Last-second choices for the NIKEiD Fantasy Challenge

My transfers were already set Tuesday afternoon but when I came home on the evening, I read that Juan Carlos Navarro will probably miss the next game. So I had to change those nice picks I’d  already made.

OUT: Nikola Pekovic (Panathinaikos), Mirsad Turkcan (Fenerbahce) and Giorgios Printezis (Olympiacos).

IN: Lior Eliyahu (Maccabi), David Andersen (FC Barcelona) and Viktor Khryapa (CSKA Moscow).

The thing is that two guys, Nikola Pekovic and Navarro, must be moved out by any means  because of injuries. So who to take as a third, Mirsad Turkcan or Giorgios Printezis, or even somebody completely different? With the two first guys out, I could easily bring in my two choices, David Andersen and Victor Khryapa. Both are currently improving their playing level and are still not too expensive. This brings me to a situation where I have 34 credits left and still one trade to make.

By selling Turkcan like I wanted to, I have to many credits. On the other hand, none of the other inside players is a selling option in my opinion, as both Edu Hernandez-Sonseca and Tiago Splitter should come up with big numbers next game. So I have to check on the forward position and forget about bringing Lior Eliyahu to my team.

So my choice goes to David Logan, who should bring good stats in the game against Zalgiris. So I really think that this is the deal I need in order to overcome my poor performance from last week and find my way back to where I belong.

Tips from the Euroleague boss: Week 7

Hello everybody, once again this is Javier Gancedo, as always from Euroleague Basketball in the last NIKEiD Fantasy Challenge blog of 2008. Looking back at the Euroleague year, it has been a fantastic one. The Final Four in Madrid was terrific; the competition system changed and it is safe to say it was an improvement; Ramunas Siskauskas was the 2008 Euroleague MVP; and we changed the website to a cooler, more stable system. Personally, I can’t complain other then about a team that never ever wins. Everyone around me knows I’m a Cajasol fan; I never hid it. So seeing my team at the bottom of the ACB table hurts. Let’s hope Santa brings some courage to those talented players that showed their skills in European basketball but somehow fail to win games in my state-of-the-art hometown Sevilla.

I am also excited because Montepaschi Siena is in town tomorrow and that is a must-watch game. Regal FC Barcelona is playing really well lately, like they showed against Panathinaikos in Athens. It reminded of a mid-nineties game in which Barcelona demolished the Greens 74-95 in the Greek capital behind 23 points from Xavi Fernandez. Barcelona played close to perfection that way but Panathinaikos had the final say, as it won the 1996 Euroleague title - its first - later on that season amid controversy. Would I be surprised to see both teams again in the Euroleague final this season? Well, it’s a possibility.

Speaking of history, it’s CSKA vs. Real Madrid this week: The teams have combined for 14 European cup crowns and 24 top continental finals. I could tell endless stories about this, since I coordinated the 50 Years of European Club Basketball projects and had to good fortune to talk to people like Lolo Sainz and Pedro Ferrandiz. Spain was under Franco’s dictatorship and the country had no relationship whatsoever with the Soviet Union. Madrid had to play the European Cup final over there, becoming the first Spanish team in any sport to travel to Moscow. Basketball beating politics for a global world? Yes indeed.

So if I were you, I would tune in to Euroleague TV for an outstanding Euroleague Wednesday. As for Fantasy Challenge, well, again I had an OK week and moved closer to the Top 3. This time it was pure luck, to be honest. I happened not to have those players that were in mind before trading and had low scores. So as usual, I will do the trades at the same time I write the blog.

Hmm… First of all, I do believe that since Victor Sada is back, he will be all over Terrell McIntyre in the big game at Palau Blaugrana. So I am trading T-Mac. Trade number two has got to be Chris Warren, playing against a low-scoring team like Unicaja. I have to thank Vedran Vukusic for the 13.2 he gave me last week, but I don’t like him against Olympiacos.

So I am taking a risk again this week by having Mantas Kalnietis. Willie Deane is gone, so Kalnietis will be playing non-stop from now on, and Zalgiris has a home game. Kalnietis is priced at just 13 credits and the trade looks suicidal, but oh well. Tau faces a couple of must-win road games, so I’m going with Igor Rakocevic for the first time this season.

This leaves me with around 69 credits for my final trade. I don’t particularly like any of the players I see available, so I am going with Turkcan because of the rebounds, and also because Joventut is short of rebounders with Mensah-Bonsu gone and Henk Norel possibly sidelined. Plus again, Fenerbache Ulker plays at home.

So the team looks like this:

Mantas Kalnietis - the big gamble this week. Is Kalnietis ready to lead Zalgiris to its first Euroleague win?

Lynn Greer - Comes off a bad game, so expect him to bounce back. Does patience lead to fantasy success?

Jonas Maciulis - Comes off an extraordinary game. Is underpriced. Maciulis stays, no doubt.

Rimantas Kaukenas - May have an advantage in offense vs. Navarro and Lakovic.

Juan Carlos Navarro - It’s a big game and Barça plays at home. Navarro must do well.

Igor Rakocevic - A newcomer in my team, as weird as it may seem. Rakocevic has been unstoppable so far.

Tiago Splitter - The All-Euroleague center should dominate against Ansu Sesay and Adam Chubb.

Andre Hutson - In great shape and ready to keep rocking. Everybody must have him, though.

Mirsad Turkcan - He should outrebound Hernandez-Sonseca, Bogdanovic and Jagla all by himself.

Mike Batiste - With Pekovic questionable, I’ve changed my mind. Batiste stays!

Since this is my last blog in 2008, I want to wish everybody out there a happy holiday break. Let’s hope that 2009 is even better than 2008 - which, in Cajasol’s case, is an easy thing to do. Hopefully!

The nightmare before Christmas

I’ve really been into the NIKEiD Fantasy Challenge lately. But this week makes me think about going ahead with it or not. Game day isn’t even over (at the moment I write these lines), and I already know that this will be my worst score ever. After it started so well on Tuesday, Wednesday was a complete disaster and Thursday was no better.

So I’m pretty happy to have spent my evening with Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (yes, I do have a private life outside Basketball), even if the Oompa-Loompas reminded me of the performance of some of my fantasy players. And speaking of Tim Burton, “Jack’s Lament” from the Nightmare before Christmas is my favorite song of the night:

PS: Dave Hein has just informed me that J.R. Holden will be back next week.

Attention: The Fantasy deadline is tonight

I was quite a bit shocked when I saw Monday morning that the first game of the Euroleague week was already today. While ALBA fans in various forums were still discussing whether their game against Fenerbahce in the O2 World will be a home game or not (bear in mind that Berlin is sometimes called the third-largest Turkish city in the World, which is not true by the way), I was wondering how to manage my time and team in order to write a quality article about the changes. I did change my plans a bit and the Euroleague Power Rankings will only be published later.

So what is the situation right now? My team performed surprisingly well last week with my best-ever ranking in the general standings: 928th. So now is the time to really stabilize and earn constant ranking points. The time for experimentation is over. Now I need the big guys, the money players. I do this the same way as my weekend predecessor Javi and always go for my trades while writing the article. But I do write what comes through my head and don’t erase the changes I did not make, as you may have seen the weeks before. So enough blah-blah, let’s move on to this week’s tips.

A quick look at the Injury List, though as incomplete as always, at least helped me to avoid having an injured player on my team. What I see is that Olympiacos has three injured forwards that probably won’t play so this might be a good possibility for an interesting gamble. Giorgios Printezis looks pretty interesting in that area, as he costs only 28 credits and should be able to better than my “steal” for last week, Rodrigo de la Fuente. Mirza Begic has reached the maximum of his potential in my opinion so he’ll be out, as I want to sign somebody who will be present in the Top 16. I’m going for similar thinking on Ioannis Bouroussis, who should be at the top of his potential at 80 credits. So he is out, too.

With the Greek center out, I have enough money in the bank to go for money in the bank in terms of centers, too: Tiago Splitter is in the house and should easily score 20+ ranking points against Union Olimpija. By gambling on Printezis, I still have the opportunity to go for Mirsad Türkcan, who I expect to go strong against ALBA Berlin, as Patrick Femerling is still limited in his minutes and the rest of the inside players are not known for the defensive excellency. So the self-declared best friend of Pat Ewing should excel in the offensive rebound action as the Turks may come up with a lot of (missed) long-distance shots.

OUT: Rodrigo de la Fuente (Roma), Mirza Begic (Olimpija) and Ioannis Bouroussis (Olympiacos).

IN: Giorgios Printezis (Olympiacos), Mirsad Türkcan (Fenerbahce) and Tiago Splitter (TAU).

After having made my trades, I took a quick look through the different rankings within our the BallinEurope Private League. Even if only the overall ranking counts to win the great Euroleague and K1X prizes, it’s always nice to see the name of some different teams at the top. And here’s the surprise of the day: David Hein and his “Garth Monsters” team is 5th in overall three-point ranking. Congratulations, Dave! Felicidades to our Spanish guys Javi and Pablo, who are topping the rebound rankings, while Penny Hardaway fan cappe is leading the assists table.

Good luck for everyone and don’t miss the deadline!

Tips from the Euroleague boss: Week 6

Hi everyone, this is once again Javier Gancedo, as always from the Euroleague Basketball headquarters at Palau Sant Jordi. Well, not always, since it is my day off today, and I’m at home chilling out in Barcelona.

First of all, the fact that I know nothing about basketball kills me. I come up with The Golden Rule about CSKA and you know what happened: Armani Jeans Milano downed the reigning Euroleague champions and David Hawkins had a fantastic game. I was shocked to see Real Madrid rally from a 28-point deficit only to lose on a running layup by Aaron Miles. Hopefully, Miles will no longer be missed in my hometown Sevilla since DeJuan Collins is in town. I’m already going to the game against DKV Joventut next week with stuff from KFC and some private DVDs to make sure he plays well.

Like I said, I am still fortunate to keep my spot here at BallinEurope. OK, I choked with the CSKA Golden Rule thing, but I think that my team is doing a pretty good job this season. It’s not easy to anticipate what you do and still be one of the top teams in the private league. Making it to the Top 3 will be difficult: There are very good teams out there. First of all and above all, keep in mind that THE DEADLINE IS ON TUESDAY AT 19:00, because Alba Berlin has an early game this week. You have been warned…

As for my team, let’s see what we have - I always do the trades live as I write this article, I think it makes it fresher. You don’t know how many times I erase parts of the text and come back. Anyway, Mirza Begic has to go because I think he reached his maximum level already and this is a little bit like the stock exchange. Let’s see what happens with the new coach and then Begic may be back.

I’ll stick to my CSKA Golden Rule, so Aaron Miles is my second trade this week. I’ve already opted to release Mirsad Turkcan because Semih Erden is back and so Turkcan will play fewer minutes. The game against Alba is a good one for him, however, but I want Tiago Splitter in my team no matter what; not because I think he will do well against Olimpija - Begic is tall and Vladimir Golubovic is aggressive and tough - but because I want to keep him for the remainder of the season.

My second trade is Terrell McIntyre, even when he will play against Barcelona in two weeks’ time and I don’t expect a big game for him then. Still, he should play well against Zalgiris this week. I have very limited money for the third trade, so I’m going to shock you all: Vedran Vukusic. He’s coming off a couple of good games and playing good minutes lately. He faces Cibona, so he can open the court with three-pointers. If they fall in, I will strike gold. If they don’t, well, erm… What’s next? Ah yeah, my team looks like this, then:

Terrell McIntyre - should be a good game for him against Zalgiris. A bit afraid that Mantas Kalnietis guards him.
Lynn Greer - Would have traded him if I had a fourth. That game against Unicaja in Malaga doesn’t look good.

Jonas Maciulis - The Bull is ready to go against the entire Montepaschi backcourt. He played well vs. L.Rytas this weekend.

Rimantas Kaukenas - I don’t like to have players that face each other, but I expect Kaukenas AND Maciulis to do well.

Juan Carlos Navarro - It’s a make-or-break game for Barcelona to win its group. Expect “La Bomba” to deliver.

Chris Warren - Well, I had other priorities, to be honest. Warren is solid and plays at home against a high-scoring team.

Tiago Splitter - Chose him over teammate Igor Rakocevic. Should stay in my fantasy team for good.

Andre Hutson - Has been rock-solid lately and is still underpriced. He’s had good games in Badalona before.

Vedran Vukusic - The big gamble. Hopefully he will read the game well and bomb Alain Koffi and Pape Badiane from downtown.

Mike Batiste - Honestly, I would have prefered Nikola Pekovic, but Batiste should do well against Regal FCB.

As usual, good luck, make wise choices and see you next week!

Who profits from all the injuries?

This week, a lot of bad news happened and some fantasy owners have to some major changes in the fantasy teams. Sani Becirovic was injured and as one of the major contributors, lots of managers need to go for some changes. And as one of the hottest players of the moment in the SG/SF position was also injured  (according to some internet rumors) — I’m speaking about Charles Smith here — it will be tough to go for a good move on this position.

My problem of the week is the following, though. I wanted to get rid of two of my players at the SG and SF positions and replace them by Becirovic and Smith. Now both are injured so I’m asking myself what to do. The first player I wanted to sell is Immanuel McElroy from ALBA Berlin, but with Julius Jenkins still out and no Becirovic in Rome, Imac may come up with a good game so he’ll stay on the team. The second guy to move was Emir Preldzic. He’s on the decline right now, so he’s out. With Becirovic injured, I see another player stepping up for Roma this week, and that’s Rodrigo de la Fuente. As Allan Ray may miss the game, too, the Spanish veteran should see a lot of minutes and could come up with some interesting stats.

In order to improve my team even more, I chose then to finally trade Sergio Llull away. The Spanish youngster had a great run, but now it’s time to cash in and get a real big-time guard rotation. In order to do so, I needed to get a bit more credits so Felipe Reyes left the boat. Reyes was replaced by last week’s MVP Edu Hernandez-Sonseca, who should bring solid ranking points against Olimpija and should also gain in value. So I have enough credits to bring Lynn Greer to my team. So, recapping my moves:

OUT: Emir Preldzic (Fenerbahce), Felipe Reyes (Real Madrid) and Sergio Llull (Real Madrid).

IN: Lynn Greer (Olympiacos), Rodrigo de la Fuente (Lottomatica) and Edu Hernandez-Sonseca (Joventut).

Tips from the Euroleague boss: Week 5

Hello everybody, once again this is Javier Gancedo, as always from Euroleague.net. What a Euroleague week it was, friends! First-time winners Union Olimpija and AJ Milano, the best Real Madrid show of the season, an impossible end to that Partizan-CSKA showdown, TWO overtime thrillers in Zagreb and Le Mans and above all, an instant classic between Tau Ceramica and DKV Joventut: If you have Euroleague TV, check it if you can, if not, well… there are ways and ways to get DVDs all over the continent. The Eurocup has also begun and we’re happy that our new game, the Eurocup FabFive Challenge, has got some positive response from people out there. It’s too early to say but all the favourites - in the Eurocup, that is, not in the game - are already showing their credentials.

To be perfectly honest - and back to the NIKEiD Euroleague Fantasy Challenge; that’s what I’m here for, after all - I think I’m playing beyond expectations, with few mistakes and too much luck. I got almost 160 points this week, climbed to the fifth spot in the BallinEurope private league and suddenly I feel I’m running out of stamina. This week was the hardest one for me to trade in the entire season. My guess is that since this is the first week of the record round of regular-season games, you can always look back and see what happened back then.

In Week 1, Will McDonald of Tau Ceramica was the MVP, but he didn’t have Tiago Splitter in top shape back then. Rawle Marshall of Cibona was second with a 29 index, but his stock had dropped a little, especially since that Adriatic League fight we don’t want to remember. D’or Fischer of Maccabi has a 28 index but he has not been playing that much since that game. Same with Mirza Begic of Union Olimpija and Ersan Ilyasova of Regal FCB, who completed the Top 5 that week.

There isn’t much reference there, is there? That’s why I think it is so tough to trade this week. I’m not alone in this, as BallinEurope editor Christophe (http://www.ballineurope.com/fantasy-leagues/euroleague-fantasy-challenge/fantasy-challenge-follow-your-own-tips/) is also going absolutely nuts. From now on, a whole different game begins. It’s not about accumulating money, but analyzing opponents, injuries, considering if your player is going against high-scoring teams … Stuff like that.

So this is what I did, and remember, I could be perfectly wrong. First of all, Emir Preldzic has to go. He was a great buy for a while, but his underachieving performance added to the fact that Pete Mickeal is back and ready to give any defender a LOT of trouble make me consider that Preldzic should be traded - no matter that I think he’s one of the most exciting players to watch in the entire continent. I am also selling Chris Warren, because Avellino plays Olympiacos on the road and that is always tough. Plus Warren is quite expensive and gives me some room to improve my team a bit.

I have decided to keep Begic to cash in the credits, so I am trading Mike Hall. Yes, he is way underrated and yes, he did very well against Panionios On Telecoms last week, but there is the golden rule. Oh, I hear you asking, what is the golden rule? One I follow each and every time:

THE GOLDEN RULE: NEVER USE PLAYERS FACING CSKA MOSCOW THAT WEEK!

So Hall has to go, too. I am buying Juan Carlos Navarro, a good player at just 55 credits, going against SLUC Nancy this week. He may face a hypermotivated Michel Morandais going against him, his former teammate, but I will take the risk. Trying to buy a center that I actually like is virtually impossible. Everyone is going against tough opponents, is very expensive, I don’t like them that week… so I’ll go for the obvious choice: Andre Hutson, Lottomatica Roma, just because he’s underrated and is in great shape. I ain’t going to think too much about the other SG/SF and take the most expensive player available: Rimantas Kaukenas. Montepaschi faces Prokom Trefl Sopot, with no Lithuanians to battle against this time around. Well anyway, I will take the chance.

So my team goes like this:

Aaron Miles - in great shape. Facing Real Madrid without Pepe Sanchez in the house. He should be solid.

Lynn Greer - coming off a great game and Olympiacos faces Avellino. Big lefties showdown against Travis Best!

Jonas Maciulis - The Bull keeps playing solid minutes. A huge game from him is just a question of time.

Juan Carlos Navarro - It is always good to have “La Bomba” in your team. Especially playing at home.

Sani Becirovic - Sometimes I wonder how can I be 621st without Igor Rakocevic. Well, he’s the reason why.

Rimantas Kaukenas - Apparently, it’s a good game for him. And Siena hosts Zalgiris in Week 7, too…

Mirza Begic - One week, no more. I love Begic though, the biggest moneymaker in the game this season.

Andre Hutson - Lottomatica faces Alba Berlin and he should post up solid numbers against Sesay and Nadjfeji.

Mirsad Turkcan - Semih Erden is back, who the hell decided that there are ONLY three trades per week?

Mike Batiste - Again, who is the big brain that limits my team to only three trades each and every week?

…shit, it was me. Oh well, wouldn’t the game be way more boring with unlimited trades, anyway?

Greetings from Nottingham, where I am this weekend: Land of Robin Hood, Nottingham Forest and anything but basketball!

Fantasy Challenge: Follow your own tips!

Another week is over and once again, my team finished somewhere in the top half of the “middle-of-nowhere” range. Across the board, my players performed well (8 out of 10 were between 9.9 and 22.0) but none went for an extraordinary MVP-level performance. But I have to say that I am happy with the trades I made: Bringing in Zoran Planinic and Nikola Pekovic were good moves, as the two combined for 35.2 ranking points instead of the 0 I would have gotten without the changes.

On the other hand, I don’t know what happened to Emir Preldzic, who made a nice 0 and Mirza Begic who threw up came up with 9.9 ranking points in just 4 minutes of play. I would suggest to Mirza that he be sick a bit more often but play 40 minutes despite throwing up constantly. I have to think on my forward rotation a bit this weekend, as Immanuel McElroy seems to be on the downturn as well. We will see what comes up.

If you check on who I advised you to sign last week, I can only say, “Christophe, why do you tell the guys out there who to sign but don’t take the guys yourself?” Carlos Jimenez (23.1), Mike Hall (18.7) and Charles Smith (27.0) were three names I mentioned. And I didn’t pick up any of these three, despite having an unused trade. No wonder I have a new favorite song:

Luckily, the standings still show that I’m not doing everything wrong. I am currently ranked at the edge of the Top 10 and so I’m still in the race for new K1X shoes or some Euroleague goodies. At the top of the table is still the fight between djalix and EVICROCK, separated by only 0.5 points. Looks pretty tough at the moment and neither player has given up on winning those Euroleague Final Four tickets.

And because I was so harsh on myself before when I was talking about the moves I did not make, I would like to mention my current good ranking in two other fantasy leagues. In the league hosted by our friends at Basketsession, I am currently ranked 4th, which may sound nothing special, but I am in front of French Euroleague fantasy guru Bricko and his CSKA Brickowski team. Additionally, another 4th place is in the books for me in the Interbasket Private League, which I also consider a nice performance.

Have a nice weekend…

NIKEiD Fantasy Challenge: Now what?

Currently, it looks like a lot of decisions have been made in the Euroleague fantasy league. The time to gain sure credits is nearly over, and only a few players are still available at reasonable prices to give you good credit boosts. I’m thinking here mainly about players like Mirza Begic (49 credits) or Sergio Llull (26 credits). But if you don’t have them in your team already, it’s really time to think about what your goal is.

My personal moves

As for myself, I have enough credits right now so I have to check which players can bring me the most credits for the least value right now: This is the reason why I’m selling Ersan Ilyasova, who has not been in his best shape recently. He’s still worth decent value, so it’s a good move in order to buy a more productive player. I’ll use this money to replace one of my two young point guards and give Zygimantas Janavicius away to bring in Zoran Planinic: He should be able to bring up some good numbers in Serbia against Partizan Belgrade. In the paint, I’m bringing in Nikola Pekovic, as I think that he’s now at a good value of 57 credits and should easily dominate against Asseco Prokom.

OUT: Ersan Ilyasova (FC Barcelona) and Zygimantas Janavicius (Zalgiris Kaunas).

IN: Zoran Planinic (CSKA Moscow) and Nikola Pekovic (Panathinaikos).

Take care of injury minutes

A good move to get interesting players right now is to check out the Injury List for possible “playing-time gainers.” For example, Marcus Haislip is out for three weeks so Boniface N’Dong should see some major playing time this week. Additionally, Carlos Jimenez will probably have a nice game in the absence of the high-flying US player.

With Marko Milic injured and Union Olimpija playing against ALBA Berlin, it may be interesting to gamble on Damjan Rudez who should profit from Milic’ absence. He is currently a bargain at 22 credits and if you want to take some risks, he may bring you 10 or more ranking points this week.

See who’s hot right now

Players often go on streaks, by which I mean they play a few good games in a row. One of these players currently is Mike Hall of AJ Milano. He was the MVP of the last game day, despite his team’s loss in Madrid. Hall managed to score 28 ranking points, however, and he is currently priced at only 30.4 credits: a sure winner in terms of credits first of all, but he looks particularly hot as he came up with a valiant 18 in the weekend’s domestic league game against Air Avellino. AJ Milano will play at home against Panionios, and the chances to earn the 10% bonus with Hall are also quite good.

Another guy who is hot right now is Charles Smith; the US-born guard will play against his former team Real Madrid, and the chances of him coming up with a great scoring effort for his Efes Pilsen squad are good. At 36.7 ranking points, Smith is a good value with which to fill up your roster, and his 18-point performance this weekend in the Turkish league shows that Smith is ready to score.

Tips from the Euroleague Fantasy boss: Week 4

Hello everyone, this is Javier Gancedo, always from Euroleague Basketball. Looks like it has been yet another great fantasy week for me. I am beginning to get worried after modifying all my previous entries because of injuries. Seriously. We’ll see what happens this week.

It has been a fantastic week in Euroleague, especially the nine-game marathon last night. We all finished at 2am, totally destroyed but happy to have experienced the best regular season in Euroleague Basketball history.:Buzzer-beaters, Louis Bullock, double-overtime games, Vlado Ilievski missing again at the buzzer, close games, passion, drama, upsets… Seriously, the Euroleague is getting better than ever, and it is impressive that CSKA is the only unbeaten team, despite being without J.R. Holden and Matjaz Smodis.

Before anything else, I would like you to introduce our new online game, the Eurocup FabFive Challenge!

fabfive.eurocupbasketball.com

This is a very down-to-earth, exciting game in which you can pick five players, one from each range, with no restrictions whatsoever. If you want to have five point guards, go ahead. Five centers? Be my guest. Just keep in mind that players may move from one group to another depending on their index rating and you will need to trade every week to have a valid, five-player team. The trades after Week 1 should be exciting. Players can go from the top group to the bottom one if they have a really bad night, and vice versa! Just build your team and maybe we all can put together a private league. OK, well, keep reading and then make a team, but don’t forget: It’s a great game, we all think.

As for Fantasy Challenge, I had a pretty decent week with good trades, especially Emir Preldzic. Preldzic rolled against Olimpija, showing he is the closest thing to Toni Kukoc in 1990 that European basketball has seen lately. If he keeps developing, Preldzic will be a hell of a player, mark my words. I moved up to 9th place in the BallinEurope private league and yes, I erased some of my deficit in the Kuqo situation. I even cracked the Top 40 with a different team. I’m telling you all this because bad times will come, no doubt about it. Of course, beating EVICROCK will be tough, as he is doing very, very well.

As for this week, I wanted to trade early because honestly, I wanted you all to know about FabFive as soon as possible. I may regret my trades before the deadline and if so, I will notify you right away - especially since it’s quite probable that someone will get injured, anyway.

Remember when I told you Nikos Zisis would be there until Holden comes back? I’ve changed my mind, since Belgrade is a tough place to play and I expect the game to be low-scoring. I also traded Bracey Wright due to the showdown against Tau Ceramica and then removed Felipe Reyes because Kerem Gonlum may out-rebound him. Those are my three trades this week.

I believe Armani Jeans Milano has been playing well lately and, since they play Panionios On Telecoms at home, I think it’s time for them to do well in front of their fans. Therefore, I added Michael Hall at power forwards and centers, a big moneymaker. My main move this week was picking up Chris Warren of Air Avellino. Warren plays against Cibona and even while Rawel Marshall will also be extremely motivated, I am sure that the Avellino swingman will have a good game. At point guard, I had to choose between Lynn Greer and Earl Calloway. I’m going with Greer for the sake of Euroleague experience, even though I wrote the Cibona-Olympiacos game report and Calloway was just UNSTOPPABLE in the third quarter.

So my team goes like this:

Aaron Miles - Another Cajasol playmaker that leaves the team and becomes a Euroleague star. Oh my.
Lynn Greer - Should have an interesting shootout against Dewarick Spencer in Le Mans.

Jonas Maciulis - The Bull returns home to play Regal FC Barcelona. He should be a solid choice.
Emir Preldzic - Has been unstoppable lately and is way underpriced.
Sani Becirovic - Sanny Boy is the Euroleague superstar he was several years ago. In top shape right now.
Chris Warren - Again the X factor. He should be ready to do well against Cibona.

Mirza Begic - It’s more than seven extra credits in our teams. You have him, right? C’mon, don’t lie.
Mike Hall - I liked what I saw in Madrid this week. Few power forwards are playing more minutes right now.
Mirsad Turkcan - Even when Andre Hutson knows him well, Turkcan should out-rebound EVERYBODY!
Mike Batiste - Big Mike always plays better on the road and the game in Sopot should be no exception.

As always, good luck in the Fantasy Challenge… And try the Fab Five, the great game with the gangsta name!

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