How To Fix NBA 2K's Association Mode, Part II: Trade Logic

After looking at the highly flawed nature of the draft last week, today I'm going to focus on another aspect of the season that needs revamping: trades. This is an obvious step that 2k10 desperately needs to fix. While I love the fact that I can trade my 27th pick for the 24th pick, and then my 24th pick for the 22nd, and so on and so forth until I've essentially traded into the lottery for nothing, it's completely unrealistic and borderline idiotic. I'm not even going to talk about the kind of deals teams offer you most of the time, or what kinds of deals you have to concoct to get star players (or even above average ones).

Now something as complex as trade logic is almost impossible to accurately simulate, since there are so many small variances in how trades work and are constructed. But here are the five steps I would take to make the trade logic as efficient and realistic as possible.

International Players to Keep an Eye on in World Championships: Part II

The World Championships kick off tomorrow, and I for one cannot wait to watch some high quality basketball again.  I'm also here to help you keep an eye on International players that you may not know much about, but could one day see in the NBA, or perhaps even this season.

Part 1 is here, and Part 2 is after the jump.

International Players to Keep an Eye on in World Championships: Part I

The FIBA World Championships start in Turkey this Saturday, August 28th.  This is a great chance to watch some good basketball again before the season starts, but also to watch some of  the foreign talent.  It was in this kind of tournament that Spanish sensation Ricky Rubio caught the eye of many Americans in 2008.

So who should you be keeping an eye on this time around?

Revisiting Ricky Rubio. Also, Alliteration.

Possibly the creepiest Ricky Rubio picture ever.

A couple of days ago the American National team played a tough exhibition match against Spain, winning 86-85 thanks to a Kevin Durant block at the end.  Of much interest to many NBA fans was point guard Ricky Rubio, the highly touted prospect drafted by the Timberwolves with the 5th pick last year.

Ricky is a source of great consternation for me.  As a Kings fan last year, I spent most of the miserable 17 win campaign alternating between Ricky Rubio and Blake Griffin highlights.  One of these two players was going to be a King, I was sure of it.  I was even in favor of Rubio over Griffin for a little bit.

But alas, draft day came, and the Rubio hype had gone down a little bit.  Still, many Kings fans wanted him and when he eventually slipped to the Kings position at 4 and the Kings passed on him for Tyreke Evans, Kings fans cursed the heavens.  Rubio dropping to 5th was a seemingly impossible proposition before the draft, but Minnesota was happy to take him when he fell in their laps.

Unfortunately for Minnesota, Rubio's buyout with DKV Joventut proved too much of a roadblock to allowing him to come to the NBA immediately, so instead Regal Barcelona bought him out of his contract and allows him an NBA escape clause starting after next season.  Meanwhile, Kings fans eventually came to celebrate their Rookie of the Year in Evans, and Minnesota fans were left to ponder what could've been if Kahn had simply used even one of their top 6 picks (Minnesota had the 5th and the 6th pick in the lottery, using the 6th pick on Jonny Flynn) on a guy like Stephen Curry, or Darren Collison, or Brandon Jennings.

So why do I think that Minnesota (and David Kahn to be more specific) made a good decision in taking Rubio at 5?

How To Fix NBA 2K's Association Mode, Part I: The Draft

Devin Kharpertian explores NBA 2K's Association mode over the next two weeks.

A few days ago, I expressed the thought on Twitter that if I was running NBA 2K's Association mode, it would be (and I'm quoting myself here) the most baller association mode ever. There are so many small (and big) fixes that could be implemented to make the experience much more realistic and fun, and yet 2K for some reason just seems content making a decent Association and making tens of millions of dollars every year. How screwed up is that?

Anyway, for the next couple of weeks, I'm going to put up my ideas on how to fix Association mode, starting with the most glaring one in my mind.

Carl Landry: World Traveler

I've been on vacation for the past week, so apologies for the lack of posts.  We'll be back up and running as usual on Monday, when Devin should make his first solo post on Pick and Scroll.

Meanwhile, enjoy a fun little post I did over at Sactown Royalty called "Carl Landry: World Traveler".

Here's the link and a preview of the type of thing you can expect:

National Blogger Association

Last year I spent quite a bit of time playing the very fun PASPN Mock GM Fantasy league, which allows you to pick a team with rosters from the previous season and simulate the offseason and the draft, etc.  Unlike other fantasy games, you have to adhere to salary cap rules, and trade restrictions as well, as well as dealing with player agents etc.

It was a fun experience, but it required a lot of effort to maintain activity and in the end only a few players kept it up.  

Recently I thought it'd be a fun idea to start a league this year, but instead of focusing on the fantasy aspect (the way the rating system works there are some players really good for Fantasy value, like Zach Randolph, that you wouldn't want on your team in real life), play it like you were actually running your team.

And who better to run these teams than bloggers of their respective teams?  As such I've gotten the word out and slowly but surely the league is coming through.  The goal is to get through the draft and free agency (during which time teams can also trade) and then compare how the Blogger GMs built their teams going into next season compared to the real GMs.  I think it'll be a fun experiment, and I'll try to keep a weekly record of the activity of the league on Pick and Scroll for you guys to follow.

After the jump, the list of the bloggers who are set to run each team currently, as well as the teams I still need to find people for.

Exploring the Worth of the Expiring Contract as an Asset

Yesterday I mentioned in my trade analysis that it is rare nowadays to see a trade be mostly about acquiring basketball talent and not trying to cut salary.

As such, the growing conception in the media is that expiring contracts, that is players with big contracts that expire that year, are very valuable assets for a team to have.  The idea is that teams with expiring contracts can use the contracts themselves to get something they want, like getting under the luxury tax for instance, or grabbing young players with smaller contracts and more potential.

This year's expiring contracts look to be especially attractive according to experts, because the Collective Bargaining Agreement is set to expire and it is widely assumed that more limitations will be placed on teams, and salary will be slashed across the board.

It seems to me though that a lot of these "valuable" contracts don't get traded at all though.  But since I like to be more analytical than "It seems to me", lets take a look at the actual expiring contracts over the last few years and see what's been done with them.  We will be ignoring rookie scale contracts as expiring since those players go on to become Restricted Free Agents, players with Player Options or Early Termination clauses, and also players with salaries less than $3 million as the value of their expiring contracts would not be considered significant enough to trade for (unless a team was really close to being under the tax).

I will warn you now, this is a long article.  If you see an egregious mistake, (there's bound to be at least one I didn't see) let me know and I'll fix it right away.

Pacers-Hornets-Rockets-Nets Trade Analysis

Yesterday, Chad Ford broke the news that a 4 team trade involving 5 players occurred between the Pacers, Hornets, Rockets, and Nets.  This wasn't a bunch of no-names either as each team either got or traded a significant player on their roster.

Indiana Pacers trade: Troy Murphy

Indiana Pacers receive: Darren Collison, James Posey, approx. $4.2 million trade exception

New Orleans Hornets trade: Darren Collison, James Posey

New Orleans Horents receive: Trevor Ariza

Houston Rockets trade: Trevor Ariza

Houston Rockets receive: Courtney Lee, approximately $6.3 million trade exception

New Jersey Nets trade: Courtney Lee

New Jersey Nets receive: Troy Murphy

My analysis of each teams haul after the jump.

T Him Up: Rasheed Wallace Retires

Rasheed Wallace is an athlete that inspires a lot of emotions from fans of teams that he's played for, which is apt for a man who was most known for the emotion he displayed on and off the court.

It was announced after the NBA Finals that Rasheed was going to retire, despite two years and almost $13 million left on his contract.  Yesterday it became official, with Wallace retiring at the age of 35 after 15 seasons with 5 teams.

After the jump, a look back at his career.

Unsung Heroes: Pacific Division

Players are often described as being "overrated" or "underrated".  In the NBA, this often translates to overrated players being players that are good, but vastly overpaid for their abilities, or who get more media exposure than some other players, while underrated often means a player who is making a pittance for his current production (funnily enough, underrated players tend to become labeled overrated when they get new, bigger contracts).

I do think there are some underrated players though, players that aren't as widely known for their roles on their team, who don't often get mentioned for their contributions but are indeed integral parts of their team.

Today is the last day of this series, and after the jump, we finish off on the West Coast with the Pacific Division.

Unsung Heroes: Northwest Division

Players are often described as being "overrated" or "underrated".  In the NBA, this often translates to overrated players being players that are good, but vastly overpaid for their abilities, or who get more media exposure than some other players, while underrated often means a player who is making a pittance for his current production (funnily enough, underrated players tend to become labeled overrated when they get new, bigger contracts).

I do think there are some underrated players though, players that aren't as widely known for their roles on their team, who don't often get mentioned for their contributions but are indeed integral parts of their team.

Over the next week or so, I'll be looking at each team to find one "underrated" player for each team in the league.  Last Tuesday, we looked at the Atlantic Divsion, Wednesday the Central, and Thursday the Southeast.  Friday we moved on to the Western Conference and checked out the Southwest.  After the jump, we venture on to the Northwest.

Unsung Heroes: Southwest Division

Players are often described as being "overrated" or "underrated".  In the NBA, this often translates to overrated players being players that are good, but vastly overpaid for their abilities, or who get more media exposure than some other players, while underrated often means a player who is making a pittance for his current production (funnily enough, underrated players tend to become labeled overrated when they get new, bigger contracts).

I do think there are some underrated players though, players that aren't as widely known for their roles on their team, who don't often get mentioned for their contributions but are indeed integral parts of their team.

Over the next week or so, I'll be looking at each team to find one "underrated" player for each team in the league.  Tuesday, we looked at the Atlantic Divsion, Wednesday the Central, and yesterday the Southeast. After the jump, we leave the East Coast and travel to the Southwest.

Unsung Heroes: Southeast Division

This is like a Rorschach Test. What do you see?

Players are often described as being "overrated" or "underrated".  In the NBA, this often translates to overrated players being players that are good, but vastly overpaid for their abilities, or who get more media exposure than some other players, while underrated often means a player who is making a pittance for his current production (funnily enough, underrated players tend to become labeled overrated when they get new, bigger contracts).

I do think there are some underrated players though, players that aren't as widely known for their roles on their team, who don't often get mentioned for their contributions but are indeed integral parts of their team.

Over the next week or so, I'll be looking at each team to find one "underrated" player for each team in the league.  Tuesday, we looked at the Atlantic Divsion, and yesterday the Central.  After the jump, we travel to the Southeast to finish our Eastern Conference trip.

Unsung Heroes: Central Division

Players are often described as being "overrated" or "underrated".  In the NBA, this often translates to overrated players being players that are good, but vastly overpaid for their abilities, or who get more media exposure than some other players, while underrated often means a player who is making a pittance for his current production (funnily enough, underrated players tend to become labeled overrated when they get new, bigger contracts).

I do think there are some underrated players though, players that aren't as widely known for their roles on their team, who don't often get mentioned for their contributions but are indeed integral parts of their team.

Over the next week or so, I'll be looking at each team to find one "underrated" player for each team in the league.  Yesterday, we looked at the Atlantic Divsion.  After the jump, we travel to the Central.

Unsung Heroes: Atlantic Division

Bullets killed the Dinosaurs right?

Players are often described as being "overrated" or "underrated".  In the NBA, this often translates to overrated players being players that are good, but vastly overpaid for their abilities, or who get more media exposure than some other players, while underrated often means a player who is making a pittance for his current production (funnily enough, underrated players tend to become labeled overrated when they get new, bigger contracts).

I do think there are some underrated players though, players that aren't as widely known for their roles on their team, who don't often get mentioned for their contributions but are indeed integral parts of their team.

Over the next week or so, I'll be looking at each team to find one "underrated" player for each team in the league.  After the jump, the underrated players for the teams in the Atlantic Division.

The Bargain Bin: Western Conference Edition

Last Friday we looked at which teams in the Eastern Conference still had roster spots available, and what available free agents might fit best there of the ones left.  Today, we'll do the same with the Western Conference.  After the jump, my thoughts.