90 Draft Class Editing Thread with Top 20

[John1974]

I dont think we have to leave them so low they might bust, but maybe if they are good players B, B+, A- should be the target range. This way TC or spending can bump them up and they will be good just not great until TC or spending does its job.

[jlafavor]

Aug 24, 2009 17:07:38 GMT -6 @joshbounds said:

C Derrick Coleman B C C- B+ B A


This guy looks like someone from last year's draft.. Pervis Ellison to a T, and look how bad a player he is this year and he was camped... That would be very sad to see DC look like Ellison after TC..

Len Bias was B C C B B A when he was drafted...

a lot goes into each individual rating, i agree with ric and arrestin in that these last couple drafts have been very heavily rated.

Joe Dumars was B- B- B+ B C A, i think these type of starting points are much better than the ones last year and this year.

[josh]

I agree that a lot of our rookie ratings have been inflated in the past, but IMO A- ratings shouldn't be completely off limits. The potential that we use in this sim engine is scouted, so it's not always solid A potential. Also, A can mean anything from 81-100, so it's not like all guys with A potential have 100 potential...It's a sliding scale.

Also, TC is a crap shoot and for people with experience, FBB has a terrible player progression system, terribly random and impossible to predict. If a guy comes out with solid ratings and solid potential, he could get way better, way worse or not change at all. Because of that, you have to make certain guys bust proof, which leads to some rating inflation that is hard to get around. I'm saying that I don't have faith in FBB to make guys with lower ratings and good potential into great players a few seasons down the road...It's way to inconsistent to work that way.

We can lower guys ratings, but at some point you're seriously devaluing draft picks and making current players that are studs at 23, 24, 25, etc infinitely valuable while the #1 overall pick will be a 15 point scorer and nothing more, maybe they'll get better in the future but maybe not...Again, it's a total crap shoot.

In my personal opinion, I think that the list we had a few days ago with Coleman and Payton rated with some A-s, etc. was OK. I can understand wanting to lower them even more, but maybe we should make these changes gradually rather than all in one off-season.

My .02

[ricaug7]

I honestly hope you're not trying to say I'm being vocal because the Heat have a pick and I don't.

You guys do whatever you feel is better for the league, I already said what I think would make ITP a more realistic league, take it as you like.

[arrestinu]

As I've said before, I defer to josh and some of you other draft/ratings gurus that know a heck of a lot more about FBB than I do (which is limited to what I've learned here in the ITP). I state the disclaimer that I pose questions without being willing to offer up an answer, so please, don't ask me what Hardaway or any other rookie should look like.

Just wanted to post this AGAIN.

I won't be posting about a draft class ever again. Make 'em whatever you want.

[aceman034]

Just throwing this out there that we have already set a precedent of rookie classes. Like Josh said if we are going to start devaluing picks it needs to be a gradual decline, not just kill an entire draft. Now you may think I am just saying this b/c I own 11 picks in the upcoming draft but there have been excellent points made on both sides of this. It comes down to that there are 0 Gms in this league, including John, with more FBB experience and draft class experience than Josh, I think his opinion should be valued highly.

[gritter13]

Aug 24, 2009 20:52:12 GMT -6 aceman034 said:

Just throwing this out there that we have already set a precedent of rookie classes. Like Josh said if we are going to start devaluing picks it needs to be a gradual decline, not just kill an entire draft. Now you may think I am just saying this b/c I own 11 picks in the upcoming draft but there have been excellent points made on both sides of this. It comes down to that there are 0 Gms in this league, including John, with more FBB experience and draft class experience than Josh, I think his opinion should be valued highly.

I agree 100% with this post, and I only have my 1st to use this year.

[ricaug7]

Well I have around 7 years of FBB experience and I think rookies created as they have been is a bad thing for a league.

You just need to look at all the star players (the 1000 of them) in ITP to see there are way too many studly players and you know what?... It will reflect in terms of the contract they ask/accept in re-signings and FA period.

[josh]

Aug 24, 2009 22:42:52 GMT -6 @ricaug7 said:

Well I have around 7 years of FBB experience and I think rookies created as they have been is a bad thing for a league.

You just need to look at all the star players (the 1000 of them) in ITP to see there are way too many studly players and you know what?... It will reflect in terms of the contract they ask/accept in re-signings and FA period.

I wanted to clarify my earlier post, Ric, as I fear that you thought I was devaluing your opinion because you don't have a pick this year...

Regardless of whether that was in response to me or not: I highly value your opinion about all things FBB. I know that from your posting style and input in the league that you have extensive knowledge of this sim engine and everything that goes along with it.

In my personal opinion, we have two different problems going on here. One is that in the past draft classes have had inflated value. I spent about 6 seasons building draft classes from scratch in a different league, and in this and other leagues I have used all the things that I learned from a ton of time spent building, testing, rebuilding, tweaking players etc. It got to a point where I was pretty accurately able to project a players peak rankings based on their exact numerical rankings from before their first training camp. I was able to take into account variation and outliers, hits and misses and all that, and be pretty confident in the outcome. Obviously I wasn't right 100% of the time (duh), and I'm a bit out of practice now, though much of the general knowledge is still there.

The issue of inflation though is simple...From a personal perspective, I don't know what the exact ratings are of each player, so I don't know how strong/weak the grades are when these guys get rolled out. There is a way to tell in the draft preview page, but that only stacks the rookies up against one another. The best inside scorer in the class might have a strong A- or a weak one...There is no way to tell exactly how these guys are rated...That to me makes a big difference in how I would build a class.

My personal preference is to categorize players into a few groups: Top level talent, mid level talent, mediocre talent with potential, low level talent and throw aways. If you notice my posts in regards to most draft classes, I'm usually suggesting downgrades to a lot of players, making sure that the top level talent pool isn't too big. This has been a problem especially in the last couple of draft classes (classes in which I wasn't super vocal about them, for whatever reason), and it was a BIG problem this season until guys like ArrestinU, Ric and myself suggested downgrades to certain players. Like I said, I agree with Ric on most things, but his ideal starting point is slightly lower than mine...

With that said, he raises a good point, which is the second of our two problems:

The camp system in this league creates a ton of activity in writing articles and doing shit to earn money to pimp players...It's great for the league in one sense and completely awful in another. Guys have the ability to camp players twice in one season, which can make enormous strides in their development from the get go. A good TC for a rookie followed up by two scoring camps can create 22 year old monsters that are scoring 22ppg on playoff teams...This is indeed a problem, and it leads me to agree with Ric about lowering rookie ratings even further in the future.

There is one issue with that line of thinking though, and it's the fact that further lowering rookie ratings forces teams to participate more to make more cash and do more camping...It creates a real imbalance between the GMs that are active in writing and the GMs that prefer to sit back and run their team without littering a message board with 400 articles about scoring production in the Midwest...It's a tough situation for all the GMs, and we're seeing super players pop up out of guys that never should have been even close to their current levels. The other main issue is that it takes the random factor out of player improvement. TC is a crapshoot, and good potential doesn't guarantee improvement, but player camping is a definite win for any player that undergoes it. If your rookie PF got better defensively but not on the class, two rebounding camps will fix that...Need more offense? No worries, how about +12 for inside scoring? It's a downward spiral.

I think that we need to do one of two things here...One, downgrade future draft classes even further and make the assumption that ALL rookies will be camped, or change the monetary system/camping system to make these camps a little harder to come by. If you raise costs (inflation, lol) or limit teams to one camp per year per player, it might go a long way to decreasing the number of absolute studs that we find in this league, which isn't a bad thing, especially considering the rookies.

I personally think that guys like Payton and Coleman should be highly rated coming out. Both guys were immediate impact guys, and because ITP has gone for realism in the past, it makes sense to continue doing so. With that said, maybe both guys could have low A/high B potential to offset some of their inevitable growth in their first couple of seasons. This combined with a more limited number of camps could go a long way to solving this problem.

Okay, a lot of text, and I apologize, but thoughts on this? I am interested to see what you guys think about this novel that I just wrote.

[don1955]

Danny Ferry PF 6'10'' 245 24 C+ C+ C C C C

is in this draft also...

[arrestinu]

Aug 25, 2009 2:17:08 GMT -6 josh said:

Okay, a lot of text, and I apologize, but thoughts on this? I am interested to see what you guys think about this novel that I just wrote.

Great post, and it's worthy of discussion. But apparently, if some of us try to say the same thing, it means we're just lowballing the draft class because we don't have draft picks.

Whatever. I'm done discussing this draft and future ones. I'll go with what comes out on draft day. Thanks for all your work and input on it Utah josh.

[John1974]

Here is what I would do. So if you like

C - Derrick Coleman B C+ C B+ B A

PG - Gary Payton B B- B+ B+ A

SG - Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf C+ A- B B D+ B

SG - Dennis Scott B- B C+ B+ C A

SG - Kendall Gill B C+ C+ A- C+ B

C - Felton Spencer B- C- C- B B+ C

SF - Lionel Simmons B+ C C A- B B

SG - Bo Kimble C+ C+ C+ B D C

SG - Willie Burton C C+ C+ B- D C

PG - Rumeal Robinson C+ C+ C+ B D C

PF - Tyrone Hill B- C D+ B- B+ A

PF - Jayson Williams B C C A- B+ B

PF - Loy Vaught B- C C B+ B B

C - Elden Campbell B- C D+ A- B B

SF - Toni Kukoc B B C+ B+ B- A

PF - Antonio Davis B C C B B- A

SF - Cedric Ceballos B B C+ B+ C+ A

SG - Dee Brown B- C+ B B D+ B

SF - Terry Mills B- C C B- B- C

SG - A.J. English C+ B B- B- C- C

[New York Knicks]

Aug 24, 2009 20:52:12 GMT -6 aceman034 said:

Just throwing this out there that we have already set a precedent of rookie classes. Like Josh said if we are going to start devaluing picks it needs to be a gradual decline, not just kill an entire draft. Now you may think I am just saying this b/c I own 11 picks in the upcoming draft but there have been excellent points made on both sides of this. It comes down to that there are 0 Gms in this league, including John, with more FBB experience and draft class experience than Josh, I think his opinion should be valued highly.

I kinda agree with this. There been teams acquiring future picks assuming they'll be getting one thing, so now that you start devaluing them too much that really screws those individuals.

But on the other hand like other people in this thread have said, we got a league full of superstars, so something gotta be done right?

[New York Knicks]

Aug 25, 2009 9:35:27 GMT -6 John1974 said:

Here is what I would do. So if you like

C - Derrick Coleman B C+ C B+ B A

PG - Gary Payton B B- B+ B+ A

SG - Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf C+ A- B B D+ B

SG - Dennis Scott B- B C+ B+ C A

SG - Kendall Gill B C+ C+ A- C+ B

C - Felton Spencer B- C- C- B B+ C

SF - Lionel Simmons B+ C C A- B B

SG - Bo Kimble C+ C+ C+ B D C

SG - Willie Burton C C+ C+ B- D C

PG - Rumeal Robinson C+ C+ C+ B D C

PF - Tyrone Hill B- C D+ B- B+ A

PF - Jayson Williams B C C A- B+ B

PF - Loy Vaught B- C C B+ B B

C - Elden Campbell B- C D+ A- B B

SF - Toni Kukoc B B C+ B+ B- A

PF - Antonio Davis B C C B B- A

SF - Cedric Ceballos B B C+ B+ C+ A

SG - Dee Brown B- C+ B B D+ B

SF - Terry Mills B- C C B- B- C

SG - A.J. English C+ B B- B- C- C

Sounds fair. Maybe start GP off with A- defense though, he was one of the top defensive PG's ever.

[josh]

I agree that Payton should have A- defense...It will be a travesty to our leagues PGs if Payton doesn't end up with A+ defense.

[josh]

Also, WTF is with SG - Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf C+ A- B B D+ B??

This guy is stronger (much stronger in handling and defense) than Reggie Miller when he came out...Why? B handling for a guy with 3.5 career APG? He was good offensively, but there is NO way that his handling and defense should be Bs. 0.8 career spg? I could see Rauf having C+ A- offense with C handling and C defense...

This is where we run into problems, guys...A guy like this will get taken #13 overall, someone will camp him and he'll be B A B A- in two seasons...When we let guys like this slip through, we create even more problems for ourselves...

[John1974]

Well you guys can work this out by monday or I go with what we have. I would put more input into it but I am going to be gone most of today, and thur-sun night.

[yourkers15]

jw when it comes to complete studs say like Shaq, and Mourning are they going to not have the abilies to be the players they should be when they come out in the draft.

Mourning was a 20/10/3 guy 1st year.

Shaq was 23/13/3 1st year


I just think the guys that we know should be complete studs should be allowed to get there.

Out of this draft Payton and Coleman should be the best looking players

GP C+ C+ B+ A C A
DC B+ C C- B+ B+ A

GP was never the great scorer, and was an alright assist guy, but his defense was always top notch.

DC was a big time scorer coming into the league and stayed that way for awhile. Not giving him any A- is fair because he could get it in TC or someone could camp him.

Just my thoughts, I also think Ric and Josh are both right.

We should lower drafts but the people we know that should be real good should be real good.

But at the same time we might go a little higher than we should on players because of the possible non-potential. But no more crazy inflation. To many players are way up there a little to quickly.

With the camping I think its fine because it keeps people active and it makes points valuable in trades. It always more people be creative with how they go about things. It is what makes this league different and stand out.

But we do have to take a step back on the drafts and allow the game to take a bigger role in how they develop.

[joshbounds]

John, how does this look? Its a compromise for the whole situation. I hope all can be happy with these ratings since there a right at where you would rate them, just GP and DC are just a tad better then you had them. I would be fine with these even though they are a big step down from where we had been talking...



C - Derrick Coleman B+ C+ C A- B A

PG - Gary Payton B B- A- A C A

SG - Mahmoud Abdul-Rauf C+ A- B B D+ B

SG - Dennis Scott B- B C+ B+ C A

SG - Kendall Gill B C+ C+ A- C+ B

C - Felton Spencer B- C- C- B B+ C

SF - Lionel Simmons B+ C C A- B B

SG - Bo Kimble C+ C+ C+ B D C

SG - Willie Burton C C+ C+ B- D C

PG - Rumeal Robinson C+ C+ C+ B D C

PF - Tyrone Hill B- C D+ B- B+ A

PF - Jayson Williams B C C A- B+ B

PF - Loy Vaught B- C C B+ B B

C - Elden Campbell B- C D+ A- B B

SF - Toni Kukoc B B C+ B+ B- A

PF - Antonio Davis B C C B B- A

SF - Cedric Ceballos B B C+ B+ C+ A

SG - Dee Brown B- C+ B B D+ B

SF - Terry Mills B- C C B- B- C

SG - A.J. English C+ B B- B- C- C

[joshbounds]

Those are what John Posted besides DC needs to be a B+ and A- defense instead of B inside and B+ defense. And GP is the same besides an A- handles instead of John's B+ and an A defense instead of John's B+. Those were the only changes, everyone else John rated looked fine..