The "How is your Association going" Thread

[hova-]

22 picks .. hell ^^ thats nice (not cheating ^^)

So Ive lost my 5th game in a row .. to the Kings! They were not doing so well but my chemistry went down by the Marquis trade and after 4 consecutive losses, thus I am at 16% now ....
And I really noticed that my players had more turnovers and did not run on the offense as nice as they could.

At 25-26 Im still in the Playoffs race but I have to watch out ... its getting tough. Next game is vs the Celtics. Just owned them after loosing three consecutive last time .. I hope we can repeat.

[Jeffx]

Gallinari seems to do it all for you off the bench. Not many changes but thats what I like .. its realistic. Nate seems to be underachieving .. you could trade him .. his value is nice.

What are your rookies like? Always interesting to draft some guys and look how they do in the league. Keep it up.

Well after a my last game against the Warriors I was able to win my 3rd straight beating the Heat ... not many points .. something like 90-85. Dirk had 32 points again. He was named Western Player of the month for the first time after being player of the week two times in January. His first award. LeBron had all three player of the month in the East so far .. hes doin fine.

So before my first game in January I trained some players. After two workout to strenghten his driving and dunking, Josh Howard trained his quickness and his ball handling this time. Desagana Diop trained his Post D. I really want to keep him and make him a decent defensive force when Dampier leaves.

I also have a trade worked out .. but Im still not too sure about it .. the Pacers would offer me Marquis Daniels for Jerry Stackhouse. Stack is not satisfied with his role so far and despite his abitlity to produce on the offensive end I dont need him necessarily (Green, Terry are good scorers, too).. whilst Marquis is solid on both ends of the court and 6 years younger. Further I like the fact that he was picked up by Dallas and really turned out to be a solid player here. He would also not mind to be a role player which is nice. His D would be interesting for me ... the Pacers would receive an expiring contract which helps them .. imho they get the better end in this trade so maybe I would ask them to throw in a 2nd rounder .. what do you think ?!

I'd probably do it, because of the youth factor and Daniels plays better 'D'.

Gallinari(together with Chandler) lead a potent Knicks bench. The first unit plays a more traditional, half-court style, while the second unit is more uptempo. Chandler is a dunking machine, while Gallinari has sweet moves around the basket(his only drawback is he's injury-prone). Nate is good for hitting open 'Js' but that's it. His layups always get blocked. Henderson's slowly developing into a solid player - I'm working on his outside game.

[hova-]

Finally snapped the 5 game loosing streak beating the Celtics for the second time this season, 85-87. Just a tough defensive battle. Dirk, Howard and Jason Terry combined for 65 points.

I led by two with 14 seconds left but Garnett got the ball and I was quite afraid of him hitting the shot for the tie so I went over to get another hand in his face and he passed it out of the jumpshot to Allen near the basket who tied it. I inbounded the ball off the timeout and gave it to Terry who has been hot the whole 2nd half. I let Dirk set a screen and it just worked out perfectly. Terry drove to the basket and was all alone. Dunked it with one hand and 3 seconds left. I really loved that play

Marquis Daniels relly fits into my style. Hes coming off the bench now with the Jet starting instead of Stackhouse. Hes not shooting the ball that good from midrange but he is really doing well assisting baskets and stealing the ball. Hes averaging 4.5 assists and 1.5 steals and 10.1 points so far.

[Patr1ck]

Where do you see your team chemstry? I've seen it before but forgot where it is.

[hova-]

On the Sim central .. at least thats were Im looking at it.

[puttincomputers]

so far i have never advanced to the third round. I have great teams but they either cave or my stars get injured.
In my heat dynasty i have
PG Wade 99
Sg Me 91
SF Beasely 89
Pf Love 84
C Oden 86

and no cheating btw

oh i didnt mention yet this is my 3rd year in the association and i have 22 first round draft picks for this year!

grrrr......... I accidentaly traded away Love.
So my lineup is as follows
Wade 99 pass first pg, but can still score
Me 93, lights out 2pt shot. career average is 30+ just set the record with 116 points in a game, 40+ plus steals. moon had 30+ in that game. wade also had a triple double
Moon 86 highflyer who is fouled quite often, in real life he is known as apollo 13 due to his leaping ability
Beasely 92 good all around player
Oden 91 a beast inside, looks like shaq now

I had 23 1st round draft picks and everyones contracts expired except for mine and my backup center. i am earning 512k this year. I edit my own salary to add 10k over the previous year, i started out at the minimum.
So i resigned Wade, Moon, Beasely, and Oden. I went to the lottery and got picks 1-4, 6-9, 11-12,15-19, 22-26,27-30 not to mention 2nd rounders. now my worst player is a 73 as a rookie!

[Patr1ck]

I don't see the point in all those draft picks, but whatever, as long as your having fun.

[hova-]

So just played my All-Star game. Was quite lame .. imho they could do more to make the ASG fun in 2k. Changing the sliders automatically or stuff. Carmelo brought home the MVP award as the Western All Stars won.

Lineups were like this:

West:

C Yao Ming
PF Pau Gasol (Well Amare was injured 4-6 weeks)
SF Carmelo Anthony
SG Kobe Bryant
PG Chris Paul
6 Tracy McGrady
7 Dirk Nowitzki
8 Brad Miller
9 Baron Davis
10 Deron Williams
11 Carlos Boozer
12 Kevin Durant

East:
C Dwight Howard
PF Kevin Garnett
SF LeBron James
SG Dwyane Wade
PG Gilbert Arenas
6 Joe Johnson
7 Andre Igoudala
8 Jose Calderon
9 Caron Butler
10 Chris Bosh
11 Vince Carter
12 Andrew Bogut (was injured though)

Not that realistic imho. No Duncan, West, Kidd, Billups, Roy, Redd, Shaq, Nash etc... well at least Dirk.

So I just did the trade that the Mavs did in real life trading Diop for Hollins and Carroll. I kind of like this trade despite Diop doing well for me. I hope it gives me a lift (just like I hope it for the Mavs in real life). Next game will be against the Nets.

There have been some other interesting swaps since I allowed the CPU to trade in the last week before the deadline. (before I just have it switched on two days per month).

Oklahoma City trades F Jeff Green and a 2009 first round pick to the Charlotte Bobcats for G Raymond Felton. (quite realistic, maybe the Thunder give up a bit too much but they needed a PG)

Sacramento trades C Mikki Moore to the Bucks for C Dan Gadzuric (hmm dunno why they swapped them .. equal players)

Utah trades G CJ Miles to the Cavs for G Sasha Pavlovic (The Cavs tried to get rid of Pavlovic and asked me for Carroll so now theyve finally got somebody to take him)

Memphis trades C Darko Milicic to the Cavs in exchange for C-F Anderson Varejao (maybe some more potential for the Cavs and Memphis got rid of his contract)

Not that bad trades at all, could have been worse I guess.

[Fresh8]

wow, Miller and Durant made ASW on urs too.

[hova-]

The Rockets roster is a superb video game roster. I dont think youll need to pull trades. Maybe you should try to get a solid big man. Yao and Mutombo have a bad stamina. You should find a youngster who can fill it in if both are out.

I won against the Nets. Was quite entertaining. Dirk and the Jet just killed them combining for 58 points. I really like my roster and find it quite stacked. I am better than I was before the trading deadline and I think the teades I pulled will pay off. Heres my rotation right now.

C Dampier/Bass/Hollins
PF Nowitzki/George
SF Howard/Daniels/Green
SG Terry/Carroll/Wright
PG Kidd/Barea

Maybe I am not the best inside but Damp/Dirk/Bass is quite okay I think. Not more, not less. My backcourt is quite good though. Well lets see how the season will end. Im at 27-26 now. Really need to win to make the Playoffs but right now I am at the 9th seed.

[hova-]

Well I played Bass as the backup for Damp against the Nets for the first time. Without Diop I am lacking size under the basket but Bass did pretty well against the Nets. Still I am giving up too many offensive boards. As I said my inside trio is not the best, but Bass is a nice leaper and still able to grab those boards. But that was against the Nets. Against guys like Yao or Duncan I think I might struggle with Bass ...

I think Hayes is the better option to send away since he is the older of both and does not bring you anything you really need. (boards shouldnt be a problem with Yao and Scola at all). So I would trade him. Landry has more potential.

[puttincomputers]

I don't see the point in all those draft picks, but whatever, as long as your having fun.

i like messing up the other teams.

[hova-]

I was able to extend my winning streak to three. Beat the Rockets in a tough double OT game which was simply classic. 130-136.
We were down all game long and in the 3rd even by 16 points but Dirk and the rest of the crew were on fire offensively. The Rockets lost T-Mac in the 4th with a dislocated shoulder and we took our chance to decrease their lead. With 10 seconds left on the clock we were down by only 1 point but Josh Howard could not hit the game winner. Thus the Rockets went to the line and Alston made both with 1 second left. So we took a timeout inbounded the ball to Dirk and just jacked up a triple which went in to tie the game. In the first OT Josh Howard came up big whilst Shane Battier had to threes to make it a tie again. But in the 2nd OT we just outhustled them. Marquis Daniels who had 17 points sealed the deal with a midrange jumper with 30 seconds left.

Dirk had his 3rd 40+ point game scoring 41, he also grabbed 12 boards and had 6 assists. I took 36 shots with him (I never take so many shots with one player).
Howard added 29. Although Yao was good, he did not dominate me like he does usually. That is what I like. I was able to keep him off the boards and thats important in the Playoffs.

My team is really good right now after the two deals and has Championship calibre. At least Western CF.

[puttincomputers]

well oden was disqusted by lack of playin time. and i was sick of complaining about 2 minutes so i traded him and beasely away. now I have beidrins and a 4 year man. this is the 5th year

[Jeffx]

Al Harrington and Eddy Curry are in the MVP voting. Gallinari is 2nd in the 'Most Improved Player' voting. Wilcox is 4th in the Sixth Man voting.

[hova-]

After beating the Kings in a quite easy game (Marquis Daniels was player of the game with 20p, my first player of the game who was not Dirk, Terry, Kidd, Howard) the Spurs snapped my 4 game winning streak. Manu had 37 points, 30 in the 1st half. After that I was able to stop him by getting into the passing lanes, but still the Spurs were better offensivley.

Despite Brandon Bass and Dirk having nice games each (Bass 18/8 9-10 shooting) I noticed that I will have problems against good rebounders with my undersized Center and Dirk who is rebounding well but not excellently. The problems is: Dampier will be out for 2-4 weeks after a collision against the Kings. Ryan Hollins is no solution. Kind of pisses me off since we were simply rolling with Damp in. And although I dont like him since he is complaining about his PT but just cant play more because of his poor stamina, he was quite important. Im at 29-27 now, still in the Playoff race.

[Fresh8]

Trade for a taller Centre then. Trade for Chris Mihm!!! He's a 7 foot stud! If you asked The X, he would advise Sean Marks!

[hova-]

Well I won against the Bucks just one night after the loss to the Spurs. Actually I was dominating them. Led by 30 points in the 2nd quarter. Decided to give PT to all my bench players, especially Shawne Williams and Gerald Green. But I really did not notice how the Bucks came back and - oh my god - took over the lead with 1 minute left. I had to rely on Dirk's buzzer beating shot with one point down. And - despite only playing 8 minutes before - he drained it to make it 100-99.

We had one day off and Dirk injured his ankle but was able to play the next game against the Thunder. We really struggled all game long, it was hard with Dirk injured and Damp still out. Bad shooting and weak defense .. nothing was falling. Damien Wilkins and Russell Westbrook did well and the Thunder beat me by 18 points in the last game of February.

The first week in March will be so tough. 5 games including two back to back games. Just sick. I used my development points to train Josh Howards handling and quickness and to make Ryan Hollins a better post defender. This guy has some talent. He played well the last two games seeing good PT with Damp out. I also tried to make Bass a better scorer but failed. I hate those drills that have to be completed in a set time.

I hope I can play a good month of March, I need to, currently being at 30-28.

[hova-]

So Ive won against the Raptors in an OT thriller. Once again Dirk hit a buzzer beating three to sent it to overtime. I dont know how often he can do this again, I should not hang on him too much in those situations.

The next game vs the Thunder was just another loss. I lost to them twice this season although they are the weakest team.
Just one night later we faced the the Spurs. This game just totally sucked. We won despite shooting .39% from the field. We played bad, the Spurs worse. Right now we cant hit anything on offense, especially three pointers. The chemistry is down to 18% and everybody has a -1 except Dirk and Josh.
Hollins was putting up nice numbers lately with 10+ rebounds every game and 1.5 blocks per game. But Im looking forward to Damps return since I need Bass as my 6th man to do some damage inside. Right now Marquis Daniels is my 6th man and he does not really lighten it up.

[Patr1ck]

I'm not sure if I will be able to contend for a repeat in my second season. I made several transactions during the season, including trading away Marcus Camby who ended up as an All Star somehow, even though his numbers were not great. I did it because I knew I couldn't keep Camby, Randolph, and Kaman all happy at the same time. I ended up with Stephen Jackson who I traded away to give the complaining Eric Gordon more playing time, knowing that I couldn't give Jackson. He is getting 31 out of 48 minutes per game(~20 min per 9 min quarters) and his morale is barely rising. He is the league leader in true shooting percentage.

Grant Hill was offered on the trading block so I snagged him, but I just used him as to trade becuase I couldn't give him alot of minutes.

I also traded for Shaun Livingston, and after that I traded away Mike Taylor because he wasn't playing as well as he had showed before.

I missed Ricky Davis dunking on people, so I got a SG who has some ups, Rudy Fernandez.

Got Brandon Bass and Dwayne Jones for frontcourt help off the bench., and signed Fred Jones to an MLE so I have an extra guard.

My lineup now is-

Baron Davis
Eric Gordon - Upset - wants more time on court
Al Thornton
Zach Randolph
Chris Kaman
P-Dub(Me)
Shaun Livingston
Rudy Fernandez - Uncertain - wants better role and playing time
Brandon Bass - Satisfied - wants upgraded role
James Jones - Uneasy - wants better role
Dwayne Jones
DeAndre Jordan
Mark Madsen
Fred Jones

As you can see, those 3 bench players' morale seems to be hurting me. I did pretty well with James Jones as soon as he joined the team, knocking down a bunch of 3's, but then I didn't see him playing much for a few games, and couldn't find him open when he was in the game. I picked those players up to play as a role players, but now they all want to be sixth men or better. I've already got two sixth men, myself and Livingston. I am not ready to bump myself or Livingston up to being a starter since I would have to find somewhere else to put Davis, Gordon, or Thornton. I should have stuck with Mike Taylor, he never complained, and didn't need alot of minutes to keep his morale high. It's just that he was getting his shit tossed when he went to the rack.

I thought I had a future starting lineup of Mike Taylor, Eric Gordon, Myself, Al Thornton, and DeAndre Jordan. I had a couple killer games with the Taylor/Jordan 2-man game in the preseason. If Livingston doesn't work out, I may have to try to get Taylor back.

[buzzy]

I'm now 16-7 with my Suns, just losing a tough one at Staples against the Lakers. My recored is alright so far, but I have been unable to go on a 3+ winning streak becuase I always lose a game here and there.
The thing that upsets me most about the Association mode is the ridiculous trades by the CPU. I like to trade myself and I wouldn't mind if there'd be more trades than in real life, but the trades they do seem too stupid.
For example I blew out the Utah Jazz because they traded away Okur for Terry and Harpring for Ridnour or so, now there they are with what, like 6 guards and not one real center.
Add foul trouble on Boozer and the blowout is in the books. Amare & Shaq were raping them down low.
Another thing is that they like to trade away guys they aquried some days ago. I think Ridnour is now with his third team within 1 month.

Another minor problem is, that All-Star votes are restricted on the exact positions, not Guard, Forward and Center like in real life. So it happens to be that Duncan and Amare are the top two vote getters on Power Forward, which means they won't be able to start together like they'll do in real life.
I'm thinking about moving Amare to the SF spot before the ASW, but it'd decrease his overall so I don't know yet. Duncan and Amare would have more votes than Melo, the top SF vote getter, anyways.

So I did some trades here and there, getting rid of Grant Hill and aquiring Channing Frye. MIght have lost some depth though.

Shaq/Lopez/Mutombo
Amare/Frye/Amundson
Kleiza/Barnes
JRich/Barbosa
Nash/McInnis

[Heiks]

I finished my 2nd 58 game season with my 2k8 Blazers. Into the playoffs, best of 5 games. After missing the playoffs in 2008 we improved to the 4th best record in the league at 37-21, just behind Lakers, Rockets and Jazz. Lebron won the MVP, which makes it two years in a row, Beasley got ROY over Mayo, Rose, Hibbert, Fernandez. Azubuike was the 6th Man, Beno Udrih MIP and Dwight the defensive player of the year.

My pretty life-like roster heading into the 2009 playoffs:

PG Blake/Rodriguez
SG Roy/Fernandez/Gregg Becker(generated rookie - good defender and outside shooter, 6'8'', 77 ovr)
SF Outlaw/Webster/Batum
PF Aldridge/Frye/Diogu
C Oden/Pryzybilla/LaFrentz/Randolph

We were the 4th seed and matched up with the 5th seeded Hornets. The first game was pretty awful for both sides, still I managed to win it 78-71 holding Paul to 13 points and 8 assists and West to 11 points while Roy scored 20. Second game in the series was a huge nail-biter, we were behind 59-72 after three and even -18 9 minutes before the end, but managed to fight our way back into the game and win it 92-89. Never felt so good, won the 4th 33-17. Oden had 20, Roy 19, Outlaw and Aldridge had both 14. Paul had a 21-11 night and West scored 19. Third game in New Orleans was easier, although we lost the 1st 23-29, we gained the lead in the second quarter and never looked back. Final score 101-89, Roy had 28 on 12/17 shooting, Paul scored 22 and handed out 8 assists. Didn't expect it to be so easy, but we swept them 3-0, yay!

Next up the 1st seeded Lakers who defeated San Antonio 3-1 in the first round.

Had no chance on the first night in LA. They outscored me 67-44 in the first half, final score 111-91. Roy was cold, Kobe had 20, Gasol 16. Remarkably, the second game was totally different. We managed to keep up with them and even win the half 56-53. Roy had 32 points, 9 rebounds and 5 assists while we pulled away in the third and won it 101-93. Won thanks to the work at the defensive end, we had a lot of steals and out-rebounded the opposition 53-44. Series tied at 1-1. I was pretty positive about the upcoming home games, but the Lakers got the best of me when Roy hit another slump while Gasol, Odom and Bynum all scored in double figures and cleaned up the boards with 14, 9 and 17 rebounds. I lost the game 85-93. The fourth game in the series continued on the same track, we lost the first half 36-54. Although Roy had a 28-point night with 6 rebounds, 6assists and 3 steals, the Lakers won it 111-101 while Bryant scored 29 points and Gasol had 26 and 18. I lost the series 1-3.

The Lakers went on to the conference finals where they matched up with Utah. On the other side of the bracket it was the Celtics and Cavs fighting for the conference title. Both series were extended to 5 games, Lakers won the Western Conference title with a 144-103 blowout while Bryant, Gasol, Farmar and Vujacic all scored 23 or more points. LeBron managed to prove that he was worthy to be the MVP this season and led the Cavs past Boston's Big Three. Lakers-Cavs, a pretty awesome Finals setup. First game LBJ had a 34-7-6 night, but Kobe topped that with 35-6-10, Lakers won 110-108 in a 4th quarter come-back. Second game, first quarter Lakers erupt for 37 points against Cavs' 26. They ride on the lead to win it 102-95. LeBron had 15 points, 10 rebounds, 8 assists, 4 steals, 5 blocks, Kobe had 15, 5, 7, 3 and 1 on just 5/9 shooting. Heading to Cleveland, the Cavs were in a must-win situation. Lakers' Bryant and Gasol showed up with other plans, both scored 25 and Lakers swept the series 3-0. Kobe was the Finals' MVP with 25,0 ppg, 6,3 rpg, 7,3 apg.

That made me wonder who won it in 2008. Well, after looking it up it was the Cinderella fairy tale by the Milwaukee Bucks who finished the regular season with the 15th record in the League. Lead by Michael Redd, Mo Williams and Andrew Bogut, they overcame the opposing Phoenix Suns in the 2008 NBA Finals to snatch their franchise's second NBA title. So back-to-back finals appearances for Mo Williams right there.

Hopefully the upcoming 2009-2010 season will be even better for the Blazers. II have a team option on Roy and Aldridge and will sign Frye to an extension. LaFrentz and Randolph will probably go. Diogu hasn't been happy with his minutes and I just haven't been able to use him as a role player, so he will probably be a free agent aswell. We'll see how the draft will work out.

[RKO]

I'm looking to start an Association with someone and can't make up my mind. Whether to take the Bulls, Blazers or even my fav team the Spurs. Every team I start with, it gets boring so this time I want to start with someone so it doesnt; get boring. Im also looking to post my story here on the forum so its gonna be a good one.

[Heiks]

IMHO think it would have to be a team that you're interested in from the beginning maybe even in real life. For exsample, I really like Aldridge, Roy, Outlaw, Webster and I have kept the core always the same. Over the time I started to like Oden and also found Frye and Pryzybilla useful as role players. I moved other pieces around, tried to get some young talent, I think I even traded for Ben Gordon at some point, but that didn't really work out. Besides, I got obsessed with the real life rosters at the beginning of this NBA season, so I tried to do most of those in the game aswell.

Anyway, what I wanted to suggest is that pick a team, that you are really fond of, keep the core players and try to slowly build around them. Maybe you should also try shorter seasons if it gets boring so quickly. Why not give the Spurs a go if they're already your favorite team.

[LiLwAyNe]

check out ma thred (laker fans) viewtopic.php?f=92&t=63161