BY TRAVIS MORAN
Back in October, I asked David Thorpe to review my league’s fantasy draft. After he’d analyzed the Hustle’s draft (my team), then everyone else’s, I asked him to assess one team in particular: Triangle, managed by my brother.
Triangle had drafted Anthony Davis in the first round and followed with Kawhi Leonard. Davis is in fantasy what he is in real life: a titan of production. When he plays, he’s arguably the most complete weapon in fantasy basketball. Kawhi lives on a mountain; when opponents scale it, he breaks out crazy Pai Mei shit, seemingly at will.
Thorpe wondered what everybody wondered: How many games were they going to play? Excluding the entire 2021-2022 season he lost to an ACL injury, Kawhi had averaged 57 appearances a year as a Clipper. Prior to this season, AD had averaged just 49 games a year as a Laker.
Here was my brother’s immediate response:
From that point, Triangle’s fantasy interactions could best be described as … chippy. Because his thinking had come under fire, my system became fuel for his derision and my top pick, Shai-Gilgeous Alexander—the magnetic pole of his contempt.
Shai also had a shaky history. Over the prior three years, SGA had averaged just 53 appearances. My second-round pick, Jaren Jackson Jr., averaged 70 over the past two seasons but played just 63 last year. In other words, unless John Stockton suddenly becomes available, every pick in the first two rounds is a roll of the dice.
In the end, injuries, both perceived and actual, dictated how our fantasy season unfolded—and to a large degree, decided the championship.
Earning a rematch
After defeating Triangle to secure second place and a first-round bye, I got the chance to watch my brother and our league’s commissioner, Trust The Process, duke it out for a shot at my Hustle in the semifinals.
They’re best friends in the hard reality of life, these two, but mortal enemies in the realm of fantasy. (That may go down as the nerdiest fucking sentence I’ve ever written.) It’s a death match anytime they lock horns, and both managers excel in gamesmanship.
Their first-round matchup didn’t disappoint. The Process dominated shooting, but Triangle managed to score 31 more points over the 32 total games. Triangle also logged a ridiculous 23 team wins to Process’ 20. Rebounds and assists, left up for grabs, fell to Triangle, who also sewed up blocks for a 6-5 advantage.
That left Process’ crafty season hinging on his team’s ability to flip steals, the only remaining undecided category.
This exposed something about Process. He had a team of incredible shooters and had patched together many other categories with incredible waiver-wire pickups. Over the final weeks of the regular season, Process surged behind routine defensive contributions from Daniel Gafford, Herbert Jones, and Isaiah Hartenstein—the exact kinds of players who would benefit him now.
However, Process dropped Gafford and Jones prior to the playoffs—and Triangle claimed both.
Herb Jones registered four swipes on Sunday, the final day of competition. Triangle got four more from Mike Conley, two from AD, and one more from Kawhi for 11 in total. Steph Curry, the first overall pick in this year’s draft, logged zero steals in four games, practically dooming the Process’ season.
It was a glaring gaffe in Process’ otherwise savvy campaign. Keeping one of Jones or Gafford would have made all the difference. In the end, Triangle won steals by two and held on for the 6-5 win.
“Congrats,” I told my brother when the score was settled. “Welcome to the Thunderdome!”
The cold dish
Going into the semis, Triangle had a fighting edge in efficiency categories—that left made 3s, rebounds, steals, blocks, turnovers, points, and team wins. I needed to win six-of-those-seven categories to advance. In our last matchup, I’d won by a single made 3.
With OG Anunoby and Anfernee Simons shelved, I added Kentavious Caldwell-Pope and Norman Powell. The beauty of Powell is that, as a Clipper, he'd match Kawhi win-for-win.
On Monday morning, I awoke to a song shared by my brother: Rick Ross’ “War Ready.”
TRIANGLE: My algorithm is actually in tune with my soul. MPJ / Bane (Simons) vs. Gordon / White Bros. in the opening night DTD battle.
HUSTLE: Simons was declared out.
TRIANGLE: That’s why I put him in parentheses.
On Day One, Kawhi was the best player in the matchup, while my guy Jaren Jackson Jr. missed 14 shots. The next night, Anthony Davis seemed to be thumbing his nose at Thorpe's suggestion he was fragile: 52 minutes, 34 points, 23 rebounds, two overtimes.
Shai delivered a subpar scoring performance (24 points) but racked up eight dimes and two steals without a single turnover. As Thorpe is fond of saying: Good but not great.
On Wednesday, I woke up hoping AD would rest on the second night of a back-to-back. My brother shared this tweet on AD’s unbelievable durability this season, then texted:
TRIANGLE: All in all a nice little night for AD; the Lakers are so much better without LeCompiler.
HUSTLE: Take away FG% and AD was downright dominant. Needed it b/c Gafford was RLP last night.
TRIANGLE: RLP?
HUSTLE: Replacement-level player.
TRIANGLE: Ah, nerd-level acronyms.
HUSTLE: Just came up with it.
Then I learned SGA, my star, was battling a quad injury. (Fuck. Me. Running.)
I was counting on Shai in a Thunder win, even against a hot Rockets team. Losing even one game from my MVP put points, steals, and team wins in jeopardy—and even assists, which were looking closer than I expected. It took great games from Desmond Bane and Naz Reid to keep me hanging around with a slim lead. Bane dropped 26 with 16 assists to keep me in the hunt, and Reid chipped in 21 and 10 boards, but he was 1-of-8 from 3. Another good game from Powell validated his addition.
SGA’s late scratch resonated like a death knell; I couldn’t see a path to victory in points with my best player and Simons out—especially with Triple J shooting so poorly.
Luckily, the Lakers would give AD a night off after his Tuesday-night marathon. However, that also meant the rest of our week would hinge on the Lakers and Thunder, and it suddenly was looking very grim for the Hustle.
My plane crashed into the mountain on Friday night. SGA sat again, nursing his quad. Kawhi delivered a signature game: 29 points, 11 boards, five assists, four steals, two blocks. At this point, the matchup was effectively kaput.
Normally, my brother has warehouses of salt to pour on my wounds, but he took a tamer route since I was visiting for Easter weekend. He didn’t even mention Triple J’s stellar 1-for-9 performance on Saturday in which he scored an earth-shattering four total points. Bane sat out in the same game, hinting at the end of his season.
On Sunday, I got SGA back for a meaningless slate, and he turned in just his eighth negative-EPM game of the year. The superhuman and remarkably durable Kawhi and AD slammed the door in my face, combining to go 19-for-31 from the field for 47 total points. SGA had his worst week of the year: two games played, 43 points, 44 percent from the field, three steals, and zero blocks.
My team got drawn, quartered, and dispersed into irrelevance—by, of all things, the very injury worries that hung over my brother’s team. I won just two categories: steals and, ironically, turnovers. Missing any time from SGA, but also Simons and Bane, was just too big a hurdle to leap, especially with AD and Kawhi doing their things.
It sucks that I didn’t get a chance to face Triangle with my best players, but them’s the breaks. No one in the universe would have guessed that health problems for SGA—not AD or Kawhi—would determine this matchup. Nothing could have made my brother happier.
On Monday morning, with the Hustle relegated to the third-place game, Triangle discovered his vinegar:
TRIANGLE: Quick, check on the analytics!
The overlooked contender
Last year’s champion, Triple Double, lurked near the postseason cutoff line all season and sneaked in as the 5-seed. Furtively, his team—led by Giannis, LeBron, and Zion—posted a much-higher ceiling than did my Hustle or my brother’s Triangle.
To reach the Excalibur finals, Triple Double destroyed Chucktown 8-3, then won a very close 6-5 matchup with regular-season champ Wemby City Ninjas. The Triangle-Triple Double faceoff was a repeat of last year’s final—which TD won, 7-4.
Triple Double started the week hot with 36 points from Cade, 30 more from Zion, and a 19-and-19 night from Jusuf Nurkić to take an early lead. On Day Two, my brother texted me with the news the universe had been waiting to deliver:
TRIANGLE: Checked the injury report less than an hour ago, and Kawhi wasn’t on it. Now he’s out.
HUSTLE: Yikes.
On Day Three, he sent me a screenshot showing Mike Conley would also miss time.
TRIANGLE: Come the fuck on …
HUSTLE: Ouch.
TRIANGLE: No injury in weeks.
That night, he shared the news that Kawhi would miss yet another game.
TRIANGLE: Guess he gave it all he had getting us here; maybe he should have rested like LeBron.
HUSTLE: Dude, he already has a ticket to ride. Same with SGA (not that it matters here). Clips and Thunder are probably playing it safe, regardless of matchup. Kawhi played A LOT this year compared to any recent regular season. If there’s a potential playoff matchup coming up, bet he comes back.
TRIANGLE: Oh, I think he plays Friday and/or Sunday, for sure. Might come with a Paul George rest game if the fantasy gods wanna make it right: make that two rest games.
HUSTLE: Gotta get PG a day off here.
TRIANGLE: Should be coming. LeBron and AD making damn sure they make it, though.
HUSTLE: It’s about to be a shitshow. Giannis is getting a day off soon, too.
The absurdity of the fantasy season: its postseason parallels the precise period when NBA teams rest their players strategically, whether to keep them fresh for the playoffs or to dive deeper into the tank. No one wins a fantasy title with all their stars active; that’s just the nature of the beast.
TRIANGLE: I’m just glad they’re both playing. I want everyone to play. Derrick White disappeared tonight, too—talk about taking the big guns into battle and misfiring.
HUSTLE: Yeah, I saw that. Celtics in total fuck-it mode.
TRIANGLE: Yep, and 11 stocks so far from TD tonight. His team is fucking hooping.
HUSTLE: Overlooked when we all should have been paying attention to days off.
TRIANGLE: Conley killed me man: 28 consecutive games for those old knees, and he was balling, too. Built my hopes this week on stocks / wins / %s / TOs. Kawhi and Conley are absolutely key to my game plan.
Triangle picked up a discarded Isaiah Hartenstein to fortify his defensive stats with Kawhi out—a huge pickup, as Hartenstein would go 16-for-20 from the field with nine steals on the week.
Losing Kawhi for the entire matchup, however, threatened to manifest Triangle’s worst nightmare—and realize David Thorpe’s concerns.
By Sunday, Triangle was still without Kawhi, but AD had given him three strong games (78 points, 43 rebounds, nine blocks) with a fourth to play.
HUSTLE: Good luck in the finals today. Looks like you need some.
TRIANGLE: You too.
HUSTLE: Whether I finish 3rd or 4th is pretty inconsequential.
TRIANGLE: Just wanted to wish you luck, asshole.
Both managers opened the day with a bit of gamesmanship, starting all their available players even though neither team could use all of them with our games-played cap. An Aaron Gordon day off allowed my brother to add a Sunday ringer: Curiously, Triangle chose the Bulls’ Javonte Green.
Triangle had a 6-5 lead with all three percentages and turnovers on lock. He’d have to hold onto steals and blocks but could lose one if he managed to flip made 3s. Excited, he shared the early returns from the Clippers game, in which Paul George was struggling from the field.
HUSTLE: Will Javonte Green be the key?
TRIANGLE: Secret sauce. LeBron sitting today is crazy!
HUSTLE: Almost predictable.
TRIANGLE: I think Triple Double thought we were chasing wins with D-White in the lineup, etc., and he loaded up on Lakers and Wolves to show a counter. But that was a bluff: You can’t afford to go down sitting the big dogs if they play.
HUSTLE: Smart on both ends. You’ll need some defensive stats from Isaiah Hartenstein, though: Rudy could change things if AD plays fewer mins.
Then, what we all feared from the jump finally happened: AD got hit in the eye and left 12 minutes into his game against the Timberwolves. Nevertheless, between AD and Conley, who played terribly, Triangle squeezed out the four steals he needed to win that category.
Triangle had a five-block lead heading into Sunday, but Zion blocked five himself to wipe out that advantage. Minutes later, Rudy Gobert added a swat to tie blocks. In fact, Triple Double had generated 11 blocks from six players—each blocking at least one shot.
If not for Javonte Green, Triangle would have eaten a buffet of crow. Green shot 6-for-7 from the field, hitting two 3s, to go with a steal and three blocks. It was, by far, the shrewdest waiver play of the entire season—and on Championship Sunday, no less.
In a wider group chat, Triple Double posed the question we were all asking:
TRIPLE DOUBLE: So, does a tie go to the defending champion?
No one answered. It’d never happened before in the playoffs, to anyone’s recollection. The procedure was buried somewhere in the bylaws.
Here’s where things get tricky: In deciding playoff seeds, the tiebreaker for teams with identical records is their head-to-head results. There, Triple Double had an 11-10-1 advantage over Triangle.
However, when neither Gobert nor Kyle Anderson registered another block, the championship ended in a 5-5-1 tie. We were all surprised to learn that, in such cases, the higher seed advanced.
That’s a huge fucking advantage that I had failed to note—and it really made winning second place and a bye that much more valuable until Triangle mopped the floor with Hustle’s face.
Playing the entire week without Kawhi—and losing AD after a quarter on Sunday—nearly cost Triangle. But my brother had earned that tie from waiver-wire excellence. In the finals, Gafford was 16-for-23 with six blocks. Herb Jones added nine steals. Brook Lopez had a bounce-back week with five swats, and Beal was 13-of-18 from 3.
HUSTLE: Have no idea how you won exactly, but congrats. Thought you’d lose in case of a tie.
TRIANGLE: Fuck that garbage-ass tie anyway.
HUSTLE: Good for narrative lol.
TRIANGLE: Javonte stuck that fool yesterday! Play of the year!
Another season in the books
Somehow, what was left of my team exploded for 81 3-pointers in 28 games in the third-place faceoff, and I escaped with a 6-5 win. It was the most 3s my team had made all season. Not that SGA, who missed the entire week, would have contributed much there, but to log that number without Bane or Simons seemed notable.
TRIANGLE: So cute that you think that’s worth mentioning.
HUSTLE: It’s ironic is all.
TRIANGLE: Don’t be a woulda-coulda-shoulda motherfucker.
HUSTLE: I’m not. Just think it’s funny how the ball bounced.
TRIANGLE: Keep holding on ...
HUSTLE: Happy you won but still not entirely sure how.
TRIANGLE: I was sleeping. Soundly. Trophy never in doubt.
Overall, Triangle played what I consider his best season by far. Motivated from the jump by being told he was going to lose helps. But here’s the kicker: That’s gambling and winning like a motherfucker.
His guys played more games than my guys this season: That’s something no one saw coming, but you have to factor in a third star in Derrick White and incredibly intelligent wire play.
Both AD and Kawhi finished the season with top-10 fantasy value, with Davis finishing in the top five. Shai finished second only to Joel Embiid metrically, but the next-highest Hustler was Desmond Bane way down in the 30s. Shai solidified his seat among the fantasy gods this season. However, he needed time off right when the Hustle needed him most. Reality always gets in the way of fantasy.
My biggest takeaways from this season:
My fantasy production value (FPV) system worked on draft day, giving me an ultra-competitive team that had a fairly dominant regular season and earned me a bye. My approach gave me five dependable pillars in an 11-category league: points, steals, blocks, made 3s, and team wins.
As David Thorpe warned me on draft day, Jaren Jackson Jr. was a bad second-round pick. He can fill it up but also ruin your week with bad shooting. That wasn’t part of my plan at all—and I doubt it was part of Taylor Jenkins’ plan this year, either. Picking Victor Wembanyama there, for instance, would have won me the regular season outright and possibly led to a title shot. Even Bam Adebayo, who went in the third round, would have been a better choice this year. Injuries simply decimated the Grizzlies, forcing Jackson Jr. to take on, well, everything. He wasn’t (yet) up to that challenge, but it’s far from indicative of who he is when surrounded by stars—we know this from last season.
My brother, manager of the Triangle, pushed in all his chips, rolled the dice, and won. It’s something I’ll be hearing about well into 2025.
After a terrible season last year, I feel like I can hold my head high this season. Of course, I’ll have to stare into my brother’s eyes looking down on me.
Fuck it, he’s earned a few months to gloat.
Thank you for reading TrueHoop!
Fantasy coverage from the 2023-2024 season:
The 2022-2023 Hustle saga: