$15 Game... THE RESULTS!

We did it!

For the last week or so I’ve been meaning to put this together, but people kept entering submissions to the form, and the Rock M Nation $15 Game kept growing. So let’s recap... you have $15 to spend on these players below:

So Josh made the graphic and I set up the form, and we let people have at it. The results are finalized — well, not entirely since the form is still open — and now we can see who everyone picked! Before we hop into the votes, let’s take a look at the overall ballots.

We had 362 submissions to the Google Form!

Of the 362, 17 of them failed to keep their team at $15 or under, with the biggest offender attempting to field a team worth $24. I too would like a team that features Kareem Rush, Arthur Johnson, Phil Pressey, Linas Kleiza, Jontay Porter, Jimmy McKinney, and Travon Bryant.

The minimum team fielded cost just $1. One player, two submissions... it was Jordan Geist. Is anyone surprised by that? I’m not.

25 submissions came in under the $15 allotment, with 13 submissions choosing more than 5 players. But a highly valuable $13 team with seven players might’ve been my favorite submission.

So what was the most selected team?

It’s not entirely clear but we can say this:

Photo by Peter G. Aiken/Getty Images

The combination of Jontay Porter, Ricardo Ratliffe, and Jordan Barnett was a VERY popular pick. I’m not surprised by Ratliffe or Barnett. Getting a 6’7” 40%+ three point shooter on the wing, who can defend and rebound for just $1 is a great value. As is a sturdy 6’8” high efficiency finisher around the basket and someone who doesn’t need a ton of post touches, but can succeed on dump-offs and putbacks.

Then comes the top overall vote getter: Jontay Porter. There are plenty of articles over the years where I’ve lavished praise on the younger Porter, but I’m a little surprised he was THIS popular. Porter played one season for the Tigers and averaged 9.9 points and 6.8 rebounds. His skill level was super high, but I tend to think a lot of these votes were based upon what we thought we were going to get from Jontay in year two, versus what we actually got.

Here is the full list of votes received — FYI I removed the votes from anyone whose selections caused their dollar amount to go over $15:

• Jontay Porter - 162
• Ricardo Ratliffe - 145
• Jordan Barnett - 131
• Marcus Denmon - 122
• Demarre Carroll - 105
• Kareem Rush - 98
• Phil Pressey - 88
• Michael Dixon - 85
• Jordan Clarkson - 80
• Kassius Robertson - 77
• Zaire Taylor - 76
• J.T. Tiller - 76
• Jordan Geist - 63
• Kim English - 62
• Travon Bryant - 61
• Laurence Bowers - 57
• Linas Kleiza - 54
• Clarent GIlbert - 52
• Alex Oriakhi - 37
• Jimmy McKinney - 25
• Earnest Ross - 24
• Jabari Brown - 23
• Arthur Johnson - 22
• Rickey Paulding - 13
• Leo Lyons - 13

I think the most common lineup was probably something along the lines of Phil Pressey, Marcus Denmon, then Barnett, Porter, and Ratliffe.

It would seem the 3-4-5 combination appeared on 23 different ballots.

J.T. Tiller and Zaire Taylor having the same number of votes is kinda cool.

I’m a little surprised Rickey Paulding and Leo Lyons were so under-voted. Lyons’ versatility was was integral to the Tigers’ Elite 8 run in 2009. And Paulding was an top level scorer from the wing who could attack from all three levels. He and Johnson were a part of one of the more underachieving Tiger teams their Senior year, but it’s hard to deny the four year production.

What did you notice about the votes? Let’s talk about all the weird decisions!

EDIT: Oops, missed Demarre Carroll... he’s been added in bc he actually got the 5th most votes.