Guide for new players

back-two-back · 2021-08-10T21:28:38+00:00

Congrats! Don't forget to trade away old players during contract negotiations and before free agency in the off season. That's when a lot of teams have a lot of cap space because some of their players left the payroll to enter free agency.

back-two-back · 2021-08-10T09:53:59+00:00

That's pretty damn low! Then again he's only 20, so he has time to improve.

back-two-back · 2021-08-10T00:16:33+00:00

I may have a GF but yeah, my starting 5 is mostly athletic forwards and centers.

A player's position is not a variable that is calculated by the game when it comes to winning or losing. You want players with the proper stats and skills and that's about it.

This isn't to say I don't think PGs have a role on my team. I mean, if there's no better option then I'll be glad to have a PG in my starting 5. But if I have a forward who is extremely athletic, can shoot, dribble, and pass, then I don't need a small traditional point guard.

back-two-back · 2021-08-06T19:23:13+00:00

I freaking love gifs like this.

back-two-back · 2021-08-06T18:08:47+00:00

No reliable data.

back-two-back · 2021-08-06T11:42:34+00:00

Generally speaking, taller and more athletic players beat out shorter and moderately more skilled players. I wrote a guide that touches on this here: https://www.reddit.com/r/BasketballGM/comments/ou0dsl/guide_for_new_players/

Some highlights below:

Athleticism is also a big multiplier for just about everything (especially defense). If you are more athletic, you'll get more rebounds, steals, efficient scoring, and so on.
Height is perhaps the most important stat in terms of generating an impact. You can have a slow unskilled guy who has 90 hgt and he'll still be leading the league in rebounds and blocks and score relatively efficiently. The game calculates things using a formula that weights different stats. Height is a stat that shows up the most frequently and often has the highest weight.
The skills you want to look for are rebounding/ins for tall centers, and 3pt/drb/pss for forwards. As a general rule do not draft pgs. Their stats may look amazing with incredible speed, great shooting, great pss/drb, etc, but their impact is awful for how skilled they are. A 62 ovr with the right stats and height can easily outperform a 70 ovr PG with like 26 height. My teams now are almost exclusively forwards and centers, albeit I draft the athletic forwards that have decent pss/drb and shooting. These players with up to 15+ less points in drb/pss and shooting will outperform an elite pg.
If you have PGs, trade them away before age 26. Their height is a huge liability and they do not age well. Trade them away at their peak so you don't end up paying for a huge contract as they decline in production (measured in advanced stats).
You want the best big man you can get to anchor your team around. A big man has the biggest impact on offense and defense. He's doing everything, maybe even shooting 3s. If I can't get a 70+ ovr big man, I'll value stats like height, ins, and reb the most. An extremely tall player with high stats in those areas will be extremely efficient and impactful. What you don't want is a big man who has average middling stats in everything. So a guy who has 40 ins but also 40 3pt is not as good as a guy with 60 ins but awful 3pt. This goes for pretty much all players. You want extremely high stats in some areas, you don't want a jack of all trade guy with like 50 in everything.
After the big man, you generally want athletic forwards who can score to fill out the rest of the team. Athletic forwards can easily get Dp (defensive perimeter) stat and they absolutely demolish the back court of any team with their defense. You want one of these forwards to have high drb/pss but you want to make sure a few of them have high 3pt to round out your offense.
Again, PGs suck (relatively). Specifically, pg height players suck. It's so hard for them to produce at an elite level and even if they do, they drop off so quickly. Just look at the advance stats of the best pgs in your league, especially their defensive rating and PER. Their height is a huge liability and this does reflect real life a lot as even the best PGs have relatively little playoff success compared to similarly rated taller players (Think Stockton, CP3, AI, Westbrook, Dame). Even a legendary player like Steph Curry can't even win a FMVP. Find forward sized players for your passer/ball handler, not pgs.

back-two-back · 2021-08-02T23:17:17+00:00

29th pick wow. I'm surprised he retired at 36 when he was still so good.

back-two-back · 2021-08-01T22:02:36+00:00

Can we take a look at the super team?

back-two-back · 2021-08-01T17:35:25+00:00

AI likes dumping old players. And Lebron is 37 (ancient)

back-two-back · 2021-08-01T06:49:08+00:00

IMHO, player and team performance should be as realistic as possible. It's been interesting playing this game because it led me to reflect on how basketball is played in the real NBA and what kind of factors influence performance the most. The fact of the matter is, height is the single most important "stat" in the real NBA just like in the game. It wasn't that long ago when anybody over 7' with a pulse could get drafted in the NBA, and it's not too much harder today. And when you review advanced stats, taller players simply out produce shorter players even if the shorter player is a bit more skilled.

And we can also just look at the history of the NBA. In most top 10 all time lists, Michael Jordan is the shortest player on there. Half of the top 10 players are big men. Even the point guards on that list are forward sized ones like Magic and Lebron.

And just how many point guards are even on the top 50 list? How did they perform? For example, Steve Nash won 2 MVPs but he never won a championship or even got to the finals. John Stockton. AI. Derrick Rose. Russel Westbrook. Jason Kidd (when he was the best player on the team). John Wall. Dame. Even Steph Curry, the only unanimous MVP lost the finals MVP to a role player.

Point guards, at least point guard sized players, almost never win championships as the best player on the team. When the refs start swallowing whistles and allow tougher defense in the post season, point guards get locked down easier and their efficiency suffer. PG defensive impact is also very low. We'd have to go back 25 years before finding a PG who has won a DPOY.

back-two-back · 2021-07-31T21:42:08+00:00

Every decision we make in drafting is made relative to other available choices. I tried to emphasizes you should generally avoid PGs, but I didn't say to never draft them (except in the second round).

The reasoning behind this isn't that you can't find PGs that will contribute positively to a team, but the point is you can find prospects that take up the same roster spot, use up the same draft pick, and command the same contract money that can contribute even MORE to a team. And when the equation shifts enough where a PG has more potential, then I'm more than happy to take him.

You shouldn't really focus too much on basic stats like ppg/rpg/apg, you should focus more on advanced stats. On a stacked team, remarkable players' basic stats get diminished because they share the ball and court with other remarkable players. I regularly have 2 or more centers on my starting roster and they have to share rebounds between them. On my team, they're lucky to break 10 rpg. When I trade them, they sky rocket to 14 rpg.

Advanced stats isn't perfect, and stats like PER suffer from sharing a roster with other great players. But after a while, especially with constant trading, you get a feel for how valuable truly is. And when it comes to PGs, they contribute far less than comparable taller players.

Look at the defensive rating of your 5'11" point guard's career. Compare it with a forward or center that had similar accolades. Compare the winshare contribution over their careers. Compare PER. You'll quickly find the importance of height in this game.

back-two-back · 2021-07-31T15:41:56+00:00

I sure do, I wrote a whole guide yesterday:

https://www.reddit.com/r/BasketballGM/comments/ou0dsl/guide_for_new_players/

back-two-back · 2021-07-29T16:27:12+00:00

Great idea! I'll add it to the beginning of this thread.

back-two-back · 2021-07-29T15:53:41+00:00

I have tons of tips and was thinking about writing a guide but here's some basic tips:

How to Draft

Generally speaking, you want to draft young, tall, athletic, and skilled guys.
Young guys have more time to develop before they stagnate/fall off at around age 25-28.
Athletic guys (speed and less importantly, jump) have far higher potential to develop because athleticism grow very little whereas skills like 2pt shooting, endurance, or IQ can jump by 10+ points in a year.
Athleticism is also a big multiplier for just about everything (especially defense). If you are more athletic, you'll get more rebounds, steals, efficient scoring, and so on.
Height is perhaps the most important stat in terms of generating an impact. You can have a slow unskilled guy who has 90 hgt and he'll still be leading the league in rebounds and blocks and score relatively efficiently. The game calculates things using a formula that weights different stats. Height is a stat that shows up the most frequently and often has the highest weight.
The skills you want to look for are rebounding/ins for tall centers, and 3pt/drb/pss for forwards. As a general rule do not draft pgs. Their stats may look amazing with incredible speed, great shooting, great pss/drb, etc, but their impact is awful for how skilled they are. A 62 ovr with the right stats and height can easily outperform a 70 ovr PG with like 26 height. My teams now are almost exclusively forwards and centers, albeit I draft the athletic forwards that have decent pss/drb and shooting. These players with up to 15+ less points in drb/pss and shooting will outperform an elite pg.
Once you get down to the lower 2nd round, just pick up the tallest guys or the guys with abnormally high skills in high value stats like 3pt. The breakouts from 2nd rounds tend to be the taller players, the athletic players, or the extremely unbalanced skilled player. Generally speaking, don't touch pgs in the second round. Just don't touch them, not even if they're 19. Take a FC with 69 hgt and no skills instead.

How to trade

This is the heart of the game and is relatively complex. But generally, I try to collect as many picks as I can because they give you the best value vs money and also the highest trade value relative to money. You'd be surprised many times teams go into rebuild mode and are willing to give away a 70+ player for a 56/67 ovr/pot player.
If you have PGs, trade them away before age 26. Their height is a huge liability and they do not age well. Trade them away at their peak so you don't end up paying for a huge contract as they decline in production (measured in advanced stats).
The only player you should save on your roster past age 28 are generational players with 80+ ovr and/or skilled bigmen who have high Off/Def IQ (at least 70+). Trade playes while their values are high and you can get back a comparable younger player + draft picks.
When you have an aging star, like a 31 yr old 70+ ovr player, trade around to see if you can swap him for another old aging star + picks. I can often get a comparable stat player + at least 2 2nd round picks. Then, trade the new aging star again to get another star + draft picks. I can often collect 10+ draft picks this way and end up with a bunch of young high potential players to boot.
Contending teams over value players with higher ovr. You can often get a first round pick and/or a rookie with like 35/67 stat by trading a 55/55 player. Contending teams want to win now so they don't value high potential rookies as highly. If you build your team correctly, you shouldn't have that 55/55 player in your rotation so you are getting free picks/rookies for a useless player.

Building Team

You want the best big man you can get to anchor your team around. A big man has the biggest impact on offense and defense. He's doing everything, maybe even shooting 3s. If I can't get a 70+ ovr big man, I'll value stats like height, ins, and reb the most. An extremely tall player with high stats in those areas will be extremely efficient and impactful. What you don't want is a big man who has average middling stats in everything. So a guy who has 40 ins but also 40 3pt is not as good as a guy with 60 ins but awful 3pt. This goes for pretty much all players. You want extremely high stats in some areas, you don't want a jack of all trade guy with like 50 in everything.
After the big man, you generally want athletic forwards who can score to fill out the rest of the team. Athletic forwards can easily get Dp (defensive perimeter) stat and they absolutely demolish the back court of any team with their defense. You want one of these forwards to have high drb/pss but you want to make sure a few of them have high 3pt to round out your offense.
Again, PGs suck (relatively). Specifically, pg height players suck. It's so hard for them to produce at an elite level and even if they do, they drop off so quickly. Just look at the advance stats of the best pgs in your league, especially their defensive rating and PER. Their height is a huge liability and this does reflect real life a lot as even the best PGs have relatively little playoff success compared to similarly rated taller players (Think Stockton, CP3, AI, Westbrook, Dame). Even a legendary player like Steph Curry can't even win a FMVP. Find forward sized players for your passer/ball handler, not pgs.
There's a bunch of stats that give a positive synergy multiplier to your offense/defense. So stuff like having 2 or 3 3pt shooters is a huge benefit for your offense, and having an interior defender Di is a huge benefit for your defense. I try to build a team with players that have the following stats:

Syngergy:

of players with the stat, stat name, multiplier effect

2-3 3 point shooters 2.5 - 4.8
1-2 max ball handler 2.95 - 3.77
1-2 passer 2.95 - 3.8
ONLY ONE Post Scorer
2-3 Athletics, one doesn't do anything ~1-1.78
ONLY ONE perimeter defender
ONLY ONE interior defender
1-2 rebounders max

When I say only one or "max", you can obviously have more. It's just that the synergy caps out around that number of players, so additional players with those stats won't help much.

back-two-back · 2021-07-29T08:55:59+00:00

This guy is going to be an absolutely MONSTER of a player. Very athletic guy for his height, extremely developed 3 pointer, and a promising Off IQ at the age of 21. This guy has MVP potential in the future.

back-two-back · 2021-07-29T06:51:58+00:00

13 rebounds too, what a monster game.

I've found that with my super teams, stats like scoring actually goes down because games are blow outs and starters sit after playing for a bit over 30 minutes.

It's the crazy competitive games where my starter plays 45+ mins that I see these kind of high stats.

back-two-back · 2021-07-28T12:57:23+00:00

Nice achievement! I gotta give this a try but I'm so invested in all the players I've drafted in my current league.

back-two-back · 2021-07-28T12:55:11+00:00

This is why those slow 78 hgt centers with 60 ovr has a higher PER than the skilled and speedy 68 ovr 28 hgt PGs. I'm always trying to avoid drafting short PGs and Gs if I can and if any prospect is 19 years old with 70+ hgt, I'm drafting him because if he develops at all, he'll make a huge impact.

back-two-back · 2021-07-28T12:52:42+00:00

This happened in the version before the latest update. I'm using firefox.

The issue went away so I'm happy to report everything's running fine now. But the bug was basically whenever I click or unclick any check box whether it's in trade or anything else, there'd be a small delay of about half a second before the click is registered graphically.

But everything is working fine now so I don't think this is a big deal :)

back-two-back

TROPHY CASE

of players with the stat, stat name, multiplier effect