1.01 Chris Paul, PG, NO
If you go 1st you take Paul, unless you enjoy people snickering at you. This isn't rocket science. The only area he doesn't help you is blocks.

I contemplated picking later in the draft ( 5 to 10) since I think there would be a great deal of value in the 3rd and 4th round players to outweigh any advantage picking anyone other than Lebron or Paul. But I never had an early pick and the players I wanted in the 3rd and 4th rounds are not guaranteed to be there with this group of managers.

Granger is basically Shawn Marion in his prime with a better scoring average and more 3's. Averaging over a steal and a block a game from the SF position is huge. He's a monster building block for my team.

Roy is this type of player, and I can use him as PG too in the fantasy game. He had a fantastic year behind, and he will improve this year almost in all categories (maybe the FG% and the assists will decrease a bit). Andre Miller's arriving and a healthy Oden on the court can help the production of Roy. I hope so..

After the first two guard picks I was so far so good in every categories. The blocks a bit later.

I gave Kevin Garnett some serious consideration and wonder if I will regret passing on him.....but Harris, if he just does what he does last year, is a solid anchor to my team.

Caron Butler and Gilbert Arenas were my top choices on my draft sheet, but their durability is questionable, and I hate using early picks on risky players. Duncan and Kidd were considered, but I'm trying to draft young this year. So I end up deciding on Joe Johnson based almost entirely on durability. He has played at least 79 games in six of the past seven seasons, provides numbers across all categories, does offer PG eligibility, and at age 28, should be at his peak.

I am not sure how Carter’s departure will affect Lopez’s production, but he might see more double teams which means either more turnovers or more assists. Here’s hoping for the latter.

Wallace is a versatile player, he fills the stats, and improved in the area of FT% a lot over the last few years.

I picked up Anthony Randolph finally. Why? I don't know. It was a sudden change. He is not a center, he is maybe not an absolutely ready player, and he plays in GSW... But you can't know it. I wanted to get him, but earliest in the 6's round. In the first three preseason games he was fantastic, in points, rebounds and block, everything what I am expecting from a good forward or center.

The above mentioned players were taken after me 1 2 3 bringing my thoughts back to the beginning of the post. A tough draft as expected.

Fortunately Okur was left for me, and I already wanted pick him in the previous round. I like Okur, because he is a center with 3's and good Ft%, and not bad at any other categories either.

6.01 Eric Gordon SG LAC
Eric Gordon was one of the best rookies last year and I am hoping him to perform better or at least equivalent to his last year numbers. He is a guy who can score 20+ points along with two 3s and also provide high percentages in FG and FT.

I think, Harverad thought the same, so fished Gordon two picks before me. Because of this I decided I will no wait with Chandler. I know it seems too early as well, but I didn't want to lose him. Chandler is a stable point in New York, fills the stats like G. Wallace, although not in the same level of course. I need very strongly him threes, and I hope he will be improve in everything this year.

I briefly considered drafting Harrington, Ben Gordon and Jason Terry with this selection.

A PF type would have really fit my needs a lot better with this pick......and I regret not taking Tyrus Thomas here. But in the end I bet that one of Diaw, Camby or Thomas would have been there. Wrong!

I think he'll be good right from the start. Not in love with his free-throw % (64% or so) but it shouldn't hurt me too much. Hoping for around 16 ppg, 9 reb, close to 1 block.

Green is the 7th straight guy I have drafted that doesn't really do anything phenomenally, but does a lot of things well. I like the 100 3's and 80-ish steals from a guy who can get me 7 boards a game. Considering that I will soon have to dip into the depths of category specialists who don't score, it was nice to add another 16+ PPG scorer to the mix.

After making this pick, I realized that the only player on my team not at least 30 years of age is David Lee. I guess my team has a limited time to win a championship.

Miller was my first real PG, with good percentages, assists and steals, and not bad at rebounds too. Unfortunately the threes are not the him table. There is a risk factor, who will be the starter PG in Portland, but I can't imagine that Blake are able to get too many minutes from Miller.

8.01 Aaron Brooks PG HOU

In this round I considered J. Noah and C. Kaman too, but Noah has to share some minutes with B. Miller (but he seems to be the strater), however Kaman will be only back up center when Camby will come back.

With Phoenix back to their fast break style after the all-star break Barbosa averaged 16.8 ppg, 3 rebounds, 3 assists, 1.6 steals and 1.5 3PTM with a FG% of .497. I'm hoping he manages to put up similar numbers this year.

Chalmers and Ford are pretty closely ranked. I like Ford much better as a player, but his injury history had me lean to Chalmers with this pick. I love his steals in particular and he hits enough 3's to be a factor. He shoots a bad FG%, but I think I am toast there anyways. I wish he was more of a 7+ assist guy, but as my 2nd PG that's good enough when combined with the steals and 3's.

I made this pick a day before the news about Raja Bell broke. The way rookies were flying off the board, and given the stats he was putting up in preseason, I figured I might as well have fun and throw logic out the window. Now he has a chance of getting extended minutes. That might translate into some ridiculous stats. I am talking about 15 ppg, 5 assists, a steal and 2 3pts. On the other hand that might be wishful thinking. We’ll see.

I really wanted to draft Tyreke Evans or Ronnie Brewer as well, but was fairly certain one of them would still be available next round. Of course I was wrong about that.

I needed a third center too, so I picked up Hibbert, with whome my blocks are all right I think. Hibbert was very good already last year, but he was in early foul trouble in the games. In the preseason games he showed what he can if he has enough time. I guess he is one of my key picks this year.

That time I found Evans, who last night had two 3 pointers. Wiht other things I was satisfied already earlier, and it was no question anymore. I guess Evans will be in the fisrt 50 fantasy players at the end of the year, Udrich hasn't any chance to compete with him.

I needed one more forward, one more center and one more utility player. So I decided to draft the "best" remaining player and sort out the positions later. Or I could draft an unbalanced team and try to make trades during the year. I considered Hill, Odom, Kenyon Martin, Haywood, Love, Haslem and several other high rebounding players and drafted ???Chris Duhon???. I figured if I took him it would make my team virtually unbeatable in assists and 3PTM. And I felt another run on PGs coming up. And he is good value in the tenth round. I do expect his minutes will be more limited to start this year, but feel he should be able to put up 11 ppg, 7 assists/game, 1.6 3PTM/game and 1 steal/game (similar to last year) in the uptempo NY offense. If my team performs as expected he could always be traded. I briefly considered Iverson, but he seemed too risky at this point.

Jermaine is only a 30-minute a game type of player these days, but that's okay. He's still decent from the floor, good at the line (relatively), can board but most importantly he still blocks 2 shots a game - something he has done for 9 straight seasons. I don't need the 2006 version of Jermaine to make this pick worthwhile....I just need 70 games at what he did last year (13PPG, 6+ REB, 2 BLK) and I'm thrilled......and there is some upside there as well.

Dunleavy was tempting, he was next in my queue after Foye.

Of course this "Master Plan" is predicated on whether my instincts about my top 6-7 picks giving me a strong base in scoring are accurate. I really wish I would have had the time to run a spreadsheet or draft tracking program to better judge my team's strengths during the draft.

I considered picking up Iverson (but already had 8 guard eligible players on my team), considered Odom and Kenyon Martin for their combination of steals and rebounds and considered Love, Haslem and McDyess as I still needed a center.

Because I was still in trouble in 3's, I decided on Morrow. His preaseason games were fantastic: big numbers of points and threes, with an amazing FG%. Yes, I know he is not a starter, but it's enough for me from the backup stage too.

I guess he will be the starter in Milwaukee, and I am sure he will be get at least 30 minutes per game. And it is enough to be productive enough. I am waiting from him a lot of assists, steals, and I hope he will throw above 1.0 threes per game.

Odom is now coming off the bench and he only managed to average 9.5 ppg, 6.5 boards, 2.4 assists and 1 steal and 1 block while coming off the bench last year. Even if he averages those numbers he is a worth a 12th round pick. However he is backing up Gasol, who has missed an average of 14 games/year in the last 5 years and the apparently brittle Bynum, who has missed at least 30 games/year over the last two years. Since he averaged 14ppg and 11 rebounds/game as a starter last year his averages for the year should at least be 11 ppg, 7.5 rebounds/game, 2.5 assists, 1 steal and 1 block.

I almost drafted Carl Landry with his .575 FG%. But at the last minute I read somewhere that Nellie trusts him ensuring him of minutes. I am looking for 100 3's, points in the teens and 5 rebounds/g.

I considered McDyess, but really think Popovich will limit his minutes in the regular season to keep him fresh for the playoffs. Popovich may even replace him with the rebounding machine that is DeJuan Blair for most of the regular season.

Two years ago I drafted Brewer because of his production in the preseason. As far as I remember he threw 30 points in one of the games. And in the middle of the season I had to drop him. Now I think it's time to give him a chance again. One more reason to try him - Love's absence in the first month.

Blatche is very good in rebounds, and it will be an important factor for me, but he is good in assists, steals and blocks too.

This round I targeted to pick up Speights or Blair, but Species and Florian wanted them erlier.