Hey guys, I like many of you I assume, enjoy playing association mode and building/rebuilding teams more-so than any other mode in NBA 2k13. However, by this point in the year where the game has been out a while I often get burned out on playing the mode traditionally. By now I've already played multiple years with my favorite team, rebuilt young teams like the Cavs, Bobcats, Magic etc, and rebuilt aging teams like the Lakers or Mavs...I want to keep playing the game and building teams, but by now it has just gotten a little stale and repetitive.
So I have come up with a few alternative ways to play and challenge myself in the mode that I will share with you and you can feel free to suggest other unconventional ways to play as well so we can all keep enjoying the game until 2k14's release. I feel like this is one of the best ways to have fun and force yourself to do things differently than you normally would in association mode.
1. Expansion Team
My first idea was to create a brand new "expansion" team and build it from the ground up; literally starting with nothing. Obviously there is no way to add an extra team to association, but you can replace one by selecting league customization to "on" when you first start it up.
But before that, you can go into Options--> Manage Roster--->Create New Team to create your own unique new franchise. The options are fairly limited, but there are around 30 logos as well as any letter or number to choose from as well as changing the 3 main colors when creating the team logo and you can also edit the home and away jersey's to your liking. I decided to rid the league of the Sacramento Kings and create the Seattle Stars using a black/orange/white color scheme due to them actually almost moving to Seattle this off-season.
Now here is where your own preferences come into play, the next thing you do is to select your roster. The way I see it, there are a couple ways to go about doing this for an expansion team challenge:
1. Copy the Kings roster to the new team and take over that team as it is.
This is the most realistic, but also the most boring considering all that will change from doing a regular association is the uniforms/stadium/logo.
2. Set rules for yourself on what players could be taken from other teams in a real life expansion scenario.
For example maybe all players in the starting 5 and anyone over 75 OVR is off-limits, but anyone else is fair game to add to your team. Maximum 1 player to be taken from each team. I did not use this set of rules, but I think it could be fun for a medium type challenge as you won't have anyone high rated, but you can quickly gather young talent with potential in the first year.
3. Compose your team entirely of players in the Free Agent Pool.
First copy the roster of whatever team you took over to your new team and start the association. Next, flash fire sale! You must trade everybody on your roster away for as many draft picks as you can over the next 2 years get to start over from scratch. As you get rid of players, sign anybody in the FA Pool you wish to a 1 year contract to keep your roster above 12 until there are nothing but your free agents left. Anybody that can't be traded for a pick must be released. Your first year will be rough and you will be one of the worst teams in the league, but you will have multiple draft picks to help bring in a young core of talent over the next 2 years and start molding into a contender. You will also have tons of cap space to potentially lure somebody like CP3 or Dwight Howard to your franchise and get off the ground quickly. This is probably the second to hardest way to go, you will be terrible to start, but lots of draft picks and cap space will give you flexibility to turn it around quickly. This was the method I went with for my Seattle Stars.
4. Compose your team of only Free Agents (No trading method)
You start off with your old teams players, but have to release them all! Sign anyone in the Free Agent Pool to fill your team (not including the ones you released). Not only will your team be bad, but you will have just whatever CAP space is left over and only a 1st and 2nd round pick along with progression to get better each year. Also your opposing teams will be better since they can sign any of your former players if they have the money without losing any draft picks or players. This is the toughest challenge with the longest road ahead of you.
For my association, I used method #3 and replaced the Sacramento Kings with the Seattle Stars. Trading away Tyreke, Cousins, etc and starting over with these players in my first year:
PG - Delonte West / Sherron Collins
SG - Michael Redd / K. Azuibuike / Kyle Weaver / Darius Johnson-Odom
SF - Damion James/ Tyler Honeycutt
PF - Trey Thompson / JaJuan Johnson / Justin Harper
C - Hasaan Whiteside / Dexter Pittman
Naturally, after simming the first year my team ended up 3-11 and the worst record in the league. (14 game schedule is my preference with 3/3/3/7 playoffs, but that part is up to you). Luckily, I had accumulated 8 first round picks from trading away the Kings roster and had plenty of CAP space to turn it around the following year.
When I had the option to resign any of my players, about half of them decided to test Free Agency and I only offered a few contracts to the remaining half. Tyler Honeycutt, Darius Johnson-Odom, Trey Thompson, and Dexter Pittman all received contract offers.
Unfortunately, I did not get the number 1 pick in the draft lottery despite having the best chance at it, but luck was on my side in other ways as I had acquired picks 2,3,4,7,13,26,28,29 (LOL I know, but it's just for fun right?) I traded away picks 7,13, 26, 28, and 29 along with my 2nd rounders to get picks 5 and 6 so I would just have them all in a row after the first pick.
In the draft I selected:
Round 1, 2nd Pick - SF Shabezz Muhammed (78/A+ Pot)
Round 1, 3rd Pick - PF Nerlens Noel (77/B- Pot)
Round 1, 4th Pick - C Cody Zeller (78/B Pot)
Round 1, 5th Pick - PG Michael Carter-Williams (72/B- Pot)
Round 1, 6th Pick - PF Rudy Boert (74/C Pot)
All of the players I drafted turned out well in my opinion and I was excited about the future of the team; even if 5 of those players ended up being my starting line-up going into the year. But I did have Free Agency left and tons of CAP space to fill out the roster.
First I offered contracts to Brandon Jennings (87) and Chris Paul (94) thinking a great PG would be a solid start to a young team rather than going after Dwight Howard. Brandon Jennings accepted my deal, but he was a restricted free agent and the Bucks decided to match my generous offer.
Next I noticed that I also would need role players to fill out the roster so I went through and looked to see what was out there. To my delight, Victor Oladipo (Drafted 10th overall in the 2nd round) was not offered a contract by the Warriors after they took him in the second, so I quickly offered him a deal. Undrafted Free Agent Tim Hardaway Jr also caught my eye as a project player and I sent him an offer as well. I also found Brandon Wright, a 26 year old athletic Center that I thought could be a good back-up to Zeller and offered him a 4 year deal.
Luckily, Olidapo, Hardaway Jr, and Wright all accepted my offers rather quickly and my team was starting to take shape. Tyler Honeycutt, Darious Johnson-Odom, Dixter Pittman, and Trey Thompkins also decided my offer was the best they would get so they all decided to return to the team for it's 2nd year.
Happy with my team, but still lacking 1 true star, I decided to increase my offer to Chris Paul in hopes of bringing him in and making him the face of my franchise. A star role, 3 year contract with his option for a 4th, $18 million starting salary, gradually increasing to $20 million in the final year if he chose to stay, and of course, a no trade clause. The works, how could he turn it down?? Well, he couldn't, and CP3 took his talents to Seattle
And now going into the 2nd year my roster sits like this:
PG - Chris Paul (96, ^2) / Michael Carter Williams (74, ^2)
SG - Victor Oladipo (74, ^2) / Darius Johnson-Odom (71, ^2) / Tim Hardaway Jr (65, ^2)
SF - Shabazz Muhammad (80, ^2) / Tyler Honeycutt (68, ^1)
PF - Nerlens Noel (79, ^2) / Rudy Gobert (75, ^1) / Trey Thompkins (67, ^1)
C - Cody Zeller (80, ^2) / Brandon Wright (72) / Dexter Pittman (60, ^2)
I'm very happy with the progress I've made and am having tons of fun with the mode. I kind of got carried away with the details, but I hope to inspire other people to keep playing the game and try out new ways to make it interesting. I also did another association involving a fantasy draft and special rules so I will follow up this post with those details to keep this posts length down a bit.
Feel free to let me know your thoughts and also be sure to post any other ideas for different ways to play association as well if you have any!