Turtle Power

One of the remaining teams our Team Spotlight hasn't focused on is Brian's Squirtle Squad. Save the best for next to next to last eh? The Squirtles have been the cream of the crop since early on and are a league leading 11-3; showing no signs of slowing down as they've saved their best efforts for the past few weeks (Evan's stats show them trending up). The loss of Carlos Boozer and Andres Nocioni for a few weeks will hurt, but this steam roller has put together win streaks of 6 and 4 so far this season, with their only (aberrant) losses coming against the worst of the West -- Phanatics, Funk Coalition, and the Sour Snails. Weird hunh?

PTS, REB, AST: A huge strength for this team has been rebounding -- ranked #1 in the league. Clean up the boards, get easy put backs, and win your games. It's not like this team is stacked with big men either. The board work is being done by predominantly three guys: Kevin Garnett, Carlos Boozer, and the amazing David Lee. KG and Boozer are at nearly a dozen REB per game and Lee is at ten per. That's plenty of REB studs to dominate REB.

Similarly, all the passing is being done by just a few guys too, namely Deron Williams with 9 AST per game, and then KG and Boris Diaw with five each. Jamaal Tinsley has been good when he's played (6 AST) per game, but he's only been in the lineup half the time. The rest of this team doesn't pass that much. Still, it's good enough for 2nd in the league in AST.

The Squirtles aren't great at scoring, but they are more than serviceable -- 5th in the league. KG and Ray Allen are both franchise players and put in 50 ppg combined. Boozer is also Utah's top dog and he's up at 22 ppg, matching Garnett. Deron Williams and Andres Nocioni are both in the solid teens but after them, the drop-off in scoring is steep. Oh wait, except for Brandon Roy, who will soon be a mid-twenty ppg stud, belying his rookie 15.0 ppg average. Once Boozer returns and Roy fits his stride (which he arguably already has), this team will have four legit 20+ scorers and their PTS ranking will probably creep up too.

STL, BLK, 3PT: If the Squirtles have a weakness, it's on the defensive end. They're ranked only 8th in STL and BLK. The only thing Carlos Boozer doesn't do is block shots, and Garnett's 1.8 BLK per game is mostly wasted on this team. Nobody else is even close to one block per game, unless waiver wire wonders Mark Blount and/or Erick Dampier gets into the lineup. The healthy return of Sean May could help here, but he's not exactly a shot-blocking force. On the steals side, this team has Ray Allen (1.6) stealing at an all time high, Jamaal Tinsley (2.0) healthy, and Brandon Roy (1.4) on the come-up. Garnett and Deron also chip in at over a steal a game, so this team has the potential to be much better in STL. They just need Tinsley to stay in the lineup -- he's only played 25 games for Brian -- and they're golden.

Shooting beyond the arc should be much better here, as Ray Allen is the premier distance shooter in the land. But the Squirtles are tied for 9th in the league in 3PT (with Reno). Andres Nocioni has been launching 1.6 3PT this season, but aside from another waiver wire wonder, Matt Carroll (1.5), this team has a lack of outside shooters. Deron and Jamaal put in one a game but that's standard for a guard. In short, with Nocioni out and Carroll's value falling, it's the Ray Allen show and that won't make the Squirtles that dangerous from outside.

FG%, FT%, TO: The other huge strength of this team is FG%. Ranked number one in the land and it's not surprising given how many offensive rebounds this team must get. After ditching the two poor shooting Earls (Boykins and Watson), the only bad shooter left on the roster is Jamaal Tinsley at 39.6%. The front line players here are well over 50.0% each (David Lee is at 60.6%, Boozer an astounding 56.9%), most of the backcourt players are good shooters, and this team is tops in FG% by a long mile. Tony Parker and Kevin Martin belong on this team!

The story gets a bit uglier for FT%. Ranked only 7th, the Squirtles have some outstanding FT shooters (Ray Allen, Matt Carroll, David Lee, KG, Nocioni, Roy) but also some duds like Carlos Boozer (69.7) and Boris Diaw (64.9). Without those two, the FT% for this team would probably soar -- but you take the good and the bad right?

For such a fine passing team, this squad is pretty good at protecting the ball -- ranked 5th. Even the guys who get the ball in their hands a lot (Deron, Jamaal, Ray, Kevin, Carlos) each average less than three TO per game. Not bad. This team is like the Jazz, they sling it, but they don't turn it over. Nice.

Bench: Brian has been very active on the waiver wire; they've made 20 waiver wire moves this season. Mostly, he's been digging around for big men (Etan Thomas, Kendrick Perkins, Erick Dampier, Mikki Moore, Sean May), but he's also grabbed his share of little guys (Delonte West, Randy Foye, Damien Wilkins, John Salmons, Carlos Arroyo, Damon Stoudamire). The real gems have been finding Matt Carroll and sticking with David Lee. The current bench looks like (assuming Boozer and Nocioni are healthy): Sean May, Mikki Moore, Mark Blount, Delonte West, and the injured Nenad Krstic (a loss since he was averaging 16 PTS, 7 REB, 1 BLK). All of these players have had their time in the starting lineup and the case can be made that each one has been a positive contributor and not just a stop gap. Moore, West, and Blount have been fantastic in stretches, and May has shown some promise when healthy also.

Analysis: Overall, the Squirtles prove their dominance by having the great inside out combo of KG-Boozer and Ray-Deron. With the up-and-coming Brandon Roy, that's five bonafide fantasy stars. It's hard to say that there are any real weaknesses on this team. Perhaps a bump in 3PT or BLK to complement Allen and Garnett in their specialties, but it can be said, why mess with success? If there's anything to be done here, it might be to move Boris Diaw. Sure he was the third round pick this year but it's clear that he probably won't live up to that billing. His varied skills are useful (5 REB / 5 AST) but he's not quite right for this team. His lack of scoring, steals, three pointers, and especially, his poor free throw shooting are dragging down a few categories that the Squirtles should be good in. Despite Diaw's utility, it may be time to bench him -- or maybe even trade him. Other than that, why complain about being number one?