Bruski's 30-DEEP Draft Review

We’re getting down to the wire here and believe me I’m hearing you guys about the Bruski 150.  It’s a race to the finish to get the final touches on this first submission, which is being released Monday.  I will give a second update on Friday around midnight, and touch it up one last time on the following Monday or thereabouts. 

To get news and updates as the news hits the wire, you can click here to follow me on Twitter. 

For projections that help form the Bruski 150, strategy articles, more rankings, player profiles and more, you can click here to check out the Draft Guide. 

Lastly, I’ve been doing Season Preview podcasts with beat writers in every NBA city, and we’ve put up links to each of them right here. 

30 DEEP

We had a conversation a few years ago about introducing an entry fee and prizes into the 30-DEEP mix.  But, the 30 owners that comprise this expert league shot the idea down overwhelmingly because they wanted it to be about pride and nothing more.  I like to think of it as some underground street fighting ring, but with modern-day abacuses and pithy chat room comments instead. 

First off, a big shout out goes to Matt Satten a/k/a last year’s champion, and a huge shout out to CBS Sports for helping us to organize and run the league with their new draft software. 

We’ll go round by round here and talk some winners and losers real quick, and then I have to get my head back into the spreadsheet. 

RULES:  9-cat, Head-to-Head league, eight active roster slots (PG, SG, SF, PF, C, G, F, UTIL), four bench slots and two all-important IR slots. 

ROUND 1

Kevin Durant falling to Gallagher at No. 6 was just incredibly fortunate.  Paul George was autodrafted and because of the size of the league we weren’t able to go back and change it without mass chaos, so Satten was gracious enough to keep George like a good soldier.  Chris Paul at No. 8 is a really good look for Jeff.  I was thrilled to get my boy Kawhi Leonard at No. 11.  Likewise, I had a real hard time passing on DeMarcus Cousins and Towers also had to be thrilled.  Doc kicked off his punting strategy with Andre Drummond, who looks really sharp in what I’ve seen of him this preseason.  LaMarcus Aldridge was autodrafted at No. 29 and you’ll see in my B150 that he won’t be on any of my teams. 

ROUND 2

This was a fairly vanilla round until we get to Polito at No. 41 overall with Kyrie Irving, which is just incredible value.  I’m good with Andrew Wiggins speculators.  One thing about this league is that if you like a guy you just have to take him because you’re not going to be able to get him on the way back in most cases.  This is pretty high for Wiggins, but he has a chance to be a very special player in this league.  I landed Danny Green and now I’ve got all the wings in San Antonio, which is probably going to kill me in the playoffs when Pop rests the both for the same week.  You’re seeing some interesting markers on guys like Karl-Anthony Towns (No. 54) and Emmanuel Mudiay (No. 57), and in the case of Mudiay we’re seeing Tracy Fay execute a punting strategy otherwise this would be too high in a 9-cat league. 

ROUND 3

I was surprised to see Giannis Antetokounmpo last this long and it’s possible the hype came too early for him and everybody got worn out by a relatively low profile preseason.  I’ve said it on podcasts and I’ve taken my hands off the reins on our player news updates for the preseason, but I am not on the C.J. McCollum hype train.  I think he’s going to score a ton, hit a bunch of threes and get some nice assists.  But everything else is a huge question mark and that’s if we assume he can play at the level he showed during an outstanding playoff series vs. the Grizzlies.  Derrick Rose is a head-scratcher here.  Ryan Knaus and I stole each other’s picks all draft long.  Jahlil Okafor would be doing well if he earned this draft position, but that’s his ceiling and I don’t see it. I think Zach LaVine is just an interesting pick at No. 90.  If he’s off the ball his turnovers won’t be nearly as bad, and the Wolves are begging him to be a superstar.  He just needs to walk through that door.  I’m not sure I’d be this high, but I know some sharps that are hip to LaVine this season.

ROUND 4

Jrue Holiday is a guy that could go underdrafted after an almost unheard of 15-minute restriction on his play until January.  There are plenty of guys that are stuck with similar restrictions, but none with his upside and his relative youth.  I heart Stanley Johnson.  That said, this is probably where he should be despite an awesome preseason.  We’ll see when I compile my most recent update where he lands.  Joakim Noah is another guy who has been beaten down by the hype machine, not for him but for Nikola Mirotic, but if he’s relatively recovered from his various ailments he’ll kill this draft position. 

ROUND 5

Patrick Patterson might be playing his way out of meaningful minutes but normally this would be a fine spot for him.  Darren Collison is a much better play than teammate Rajon Rondo.  I went for Marcus Smart here and it’s the round of the draft in which owners really start to seek out positional needs vs. best player available.  I almost went for Jeremy Lin but hoped he’d slide.  Matt Buser is too good of an owner to let that happen.  P.J. Tucker should be an easy profit at this stage, so long as the situation in Phoenix doesn’t get too toxic.  Dennis Schroder has otherworldly speed and quickness.  When it all clicks it’s going to be fun to watch. 

ROUND 6

Sorry, not buying the Myles Turner hype either.  If he stays healthy, and can get minutes over the improved Ian Mahinmi, then he’s going to have to produce efficiently enough to make it work.  That said, this was pick No. 152 and not the early late round we’ve been suggesting in our blurbs.  I like Raul Neto for his role within the Jazz, but this was real high for him.  Isaiah Canaan is one of Sam Hinkie’s guys, but virtually everybody else in the organization is hoping for other options to pan out at point guard.  I was hoping that Kyle O’Quinn would slip another round and I really needed a shooting guard.  Silly me. 

I’m also not on the Nik Stauskas hype train at all.  Yes, he could get every opportunity to go big but he’s a league-bottom defender that doesn’t produce defensive stats.  That’s a tough sell for a team with bad defenders everywhere.  Brett Brown has already been hesitant to go along with the front office hype. 

That’s before we get to the question of whether he can be efficient enough to not be a total liability in fantasy leagues.  I have no idea why we’re hyping him, but that’s nowhere near as egregious as the hand-wringing over the Kings decision to make that trade.  I want everybody to try and remember who made the most fun over that deal and watch them try and walk that back over the next year or so.  It’s going to be high-larious.  At No. 175 you can’t really go wrong though. 

ROUND 7

Gary Harris is an interesting pick because he’s profiling like a Michael Malone guy.  I want to get behind Justin Anderson this season but I don’t know if his minutes will translate to fantasy value.  He’s going to get minutes.  The only way this pick works out for Gallagher is if somebody ahead of Bobby Portis gets hurt or traded, but the rookie has looked great so far.  Ira Winderman was so impressed with Josh McRoberts that he practically started his own Sixth Man of the Year chant, but there wasn’t any real production to go with that hype and McBob started missing games for precautionary reasons.  I like the value here.  Joffrey Lauvergne was a guy that I hoped could slip, but he did too well in the preseason and got too high of a profile. 

ROUND 8

Maurice Harkless and Mirza Teletovic could end up paying off at this stage, and I liked the Shane Larkin pick.  I think Brandon Bass could be an under-the-radar value at this stage. I was planning for the future with the Norris Cole pick.  Assuming he didn’t do any real damage with the high ankle sprain, he could be pressed into big minutes pretty quickly in New Orleans.  Nikola Jokic is a great pick for this format where his non-breakout production can actually be useful.  If he can wiggle into big minutes, it’s all icing on the cake.  Mike Dunleavy was taken by Rick Kamla and he’s now on my squad.  More on that later.

ROUND 9

That last comment on Dunleavy?  Ditto for Anthony Bennett.  Mike Muscala has a fantasy friendly game and he might be able to be useful in a limited minute role, with the key word being ‘might.’   Chase Budinger could be nice for Buser as the Pacers clearly like what he brings to the table.  Wesley Johnson should basically print money for Benny Aziz with a No. 259 selection.  Dwight Powell is a huge upside pickup here for Hector Castro.  Similarly to Johnson, Matt Barnes could also do his low-volume, high-value thing in Memphis. 

ROUND 10

I’m not buying Thomas Robinson’s stat set, but he’s got what the Nets need as an energy player down low.  Castro made another savvy pick with Devin Booker, who can’t buy beer but is already turning heads in Phoenix.  R.J. Hunter is going to get overhyped for the next few days, but at this stage in the draft it’s a fine pick for Gallagher. 

ROUND 11

I don’t know if Christian Wood is going to make the team but I really wanted him on my 30-DEEP team to see what he could do.  T.J. McConnell is the guy that everybody in Philly seems to want to start the season at the point, but he might not make the team due to roster math beset by bad decisions at the top.  Again, there are folks out there that thought Sam Hinkie swindled the Kings with his 10-year plan.  If Cameron Payne had an easier path to minutes I’d be all over him in standards.  But he doesn’t so I got him at No. 311. 

ROUND 12

I got Walter Tavares, who looks to me the way Rudy Gobert looked during his rookie season.  Consequently, I thought Gobert should have played a lot more that season, and Ty Corbin disagreed with that sentiment.  Kamla purportedly wanted a player out of Atlanta to watch, which may have been some gamesmanship, but he offered me Mike Dunleavy and Anthony Bennett for my No. 350 pick.  I have thin wings behind my two stud starters, and Dunleavy can be a helpful dude come fantasy playoff time.  Bennett seems to have supporters in Toronto and the two guys playing in front of him aren’t that imposing.  It’s a trade that I have to make on paper, but if Tavares gets 20-28 minutes due to some random injury and has a Hassan Whiteside-like season – circle this paragraph and be prepared to laugh at me.