[CHRON] Rockets notes: Ariza's playing time could be reduced

T-Mac's ball handling skills are rare for players of his height, and I don't see Ariza one of them...

 

honestly here until people stop treating ariza like he has to be our guy that stays out on the court the most because he is our best player,the easier it will be to figure this out.

 

So how would you distribute the minutes then?

 

it depends on what mcgrady you want. Eventually i want mcgrady to take ariza's spot, but for now thats not in the plan for mcgrady until he gets into the flow of things, i am just saying gradually you take mins away from ariza, budinger, and lowry to get t-mac back up to speed

 

Given that status of minutes distribution, I think Lowry's minutes would be highly likely to be cut to give McGrady around 4 minutes of his another 8, also Ariza should only play up 30 mins. per game despite his claims that he's comfy with the minutes he played and wanna compete out there.

 

So let's say McGrady is back up to speed then. What's your ideal minute distribution for each player?

Personally I can't see a situation where all the players would be happy with their playing time. And the thing is, I really believe all our perimeter guys in the rotation are deserving of meaningful minutes.

 

You think McGrady should be playing 16 minutes for the rest of the season? And you'd still have to find some more minutes for Budinger, unless you want him to play less than 14 minutes.

Plus, we'd have a team in which no rotation player would be playing more than 30 minutes. Is there any team that functions that way?

 

mabye the celtics, i just dont believe the rockets are that deep

 

Well, I didn't suggest he should play 16 minutes for the rest of the season, I mean, gradually his minutes should be increased to somewhere around 16. As coach A said, he would evaluate his game and progress, that means if he's truly healthy, cutting off of Ariza's minutes and adding it up to McGrady's won't hurt anybody's feeling. Considering the possibility that McGrady plays well enough to earn more chances to be out there competing, Ariza should adjust his role back to what it was last year with the Lakers, spot up shooter and a deadly slasher. Whether or not it's gonna work out depends on how well McGrady's gonna perform.

As for Budinger, 14 minutes would probably be enough for him considering his instability to score and on and off shooting touch. Slightly changing the minutes one should play depends on the matchups we have, that won't be a tough task for Rick to figure out.

Well, as I know, the Hawks have been playing unselfish team ball lately and most of their players, expect Jamal Crawford and Josh Smith, played less than 30 minutes per game during the last couple games.

Here's the last game stat sheet from Yahoo! sports.
J. Johnson G 28:37
M. Bibby G 22:39
A. Horford C 32:05
J. Smith F 30:29
M. Williams F 17:04
J. Crawford 34:15
M. Evans 24:34
J. Teague 17:02
Z. Pachulia 16:51
R. Morris 8:34
O. Hunter 7:50

 

^^^
Good example, but that game was a blowout for Atlanta in which Joe Johnson didn't have to play in the fourth quarter. Johnson, their main scorer, is averaging 37 minutes this season.

 

Beautiful choice in car even if I am a little biased lol.

 

Yes, it had to come from somewhere, Ariza is the logical choice. He has been logging heavy minutes.

 

So depending on the certain condition, distributing minutes to both SG and SF positions could be flexible.

And also, Ariza, our secondary scorer on this team, is logging the most minutes played, his efficiency has really been an issue and he should put a lot of work to it.

 

If you are going to reduce Ariza's minutes (and you should) they should go to Budinger....

DD

 

Reducing minutes for Ariza, etc. for Tracy's insertion is a no-brainer. Rick will feel it out and as usual, whoever is playing the best out of the bunch or isn't in foul trouble, (minus Mac for the next couple of weeks) will remain on the court. At times all of our players will struggle and the players, fans, and coaches alike shouldn't mind if someone replaces them on the court. As long as it doesn't lead to Cook, Brian.

 

If Tracy does not improve dramatically in the next 5 games or so, he would go back to the bench.

This is a meritocracy, not a charity.

DD

 

http://blogs.chron.com/jeromesolomon/2009/12/ariza.html