Hoops Habit
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The Ultimate 1-on-1 NBA Fantasy Tournament

By Michael Dunlap

Jan 25, 2015; Cleveland, OH, USA; Cleveland Cavaliers forward LeBron James (23) looks to shoot against Oklahoma City Thunder guard Russell Westbrook (0) in the fourth quarter at Quicken Loans Arena. Mandatory Credit: David Richard-USA TODAY Sports
Jan 25, 2015; Cleveland, OH, USA; Cleveland Cavaliers forward LeBron James (23) looks to shoot against Oklahoma City Thunder guard Russell Westbrook (0) in the fourth quarter at Quicken Loans Arena. Mandatory Credit: David Richard-USA TODAY Sports /
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Who wouldn’t love seeing Kevin Durant square up against LeBron James in an old-school 1-on-1 matchup? How about a style clash with Stephen Curry against Marc Gasol? The NBA (and probably the players) aren’t fond of making a 1-on-1 tournament a reality, but at HoopsHabit.com, we thought we should give it a go.

We’ve picked 64 players to compete in our 1-on-1 tournament (more on methodology later) and the winner of each matchup will be determined by fan vote.

RULES

Standard 1-on-1 game, 2’s and 3’s to 21. Possessions will alternate in order to alleviate concerns about big mismatches. All other normal 1-on-1 rules apply — no free-throws will be taken, no technical fouls and no disqualifications.

We’ll vote on each matchup in each round to determine who moves on. All voting will be done on this piece and everyone will be allowed to vote once on each matchup. We’ll leave the voting open for 3 days in each round.

METHODOLOGY

Using Synergy stats, we were able to choose 64 players to participate in our tournament based on points per possession in isolation and score frequency on both offense and defense. We used the stats from the 2014-15 season and only players who had at least 50 possessions in isolation qualified (with a few small exceptions).

Each of the top-25 from each category were automatically included and earned points based on their standing (25 points for first, down to 1 point for 25th). By going through each of the four categories, we came up with 58 players, leaving six wild card spots.

WILD CARDS

Paul George missed the entire 2014-15 season and thus would not have qualified. He was given a wild-card entry into the tournament.

LeBron James, Jimmy Butler and Stephen Curry did not place in the top-25 in any of the categories but were given wild-card entry.

The third-to-last entry was gifted to John Wall, who for my money is one of the fastest, most electric players in the game who could do quite well in a 1-on-1 scenario.

The second-to-last entry was given to Kobe Bryant, who was in iso more than only six players in the league last season, but didn’t make the top-25’s for auto entry.

The last entry was awarded to Russell Westbrook, who had the fifth-most iso possessions of any player in the NBA.

NOTABLE EXCLUSIONS/CHANGES

Because of the equal inclusion of defensive standouts, some really good players were left off the list. If they didn’t qualify for any of the top-25’s and didn’t have the star power to knock off the wild cards, that’s just the way it goes. Our apologies to Rudy Gay, Andrew Wiggins, DeMarcus Cousins, DeMar DeRozan and Joe Johnson, among others.

There were two main subjective changes, made solely by my own opinion:

Carmelo Anthony would have been a No. 16 seed based on his points. He was moved up to a No. 4 seed, Courtney Lee was moved down.

James Harden would have been a No. 11 seed based on his points. He was moved up to a No. 1 seed, with Dirk Nowitzki moving to No. 2 seed and Jarrett Jack was moved down.

Next: Who Made The Cut/Seedings