The art of playing Fantasy Football is all about matchups. If you have the choice of playing a top 10 running back against the top rated run defense OR, playing a top 15 running back against the worse run defense, the smart play is to play the matchup. What I've always found odd is that most Fantasy Basketball owners never consider the opponents their players are competing against in setting their lineups. However, if you analysis the data, there are real advantages that can be made when playing against some of the defensive doormats of the NBA.
Table 1
Points Per Game | |
Golden State | 111.0 |
Sacramento | 109.0 |
Indiana | 107.1 |
New York | 106.6 |
Phoenix | 103.3 |
Oklahoma City | 103.2 |
Washington | 102.4 |
The simplest way to exploit a bad defense is to look at the number of points a defense gives up every game. Golden State leads the way by giving up 111.0 points per game followed by Sacramento. How does this compare to the better defenses? The top two defenses, Cleveland and Boston give up 90.9 and 92.3, or an amazing difference of 20 points per game.
Field Goal Percentage (FG%) | |
Sacramento | .483 |
Washington | .480 |
New York | .477 |
Memphis | .474 |
Oklahoma City | .472 |
Minnesota | .470 |
Portland | .468 |
Table 2
While points per game is an important data point, it's not the most important stat in determining the quality of a defense. For instance, a team could have a run and gun offensive style that requires the opposing team to score more to keep up. While the chances of this team having a porous defense are high, we really need to consider FG% as the true indicator of a team's defensive ability. In crunching those numbers, Golden State and Phoenix fall out as two of the worse defensive teams in the league, while Sacramento and Washington move up. Combining Sacramento's opposing FG% with their ppg. allowed, it's clear that they are the worse defensive team in the league; and getting worse. Over the last 10 games, Sacramento has given up 115 points per game with a 51% field goal percentage. By the way, Washington isn't much better at 108 and 50.5%. Not convinced, look at these lines that some players had against Sacramento over the past month:
- Linas Klieza: 27 points on 11-27 shooting in 30 minutes
- Michael Redd: 44 points on 16-26 shooting in 39 minutes
- Eddie House: 28 points on 10-13 shooting in 20 minutes
- Mo Williams: 43 points on 15-24 shooting in 42 minutes
- Jason Richardson: 24 points on 10-12 shooting in 24 minutes
While the list above are decent players and in some cases good players, they are by no means the top NBA players. However, if the second and third tier players can put up these type of numbers, imagine what the top players are doing. I'll let you do that research, but take my word on it…it ain't good!
Perimeter defense
3 Point Percentage | |
Sacramento | .404 |
New Jersey | .395 |
Washington | .389 |
Portland | .384 |
Golden State | .383 |
Miami | .381 |
L.A. Clippers | .378 |
Table 3
When a Basketball analyst talks about a team having good perimeter defense, they are really talking about the team's ability to defend the outside shot. If you're like me, you're always looking for 3 pointers and therefore add three point specialist such as Roger Mason, J.R. Smith, and James Posey to your team for short burst of help. But how many times do those players disappoint? A lot; and that's why they are always on the waiver wire. However, you have a better chance of success if you take a look at those players in context of the teams they are playing in a given week. Table 3 shows the worse defenses against the three point shot. Surprise, look who's on top again! Compare these teams to the best defenses against the 3 point shot, Cleveland and Orlando at 33%. Quite a difference. As I did with points and FG%, let's take a look at some big games over the last month against Sacramento, New Jersey, and Washington.
- Mo Williams against Sacramento: 7 for 12
- Yukhouba Diawara against New Jersey: 5 for 8 (How about that one)
- Michael Redd against Sacramento: 6 for 9
- Steve Novak against Washington: 5 for 10
Turning to the point guard for assist
Assist Per Game (Apg.) | |
Washington | 24.3 |
Golden State | 23.9 |
L.A. Lakers | 23.2 |
Toronto | 23.0 |
L.A. Clippers | 23.0 |
Philadelphia | 22.1 |
Sacramento | 22.0 |
There is a plethora of data on each statistical category and in due time, we'll cover all of them, but the final category for this article will be assist per game (apg). The best defensive teams in the league, Orlando, Cleveland, and Boston, give up on average 18-18.5 apg. Compare this to the two worse teams, Golden State and Washington and the difference is approximately 35%. In other words, a top point guard can expect to get 7 assist per game against Boston and 9.5-10 assist per game against Golden State. That's substantial. One surprising team on the list is the Lakers. With a team as good as the Lakers, you would assume their defense is stellar. However, it's good, but not great and might spell trouble for their hopes of a NBA Championship. With teams getting that many assist per game implies that their interior defense is suspect. Now with the loss of Andrew Bynum and no Rony Turiaf as an enforcer off the bench, I would be worried if I'm a Laker faithful.
Golden State appears again, and while some this can be explained by their RUN and GUN style, their interior defense is clearly a problem. It's one of the reasons why Ronny Turiaf's block shots stats are so stellar this year – point guards go unchecked into the paint. While he blocks his fair share, more times than not, the ball is kicked back out for a mid range jumper, and an assist results. Washington leads the list and it appears that their defense is just awful from top to bottom.
Review the defensive stats before setting your lineups
While Fantasy Owners should spend considerable time looking at Player Efficiency Ratings and injuries that might affect a players time on the court, it's also important to consider the opponents your players are competing against in a given week. If you're debating between two players and one of them has a back to back with Sacramento or Washington, you now have another data point to make that decision. By the way, if you haven't figured it out by now, play the guy with the back to back.
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