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Drive to the Finals is Back!
Popular playoff fantasy game returns for another run By Jon Loomer
Play in Jon's League!
YES! It's official, the NBA Playoffs are coming. How do I know? Because Drive to the Finals has been launched, signaling the start of the playoff fantasy game season. I still remember sitting at a roundtable when this game was originally conceived a little over two years ago. This room was like your parents' '78 Oldsmobile, but for fantasy games. It was a beautiful sight. It was January, and we were putting together plans for the NBA Playoff run. I was still relatively new to NBA.com and wanted to make a splash with a new game. What we had at the time was our tried and true bracket game, Pick 'n Roll. Good game, but I wanted a Playoff-long strategy game. What do we have in-house? We had the NBA: The Rookies engine, which was a simple game designed around picking a player for each day of the week during the regular season. You gained points for that player's Points + Rebounds + Assists, and you couldn't pick him twice during the week. The game was ok, but I wanted a twist. Ideas started flying. How about picking any player in the Playoffs, but limiting your choice of a player to a single round? And then the mother of ideas... "Use him once. Throughout the entire Playoffs." I think I said it. I'd like to take credit for it, but I really can't be sure. All I know is that I loved the idea, and I tend to love my ideas and hate everyone else's. So let it be said: The idea was mine. I'm a jerk like that. Initially, there was some push-back. Concern that it would be too difficult. Then we started doing the math. Heading into the Playoffs, there are 16 teams and eight or so players who get consistent minutes on each roster. That's 128 players. That player pool will be cut in half after each round. For two months of action, accounting for an occasional day without games, a user will need to pick approximately 50 players. Very doable. "The Finals will be impossible," they said. "You would have used all of your best players on those teams by then." Maybe. But not if you plan appropriately. Ah, a strategy game is born! Drive to the Finals presented by AutoTrader.com is easy to play, requires low maintenance, has a strategic level, is free, and offers a huge payout to the winner. It has it all. In fact, this game worked so well that we used this model for the 2006-07 and then 2007-08 regular season -- you know it as Pick One Challenge. You know the basics. If I pick Kobe Bryant on the first day of the NBA Playoffs and he scores 35 points with six rebounds and five assists, I get 46 points for that night. Nice. The key, though, is that if I use Kobe today, I can't use him tomorrow or in future days. He is dead to me. That means that during each series, I need to plan. Which teams do I expect to advance? If the teams are clear favorites (one seed versus eight seed, for example -- unless it's Dallas vs. Golden State, Part II), it is in my best interests to reserve the best players from that team. Likewise, I need to make best use of my current player pool before it is cut in half. If the Lakers are eliminated in the first round and I am unable to use Kobe, I just missed a major opportunity. He will never be available to me again. So that means I need to pick the best players on the teams that I expect to get eliminated in the current round. That doesn't mean I shouldn't react. If the Lakers go in as favorites, I'll lay off using Kobe. If suddenly they go down 3-0, I will more than likely be forced to use Kobe for the next Laker game, otherwise risk losing him without ever selecting his services. And you'll be up against many dilemmas. Say the Lakers are down three games to two and they head back to Staples. Do you expect them to come back? Is the risk just too great NOT to use Kobe? Also, what if a team like the Cavs is also down in their series? Do you use Kobe or LeBron James? Ah, the choices! It's great! I can tell you from personal experience that it ain't easy. The past two seasons, the NBA.com staff played as a single entry, representing the "Expert Picks." We've done pretty well, using a common strategy and finishing 87th overall two season ago and 260th last year, easily in the 99th percentile. We didn't win, which would have been the greatest expert exploit of all time. But we did well. That said, we could have done much better. It's tough getting everyone on the same page, and any team is as strong as its weakest link (I blame John Schuhmann). Our closest shot was two years ago when we nearly cracked the top 50. Due to some poor picking earlier in the Playoffs when we resorted to taking Dirk Nowitzki and all other top Mavericks players, our options were somewhat limited in the Finals. Following were our picks and the total fantasy points scored for those Finals picks:
Udonis Haslem - 13
Clearly, we had close to nothing left on the Mavs, resorting to the Dampier selection on the last day. We did great preparing for the Heat, just not Dallas. Not convinced? Create an entry and try it out. You can't make picks yet until the Playoff field is set on April 17, but you can certainly get started by creating or joining a league. In fact, join my league. I will beat you. League Name: Beat the Bad Guy Like last year, we will have a daily article from the NBA.com staff with an expert pick for the day. Coming soon! |
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