Phan Phrenzy

Well, looking over the Phanatics roster, you would think that they could manage more than two wins so far. They have one of the best rosters on paper and they seemed to have drafted well at every position. However, a few injuries and a weird blend of talent has this team barely treading water. Let's take a look.

PTS, REB, AST: How does a team with Vince Carter, Paul Pierce, Richard Jefferson, Lamar Odom, and Al Harrington rank 8th in the league in PTS? After a stellar first few weeks of scoring, the Phanatics have dropped incredibly far in points scored. The problem isn't the top of the roster, it's at the bottom. The supporting cast isn't known for scoring -- like, at all -- and with Jefferson underperforming and Odom inevitably cooling off (15 and 17 ppg respectively) there's nobody else here to provide scoring support. But hey, at least this team can rebound. Marcus Camby is the man in the middle and he gobbles up 11 rebs a game. Camby, along with Drew Gooden and Lamar Odom, give the Phanatics enough muscle on the boards to rank 4th in the league. Assists is a problem. Only Luke Ridnour averages more than 5 AST a game. Pierce, Carter, and Odom are all at about 4 per game, but that's hardly better than Marcus Camby (3 AST per), for comparison's sake. Unsurprisingly, the Phanatics suck at passing, ranking second-to-last. Marcus Williams might help here, but he's got oh, Jason Kidd in front of him. Maybe next year.

STL, BLK, 3PT: The one true strength of this team is 3PT shooting. Vince and Pierce are both mad bombers; Ridnour, Odom, Hedo, Harrington, and shudder (or shimmy), Antoine Walker, put in one a game and that's good enough to make the Phanatics dangerous from beyond the arc (4th). BLK and STL is where it gets ugly. 9th in BLK and 12th in STL. The Camby man can but he can't do it alone. There's nobody behind Camby in the BLK department -- unless you count Nazr Mohammad at 1 BLK per game -- and his strong numbers there (2.7 BLK per) are going to be wasted unless Ping can pair him up with another shot blocker. Remember, it takes two to make a thing go right. An even bigger issue is that all these big names can't, or won't, play defense. Nobody steals the ball on this team. Only four players average even close to one steal a game and that's bad enough to rank the Phanatics dead last in the steals department by a wide margin. Play some D kids.

FG%, FT%, TO: It gets worse. The Phanatics are ranked 9th in both percentages and 8th in turnovers. They don't shoot well, they don't pass much, they can't steal at all, and they turn the ball over a lot. Doesn't sound like a winning formula does it? Actually, that 9th in FG% isn't too bad considering this team has Antoine and Vince, among other infamous chuckers. The FT% is being killed by again, Antoine, but also Mason and Harrington. Should Antoine take free throws from beyond the arc? Maybe he should... The turnover thing is also unavoidable. Pierce, Odom, and Ridnour are all primary ball handlers on their teams. If you want AST, you have to take the TO too. The bigger issue is that the mid-tier guys like Mason, Harrington, Hedo and Jefferson don't return anything positive for their semi-high TO numbers.

Bench: To be fair, this team is missing David West, who was projected to be a 18-7 guy with great percentages and a few goodies. Nobody knows how his elbow is but on his return, he should be a very nice complement. Nene, Nazr, Hedo and Marcus Williams are the usual bench mates, but there's been a lot of time logged for each of them since West, Jefferson, Gooden and now Odom are injured or have missed time. Ideally, the bench should provide a bit of REB, BLK, AST and 3PT, but currently, most of the aforementioned guys have been spot starters. It's safe to say that Nene and Hedo are close to waiver wire fodder and Marcus is talented but a year or two away. Nazr Mohammad started the season off strong but has now regressed quite a bit. This bench doubles as a trash heap and hospice.

Cure: First off, what's the best lineup for this team? Pierce, Vince, Odom, Jefferson and Camby as the first five. Follow that up with West, Harrington, Gooden, Ridnour and well, anyone else. Mason, Nazr, Hedo, M Williams, and Antoine are equally (below) average. That's not too bad of a starting ten actually.

What we'd look to do is build a strong all-around team since the Phanatics have so many well balanced players who contribute in many categories. The big three are very key, especially Odom -- whose name pops up all across the statistical board. Camby is key too, as he anchors REB and BLK. However, he needs some help, plus his health (and age) are always a concern. West won't pull too much in a trade now, unless someone wants to pay full price for him, so he stays. He's a solid young forward and should recover from his injury just fine -- eventually. Drew Gooden has more value on this team than off. If the Phanatics don't decide to ditch AST, Ridnour will need a buddy in the backcourt too -- otherwise he's superfluous.

The first thing we'd look to do is deal off all those PTS-REB one or three category guys and bring in some variety in return. Richard Jefferson and Al Harrington, I'm talking to you. They're both redundant on this team. They are nice players, but not really much different than knock-off versions of the stars that already reside on this roster.

Target guys like R Artest, L Hughes, Gerald Wallace, even AK47 in an effort to bring in BLK and STL. FG% is going to be lost from the get-go, so taking back a mad shooter won't hurt. If no big man can be found to pair with Camby, well, look harder. Biedrins, Ben Wallace, Emeka, Gasol or Kaman might be had at the right price. Camby could possibly be traded since he is injury prone (thus forgoing BLK), but someone will have to pick up the REB slack in his stead.

In general, this team is suffering in all areas with no clear strengths and it needs to leverage Vince-Pierce and surround them with category dominant types in the smaller categories like STL and BLK. I'd also look to punt one of the AST, STL or BLK categories since covering all three would be very hard to do at this point.

Build up the PTS, REB, 3PT to dominant levels and also make moves to compete hard in STL and BLK (or AST). This team is probably unlikely to ever get good at FG% or TO but FT% should be okay after a few of the transgressors leave the roster. The entire bench is suspect and could use a few promising names, or at least a few category stuffers ala Damon Jones. This team is full of potential but needs a few adjustments to achieve their best.

Ch-ch-change...

Some names to look at: Zaza Pachulia, Kyle Korver, Jarrett Jack, Raja Bell, Chris Duhon, Darko Milicic, Al Jefferson, Brevin Knight, Devin Harris, Monta Ellis, Andrew Bogut, Danny Granger, Mo Williams, Andris Biedrins, David Lee, Randy Foye, Jamal Crawford, JR Smith, Luke Walton, Damon Jones, Troy Murphy, Speedy Claxton, Jason Williams, Stephen Jackson, Larry Hughes, Mike James, Zydrunas Ilgauskas, Steve Francis.

Pick up right now: Charlie Bell, Chucky Atkins (gone), Earl Watson, Willie Green (gone) types and dump Antoine and Hedo and probably Nene. Grab young bigs like Andrew Bynum and Travis Outlaw for the future. Heck, replace the whole bench!