That's the best I got. He's in my top four. He might be in your top twelve. I won't begrudge anyone who puts him #1. I won't even question a list of five guys. But if you're going to claim there were ten players better than him, I want to see your logic. ~~~~ VOTING TIME: (Also discussion time)The Honu go into the offseason with, if I understand the "No Salary Cap" data correctly, roughly 45 million dollars to play with, Esteban Barea, three draft picks, and some decisions to make. Rudy Gobert, Dylan Windler, Sviatoslav Mykhailiuk and Fred Valentine will be free agents. We have team options on Olynyk, Miller, and Sharp. Some of these guys are harder to replace than others. If we want to keep our picks and not stash them or assign the second rounder to the G-league (this is probably what I will do----they will be the second-to-last pick, they almost certainly belong in the G-league), but, assuming that I activate all three guys, I have four incoming guys, which means I potentially need four outgoing guys. Valentine is one of them. There's no reason to re-sign him Gobert is our aging defensive-minded Center. I can't guarantee he'll resign. He ended the season very happy because we won a championship, and that tends to make everyone happy. But before that, he was upset because he wasn't involved enough in the offense. ( Floyd again ) If he takes his option, he'll make 34 million of our 45 in spending money, but if he doesn't, then he'll likely want about 20, but for multiple years. He's currently declining in overall ability, but is extremely good in what we use him for, interior defense, and he shows no signs of losing this particular impact. He might need less minutes and could take a big dip, though.Windler is frequently late in our rotation, and would be our third SF in the rotation, likely---though he's extremely solid at what he does, and has surprised me by playing his way into our starting lineup occasionally. As a rotation player in an offense, he's basically extra points, which can be hard to come by. He also passes well and rebounds surprisingly well. Mykhailiuk is weird--he's a poor defender, but he always tries on defense, and he's a physical player who gets his money's worth when he fucks up and fouls a guy. Bilic is legitimately a good defender, but having an enforcer to back him up might have some merit. Svi is also streaky. I'm not sure why, but he'll alternate long stretches of hitting nothing, and not missing a shot. He averages out to a slightly worse shooter than Windler. Svi never turns the ball over, and has ranked in the bottom 10 in the league in turnovers for two straight years, among qualifying players. Olynyk has surprisingly not begun declining. He's an interesting mix between Kabengele and Bol, but not as good as either. He doesn't shoot as well as Bol, or have quite the athleticism of Kabengele, but he both has a ranged game and does great work around the basket. He's come up really big for us in the two years we've had him, and I honestly wasn't expecting him to play a minute. Miller is a defensive interior presence. He's not a stiff on offense, but he's going to get his points largely through slashing and dunking, and not with serious post moves. He's an above average rebounder. His help defense is not as good as any of our bigs except maybe Olynyk, but his man to man post defense is probably the best on our team. He is no longer an A+ potential, and I am not sure why (I didn't rando him down) or what happened to make it go down. He's still got room to grow, though, and who knows, maybe the rando will bless him. Sharp is the best Rebounder on our team, but doesn't do enough other things to regularly get minutes. I don't think he'll develop more, but he's still got time to surprise me. If he picks up one or two more skills, even just a little bit, he'd be incredibly valuable. Please weigh in on which guys you feel are more valuable going forward. If all seven guys leave (they won't, if nothing else I'd take my team options), our depth chart currently reads: Floyd/Holiday/(Wright) Wright/Powell/Barea/Bilic/(Floyd)/(Holiday) Bilic/Barea/(Powell) Bol/(Kabengele) Kabengele/(Bol) The Draft We have the #3, #32, and #63 picks. The consensus #1 pick is a shooting guard named Andre Whitney. In the off chance he falls to me, I intend to take him. The other options are 1)PICK #3 Jacque Cisse (PG) A french Point Guard with the highest potential and best athleticism of available point guards. He'd have to stay in France for a year. His midrange game is legit, he can't even play tower defense, and he has a disturbing mustache. Fabricio Nunez (PG)An Argentinian Point Guard ready to come over right now. He can score at will, and has a reasonably good passing game, and is completely NBA ready out of the box. He has limited potential (that I'd at least burn a camp on), and a disturbing beard. Steven Washington (C) A Center from Texas that can score inside and has good interior defense. Has better potential than the other center option, but not like, gobs of it like Cisse or Whitney. Is surprisingly not great at rebounding. No weird facial features, but he's pretty ugly. Can only play center Leroy Westbrook (C) A Center from Nevada. Has slightly less potential than Washington, and not as good scoring ability, but he's not hopeless on offense. Is much better at rebounding and noticeably better at defense. Can also play PF. Easily the handsomest option, he looks like an average, if sleepy, man. I'm not guaranteed to get the guy you name, so PICK TWO. I intend to keep this pick because these are the hardest positions to competently fill and we have a real chance at actually doing so. 2)Pick #32 A)Most Potential Available B)Try to draft a rotational player C)Draft for a specific skill D)Shop the pick 3)Pick #63 A)Draft on potential, aim for a guy I can stash overseas for as long as possible B)Draft on potential, aim for highest potential I can stuff in the G-league C)Draft on potential, but aim for a very specific niche (name it) D)Best name available 4)William Floyd This guy almost shot us clean out of the finals. He's very productive for us, but I think he might be holding us back, and if Gobert walks, it's almost certainly his fault. If Gobert can be enticed to come back, depending on how old/content he feels, he might still be upset about touches. Other players are going to start getting mad about touches. He definitely can score at an elite rate, and his actual shooting numbers are good, too, but his USG and POS are way, way too high, and this can and will (and to a degree, has) expose us in an actual playoff series. What do we do about it? A)Nothing. Floyd's fine, you take the bad with the good, sometimes he'll shoot us out of a game and that's life. Why rock the boat? B)Trade him for a scorer Obviously, we'd have to get some of his points back---I'd only accept offers if they contained someone with at least 18 points a game last season. C)Trade him for an actual point guard We have never had a true pass-first point. (...ok, we had Monte Morris for like, two months) Our best passer has consistently been Delon Wright, one of our shooting guards, and until this season, our bench option SG. How good would Bol be with someone actually giving him the ball? For that matter, I'm a little curious what Windler would have looked like. Kabengele is another guy that could benefit tremendously from having someone actually recognize his athletic cuts toward the basket, or realize that he can go up and get lobs. (Kabengele keeps developing and theoretically could take the starting spot from Gobert, depending how much each rises and falls. Or if Gobert straight-up leaves. I'd be pretty comfortable with a team that had him at either C or PF moving forward.) D)Turn him into a Shooting Guard, revoke his primary ball-handling privileges. He'd be undersized and a liability on defense, but Bilic should help some with that. The thing Floyd does best is score from almost anywhere on the court, which is a very valuable skill, but it has to be leveraged properly. He might resent this.
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Jun 10, 2020 07:35
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Until we find out what this new capless world is we shouldn't overcommit to keeping role players here, the only essentials now are Bilic and Bol. I'd almost say slash and burn the roster otherwise but let's see. We really want to keep Gobert and Miller. Even in this new world and as Gobert declines he offers us that defensive skill which is hard to just find, and that makes him valuable. I assume Miller is now an A or A- potential wise, which is still good enough that we should hold onto him. The others we can take or leave, I leave to your discretion. I choose both of the point guards, with Cisse the preferred choice to draft, B for pick 32, since we should start revamping our rotation and for our last pick, do B and find someone to stash in the G league. I say move Floyd to SG, D. We have to get the ball out of his hands to some extent, and with Barra we have an interesting small/big combo at shooting guard. Thordain fucked around with this message at 18:13 on Jun 10, 2020 |
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Jun 10, 2020 16:43
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1) Nunez or Cisse if Nunez not available 2) A 3) B 4) D - maybe Nunez can take over PG
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Jun 10, 2020 16:54
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I say we keep Windler, if for no other reason than I've formed a completely arbitrary attachment to him, and he's pretty much always been pretty handy. I'd rather not dump him. 1) Cisse and Washington 2) A 3) B 4) B
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Jun 10, 2020 17:38
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It's a good point about needing more context on contracts in this scary new world...... I'm not sure if I want to sign anyone not core for more than two years. Kabengele is also a great interior defender now. He has 98 help defense compared to Gobert's 99. But he's in no danger of leaving for a little while since I had managed to sign him for a few more years last year
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Jun 10, 2020 19:34
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Chapter 8, 2024-2025, Offseason I did the entirety of the offseason in one session this time, mostly because I was nervous about free agency, and also because I didn't have the money to pursue any of the big name free agents anyhow. 2024 is a pretty by-the-numbers draft without a lot of big surprises or enormous trades, but there were a couple to mention. I have some more screens because I also wanted to show where all the guys I was considering at 3 went.  Welp, the Hawks couldn't pass on this guy, and I don't blame them. He's not significantly better than anyone in what looks to be a fairly weak draft. All four players I was considering fall to me, as the Thunder picked a SF (I wasn't considering any of these, unless they played big and I could slide them to PF---none did)  Cisse here was the only person mentioned on all three votes, so Cisse it is. Behold the 'stache  Nunez is the very next pick, also by the Thunder---it's not an Alfred Kerr hobo beard, but it's a pretty gross looking beard that's a weird decision for that face/coloration.  This trade doesn't seem like it'd move the needle very much, but I've been consistently showing trades of any players 80+ in the draft.  However, the Bulls use their newly acquired #12 pick to nab Washington here, who was on my board.  The Grizzlies acquire Jimmy Butler  And this is the guy Miami draft to replace him. Is he a sleeper, can't miss prospect that everyone passed on? (Nope!) EDIT: I just noticed, they even gave him Jimmy Butler's number. You'd think a team called "The Heat" wouldn't be so ice cold.  Hey, remember that time a few seasons ago where the Celtics traded one of their picks for Blake Griffin?  Look how close we came to almost grabbing a guy at 32 I was willing to take at 3. Look at that description: Simply put, the best interior defender in the draft. I tried to trade for this guy, but Toronto was having none of it. Oh, well. Then I go on the clock again, and the Clippers offer me an absolutely baffling trade:   Last year's #4 pick that they've apparently given up on (despite his A+ potential), plus a future second round draft pick. A+ potential and he averaged 12.2 and 6.4 last year----he didn't play very many games. They're gonna regret throwing this poor kid in the garbage. I accept the trade, since he's way better than anything I could grab at this point, and I stuff him in the G-league because he's not going to make our rotation, might make a huge leap, and I have 3 years to make him not hate us.  This is the guy they grabbed. Maybe they saw something in him. My "Put a guy in the G-league" pick comes up, and there's only one guy with an A- potential (that I know of.....there are a ton of guys I don't have scouted)  The realistically ugly Wayne Hollins joins our team on a two-way contract. Maybe he'll turn into something. If he does, I dunno, I'll waive someone or make a trade. Mr. Irrelevant 2024 is this guy with a big ol high-top  Free agency rolls around, and the first thing that happens, is loving Gobert screws us by taking his player option, despite saying for an entire season that he wasn't going to do that. This stops me from signing any big name players that I might have wanted, as I discover I only have about 12 million dollars to play with after my team options----I'm by far the poorest team in the entire league. I am completely convinced the teams voted to abolish the Salary Cap entirely to spite me. They will (literally) pay for this.  I also pick up the options on Miller and Olynyk, and let Jimmie Sharp walk. No one signs him or Valentine.  I need a backup point guard, and could do with another forward (either type). Since Jadecore brought it up, and because I completely agree, I make sure to offer another contract to Dylan Windler. Peeling back some of the curtains of the absolute idiocy that makes up NBA 2k's mechanics, there's a stat called "intangibles" that, as near as I can tell does nothing but affect an overall rating, although maybe maybe does something with how "clutch" a player is.... so it's a trap stat that inflates or deflates a player's ratings----Windler has a 25 Intangibles, which is the lowest score in this stat possible. In other words, his 77-80 overall is actually as good as a player with a 77-80 rating can possibly be He's still not great, overall, but he's insanely valuable as a cheap fringe rotational piece, and will perform when I give him minutes. This is not to say that players with high intangibles are automatically bad---just that they're not quite as good as they seem. I also welcome Ryan Arcidiacono back to the team, as I need a back up point guard for and the price was right. Plus he already knows our system. As for how other people work in Free Agency in this new, post-cap world:  A few teams do stuff like the Suns did here---sign multiple players to really big contracts at the same position. This just makes me angry. If they don't play together on the court with one guy taking a different position, this sort of idiocy does nothing but drive up contracts league wide and won't even benefit the team doing it. Please note: this is actually very realistic, and NBA teams do this sort of stupid poo poo all the time because almost no one employed in NBA front offices deserves to be there. Other teams like the Warriors, which have a ton of money, try to buy their way to a championship:  Please note that they still have Steph Curry and Klay Thompson A third thing I notice about the new cap rules is this slick little maneuver from Orlando:  Last year, they didn't have a way of keeping Vucevic without screwing up their cap. But after a 1 year excursion to learn how they play in Denver, they're able to sign their former best player to a big deal and lock down Brandon Ingram, who was the highest overall available player in this free agency. So this was a major coup.  The bulls sign these idiots instead of offering contracts to their excellent defenders A.C. Lowe and Emanuel Terry. I do not understand this move---they were both restricted free agents, and with the cap gone, they could have matched an offer sheet anyhow. They just gave up on two very good players to sign.... whatever this mess is. Bulls continue to suck.  The Cavs sign Terry, as well as last season's rookie of the year, Shamorie Ponds. (Also, Kevin Love came back)  Meanwhile, A.C. Lowe joins the Heat. It's a shame the AI almost never plays guys out of position or reassigns positions to players, because if they moved him over to SF, he could replace Jimmy Butler, and coupled with Shai, could give them a really fun looking couple of wings to run out together. Progression treats us very well, with no players on our team regressing an actual point overall, (though Gobert loses a bit of athleticism---just made up for it by getting a little bit smarter, which the real Gobert could use off the court)  ...................................................then this inexplicably happens. I don't even think he was in the G-league. Can we test Ike Anigbogu for steroids? There's a second scramble of free-agency as not every team had a full roster before the season began. During that time, I find one of our stalwarts has found a safe home on a decent team.  I'll miss you, you weird bastard. I forgot to snag the power rankings, but they have New York at 1 and us at 2. Not that the pre-season power rankings mean anything. Veryslightlymad fucked around with this message at 05:16 on Jun 11, 2020 |
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Jun 11, 2020 05:11
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Thank you for posting so regularly! I am really enjoying this. I'm assuming you'd post it if so but I wanted to ask, have any big name people gone to any unexpected teams in their older age? I always enjoy that kind of stuff.
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Jun 11, 2020 16:01
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That mustache is fantastic. I don't care if we missed out on a big point guard, Jacque Cisse rules.
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Jun 11, 2020 16:49
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Can we get an update on the careers of the best names from the draft like Jackson Jackson?
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Jun 11, 2020 18:52
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beejay posted:Thank you for posting so regularly! I am really enjoying this. Thank you! I have been trying to post player movement for anyone rated highly or for anyone that has been an All-Star. One thing I forgot to mention with this past off-season is that Chris Paul apparently only had a brief deal with the Magic and has found himself picked up by the Jazz. So, once again, him and James Harden are on the same team. Thordain posted:That mustache is fantastic. I don't care if we missed out on a big point guard, Jacque Cisse rules. He's also a pass-first point, so I'm a little excited to have someone like that for once. Though, now that you mention size, I feel stupid for not posting that information. Especially with Floyd sliding over to SG, it might have swung votes in favor of Nunez. Largepotato posted:Can we get an update on the careers of the best names from the draft like Jackson Jackson? Sure! (This draft, sadly, did not have a particularly good name. "Rich Smart", the Dating Profile, (who I'd have selected if it got voted for) didn't get selected and will play at least another year in England. Perhaps he'll never be seen again.) Jackson Jackson is a productive member of the Hawks. Dick Steele is in the G-league, but hasn't fell out. Wayne Newton is a core member of the New York Knicks Steppenwolf somehow lost all his potential (this was before I was tweaking it) and busted out of the league. Barry White III is also a bust, but I can't remember if he's employed or not, still.
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Jun 11, 2020 19:15
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It might be a problem next season, but that's so far away it barely matters. I don't have a full view on the team right now (Not to critique, but if there was a set of images in the OP showing the current state of the team I would find that very helpful) but if this selfishness is a long term problem for Floyd I see his future as a productive sixth man, propping up some second unit so long as he has a smart point guard to watch him. Also echoing beejay in saying that I'm enjoying this lp a lot.
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Jun 11, 2020 19:44
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Yeah, that's my bad. Part of why I was having a small "just to January" update was to do that, and then I haven't actually been doing so. Expect a player rundown on today's update.
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Jun 11, 2020 19:47
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Chapter 8, 2024-2025, Part I, 2024 The Honu come out the gate swinging, winning several of their early games in devastating fashion, but hey, even our close games during this period have some eye-popping numbers.  Bol Bol continues to show his superstar talents. Meanwhile, William Floyd adjusted pretty admirably to the move to Shooting Guard. His scoring has not dipped at all, despite not being allowed to handle the ball, and, somehow, his actual assist totals are about what they were before, too. His turnovers are up, but honestly, I prefer that. His shooting percentages are much higher than last year, and that can only be a good thing for us. Over the next several weeks we enter something I call the "Oh, gently caress this bullshit" zone, which is full of reports like this:  During this period, Gobert, Bilic, Wright and Powell all experience injuries as well. I'd have activated our G-leaguers but:  They'd probably deliberately throw the game. OK, real talk, if I ever, and I mean EVER meet the guy who came up with the loving morale system in this game, I am going to smack them hard in the face. Like, hard enough to draw blood. From one of us, I don't care which. Go ahead and sue me or toss me in jail. At this point, it is worth it. Even my other guy on a loving two way contract is mad about being in the G-league-----that's... that's what those contracts are supposed to cover, mechanically. This sort of poo poo manages to be both idiotic gameplay design and nowhere near accurate to the NBA. So congratulations, gently caress-o. You've failed at literally every aspect of your job and manage to magically keep it year-by-year. I hate you. I hope you take a shower with 36,000 angry wasps.  My guys tend to find a way to perform, even with a skeleton crew.  Bol's play (when healthy) still manages to be among the league's best. I feel pretty good about my scouting/player valuation, after seeing December's Rookies of the Month.  Despite the constant injury woes, despite all the nonsense I've put up with this season, I still manage to be tied for the best record in the league. My only competition is the Warriors, the best team money can buy. (They have the highest salary total in the league.) The Honu, by contrast, have the third lowest salary total in the league.  One reason for why our team is so good, probably the main reason, is how ridiculously good our team is at the long-ball.  We have a whopping 3.3% higher three point field goal percentage over the next highest team, and we attempt more threes than anyone except the Hawks. The east, meanwhile, looks like this:  I forgot to screen grab it, but on Christmas (and the following day), we lose both sides of a Home and Home to Dallas. We were pretty beat up, but played them tight in each game. Our rivalry rating with Dallas is now 100, making ours one of the most anticipated Rivalries in the entire league.    As stated, Floyd's move to shooting guard didn't hurt him any, and actually made him much more efficient, which is definitely good news for us. I'll take a half a turnover a game over something like six missed shots. This is the first season he's averaged more points than Bol, but it's still very early days. Bol continues to be a monster 25/9 player. Despite no one on our team averaging 10 rebounds a game, we are in the top half for total rebounds---our depth is stupidly good. The last two guys on our usual rotation both had near-record years in three point shooting recently. Holiday's scoring is down, but his assists are up. He's almost at 7 a game, and I think this might be his first season averaging at least 6. Having a point guard that actually passes, FLOYD, is a pretty big benefit to the team. Esteban Barea is a scoring threat from just about anywhere, and plays much more aggressively than Bilic on offense---Bilic is irritatingly passive on that end of the court. He could actually score frequently, but just chooses not to. Esteban has got the highest vertical leap in the NBA, and I hope he's played enough minutes to be in the dunk contest. Mfiondu Kabengele is a stud, and I think the team would be OK if Rudy Gobert decided to leave. I'd still prefer to have Gobert, but Kabengele is a bundle of athleticism and an excellent interior defender. in his own right. He can also shoot, sort of, maybe, a little. Dylan Windler is also a stud, good at just about every aspect of Basketball, except for apparently the game deciding that he's good. His numbers noticeably decline when he's a starter, so I'm pretty OK with having him come off the bench, where he really, really shines. Windler has a PER right now of something like 20.1 Sasha Bilic is, as I said, irritatingly passive on Offense despite having A+ ratings in both close range and mid range scoring. He also has a slithery finisher badge. Nonetheless, he does everything sort of well, but defends very well. I'll take the deceptive offense so long as he's running the other team's best perimeter player ragged. Delon Wright continues to fill up every statistical category, is shooting some good numbers, and generally is aging like fine wine. He actually improved during this past offseason, becoming an 81 overall. Norman Powell..... kind of sucks. He's competent defensively, and he doesn't cost us games or anything, but he doesn't contribute a whole lot for a guy who gets as many minutes as he does, and I'm giving serious consideration to trading him at the deadline to free up more minutes for Bilic/Barea/Windler. It might be worthwhile to move one of Barea/Windler to SG. They'll drop in rating, but the flipside of that is, they should also develop more, because 2k is absolutely insane and broken mechanically. Ralph Miller is an excellent one-on-one post defender, a reasonably good rebounder, and can't really shoot. His FG% is so low because he takes more shots than he ought to. Sometimes he'll go off. If his offensive game actually develops (and it.... probably will? I've noticed most players FG% tends to increase over time) he'd be a really solid piece. I don't think he'd be as good as Kabengele even then, but he's definitely an overall positive presence on the team. He has a Hall of Fame "Worm" Badge. Rudy Gobert is old and senile. His numbers have declined some, and he bafflingly is always mad that he doesn't get touches on offense. Motherfucker, Kabengele gets half your minutes* and plays the same position and scores nearly twice as many points. Quit your whining and learn how to actually make a shot before you come crying to me about touches. Nevertheless, his interior defense is almost necessary, and a major part of why we're so dominant over the last two seasons. *This is an exaggeration, he gets like, five less minutes. Olynyk, now. He gets half the minutes and actually does score more points Ryan Arcidiacono is a point guard. He performed admirably during stretches where Holiday was injured, because to hell with the idea of giving Floyd the ball again. He makes very few mistakes. He doesn't shoot often, but when he does, he takes the three, and he probably hits it. As a back-up player at the end of my bench I am very happy with him. EDIT I somehow didn't screen Grab Kelly Olynyk? Who is definitely still on this team and also definitely productive. He plays something like 10 minutes a game and still manages to average more points than Gobert. He's got the most range of our centers on offense and, despite having the worst interior defense SCORE, actually holds his opponents to a lower field goal percentage right now, so.... whatever. I gave up trying to figure that poo poo out with Mykhailiuk. Olynyk has a spot on the rotation for as long as he wants it. Harry Francis is a piece of poo poo. Wayne Hollins is also a piece of poo poo, but I haven't given up on him, yet. gently caress THE G-LEAGUE SYSTEM IN THIS STUPID GAME. Veryslightlymad fucked around with this message at 06:53 on Jun 12, 2020 |
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Jun 12, 2020 06:45
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I think at a certain overall rating players get pissed that they're in the G-League. I thinks it's about 72. That guy is a 74 while having Zero Morale so maybe we should think about converting his Two-Way Contract into a regular one. He seems good enough to be a regular bench piece. fucking love Fiona Apple fucked around with this message at 09:12 on Jun 12, 2020 |
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Jun 12, 2020 09:08
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Hoo boy, those Gobert and Bilic scoring numbers are rough. Glad we have our deep bench of firepower but I wonder if Bilic has some intangibles set to discourage scoring. If he can crack it we should have a scary lineup though. Might be time to drop Gobert after the season if Kabengele is playing that well, I doubt you'd be able to move that contract reasonably.
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Jun 12, 2020 19:13
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Bilic has been playing (sometimes) with a broken nose, in his defense.
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Jun 12, 2020 19:51
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Chapter 8, 2024-2025, Part II, All Star Break Just a very tiny update this time around. Nothing really exciting happened in our first half of the season, hopefully the back-half+Playoffs make up for that a little. I'm spotlighting some players that are on other teams to just kind of paint in some of what I get to see and what you don't.  Ho-hum, another year, another dominant performance by Bol. The trade deadline approaches, and I float a bunch of names (like our G-league ingrates, and also Powell) as well as my draft pick, but there's nothing worthwhile floated back, so I stand pat. There's really not many trades to speak of:  Although, by this point, I feel like Blake Griffin is in some kind of weird-rear end Divorce Settlement between the Celtics and Bulls.  All-Star teams are announced, and Bol is actually rewarded by the fans and made into a starter---he's a popular guy, our little Finals MVP. (Incidentally, the OTHER all-star screen will correctly read him as a 5 time selection and Bagley III as a 2 time selection---it will count the years they missed but were voted in, and every other screen, including the awards screen, will not acknowledge if they missed an all-star game from injury. Weird. That's not our only presence on the festivities though. Our team's sweet shooting is shown off as both Bol and William Floyd (the reigning champion) are entered into the 3pt shooting contest (but not Dylan Windler). Neither win, but Herbert Curry of the Hornets does. The Clippers draft-and-stash Italian rookie wins the slam dunk contest.  This guy is secretly my favorite of the randomly generated characters. His facial expression gives off a serious YOSHI-HASHI vibe, and, when I went into his character editor to take a look at his signatures, I learned to deeply regret not being able to get video captures to work, because oh my god, he doesn't actually look at the basket when he shoots. The best three point shooter in the league right now actually turns his head while he shoots, and that is fantastic. I love him. Bilic was injured and out for most of the season, and so misses the young player showcase US vs World game, but Esteban Barea plays in it, and scores 10 points for the winning world team. It's a shame that 2k doesn't keep track of this, but Bol Bol makes up for his missing last year's all-star game entirely by going out and definitively making himself the All-Star MVP this season, with a line of 30 and 11 with four blocks, beating out the next highest scorer, Damian Lillard, by 12.  Lillard shouldn't have been here at all, and neither should Jayson Tatum, Nikola Jokic, James Harden, or Brandon Ingram. I'm sorry, if the fans don't vote you in, and you're on a losing team, you're not an all-star. You should only be on the injury reserve list. For your consideration, then, some snubs:  Like Shamorie Ponds, Zach Norvell Jr. is a real person that currently plays in the G-league, and it's cool that the game sometimes develops those guys into legitimate NBA players/possibly even stars. He is easily just as important to Houston's team as Westbrook is, and he's also the guy I will stick Bilic on if we meet up in the playoffs. EDIT: That FT% isn't "Small Sample size", he's currently 153 for 153. (This is after I toned down free throw shooting)  Jamal Murray has been consistently putting up decent numbers for the Nuggets, who are actually decent this year. The biggest snub continues to be the Cavaliers, who keep making the playoffs, but never seem to be acknowledged at the All-Star break. Their fans have to be losing their minds. It's not like there's nobody who qualifies, either.  Andre Drummond has slowly morphed from his 15/15 self into an 18/12 guy. For a team that highly seeded, you could make a case, but for my money, the biggest snub (despite not considering himself one) is the star of the Cavs team, their Small Forward:  Ciro Reyes. This guy is having a fantastic season, and shows substantial improvement every year he's in the league. At only 23(!) he's got a long career ahead of him, and I will be shocked and disappointed if he's never on one of these all-star teams. Standings: West    East:    EDIT 2: You brought this on yourselves, Chicago. Nice job not signing two of the top defenders in the league despite them both being restricted Free Agents. Both of their new teams are in the mix for the playoffs. Veryslightlymad fucked around with this message at 05:47 on Jun 13, 2020 |
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Jun 13, 2020 05:34
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SNEAK PREVIEW FOR NEXT UPDATE: "OK, huddle up everyone. I want all you guys to know just how proud of you I am going into this series. I know that we're considered big underdogs here, most analysts don't even think a win for us is possible. Well, I don't believe in impossible. I believe in you. As long as you guys settle down, and play within yourselves, you'll be fine. I know you will. You young men are the first team representing our city to go to the playoffs in nineteen years. That's already something for you to be proud of. I want you all to go out there, play the game like you always do, and let the game come to you. As long as you don't give in to pressure, you'll be fine."  NARRATOR: They gave into pressure.
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Jun 13, 2020 09:34
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OBS doesn't work for your video capture? Seems the easiest to set up and it's free.
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Jun 13, 2020 09:58
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I've been trying to use my onboard one. Lemme give it a shot.
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Jun 13, 2020 10:29
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| # ? May 10, 2024 07:25 |
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I somehow missed that Herbert Curry is Italian? And now it's going to haunt me for the rest of my life. The first child named Herbert since the first world War and he's Italian. Beautiful, this game is great.
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Jun 13, 2020 16:07
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