So, my team sucks. It's my first season, so I guess that's also understandable. Also, I did a Historical Timberwolves team. Maybe another problem.

My question is...once you're 1-10, 4-20 (like I am currently), what do you do? I've done a few waiver wire moves, but am not really improving. I think another issue is that I spent too much on my bench. Is that a problem? Now, I'm basically trying rookies and scouring waiver wires to get help. Any tips?

hey goat, welcome to WIS.. can u copy and paste ur team here?

that would help people figure out what's wrong and what u should do to improve

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Yep, most of us learned along the way by asking questions in this forum and benefiting from the generosity and wisdom of other owners. I'm sure many will be willing to weigh in if you can provide more specifics.

One lesson I learned early on is to treat the waiver wire like a crack pipe and stay the heck away from it. The only times I haven't regretted using the wire is with very low-priced scrubs, in cases where I realized I didn't draft quite enough minutes at a specific position. But the more expensive the player(s) you're swapping out, the more overall value your team is losing due to the transaction fee.

Generally it's better to just suck it up, tinker with what you've got, try to learn lessons about how to draft better in the future and enjoy the game.

As for how much to spend on bench players, there are different schools of thought on that and they're all correct. Some owners do well at trotting out five studly starters and filling the bench with basically ineffective scrubs. That approach can win you a lot of games, especially in $42 million open leagues. Other owners have really mastered the art of figuring out what they can afford to sacrifice in their starting lineup in order to bring more talent off the bench (and stay more competitive through all 48 minutes of a game). Still others really like to platoon at certain positions.

The first key is to start figuring the sim out...which statistics are most important, what combinations of things can create a strong team. The thread posted above by ncmusician can help, and again, some of us can offer more specific suggestions if you can display your team here.

Thanks for the tips. I'll check out the newbie thread. Sadly, I've already started messing with the waiver wire. (I don't think I've really made my team worse. But I certainly haven't made it better.)
My original team:
99-00 Kevin Garnett
03-04 Latrell Sprewell
94-95 Isaiah Rider
02-03 Radoslav Nesterovic
91-92 Felton Spencer
04-05 Trenton Hassell
99-00 Terrell Brandon
05-06 Eddie Griffin
08-09 Sebastian Telfair
96-97 Sam Mitchell
98-99 Stephon Marbury
2010 Bradley Cardwell (R)
2010 Drew Franklin (R)
94-95 Charles Shackleford

Later picked up: (For Shackleford, Brandon and, gulp, Garnett)...
77-78 Bill Walton
76-77 Spencer Haywood
83-84 Magic Johnson

I think I was going more for favorites than having a strategic team. (Also, I picked the Timberwolves...)

Also, my main weaknesses (originally) were rebounding and defense. I am slightly better at rebounding now, but my defense still blows.

defense, in the current sim, seems to be not all that valuable (or, at least, not worth the extra price it often entails). it's a good idea to have one or two very good defenders (85+) but the real key, I think, is to avoid having any really bad defenders (less than 40 or so). As long as most of your team is above 50 or so defensively, you're alright - it's having to play guys whose defense is between 20 and 30 for 60 minutes a game that can really kill you.

and I think the most important thing to figure out in the SIM is how much of everything you need. You need certain baseline values for your team in terms of scoring, DReb%, ast%, efg%, minutes (really most anything) and you need to be careful to not pay for stuff you won't use. Your team needs about 19600 minutes for a season, so don't draft 21000 minutes - it means you're paying for extra minutes that you can't use. And in an open league, you can count on getting at least 600 minutes or so from your rookies, so you really don't need to go over 19000. You can go even less than that, but that takes constant attention in terms of switching out players to avoid fatigue issues. Don't draft 13000 points, because your team won't get anywhere near that, and you're sacrificing somewhere else (probably in terms of efficiency) for all those points.


It takes some figuring out to see how much of everything you need on your team, and therefore how much you need to pay for different commodities. Just look at the successful teams in your league and see how their teams are put together, experiment a little, and you'll catch on eventually.

Thanks, again. The baseline values thing will be really helpful. (At least in giving me a starting point to build on.)