Fantasy Basketball Rankings: NBA Playoffs Cheat Sheet 2015

This article is part of our Fantasy Basketball Rankings series.

NBA Playoffs Cheat Sheet 2015

Some call the playoffs the real season because it's when things are ultimately decided, but in the NBA, it's more than that.

From a fantasy perspective, the playoffs are the real season because it's the first and only time all year you can be sure every player is going all-out on a nightly basis. No more players missing games to rest for the postseason. No more scanning the waiver wire for backups who could be potential studs when the normal starter shuts it down for the year. No more teams sitting their entire starting lineups, like the Hawks did about once per week for the last month. No, in the postseason you'll be getting every player's max effort, which makes a major difference.

The second big difference is that, in many NBA postseason leagues, you have to choose your players based upon which teams you think will fare best in the postseason. Games count, so it does little good to pick the No. 1 fantasy player in the league if he's going to be knocked out in the first round. Instead, it might be smarter to invest in a top-20 guy who has a shot to make the Finals and play in 20-plus games over the course of the postseason. NBA postseason fantasy leagues make you try your hand at predicting what will happen on the court, with dire consequences if you're wrong.

The Matchups

East

1. Atlanta
2. Cleveland
3. Chicago
4. Toronto
5. Washington
6. Milwaukee
7. Boston
8. Brooklyn

West

1. Golden State
2. Houston
3. Los Angeles Clippers
4. Portland
5. Memphis
6. San Antonio
7. Dallas
8. New Orleans

Team Tiers

Tier 1: GSW, CLE, ATL
Tier 2: HOU, LAC, SAS
Tier 3: CHI, TOR, WAS, POR, MEM
Tier 4: MIL, BOS, BRO, DAL, NOP

This tier system is based on which teams I feel have the best chance to make it the furthest. Golden State has been the class of the West this season, plus there is a clearer gap between the Warriors and their first and potential-second-round opponents than any other team in the stacked West. In the East, Atlanta and Cleveland have separated themselves from the field in a similar way.

The Rockets, Clippers and Spurs each have the ability to represent the West in the Finals as well, but the way the bracket is set up means they would have to get through each other to get there. Thus, they can't all play the same number of games and must be placed one level down from Golden State.

The Bulls and the 4/5 seeds in each conference comprise Tier 3, teams that I see potentially making the second round but not advancing much further.

If any of the Tier 4 teams make the second round, it would be an upset to me.

The tiers reflect an estimated number of expected games. For uniformity, let's say that Tier 1 teams are expected to play 20 games, Tier 2 teams 15 games, Tier 3 teams 10 games and Tier 4 teams five games. Of course, the estimates are not intended to be exact but instead to provide general expectations for the rankings.

Ranking method

I began with the Yahoo! season-long player ratings, sorted by average statistics. I then rearranged it a bit based upon some of my expectations for the playoffs. For example, I moved LeBron James and Tony Parker up on the rankings on the assumption that they will both play better and play more games than most teams in the postseason.

My modified rankings were on a scale of 0.5 to 1.5, with the idea that you would need about three games from a player rated 0.5 to try to approximate what you'd get out of a player rated 1.5. Again, this isn't scientifically rigorous, it's more to give us a cleaner break-down of player value.

Once each player had both a player rating and a rough estimate for the number of games played, the final ranking order was determined by multiplying those two values together. Injuries that haven't been officially deemed season-ending aren't factored into the rankings.

Without further ado, here is your 2015 NBA Playoffs Cheat Sheet.