Who Is That Masked Man?

As you know, it took me a good 20 minutes to decide whether or not to bid $14 on Ben Wallace. While at the time I may have only slightly second guessed my decision to draft an overpaid 33 year old player whose game is clearly on the decline, I only recently grasped the full ramifications of overreaching for this former 4 Time Defensive Player of the Year Winner.

I should’ve known that only an unprepared Yom Kippur at Joel’s team would be willing to introduce Big Ben for $13 when he was obviously worth no more than $10. That pissed me off. Believe me! As Yom Kippur can attest, I made a special trip home to Detroit a couple weeks before the season began in attempt to prepare his scatter brained mind for the auction. We went through several mock scenarios as we hit the bong and watched the first Red Wings game of the season.

Hear are a few examples:

The Misers: “I’m gonna throw out a couple names and you just tell me off the top of your head what you’d be willing to bid for them at the auction…much like you would do anyways.”

Yom Kippur: “OK”

The Misers: “Luol Deng?”

Yom Kippur: “$10”

The Misers: “AK47?”

Yom Kippur: “47”

The Misers: “Al Jefferson?”

Yom Kippur: “24”

The Misers: “Ben Wallace?”

Yom Kippur: “31”

The Misers: “You're living in the past my man and you better get your head out of your ass and start preparing for this auction already cause you’re waayyyyy off. I mean god! A guy like Ben Wallace will go for $5. MAX!”

So there I was, forced to overpay for a center that I wanted less than those that were still available such as Brad Miller, Andrew Bogut, Sammy D and Andris Biedrins. Desperate to shore up blocks and steals though and concerned that AK47 would go for more than what I had budgeted for, I needed to bid. Turns out, AK47 was gonna go for less than what I had allocated so I took him and the aforementioned centers ended up being great bargains.

This tied my hands at the end of the draft because it left me with only $4 to fill four roster spots, which clearly violated my rule of having no more than two $1 players this year. I felt confident though based on my ability to find solid $1 contributors such as Johs Childress and Raja Bell in years past. However something went seriously awry and I ended up drafting the following players:

Anthony Parker
Luke Ridnour
Wally Szczerbiak
Delonte West

You will notice that three of those four players are on the Sonics. If you recall, I immediately tried to justify that move by claiming it was a great strategy because while I didn’t know which one of those three would start the season, I was confident that at least two would. This as discussed in a previous blog post is referred to as the Fantasy Basketball Hedge. However, the season starts today and it turns out THAT NONE OF THESE FUCKING GUYS ARE STARTING!!!

And that is why Rob Ridnour's comments about his son almost brought a tear to my eye this morning:

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/moore/337341_moore30.html