I think Novak should start, while Wells or Snyder should finish the games. NBA games usually progress to pick up speed. Novak's lack of athletism will be less exposed at the begining of the game than at the end. Remember in 1995 we were starting non-athletic forwards (Chilcutt and Chucky Brown) but Mario was finishing the games. Also, running the 1995 analogy, I view Alston as a Kenny Smith - good to start the game and set things up. We need somebody to emerge as the new Cassell - a great closer. My prediction is that Head may emerge in this role; he is a clutch player, however, he is no Sam Cassell at this point . Spanoulis may eventually fit the Bill , but not likely until next year.
I have no problem seeing Snyder start. He deserves it at this point. But if he does not keep up, you can bet he'd be pulled. There are plenty other players who are competing for that 5th starter job too.
That is hard to understand. IMO, Novak has played his way into the rotation based on the preseason. Nevertheless, I can guarantee you we will have stretches where we can't score because our offensive chemistry clearly isn't where it needs to be. If JVG says he wants shooting and we have a guy that can hit 50% of open 3pt shots, how can he keep Novak off the floor? I do agree with the concept of starting Novak slowly at the beginning of the season. We don't want to burn him out midway through the season. But he should be out there every game getting 5, 10, 20 minutes depending on the situation.
I can't believe JVG would totally bench the guy and leave him out of the rotation except in a Padgett type role. Just can't see it after this preseason, his rookie preseason, and he played so well.
Of course I didn't mean you take 5 and put five in. But you start with Yao-SB-Tmac-Snyder-Alston. Wells and Novak are probably some of your early subs, depending on fouls and match-ups and game flow and such. Deke/JH for Yao and Head for Alston are regular subs too. But invariably Yao or Tmac will rest on the bench, though usually not together. And other times one of them will be on the floor, but maybe he will need a break or mix things up. These are times where Bonzi as the 3rd best offensive option on the whole team, is of most value, as is him being fresh. It won't be much fun for opponents best wing defender to have to work on Tmac and then draw a fresh Bonzi. Doesn't sound much fun at all. Now I don't think you can bring Snyder in off the bench and get this kind of presence, yet playing off of Yao/Tmac to start the game Snyder may be nearly as good as Bonzi. Thus Snyder (off the ball player) starting and Bonzi subbing (with the ball player) IMO best utilizes their strengths. This is analogous to the KS/SC rotation at PG, everyone knew overall Sam because the better player, but the advantage was much greater with the 2nd unit than playing with Hakeem and Clyde both in there. Now probably more often than not Bonzi will close games because he is the more experieced and overall superior player, but if Snyder is playing great and hitting 3s maybe at times he gets a chance as well. I think Sam was more of a "sparkplug" than a closer. Lots of games we closed with KS in there because he was money off the open look. Yes sometimes Sam was hot and we stuck with him at the end, but that wasn't his all the time role. I think Bonzi is the sparkplug for this team. I don't think we need to have a bench point guard do that. A bench point guard to knock down open Js and play defense and not screw up the flow of the offense is fine--right now it look to be Head. Well when the games really matter Elie was starting at SF and Horry at PF. Why? That made the best defensive team out there. The best way to demoralize opponents is to come out strong and shut them down. Weaken them up a little bit and get them to realize they need to shade their teams to defend Yao and Tmac. Once the defense is established and match-up problems with Yao and Tmac are established, then it is Novak's ideal time to get in there and bomb away on an overplaying defense. Then you have total demoralization, you have shut them down than tore them up on the inside (Yao/Tmac) then bombed them from the outside (Novak). Teams will get hopeless right away. But you put Novak out there right away and teams will target him right away. Everything about him will be learned, and every weakness exploited. You will have him trying to defend starting swingmen or power forwards, and guys who quickly learn on the other end just not to leave him open. I would not go this route unless Snyder just isn't working out and this seems like a better tinker than Bonzi.
