Draft season is rapidly coming to a close, but there's still one last big weekend full of fantasy basketball drafts coming before the 2015-16 NBA season starts.  RotoBaller is here with all the rankings, sleepers, and draft strategy you need.  Today we'll take a look at the potent strategy of punting in fantasy basketball.

When it comes to head-to-head category leagues, you'll hear a lot of people talk about punting categories.  But that's easier said than done.  I see new and casual players on Reddit's fantasy basketball subreddit asking all the time "How do I punt?" or "What categories should I punt?"  My answer is usually it depends on your league (number of categories, opponents, what players your basing your team around).  But I will try my best here to give a general answer to the question of how in the name of Pat McAfee do you punt?

 

What is punting?

First things first, something that may seem obvious to experienced managers, but isn't so clear if you've never punted before.  Punting is a strategy of completely giving up on one or more categories in a head to head category league in order to select players who maximize your team's strengths in other categories.  For example, by electing to give up on winning FT%, you can build a team that features Andre Drummond, DeAndre Jordan, and Dwight Howard to absolutely dominate in rebounds, blocks, and FG%.

 

Can I punt if I'm not in a H2H category league?

In roto leagues you should almost never punt.  It's almost always better to try to compete in every category.  Even if you're not great somewhere, getting 4 or 5 points instead of 1 point for a category is a big deal in the final standings.  I did say "almost" in those sentences because I can see a scenario in an extremely strong league where a punting gambit could work.  But I'm talking a god-level expert league where everyone fights and scraps for points in the standings to the bitter end.  High-level roto punting strategies have been famously pulled off in baseball before.  But such strategies absolutely require top-to-bottom active owners to work -- they will backfire spectacularly if just one or two owners get lazy about their teams allowing your domination everywhere else to be not-so-dominant over competitive owners.  It's best to ignore punting as a strategy in 99.99% of roto leagues.

Meanwhile, you literally cannot punt in a points league.  Points leagues may seem like they have lots of "categories" because they use the same stats you see in category leagues (points, assists, steals, etc.) to figure out the scoring.  But really, the only have one category -- fantasy points.  It doesn't matter how you get them, but you obviously should not punt them if you are hoping to achieve winning results.

 

How many categories should I punt?

Advanced owners can tell stories about punting three or four categories in a league, but you should really know what you're doing before trying to pull that off.  Your draft has to be perfect for it.  As a punting beginner, I'd suggest punting just one or two categories, while attempting to be extremely strong in five and at least semi-competitive in the other two or three.

 

How do I decide what categories to punt?

Let's say you are getting ready for your head-to-head category league snake draft this weekend and you want to try to employ a punting strategy.

If you were doing an auction draft, you could practically pick what you wanted to punt before the draft, if you knew other people weren't going to employ the same strategy and bid up key players.  In a snake draft, though, you can't just decide you're going to punt FT% then end up taking Andre Drummond 3rd overall.  He may technically be the 3rd best player to have on a FT% punting team, but that's a massive waste of draft capital.

Even if you aim to punt categories, your goal in the draft is still to maximize the value of your picks by taking guys close to their overall value, then getting surplus value based on how they fit into your punt strategy.  Assuming Anthony Davis and Stephen Curry go 1/2, you should still take James Harden and not Andre Drummond 3rd overall, no matter what you had planned going into the draft.

You should be deciding what to punt should come sometime after making that first pick, with your second and third picks really committing you on a punt strategy.  To that effect, let's take a look at a typical first round (we'll just list the top 12 of the current Yahoo! default rankings), and what categories you could choose to punt with each player.

 

A punting strategy for every first round pick

1) Anthony Davis (PF/C, NOP)

Sometimes punt: AST, 3PM
Never punt: FG%, FT%, REB, BLK, STL, TO, PTS

If you're lucky enough to get AD, you can usually be competitive without punting, so you may want to skip.  He brings so much value everywhere.  You obviously aren't going to be punting FG%, rebounds, or blocks with Brow.  He's the best center in the game for FT%.  He's a huge scoring threat.  He gets steals and doesn't turn the ball over.  He even projects to be an okay passer and three point shooter for a C eligible player.  If you do end up punting a category with AD, it will most likely be assists, because not picking again until the end of the 2nd will probably preclude you from grabbing an elite point guard.

2) Stephen Curry (PG, GSW)

Aim to punt: BLK, REB, FT%
Sometimes punt: TO
Rarely punt: FG%
Never punt: STL, AST, 3PM, PTS

Curry has a lot more interesting punt strategies that work with him than Davis does.  You could punt one of his two major weaknesses -- blocks or rebounds.  But, perhaps counter-intuitively, he works well with a FT% punt strategy.  You're wasting a little bit of very good FT shooting for sure, but he doesn't take that many attempts and generally all point guards will give you good free throw shooting you'd have to waste in a punt.  Point guard is usually one of the harder positions to fit into a FT% punting strategy because so many of them are bad FG% shooters who you generally don't want on your roster (if you're punting one percentage, you want to always be winning the other).  Threes can also be hard to amass without hurting your FG%.

Curry fills your PG spot, he can single-handedly keep even a big-man heavy roster competitive in threes, and he can put up a plus FG%.  He also has a high steals rate, which is another hard fought category when you're punting FT%.  He allows for a rare strategy where you're only truly punting FT%, and not also punting assists and having a hard time in steals or threes by default.  If you can manage to grab DeAndre and Drummond with your 2nd and 3rd round picks (extremely possible based on current Yahoo ranks, and not much of a waste of draft capital at that point) you'd be set up with arguably 3 of the top 5 players for a FT% punt and set up to absolutely crush your league in 8 out of 9 categories.

3) James Harden (SG/SF, HOU)

Aim to punt: TO, FG%, BLK
Sometimes punt: REB
Never punt: PTS, FT%, 3PM, STL, AST

Now we're talking punt-friendly.  The obvious thing to punt in 9 category leagues with Harden is turnovers.  He makes a ton of them, and occupies a wing spot on your team where you don't usually get that many turnovers.  If I get Harden, I like to double-down on high turnover guys throughout the draft -- give me Gordon Hayward, Eric Bledsoe, Reggie Jackson, and Elfrid Payton -- knowing I'll crush it in other counting stats with these high usage studs.  Harden also fits well with a FG% punting strategy, allowing you to grab big men who sacrifice FG% for either more threes (Ryan Anderson, Markieff Morris) or more defensive stats (Nerlens Noel, Roy Hibbert).  A great 2nd rounder to pair with Harden in a FG% punt is Draymond Green.

4) Kevin Durant (SF, OKC)

Sometimes punt: REB, AST, STL, BLK, TO
Never punt: PTS, 3PM, FT%, FG%

For the same reason Durant's such a roto-friendly guy (across the stat-line contributions), he's also one of the hardest guys to build a punt around.  You could go for a turnover punt, but he's not that bad there for a first rounder -- he's no Harden.  I suppose you could also punt steals, too -- he gets a decent amount, but it's one of the lowest totals of any of these protected first rounders.  I certainly wouldn't start targeting a punt with him immediately, though.  It might be best to roll with a more balanced team if you are building around KD.

5) Chris Paul (PG, LAC)

Aim to punt: REB, BLK, PTS, 3PM, FT%
Rarely punt: FG%
Never punt: AST, STL, TO

Chris Paul is one of my favorites for a number of punt strategies.  He's such a valuable team-building piece, and I'll keep drafting him over sexier high-volume point guards like Westbrook to the bitter end.  There's really only three categories where it never makes sense to punt with CP3 -- assists, steals, and turnovers.  It rarely makes sense to punt FG%, either, because like Curry, he's such a big plus there as a PG, but I could see it.  You can have fun, elsewhere though.  He can be the basis of a dominant pass-score-steal-shoot-FT% team that punts rebounds and/or blocks.  He can fit into a funky FT% punt team in the same counter-intuitive way as Curry (see above).  He also scores few points per game than any other projected first rounder, so you could punt points with him.  Finally, he doesn't shoot a ton of threes, so he can pair well with a bunch of big men and other guards who don't shoot a ton of threes (like Jeff Teague or Dwyane Wade).  In a lot of these strategies, particular points, FT%, or three pointer punts, Paul pairs well with a defensive ace big man in the second round such as Rudy Gobert (if he slides) or Nerlens Noel.

6) LeBron James (SF/PF, CLE)

Aim to punt: TO, BLK
Sometimes punt: FT%, REB
Rarely punt: 3PM, STL
Never punt: PTS, FG%, AST

LeBron is almost in the group of all-around beast as Anthony Davis and Kevin Durant when it comes to punting.  Luckily for our purposes, he does have one really obvious punt -- turnovers.  He also works well out of a PF/F spot when you're punting blocks and/or rebounds.  He'd be a better FT% punt if he could play a G spot with these stats, but he's a decent fit into the SF spot.  Turnovers are a bit more obvious, though, and great fits for LeBron in the 2nd to that effect include Paul George, Paul Millsap, and Blake Griffin.

7) Russell Westbrook (PG, OKC)

Aim to punt: FG%, TO
Sometimes punt: BLK
Rarely punt: 3PM
Never punt: PTS, AST, REB, STL, FT%

Extremely high volume, low FG% point guards like Westbrook, Damian Lillard, and Kyle Lowry are as close as you'll get to a bizarro world version of Andre Drummond and DeAndre Jordan when it comes to FG% instead of FT%.  It's not quite as deadly an effect (you can still use Westbrook and Lillard in roto without guaranteeing yourself last place in FG%), but it gives you a good category to punt.  A nice combo punt with Westbrook is FG% and blocks -- he has such a high volume of rebounds as PG, he can be a nice piece for that stat, and you can concentrate on combining him with big men who can amass rebounds and threes without hurting your free throws, while not having to care about blocks.  In that strategy, Kevin Love makes an absolutely perfect fit with Westbrook in the 2nd round.

8) Kawhi Leonard (SG/SF, SAS)

Aim to punt: AST
Sometimes punt: PTS, BLK
Rarely punt: FT%, 3PM, REB
Never punt: FG%, STL, TO

Kawhi is extremely well-rounded, so he's not a great basis for hardcore multi-category punts.  But he is a great fit in a single-category punt of assists, especially the later he slides to the end of 1st round, increasing your chance of pairing him in the early 2nd round with another wing like Klay Thompson, Jimmy Butler, or Paul George.  The reason he makes such a good assists punt play is how much he maximizes the overall value of one of your starting guard spots outside of assists.  If you combine two wings of this class, you've got two of your guard spots filled with all kinds of stats, with only point guard to go.  You can then draft big after big after big to fill the forward, center, and utility spots, waiting to grab shot-happy PG-eligible guys like Lou Williams or CJ McCollum for their points and treys in later rounds.  I employed this exact strategy in the RotoBaller Writer's League draft with Butler and Klay as my top two picks at 12/13 (a recap of that draft is coming to RotoBaller soon).

9) DeMarcus Cousins (PF/C, SAC)

Aim to punt: TO
Sometimes punt: FG%, 3PM, AST
Rarely punt: FT%
Never punt: PTS, REB, STL, BLK

With Cousins and turnovers, it's the same deal as with Harden and LeBron -- he's putting up a bunch and he's not a point guard, so he's going to make it difficult to win them anyway.  It's a good excuse to punt.  Threes and assists can turn into punts with him if you draft a bunch of other guys short in those areas going forward.  Neither of his percentages is terrible on the one hand, or out of this world on the other.  Of the two, I'd lean more towards punting FG%, based on positional value.  Drafting him is precluding you from filling one of your PF/C spots with a really elite FG%.  He'd make a very nice center on a FG% punt team in the same way that Chris Paul makes a nice PG on a FT% punt team.

10) Carmelo Anthony (SF/PF, NYK)

Aim to punt: FG%, BLK
Sometimes punt: STL, TO
Rarely punt: AST, REB
Never punt: PTS, FT%, 3PM

No, I can't believe Carmelo is still ranked 10th on Yahoo, either.  I'd rather eat a rock than risk my first round pick on Melo.  But he's interesting to talk about in the context of punting, so let's roll with it.  We'll assume you got to the draft late and he was auto-picked.  In that case, you can try to turn lemons into lemonade with a punt strategy targeting FG% and blocks.  He can fill a PF spot with really good stats outside of those two categories, and you can concentrate in subsequent rounds on the guards who form the core of a strategy punting those two categories.  Butler and Klay fit extremely well with this build if you want to double-down with your 2nd rounder and fill another hard-to-fill forward spot in your lineup.  Damian Lillard and John Wall are also obvious 2nd rounders to pair with Carmelo in this strategy.

11) Jimmy Butler (SG/SF, CHI)

Aim to punt: AST, BLK, FG%
Sometimes punt: 3PM, REB, PTS
Never punt: FT%, STL, TO

I've already mentioned Butler a lot as a guy that pairs well with a lot of punt strategies if he slides into the second round.  If you're in a league with 10 teams or fewer, that's more likely.  In 12-teamers, he's usually going toward the end of the 1st, though.  He pairs well with Klay Thompson or Serge Ibaka in an assist punting strategy.  Paul George or a point guard like Wall or Lillard works well if you'd rather compete in assists while punting FG% and/or blocks instead.

12) Klay Thompson (SG/SF, GSW)

Aim to punt: AST, REB, FG%
Sometimes punt: BLK, STL, FT%
Never punt: PTS, 3PM, TO

Finally, Yahoo's #12 in Klay (who I find often slides into the 2nd round behind "sexier" picks like Damian Lillard, John Wall, Rudy Gobert, and Paul George).  As I've described in other scenarios, he pairs quite well with another wing or Serge Ibaka in an assists punt.  He also allows you to fill a forward spot in a rebounding and FG% punt if you pair him with Lillard.  Combining Klay with a lot of the guys available at the start of the 2nd is a nice enough start that you don't even have to commit to a punt until you see what things look like in the 3rd round, either.

 

Okay, I have my 1st rounder and a complementary 2nd rounder -- now what?

In the mid rounds, you generally attack players at the core positions who fit your strategies.  If you're not finding a great value based on ADP at a given pick, don't be afraid to reach on someone a little higher than their rank suggests.  Players that fit your punt are worth more to you in this strategy and the absolute difference in value between picks gets lower the later you get in the draft.

Here is a list of some mid-round (3rd - 8th round) players whose values rise significantly when punting each stat:

Points

Trevor Ariza, Nicolas Batum, Tyson Chandler, Danny Green, Joakim Noah, Andrew Bogut, Ricky Rubio, Robin Lopez, Gorgui Dieng

Threes

Jeff Teague, Giannis Antetokounmpo, Dwyane Wade, Eric Bledsoe, Thaddeus Young, most PF/C

Rebounds

DeMarre Carroll, Danilo Gallinari, Wesley Matthews, Khris Middleton, Kyle Korver, most PG

Assists

Nikola Mirotic, Terrence Jones, Danny Green, Robert Covington, J.J. Redick, Lou Williams, most PF/C

Steals

Hassan Whiteside, Jonas Valanciunas, J.J. Redick, Robin Lopez, Dirk Nowitzki, Isaiah Thomas, Karl-Anthony Towns

Blocks

DeMarre Carroll, Chandler Parsons, Thaddeus Young, Zach Randolph, Markieff Morris, Ryan Anderson, most PG/SG

FG%

Nicolas Batum, Nikola Mirotic, Kemba Walker, Robert Covington, Danilo Gallinari, Trevor Ariza, Brandon Knight, Bradley Beal

FT%

Andre Drummond, DeAndre Jordan, Dwight Howard, Elfrid Payton, Goran Dragic, Dwyane Wade, Terrence Jones, Kenneth Faried

Turnovers

Eric Bledsoe, Victor Oladipo, Gordon Hayward, Reggie Jackson, Rudy Gay, DeMar DeRozan, Karl Anthony-Towns, most PG

Once you have the basis of your team, you can either fill empty spots with specialists in the weakest categories you're still competing in, or snag those late round studs who are worthless if you aren't punting (ie, Mason Plumlee in a FT% punt).  But the bottom of your roster isn't a big deal in the draft, since you'll be using it to snag breakout stars or stream players in good match-ups.  You can even still draft for maximum upside of a breakout regardless of usefulness in your punt system, in hope you'll get someone valuable in a potential trade.

So that's it!  You've got a team built to punt.  You can't just rest on your laurels to win -- you still have to game the waiver wire and watch your matchup for opportunities to steal a category throughout the year.  But this is a good start.  You've built a team with real strengths that give you a better chance to win more categories than you lose every week.

 

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