FanHouse MikeConley

Title Chaste is the diary of Matt Snyder in his season a virgin fantasy basketball player.

Well, that didn't take long. Thanks to Mo Williams, Danny Granger, Amare Stoudemire, Brook Lopez, Jason Terry, Andrea Bargnani and Shawn Marion, I won my first career fantasy basketball game. I should also point out I owe the scheduling for the victory as well, because my team checked in as the sixth-highest scorer out of 12. Really, it could have gone either way. This victory was a sign that being lucky is just as worthwhile as being smart in fantasy basketball, just as I already knew in fantasy baseball and fantasy football. On the other hand, skill is still paramount -- as the top scorer for the week was, not surprisingly, Tom Lorenzo.

---

---

FanHouse previews all 30 NBA teams in advance of the 2009-10 season.

The Grizzlies are not a joke. They are the punchline. That's where they've fallen to. They aren't even the setup for the joke. They're just mentioned as the end point.

A little under two years ago, Grizzlies GM Chris Wallace (and by that, we mean owner Michael Heisley) traded Pau Gasol for cap room and some loose junk. The only valuable component they got out of the deal was Marc Gasol. The move elicited everything from mockery to outrage from pundits and even league personnel. Things have not improved considerably since.

Allen Iverson needs to lay low for a while.

After establishing himself as a potential Hall of Fame guard, with offensive skills never before seen in the league and establishing himself as a perennial winner who's only flaw was that he was surrounded by insufficient backup, the last year has done a lot to tarnish that reputation. After being traded to Detroit he was an outright disaster, unable to find his place in the offense or in the locker room. Meanwhile the guard he was traded for, Chauncey Billups, lead his team to the Conference Finals.

As a free agent this summer, Iverson needs to go somewhere quietly and rebuild his image, much the same way that his old coach Larry Brown has in Charlotte. But it might be another small market team Iverson ends up with. One that now features an... eclectic makeup of personalities.

Iverson might be headed South for the Winter.

On Tuesday night, fortune finally smiled on the Memphis Grizzlies. After constantly finding themselves on the wrong end of an errant heel from Lady Luck's rumba, they got their turned to dance with her and ended up with the No. 2 overall pick. Finally fortune smiles on the downtrodden. Or did it?

Mike Dunleavy doesn't appear to be bluffing regarding the Clippers "obviously" drafting Blake Griffin. Which means highly touted Spanish point guard Ricky Rubio would fall to Memphis. Their other option is UConn big man Hasheem Thabeet. On the surface, this looks like a win-win situation for the Grizzlies. But if we dig deeper, it may turn out to not be so great after all. Par for the course for the Memphis Grizzlies.

It's been such a wild year for the Phoenix Suns that the trade deadline rumors that swirled around Amare Stoudemire almost seem like they didn't even happen. But happen they did, and the fact is that the Suns were openly trying to deal their young All-Star to anyone who would listen -- including the Memphis Grizzlies.

There were plenty of unsubstantiated rumors about where Stoudemire could possibly end up, but Memphis was apparently a legitimate possibility, at least from the Suns' standpoint. The Memphis Commercial Appeal has the details of how it all could have gone down.

Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.

Miami has two options this summer. The Heat can continue to be a legitimate one-man band, or it can get hooked up with some shady underground biotechnician and clone Dwyane Wade. Your choice, Heat.

Wade went ballistic (again) with 42 points on 34 FGAs and 13 FTAs. He added four rebounds, four assists, four steals and a block. And only one turnover. I mention turnovers quite frequently in Doing Lines, but just to be sure you grok my spit: one turnover in (effectively) 45 offensive possessions Wade is personally responsible for is ... unreal. Those 3.4 turnovers a game might look like a lot. But account for how much of the offense rests on his shoulders and ... yeah. B-E-A-S-T.

Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.

Forget what Shane Battier may have told you -- Ron Artest deserves a muzzle after shooting 0-for-9 from three-point range on Monday.

As The Dream Shake says, "When the opposing team doesn't even bother to rotate onto you, that's a sign that they want you to shoot that shot."

Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.

The Grizzlies lost to the 76ers, and that's to be expected. Memphis falls to 16-45, a welcome visitor in the Dungeon of Doom populated by your Kings and Thunder and Clippers. But things got a little weird Saturday night in Memphis.

Two Grizz scored at least 30 points. O.J. Mayo? No, he had only 11. Rudy Gay? Nope, just eight. How about ... Marc Gasol and Mike Conley? Baby Gasol finished with 30 points (and 13 boards and three blocks) and Conley racked up 31 points and nine assists. WHAT.

That's Mike Conley, and if you look closely, something seems to be missing ... like half of his tooth. Conley caught the business end of a Baron Davis elbow early in the first quarter of Wednesday's win against the Clippers. Oddly enough, Conley was the one called for a foul.

Davis sank the layup and the free throw; Conley, meanwhile, bloodied a towel and left the game for good. My favorite part of the picture is O.J. Mayo's look of concern -- I can't tell if he's more worried about Conley's grill or the fact that Marko Jaric is about to enter the game.

Memphis has been a team that has been a bit tangential to the whole Amare Stoudemire Sweepstakes -- there's been reported interest and/or contact, but the only rumor out there (Rudy Gay and Mike Conley as the main parts) seemed a bit too rich for the Grizzlies.

Apparently, Memphis management agrees. Ron Tillery of the Memphis Commercial-Appeal reports Memphis owner Michael Heisley has rejected Phoenix's (supposedly firm) offer, and the Grizz are out of the Amare derby.