B Draft League

Commentary by HARRY & CUNDALL...

Motha Lovers 73  Above the Rankings 60

Not a Regular Ass Thursday for Chas

The championship game has arrived, the game we’ve been working towards the past three months is finally here. I posted some pre-game comments in the discord, but the biggest news of the night was Chas’s wife was here, YET AGAIN, to root on her man. I noticed Jamil and Harding’s wife were not in the building, do they even love their husband? Why don’t they care enough about them winning, like Chas’s does? Is this grounds for divorce? NEXT ON JERRY SPINGER! No, we have a game to play Jerry! Above the Rankings, informed me they only had 4 for this one, where the fuck was Ian Marlier? Next I see him I’m giving him a piece of mind for not being available for this game. Motha Lovers, had everyone and their previously discussed wife advantage. Would ATR be able to overcome this? TO THE ACTION!

ATR started out the game in zone, not triangle-1, like I suggested. Obviously, my idea was better, as Casey dribbled around and around until someone got open, that person was Evan Kodra. I highlighted Kodra in my preview, because I knew he would be given opportunities to do damage in this game and he came through for his number 1, Chas Balls. Kodra, led his team with 13 first half points, going 3 for 5 from deep. He was being aggressive with his shot, take notes, Sam Pollock! A welcomed site for his team that needed some extra scoring.

On the other side of the ball, the other man I highlighted, Jamil was stroking it from deep. He went 3 for 5 himself from the promise land. He also had some tough takes to the cup and led both teams with 16 first half points. These were much needed points, because Harding was really struggling to get himself going in the first half. He wasn’t able to take advantage when match-ups presented themselves and Kodra’s defense was good on the other occasions. Disappointing first half and game for our OPOY.

The game stayed in the 6-8 point lead for the majority of the first half, just as I predicted. Marlon, called more fouls in the first half, than I’ve ever seen him call in one season. ATR, got themselves in the bonus with time left in the first half, but couldn’t do anything with it. Motha Lovers, went into the half up 36-30. Not a great sign for ATR, who I thought needed to be ahead after the first half, due to their limited stamina only having four guys. Let’s just blame Ian Marlier, and move on, ok? BACK TO THE ACTION!

ATR moved out of the zone in the second half, which immediately freed up Casey to start chucking from deep and the floor started to open up a bit. Chas, would hit a three, Motha and Koller came alive with some good passing. They also dead rimmed a couple shots in, which told you whose night it was going to be. Lots of good passing from Motha Lovers, who registered 20 assists on the game to ATR’s 4 (YUCK). Casey, lead the world in this game with 11 assists and would register a triple-double, doing whatever he wanted on his Wednesday teammate. Although, I will admit they screened well for Casey, but Harding probably should have alerted his teammates which way Casey was going every time. 

Speaking of Harding, he sucked in the worst possible game to do that this season. Even from the free throw line, where he’s usually good, he missed 2 of 3 free throws off a 3-point attempt. Abreu, the X-man wasn’t a factor either. He was dining at the Casey buffet, but insisted he was on a diet, so he didn’t feast. All season long he had been the guy to give them a little extra, but he wasn’t getting anything in this one. Robel, struggled too, he lost his light touch he had that one week. If I ever have him on my team, I will fix this post mess, but until then he’s on his own. He let his little buddy (to him) out perform him in this game. Now he has to look at his smiling face on the website.  

Motha Lovers started to extend the lead as the second half went on. ATR, just didn’t have the fire power to match them basket for basket, with Harding having an off game and Abreu going back to below his average in points. They had a small run late, where they forced a turnover and Jamil had a fast break down 10, but he got scared he was about to be blocked and went into up-fake mode. No one bit and he had to kick it out, they ended up not scoring on the possession and that really was their last chance. Motha Lovers, got it together and hit a couple more shots to extend the lead back into the 13-15 range. That was the end of the game there. 73-60 Motha Lovers Final.

Grades

Casey A+: Triple double in the ship gets you an A+, monster performance to get his team the title.

Koller B+: Defended well at the rim in this one, posted a big man’s double-double, but shot remained trash.

Kodra A+: Stay aggressive his shot and that was the difference in this game. Not to mention his defense on Harding.

Motha A: Besides missing horribly on 3s, played well and outshined his buddy on the other end of the floor.

Chas A+: Captain’s A+ for guiding his team to victory and the title. 

Taha B-: Didn’t play that much, but he did hit a three.

ATR

Harding D: Bad game of Harding at the worst possible time. 

Robel C+: 7 points, 16 rebounds, 1 steal and 2 blocks. They needed more from him early on in the post. 

Jamil A: Did everything he could to get his team the victory, 23 points should be enough.

Abreu D+: I had high expectations for him coming into this game knowing Casey likes turning role players into superstars. Abreu, didn’t have it though.

#BDraft Motha Lovers are your Spring 2022 champs!!

It's not just a regular ass Thursday when @Chasbelliveau77 returns to the mountain top!

Congrats @CaseyTenney @bkoller297 @evan_kodra Taha and Motha! pic.twitter.com/9Esy3AaByd

— CAC Basketball (@CACBasketball) July 29, 2022

It’s the time of the year that everyone loves, AWARD TIME! I’d like to say there were a lot of great candidates out there for awards, but I’d be lying. Only a special few can reach the mountain top of glory. So, lets get to it, shall we?

2022 B-Draft Role Player of the Year

This is our new award, renamed after the “6th man of the year” award, that was always a pain in the ass to give, because of absences and trying to figure out who was actually the 6th man. Therefore, this new name makes sense and it was tough choice between two strong candidates. Abreu, was had to step up all season with the continued absences on his team and their first round pick going down immediately (save your jokes you unfeeling monsters!). We’ll have a lot more on him in the championship preview, but he provided much needed support to his team all season and deserves some love. Our next candidate, Djordje, actually led the league in APR for half the season, which is damn impressive. He was clearly on the right team this season for his abilities and was able to shine through with some career highs. 

2022 B-Draft Role Player of the Year: Djordje Vlajkovic 

Some awards are easier than others and despite how good Abreu has been lately, Djordje is the pick here. He really stepped his game for Sam-I-am this season. He showed an increased ability to get up and down the court at a high pace, which got him a lot more easy buckets. He even managed to finish some too! The X-Man will have to settle for a bigger trophy, maybe?

2022 B-Draft Defensive Player of the Year:

I will go through my usual rant here about how hard this award is to judge, based on knowing what teams defensive plans are for each game. No one new really jumped off the charts this season, in terms of defense, so no one will be surprised to hear the usual names here. We’ll start Casey (lolol, no), the best defenders for my eyes have been Harding, Nestler and Myer. Spoiler alert, you’ll probably be hearing the first two names again. All three men usually take the best offensive player on the other side, no matter their size or speed. We saw Myer take Joel’s soul in the first round, Harding locked up injured Nestler in the second half last week and Nestler is always blocking someone into next week every game. Of course, I would be unfair not to mention the efforts of Evan Kodra each week and the good defense Kap usually plays, he did lead the league in steals.

2022 B-Draft Defensive Player of the Year: Raymond Myer

Even if he does clutch, grab and hold every possession, few could argue that Myer isn’t the best defender in this league. He’s tough to screen, hard to get pass off the dribble and does a great job of ball denial. He can grab everyone in this league, on any team. Harding and Nestler are both great defenders themselves, but Harding’s size can be taken advantage off and Nestler is often looking for the highlight block one too many times. Myer, is the all-around better defender and doesn’t have many defensive weaknesses, depending on who’s reffing.

2022 B-Draft Offensive Player of the Year:

The good ole offensive player of the year award people can see coming a mile away. You know the contenders here, Casey, Harding, Calvin, Nestler and Myer. Four of the five guys in contention for the award have 20 plus points and 4 plus assists a game. The one person missing from the group, is your 2022 scoring champion, John Harding. He happens to be lapping the field by 8 points for the lead, which is pretty impressive or maybe just a product of the team he’s on. Every other contender has a teammate that isn’t too far away from them in points. All 5 guys attract the most attention from opposing teams each week, although Harding I would saw draws the most of the 5, due again, to his supporting cast. So, who gets the gold?!?!

2022 B-Draft Offensive Player of the Year: John Harding

Always the bridesmaid and never the bride for Harding, earlier in his CAC career. I think this is his third career victory in this category, so he’s really going to have to step it up next season if he wants to win it again or MVP. This award could have gone a couple different ways, specially to Nestler who upped his offensive game throughout the season. Casey, is always an offensive force, but he’s done better. Calvin, took a big step toward becoming a playmaker, as opposed to last season when he ignored his non-Harding teammates. Myer, I thought played better in the playoffs and his teammates hogged a lot of offensive glory from him too. 

2022 B-Draft GM of the Year:

Now this one might be even tougher than the MVP award coming. All of the top 3 teams captains deserve praise for the work they did during the draft. Ian, rightfully gambled on games being moved a week, so he could draft Myer. That obviously made his season. Chas, went the conventional route and grab some proven mainstays in B-Draft, including revenge tour Casey. Jamil, you could say got lucky with his first round pick, but masterfully picked up Harding and the Abreu pick might have been the best one in the draft. Civale, could have been in this conversation too, had his team not fallen off a cliff late. This one is really close to call, so I decided to flip a coin. 

2022 B-Draft GM of the Year: Jamil Ball

I had to go with Jamil here, because it’s not often you forfeit your first round pick and still make it to the championship game (Or the Semis, which is when this was decided). He picked up Robel, who I would have had around the third round in this draft and yes, if Harding didn’t try to scam us all, he would have been in the first round. So, pretty much Jamil went the season without a second round pick and had a very successful season. Chas, was a close second here, picking a very well rounded squad. Two good drafts for Chas this season, none for me, the world is upside down!

 2022 B-Draft Most Valuable Player:

Now, the real fun begins. We have a hotly contested race here, between the OPOY winner and the DPOY winner. Plus, a former MVP in Casey and a rising star in Calvin, along with an old mainstay, Adam Nestler. I might as well copy and paste everything that I said on the OPOY part and put it here. Let’s talk defense, obviously Myer gets points there, along with Nestler and Harding, who played exceptional defense all season. All of these gentleman’s teams performed well, leading their team to a winning record. Annnnnnnnnnndddd the winner is:

2022 B-Draft Most Valuable Player: Adam Nestler

A definite upset coming into this season, Nestler was closer to being the most disappointing first round pick. However, he finally, FINALLY turned up the aggression on offense, pushing his scoring to over 20PPG. His stat line to finish the season was pretty damn good, 20-14-6-1-1. It looked like he took a step forward this season. Harding, would have been our second choice here, but it’s hard to have him over Nestler, when Nestler beats him in every category, except points. Of course, this would have looked different if the award wasn’t decided upon before last week’s game. However, it was and that’s that!

2022 B-Draft All-First Team:

G: Casey

G: Harding

F: Nestler

F: Myer

Pretty obvious selections here. 

2022 B-Draft All-Second Team:

G: Calvin

G: Weinstein

F: Koller

F: Sutton

It occurred to me while doing this, that the guard play this season was trash, so Calvin gets to be a guard, even though he claims he’s a forward. Give us better guard play next season you cowards.

2022 B-Draft Championship Game: Motha Lovers vs Above the Rankings 7p Game:

The hottest team in the league takes on the 1 seed in our championship game here. My sources on ATR. tell me they’ll be running with 4 guys tonight. Who the four are, is up to Chas to worry about. I assume Motha Lovers will have everyone, Marlon, will be our ref. Let’s dig into this game, shall we?

These teams met all the way back in week 3, when I was dying of Covid, so I didn’t see the game. Motha Lovers won 60-53, they had everyone at the game. ATR had 5 guys, no one crucial was missing, so Ian! Looked like a low scoring game, where the stars of the show carried the load. Harding-Casey-Koller scored 80 of the game’s 113 points. The write-up seems to share that point of view as well, with a lot of average grades and the 3-point stats show that in glaring colors. Everyone named Harding or Tenney went a combined 3 for 22 from deep in the game. That brings us to the theme of every playoff game, which is where is the secondary help coming from? 

Usually I focus on Abreu here, but I’m not going to do that. This week I’m focusing on Jamil, who is going to have to have a big performance in this championship game. He’s going to have Chas on him, which means height and strength are going to be in his favor down low. He’s a tough downhill driver, who can Chas in some tough spots downlow or even Taha. One of the two is going to have to be on him all game and he exploit that. Jamil, can still get buckets, no matter how old he claims to be. He did it when I was forced into guarding him one week and he can do it here too. 

On the other side, I’m looking at Kodra, who’s another guy capable of scoring with the right match-up and he’s going to have someone small on him this game. I assume that will be Abreu, Kodra, can score in the post when smaller guys are on him. It’s just a matter of him forcing himself to go down there and his teammates finding him. This is no time to be timid, every bucket counts in a championship games. Young Jeffrey Motha, won’t be afraid to shoot, which can be a positive or negative. Chas, seems to trust size or himself, which could be a fatal mistake.

Now on the meaty match-up of the evening, Casey-Harding. One will be guarding the other on one side of the floor. It’ll be interesting if Harding has learned anything from teaming with Casey all season in Franchise. I’ll be disappointed if he hasn’t. Harding, definitely has the ability to hang with and limit Casey offensively. The question will be if Casey’s awful mid-range shot is falling or not. That brings me to the other side of the court, where Kodra will no doubt be on Harding. Kodra, is a good defender, but no one is good enough to get around a Robel screen. If I were Harding, I’d be calling Robel over for a screen all game long and force Koller to defend in space, where he’s weak defensively. At the same time you draw Motha Lovers bigs away from the rim. 

The last match-up of intrigue will be the big man match-up of Robel and Koller. It appears from the stats Koller didn’t have much trouble scoring last time and he’s truthfully a tough guard for Robel, because he’s constantly moving. Even if he’s a travel machine with the ball, Robel doesn’t want to have to move so much on defense and his team doesn’t want that either. Now the other end of the floor is where it gets more interesting, Robel’s screens can wipe away any defender as I’ve mentioned, but its his post game that can really turn the tide in this game. However, last week he was back to chucking the ball off the glass, not the soft touch I saw in round 1. If he’s going to score, he needs to get good position and have a soft touch at the rim. He can move Koller as easily as everyone else down low. 

Something I don’t usually mention, but deserves some serious mention in this game is stamina. Robel and Jamil’s stamina hasn’t been up to snuff some games this season. Even last week, Harding had to call a timeout to remind everyone to get back on defense. You have to get back on defense when you play Motha Lovers, because Casey and Koller love to get out in transition. That’s where they pick up the easy buckets. Now, ATR can come up with a defense, maybe zone or triangle-1 to counter this? But even so, they have to get back in transition. ATR is going to have 4, for 40 minutes, so they need to think of something. It’s one thing to have one guy dragging, but they can’t have two. 

This is going to be an interesting game, but somehow I feel it will be in the 6-8 point mark one way or another. You have to wonder what Casey and Harding’s mindset will be at after they blew their undefeated season last night. The pressure must be on revenge tour Casey, whose tour might have just ran off the Tobin Bridge. Nonetheless, I think Motha Lovers have the edge here, they have a few more options and having subs in a game like this matters, especially when there are guys on your team that are really going to need a blow. ATR is a good squad, but they have a few cracks that Motha Lovers can exploit and its those small edges that win games.

Motha Lovers -6.5 over Above the Rankings