With the 12th and 13th picks in the draft, this team secured Dwyane Wade and Al Jefferson. Strengths of this pairing include scoring in particular, as well as the fact that between the two of them, the major categories have been addressed decently to start, with the exception of three-pointers. Wade is eligible at point guard while Al Jeff can play center, so there is no need to worry about positional issues.

This sounds like a good chance to draft a player who can 1) pad the stats Wade and Al Jeff are good at and 2) start to address three-pointers.

Round 3, Pick 12: Rudy Gay, SF/PF, Memphis Grizzlies

Gay has only been in the league for two years. Take a look at his stats.

2006-07: 78 GP, 42.2 FG%, 72.7 FT%, 10.9 ppg, 4.5 rpg, 1.3 apg, 0.7 3pg, 0.9 spg, 1.0 bpg, 1.8 topg

2007-08: 81 GP, 46.2 FG%, 78.5 FT%, 20.2 ppg, 6.2 rpg, 2.0 apg, 1.7 3pg, 1.4 spg, 1.0 bpg, 2.4 topg

Mike Miller now plays for the Minnesota Timberwolves, with O.J. Mayo being the major part of the trade coming back to Memphis. The following is a contender for most overused sentence heading into this season…Rudy Gay will be “the man” in Memphis this year. Gay took 16.7 field goal attempts per game last year. Compare that to LeBron James who launched almost 22 shots per game, every game. A couple more shot attempts per game could easily lead to a couple more points per game, but hopefully he keeps his FG% above 45%.

Fantasy geeks all love players that bring the 1-1-1 to the table i.e. at least one trey, steal and block per game. Due to his rebounding, Gay makes a better play in fantasy hoops at small forward, but he is eligible at power forward. In a head-to-head league, putting him at the four spot makes him a very tricky play because of his three-point shooting.

I like both Gay and Danny Granger this year, and they seem to be pretty similar fantasy players. If I can pass on Granger and Rudy is still available more than a round later? Woo hoo! Sign me up!