What position would your kid play in Basketball?

[Namira]

put him in, coach

[The Honeless Beard]

You know, out of morbid curiosity...

Scouting Report: Nora's small and slight, constantly tired and constantly sick with a weak constitution. At first glance you may look at her and see someone who's a liability on the court, but if you look beneath the surface it gets much, much worse. Being small and slight would be fine - even an advantage - if you had speed or skill to make up for it but unfortunately, Nora's got neither - the closest thing she'd be able to have is fine motor skills, which doesn't do much for dribbling and shooting.

Analysis: Nora's likely not good enough to get on the starting five, but she'd be a 1 if she were out of necessity - you cannot put someone beneath 5'5" on a court at any other position except the 1. However, because a lot of short kids are in this thread, Nora's only slightly shorter than a handful of them and could be played at their positions - if, again, she weren't the weight of a sandwich bag soaking wet. Nora's biggest asset? Her stroke is probably perfect, and she has the personality to work on it over and over until it's the tightest mechanical shot ever.

Signature shot: Dead-eye from the line, taking every technical FT the team gets called. She bounces the ball once, squints behind her facemask, drains it. Nothing but net.

Standard statline: 6-0-0, 6/6 from the FT line and logging 8 minutes of garbage time play.

[Pippi]

tell me how the girl who passes out if she stands up too fast does playing baasketbaaaullgnghff

[almostinhuman]

gonna double dip and ask for the new kid now lol

[MurderWeasel]

Can you do Sofia from PV3?

[The Honeless Beard]

angry Irish girl

Finally, some good fucking food.

Scouting Report: It feels like ages since I've had such a raw talent to dissect, so let's talk about Derbhile for a second. Derbhile is 5'11, which means she's taller than the average of this little league we're rolling out here, and is listed as incredibly athletic as well as competitive - a bell we're gonna ring with every ounce of strength. Derbhile likely does best while utilizing her Camogie gifts - body blocking from the ball, driving hard into the rack, and absorbing contact. She's likely a rival for Keiji as a rack-running, body bruising player who seeks out and dominates close contact. Her one flaw is gonna be dribbling skills, but putting the ball on the floor is never gonna be her desired objective.

Analysis: Derbhile is gonna be a slash-and-kick 3, and we're slotting her here for two key reasons. Firstly, small forwards usually line up on the wing which means they can jump into help defense immediately if they see a play going south, and everything in Derbhile's profile points to a great defender. Secondly, while Derbhile may be undersized for the position, I do think she'd see that as a challenge and really absolutely bust the chops of whoever she's up against. Pity those who try to contain her.

Signature shot: Catch, up-fake, and hard drive to the rim to foul through contact, and bag the And-1.

Standard statline: 26-5-1, with 66% FT and finishing at 55% clip. No threes - all earning it the hard way.

[The Honeless Beard]

Kyle Benson

I love opportunities to teach stuff.

Scouting Report: So, body wise, Kyle's a big draw. 6'0", 157lbs, pointing to a decently sized person if it weren't for specifically a mention of 'lean', which means we've got a big skeletor on our hands in my mind. His vision on the court is probably really good - eagle eye and all that - but his huge downside here is that he cannot communicate verbally, which honestly is a big minus in every column. Basketball is all about communication, especially on defense. Kyle can't call out screens and switches, cannot communicate when he's open ball verbally, and generally will be putting a large strain on the offense and defense with this. He could probably play man-to-man defense, but without any real meat or muscle he's likely to get burned and burned often.

Analysis: Let's assume that Kyle's got a decent wingspan for obvious reasons. The long arms put him as another faceup 4, largely because on offense this allows him to be setting picks right in the 1's POV and allows for easier buckets as a result - lessening the load on the 1 for passing since the 4 should pert near always be nearby. He'll likely take only long bombers and get limited playing time.

Signature shot: Popping off of the pick and roll for a long 3 pointer.

Standard Statline: 9-0-0, 66% from 3.

[The Honeless Beard]

Kaine, please? ; )

Scouting Report: Coach Janice Versetti of the Duniway Fighting Shushbugs is a genius. Kaine is listed at 6'2", and weighs 171lbs, which is obviously quite undersized for a center. But Coach Versetti stuck him at the 5 anyways. Why? Because obviously the Shushbugs run a positionless run-and-gun offense predicated off of their two best players, Lincoln and Kaine. Every one of their starting 5 play totally positionless and can guard 1 through 5 easy peasy gg no re. Anyways, Kaine is probably amazing at banging bodies and leaping for rebounds - has to be, since his job is the toughest when guarding bigger players. He can finish with either hand, most likely, has a killer jump shot, and is a heavy screen-setter.

Analysis: Outside of Coach Versetti's high powered run-and-gun offense, Kaine fits best at the 2 - shooting guard. This maximizes his ability to run around screens and fire off quick passes and shots, but doesn't put the burden of the offense solely on him. It also allows him to run inside at will to bang bodies as well as hang outside as well. Kaine likely starts, and does best when left to his own devices on either wing to work the defender 1-on-1.

Signature shot: A left-to-right drive that ends with a hopping scoop shot for 2 points.

Standard Statline: 22-9-1, decent volume.

[The Honeless Beard]

Melodie

Scouting Report: At 5’9” and 150, Melodie is actually above the bar for weight and height of this league we’re trotting out - all good things. We don’t get much of her athletic ability in her profile, but I’m going to assume she doesn’t work out or really have any interest in athletic pursuits - her hourglass shape is attributed to body fat form more than sculpting via exercise. So we can assume her handle isn’t great, her endurance similarly so - but she does have the ability to sense flesh without looking at it which will make her a god on defense with an innate feel for when people are going to attack.

Analysis: Melodie is going to be another defensive specialist - and we’re going to use the term specialist very liberally here, because her specialty will be being trot out for like 5-8 minutes at a time to disrupt two or three shots. She won’t be able to get steals or affect the gameplay on a physical level but she’ll be able to react to attacks at the basket quicker than most if she hones it.

Signature shot: Whirling to block a pass that nobody else saw, and calling out oncoming blindside screens for her team.

Standard statline: 0-0-1 with 1 block in 6 minutes, at which point she probably needs to lie down.

[The Honeless Beard]

put him in, coach

Scouting Report: Javi is a referee’s worst nightmare, because is it still a travel when you’re literally walking on the air? At 5’5” and 155 pounds, Javi’s height and weight is irrelevant, because he can walk on air. Javi’s handle ability and his athletic prowess are also, similarly, irrelevant, because he can walk on air.

Analysis: Javi plays literally any position because he can walk on air - they will park him near either basket and he can just drop the ball into the net if he focuses hard enough. They will need to create entire rules just around Javi’s abilities. This will destroy the basketball world as we know it. I regret taking Supers powers literally in this thread because that means I’d have to take Javi’s literally and of COURSE Elena would give me Javi. Fuck.

Signature shot: Dropping a ball into the hoop from 6 inches above it.

Standard statline: Javi could score like 900 points.

[The Honeless Beard]

tell me how the girl who passes out if she stands up too fast does playing baasketbaaaullgnghff

Scouting Report: Mercedes Guenther is a pretty good height for hoops, at 6’1” and 160lbs. Her hobbies including lifting weights and yoga are also promising, giving her that much sought pliability as well as arm strength. Her supers power isn’t really a pro or a con her - Eldritch Blast isn’t useful on a basketball court aside from specific murder scenarios and those are banned - but what is important is her drawback - basketball is cardio heavy and incredibly intensive as a workout, and her raised temperature means that she’s at high risk when she plays for extended periods of time.

Analysis: Mercedes is gonna be a 3 - small forward - because of her strength when backing opponents down and her elasticity when guarding people, but I want to highlight that body temp thing. If we’re really, truly treating this as a thought experiment - and half the joke is that we are, to an absurd degree - then realistically I don’t think she’d be allowed to play - too high risk. However, because that’s the boring answer, I think we can say that through ice pack technology and careful fitness monitoring, we have achieved the miracle of getting Mercedes to play a full uninterrupted ten minutes of basketball - scientists marvel at this.

Signature shot: Two hard dribbles in the paint as she shoves her defender backwards, followed by a left-handed spin move to the rack for two.

Standard statline: 6-7-2 on 10 minutes at 68% shooting from the field.

[Namira]

put him in, coach

Scouting Report: Javi is a referee’s worst nightmare, because is it still a travel when you’re literally walking on the air? At 5’5” and 155 pounds, Javi’s height and weight is irrelevant, because he can walk on air. Javi’s handle ability and his athletic prowess are also, similarly, irrelevant, because he can walk on air.

Analysis: Javi plays literally any position because he can walk on air - they will park him near either basket and he can just drop the ball into the net if he focuses hard enough. They will need to create entire rules just around Javi’s abilities. This will destroy the basketball world as we know it. I regret taking Supers powers literally in this thread because that means I’d have to take Javi’s literally and of COURSE Elena would give me Javi. Fuck.

Signature shot: Dropping a ball into the hoop from 6 inches above it.

Standard statline: Javi could score like 900 points.

real question is whether it counts as a lane violation if you're in midair over the key

[The Honeless Beard]

gonna double dip and ask for the new kid now lol

Scouting Report: Austin Greene is described as overweight for his height and age at 188lbs for his 5’8” frame, and has nary an athletic past-time in his biography so we can also say that his cardio’s not the greatest and his interest and dedication to the craft of basketball is lacking. He strikes me off of general profile vibes to be the type to grudgingly participate in team sports, so it’s that grudging participation that we’ll tap into for the rest of our analysis. His power wouldn’t necessarily help us on a basketball court at all unless he sensejacks the coaches during huddles, which is precisely where we use him.

Analysis: Austin Greene is used as a spy. He falls asleep at halftime and jacks into the other team’s locker room to spy on their adjustments at halftime, and reports in. Unfortunately he can’t really catch the later half of the speech because he needs to wake back up and get back to his bench or risk disqualification, so most of what he hears is the pep talk that the other coach gives. He’s being slotted in as a 3 but because the position needs to work hard, he’s going to be our first outside scoring 3 with a half-hearted jumpshot that is giving ‘my mom said i needed to do this to get a good christmas present’ energy.

Signature shot: A half-hearted jumpshot that is giving ‘my mom said i needed to do this to get a good christmas present’ energy.

Standard statline: 3-0-0 with 50% shooting, 6 minutes of playtime.

[The Honeless Beard]

put him in, coach

Scouting Report: Javi is a referee’s worst nightmare, because is it still a travel when you’re literally walking on the air? At 5’5” and 155 pounds, Javi’s height and weight is irrelevant, because he can walk on air. Javi’s handle ability and his athletic prowess are also, similarly, irrelevant, because he can walk on air.

Analysis: Javi plays literally any position because he can walk on air - they will park him near either basket and he can just drop the ball into the net if he focuses hard enough. They will need to create entire rules just around Javi’s abilities. This will destroy the basketball world as we know it. I regret taking Supers powers literally in this thread because that means I’d have to take Javi’s literally and of COURSE Elena would give me Javi. Fuck.

Signature shot: Dropping a ball into the hoop from 6 inches above it.

Standard statline: Javi could score like 900 points.

real question is whether it counts as a lane violation if you're in midair over the key

Just underpaid referees at a high school level having full blown shouting matches in the official league office about this.

[The Honeless Beard]

Can you do Sofia from PV3?

Scouting Report: At slightly above average height (5’7” and 10 stone 5) Sofia is explicitly mentioned to have an athletic build - which means that she’s generally built for endurance, with the athleticism mostly born out of general life-living and not targeted towards sports/organized activity. That means that she won’t have the body for ball necessarily, but will do as a long term minutes eater - she also has ‘spark plug’ status as a quick heat check off the bench due to her ability to sit for a while and then start quickly.

Analysis: We’ll slot Sofia at a controversial 2 guard, but honestly she’s likely a 2-3 split between the positions. We can assume that she doesn’t have the skillset to hone her craft at shooting, but I think defense and rack-running gives her a lot of leeway to hold her interest - it’s likely much more exciting. I think it’s safe to mark her for a lot of minutes but not a lot of involvement in the offence unless a loose ball goes her way.

Signature shot: A poke-steal followed by a rack-running layup at the other end.

Standard statline: 9-5-4 with 2 steal/blocks in some respect.