brad, ginandjuice's team in your league is eerily similar to my team that won 72 games. There are a couple of differences, but I think 9/12 are the same. so - yah - gl with that one.

Not only does AsIf suck for updates but the some parts of the site are incredibly buggy. Anyone tried to use SimMatchup lately? What a piece of crap!

I love that not only are 3s and boards the key to winning most championships but the free throws are so off that 3 point shooters that rarely get fouled are going to the line as much as players that got fouled all the time (sic Wilt). Anyone drafting free throws is doomed.

BTW - this site looks like crap in chrome (shocking!!!!)

Quote: Originally posted by benjihall on 4/13/2010
the free throws are so off that 3 point shooters that rarely get fouled are going to the line as much as players that got fouled all the time (sic Wilt). Anyone drafting free throws is doomed.

Yeah, and that's why the bomber teams do so well - there is no way to defend them. No bomber team has enough threes that they're shooting more than a third of their shots from behind the arc (none that win consistently, anyway), so playing a +3 on them gets you into foul trouble because you're out of position for most of their attempts. But if you don't play any + versus them, they kill you from out there. And the double edged sword is, when you play +perimeter, your rebounding chance goes down, so if they stock up on offensive boards, they gain a huge possession advantage. And get this - if you don't play +perimeter, not only will the percentage from out there kill you, you'll end up giving them a plethora of four-point plays.

It's kind of ridiculous. It's not unbeatable, but to beat it you have to incorporate much of the same strategy into your team.

Quote: Originally Posted By ashamael on 4/13/2010

Quote: Originally posted by benjihall on 4/13/2010

the free throws are so off that 3 point shooters that rarely get fouled are going to the line as much as players that got fouled all the time (sic Wilt). Anyone drafting free throws is doomed.

Yeah, and that's why the bomber teams do so well - there is no way to defend them. No bomber team has enough threes that they're shooting more than a third of their shots from behind the arc (none that win consistently, anyway), so playing a +3 on them gets you into foul trouble because you're out of position for most of their attempts. But if you don't play any + versus them, they kill you from out there. And the double edged sword is, when you play +perimeter, your rebounding chance goes down, so if they stock up on offensive boards, they gain a huge possession advantage. And get this - if you don't play +perimeter, not only will the percentage from out there kill you, you'll end up giving them a plethora of four-point plays.

It's kind of ridiculous. It's not unbeatable, but to beat it you have to incorporate much of the same strategy into your team.

Agreed you need much the same strategy but one thing that seems to work is having a high 90 defender on their best SG or SF. Know I'm going to get some sh*t for that but its been working for me. IMO defense is more effective on perimeter players than the low post.

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Originally posted by eleibowitz on 4/13/2010

Quote: IMO defense is more effective on perimeter players than the low post.

Agreed;) I was happy to have a 63 win OL team recently that used defense (as well as 3's). We were ranked about 12th in fg%, but help opp to league low of about 46%.
What did me in in the playoffs was having only 2 high usage guys and me being too lazy to adjust to a fairly weak opponent. I will never use +2 btw as it has never worked for me.

Starting defense totaled about 450.

high usage, high fta guards destroy the low defense guys typically found in OLs, btw.

My team is 1-1 as Jordan scored 57 in the first game to negate a 21/21 game by Kareem. Are any teams in the playoffs yet?

Quite a ways to go still. League 33701 is the furthest along, at 36 games in. I'm 16-20 but gerryred is faring better at 22-14.

With a .444 record my team is outscoring, outrebounding and outpassing opponents, and shooting better from the floor and the line, but has 149 3PM to opponents' 300.

that's the very reason I say threes are necessary. Any good team has a lot of possessions and a way to get more of them than you. So when two teams face off that have high rebounding percentages and low turnover percentages, the two things that most often determine the outcome are 1) who fouls more? and 2) who scores more? The better perimeter shooting team will score more.

Let's say both teams shoot 90 field goals and have 25 trips to the line. For the sake of simplicity, let's say each team makes 20 of those 25 ftas and 45 field goals. Team A shoots 3/6 from beyond the arc, while team B shoots 10/25. Team B wins, 100-93. This is an atypical result, as usually team A will have more FGM and shoot better from the field, while team B will have many more threes and more points. Rarely do free throws even up like this. More often, the results will be highly skewed - one team will have 35 or 40 ftas while the other will have 12. And it always seems to be the opposite way you would think (paint team should have more ftas than the perimeter, assuming similar pf48min).

A more typical result could look something like this:

Team A 55/100 3/7 10/12 = 123

Team B 42/88 12/21 30/37 = 126

And then the owner of Team A is cussing about losing because of imbalanced and improper FTA distribution (valid argument), but the real reason is that Team B is impossible to defend. There's no way to position your defense that doesn't cause insane (and inconsistent) foul distribution. In a seven game series, running a +3 versus team B, you could very well see Team B shoot the following number of FTAs: 25, 37, 31, 9, 12, 42, 10. You could do the same with a +1, an even zero, or even playing - against them. It's extremely inconsistent, and in the current sim, there's no water to put out the fire.

You basically have to fight fire with fire, as a really good OL team "bomber" team will have everything a team without a three-point assault will. And with the inconsistencies, it makes any coaching decisions/strategies have minimal impact. The closest thing to water in the sim right now... is Air (as in Jordan).

Nice post, ash - and I like the fire/water analogy. Good defense should supply the water, at least to some degree, but many seasoned owners have complained about defense being overpriced in this version of the sim for the value it provides.

A couple versions of the sim ago, jose can u c rattled off 5 straight open league championships with the same starting lineup. I know the backcourt was Kidd and Moncrief and I think the rebounding came from Russell and Thurmond. I don't remember who the SF was, but you get the point anyway. That team would be blown off the court now - in part because Bill and Nate's rebounding value has been nerfed and blocked shots aren't as valuable as they used to be, but especially because strong perimeter defense rarely will mitigate a strong three-point assault.

defense sure seems to have an impact in 33714

out in the west the two best teams so far are running half court and winning with great defense...holding teams to around 100ppg

coolmay is leading my division....but ive beaten him 3 out of 4 including a 145-109 beatdown...we both have high scoring offenses but my defense is better and i have jordan...he really is the x factor...hes the runaway mvp right now going for 35/8/8 and shooting 60%

i thought the west was going to be stronger but we are just top heavy with the 6 playoff teams pretty much already decided...with me and sly the 5 and 6 seeds...it would be very tough for us to get through the playoffs

nc is holding the 6th spot in the east with a whole bunch of teams still in contention..itll be interesting to see how the wests best do against this conference....is there more parity in the east because they have no powerhouses?....or are the west teams looking amazing due to the bottom half of its teams?

They're holding teams that low because they are running half court and have tremendous rebounding. Fewer possessions = fewer points. A better stat to look at is def fg%. #1, 2 & 3 in the league do reside in the Pacific. Look at Cubicle's defensive ratings. Then look at Sometimes' defensive ratings. Then look at mine. There's no way I should be even close to those two with my three 60s in the starting line up (one of the 60s splits time with a 41, too), but I am. But yes, defense has an effect - it's just inconsistent with other aspects of the sim. You have to look at it in a relative manner. emarvel & felonius both have good defensive teams and are leading the league in def fg% because of it. I have an above average defensive team and am third. While we do have a couple of poor teams, we have each other. And my two leading scorers are shooting 60%+ from the field, so that's not exactly something easy to defend.

That was never my point about defense, though. My point about defense was the defensive positioning feature... it actually hurts good defensive teams, because good offensive teams make it impossible to get the right positioning to play against it. In theory, you should play a -1 or more versus almost everyone, and I used to do that, but it bites you in the *** every so often. What ends up happening is that the dice roll in a different direction and cause you to have tremendous foul trouble. And when you do nothing, you get eaten alive because you're playing midrange constantly. And even then you foul a lot. That's the reason I started building my teams the way I do, and why I don't particularly care for midrange dominant players. I want a heavy paint scorer, a bomber, or a specialist (rebounding, assists, etc). Low fouls, average to good defense (instead of elite), and worry more about offense - and you'll be way ahead of the elite defensive teams. Watch what happens throughout the season in the pacific. The cubicle team doesn't have enough offense to remain at the pace it is on. What offense it does have is all perimeter. Don't run a +3 on it, you'll get eaten alive like I did. Try a +1. Enough to effect what little offense it has, but not so much you'll get killed when the dice roll the wrong way (and not so much that you'll get killed on the boards... you'll still probably get beat, though. It is truly one of the best rebounding teams I've seen that didn't decide to start Rodman at the 3, 4, & 5).

Cheers! Off to the beach

nice post ash....truthfully i hardly ever adjust my defense but may try it out on cubicle if i lose again to him...and totally agree with cutting the midrange out for a dominant offensive team...i learned that quick in my sim career...jordan is of course an exception...love that guy

The worst thing about defense has always been the number of shots a guy will get off vs a great defender. We've all seen the likes of Glen Rice going for 40+ on a Jordan. There is no way in the world he would
A) get enough shots to get 40
B) if for some crazy random reason he did get them, shoot good enough to get 40
It should happen about 1 out of 100 times not 1 out of 3

That and double teaming being useless makes defense really overvalued. Does the Fox programming gerbil even understand basketball?

Just my opinion.