Rookies vs. Sophomores Challenge

I always get geeked up for All-Star weekend. There's something about the atmosphere that encourages fun, excitement, and best of all - no defense.

Look, defense is great for winning basketball games, and no one appreciates a well-timed AK-47 block like myself, but in general I'd much rather watch offense. Give me a 127-124 game over 78-69 any day. And that's why I love the All-Star game and especially the Rookies vs. Sophomores Challenge.

We already got a prediction from our friends over at the Wages of Wins, and it looks like they were right on. The closest the game ever got was 0-0, and the rookies mostly looked lost and outmatched. I mean, Chris Paul had 9 steals. Nueve! Yikes.

Just for fun I calculated out the Win Scores for each player in this game. Mostly I was looking for a chance to pimp Deron Williams and Paul Millsap. Both of these players are big reasons why the Jazz are playing so well this year, and I'm glad they got a chance to show off in this game.

Millsap was definitely the best rookie in the game, scoring 22 and pulling down 8 rebounds, while compiling a Win Score per minute of 0.52. Has the rest of the league finally figured out what a player this guy is? Surprisingly, the next two highest Win Scores belonged to Rudy Gay and Adam Morrison. Maybe they could be more productive for their respective teams if the opponents would stop with the pesky defense! Unlucky Jordan Farmar rooted the rookies with his four turnovers and managed the only negative win score in the game.

Now for our victorious sophomores. David Lee had as close as you can get to a perfect game in basketball. Fourteen of fourteen shots, 11 rebounds and two blocked shots. His win score of 28 would have placed him on our top ten list for the year, if this were actually a real game.

As mentioned before, Chris Paul almost grabbed a triple double with points, assists and steals. And DWill had the third-highest Win Score per minute on the team, although he curiously only played 15 minutes. All in all, a tremendous game for the sophomores. When Monta Ellis shoots 13-16, you've done something right.

Here's hoping that the real All-Star game provides as much excitement and fun as this game did. And here's hoping for a few "Money" shots from Mehmet Okur (and we won't discuss whether the numbers agree that he should be in the game).