i dont think its that difficult. start with rafer, tmac, shane, howard, deke. who do you bring off the bench? luther subs rafer, bonzi subs tmac, kirk subs shane, chuck subs howard. cut into chuck or kirk's minutes to get tmac back in earlier. maybe kirk's minutes will be limited, but i think it honestly takes more effort to keep the rotation limited to 8 than to expand it as a natural result of the subbing pattern. especially when we're looking at chuck hayes as our sole backup to deke, it's apparent we've been playing pretty small already, so we might as well play with the one guy who's actually athletic enough to run in small ball (snyder).
uh.... You got Deke/Juwan/Hayes sharing 33 minutes?!? This type of smallball will not only be a height deficiency, but giving Yao more feet/leg trouble and foul trouble from having to help defensively if anything. You're basically giving Kirk and Bonzi the same amount of minutes than 3 players who has played phenomenal during this stretch. I'd give yao 30-35 per game at best. Also, you dont' want Tracy to play 10-15 minutes each on 3 positions. You can't really ask a guy to continually guard different players on the court when he could lock on to one. It really is a mental challenge. Finally, by playing Kirk 26 and Bonzi 28, that means you'll have two very similar offensive player on at the same time, which is very redundant because both needs a lot of space to operate. Bonzi is better at his offense and finishing and Snyder better at defense, but when talking about it offensively, both relies on one-on-one matchups. Bonzi uses the bost or slashes into a post while Snyder tries to slash around the baseline. Both are mediocre shooters and very streaky. One's more athletic than other. But I'm sure you can see how they might have trouble spacing with each other on the court. It really is a nice thought and I'd love to find a real way to get both on the court (snyder/wells), but a 10 man rotation is a lot to handle. We could really only hope for a lot of blowouts so everyone can play and our starts don't have to log in 35 a night.
Here's how I would do it, assuming no foul trouble. Starting Lineup: Alston/TMac/Battier/Hayes/Yao Hayes starts to compliment Yao with his defensive rebounding and crashing the boards. With Howard and possibly Battier able to play the 4, Hayes can be more aggressive on defense and be a great asset to have hovering around the basket for passes as long as he makes his layups. Yao/TMac/Alston are all great passers and Battier is smart enough to find him as well. I'd give an early rest to Hayes/Yao out together, maybe around 4-5 minutes left in first quarter. Howard/Mutombo comes in together, giving us what we have as a starting lineup now and building chemistry. Alston goes out around the 3 minute mark whenever there is a dead ball. Head comes in for limited PG duties, but TMac controls the ball and offense. End of 1st Quarter minutes distribution: Alston: 9 TMac: 12 Battier: 12 Hayes: 7-8 Yao: 7-8 Howard: 4-5 Mutombo: 4-5 Head 3 Start the second quarter by giving Battier a quick rest, moving TMac to the 3, put in Bonzi. This group's purpose is to give a team a chance to get some offense in and hold off while TMac controls the ball on offense. Around the 2-3 minute mark, replace Mutombo and Tmac with Hayes and Alston. This is where it gets a little iffy because Hayes has a tendency to get in foul trouble, but I do believe that Juwon could keep himself fresh. Alston coming in moves Head as a small shooting guard and allows the offense to run through what he and Bonzi could create. Head does have a tendency to find Hayes with passes and with 2 shooters (yes, I counted rafer as a 3 point shooter, just less teardrops), it could give time for both TMac and Yao off the court while the offense go small. Deke should be done for the quarter, giving him well deserved rest for his work this year. His minutes should be limited to stay fresh this year after Yao's back. Try to make it to around the 5 minute mark, Head will take a rest, allowing Battier to come back in for a defensive effort. It should be time for Yao to step back in, protecting Howard and the possibility of foul trouble from both Hayes and Howard. With about 5 minutes left (7 minutes in quarter), put TMac back in for Bonzi, giving our starting lineup back for the remaining 5 minutes. Of course, if foul trouble happens, you have good backup in each position. If we need some last shots, we put our shooters in, protect Yao from foul trouble, etc. Minutes breakdown: Rafer 18-19 Tmac 19-20 Battier 19 Hayes 16-18 Yao 14-15 Howard 9-10 Mutombo 6-8 Head 8 Wells 7 (9 man rotation) 3rd Quarter: Starters start, feed through Tmac/Yao. I'd go with Yao ready since his endurance might allow him to become more efficient early. This should be when TMac really takes over. Let him exert himself more for about 8 minutes. Take TMac out around 8 minutes if he shows sign of fatique and if he's not in one of those shooting phases where he's making everything. Take TMac out with Hayes. In comes Head/Howard. This allows the offense to run through Yao with shooters available. Also, Battier's corner shooting creates spacing with Head running the middle and Alston as a weak-side slasher if first option's not available. Howard allows a FT range shooter that could help space. With about 2 minutes left, rest Battier for a stretch run, put Bonzi in for extra minutes. This allows Howard to push his offense between 15-18 feet and have a double post with Bonzi/Yao. End of 3rd quarter Minutes breakdown: Rafer 30-31 Tmac 27-28 Battier 29 Hayes 24-26 Yao 26-27 Howard 13-14 Mutombo 6-8 Head 12 Wells 9 (9 man rotation) Start of 4th Quarter: Rafer gets his final rest, likely a short one. Snyder gets a chance to play with Bonzi, assuming I'm wrong that they can't co-exist. Yao goes out, Mutumbo gets short minutes. We start with Head/Snyder/Bonzi/Howard/Mutumbo. This offense will run through Bonzi while Mutombo lurks around on the weak side. Snyder plays weak side and Howard/Head are the offensive weapons. This is a short spurt where you take your chances and run when it's available. It's also important that this team keeps under control to play defense as your stars are out as well as Battier's intangibles. This is very similar to the old Chicago Bull's rotation where the starters get a rest for the most part while the bench gets playing time to keep fresh and possibly get some unity. This, in my opinion, is a good group to put together. You take your chances off turnovers, have a running team while Mutombo can slowly move upcourt if it goes to a half court set. He could slowly make his way to the basket for some possible defensive lapses. Snyder can drive weakside baseline early and try to get easy scoring opportunities. 3-4 minute mark, Mutombo's out, and so is Snyder. Sorry, but there's just no way to play either Bonzi or Snyder for too long with this offense. In this case, I might take out Bonzi to let Snyder feed off of TMac. Mutombo is playing as a bench player now. If he even comes out at all in the 4th, he can't play too long after such a long rest. You milk what you can and try to keep his minutes down. That's it for him. Battier comes in for Mutumbo and TMac back in to take control. Head to PG. It's now Head/Snyder/TMac/Battier/Howard. This is a small team that could run the court. Snyder could penetrate the weak side and TMac will try to take over again. Around the 6 minute mark, put Alston/Yao back in for Head/Snyder. This gives Howard his final minute or two to expand the lead. Hayes in for Howard around 4 minutes if we have a good lead. Approximate FINAL minutes distribution: Alston: 36-37 TMac: 35-36 Battier: 36 Hayes: 28-30 Yao: 32-33 Howard: 21-22 Mutombo: 9-12 Head: 18 Wells: 12-13 Snyder: 6 Of course, it's not really as easy as that, but it allows each member of a "10" man rotation to fit in while they're in. It won't work vs smaller teams like the Suns where Mutombo might not even play, but you get the jist of it. EDIT: For the record, this is just something for as soon as Yao gets back. This gives him more time on the bench while players get a chance to earn some time on the court. Hayes should not get that many minutes once Yao's healthy and Bonzi might take some time on the court with Battier on the 4 some too.
You guys are treating having a deep rotation as if it were its own reward or an objective in itself. It's not. Winning is the point, and having a rotation that wins is a lot more important than getting Kirk Snyder (or Bonzi Wells) 6 minutes per game. I don't think any player in the NBA that consistently plays 6mpg. THere might be guys who average 6mpg but that's probably the product of a lot of 15 minute games averaged in with 1-2 minute cameo role. I keep hearing people invoke the suns - the suns play at the fastest pace in the NBA yet they overwhelmingly rely on their core 6 players since their forwards and guards are relatively interchangeable - you could essentially put almost any combination of the core 6 out there and have a viable lineup. Nash, Bell, Barbosa, Marion, Diaw Stoudemire all play 32+ minutes per night. THe only guy that has consistently been in the rotation (absent a brief cameo from Marcus Banks, though he plays now that nash is hurt) other than those six is James Jones. A bench doesn't get much shorter than that, so I'm puzzled as to why we need to lengthen an already longer rotation to deal with it.
Candlegreen If only JVG had you along side him on the coache's bench. You could force JVG's hand to be more flexable inhis rotation. I like the idea of Yao Ming playing 30-33 mins, in this way he won't get overly exhausted. your idea sounds great and all our players would be in good shape for the playoffs.
As opposed to the 34.5 minutes he was averaging when he went out? Yes those cumulative extra 30-something minutes over the course of the season were kiling him.
I agree with SamFisher. 8 man rotation is fine. Generally, that should give starters about 30-36min a game and bench players 12-18. NBA players in shape should have no problems doing 30min a game. Obviously minutes vary depending on foul trouble, momentum, matchups, score, etc. As long as our starters aren't hitting 40+min, I'm fine with this type of rotation.
That would only work if everything works perfectly.... The game situation, struggling shooters, defense lapses, foul trouble all go into this. This is something I might try to go into when Yao just got back. When the time comes that Yao's healthy, a lot of those minutes might disappear from Snyder/Hayes/Mutombo. For the playoff run, I might try to keep guys fresh. Hayes should not get that many minutes because he plays in spurts. I also have the idea of blowouts in mind on some games. I like the idea of resting Battier/Yao/TMac if we have a sizable lead. I like that idea starting the 4th, very much like those old Bulls days. That gives them a chance to NOT have to come back in the game if the bench does things right. It also gives people like Snyder a chance to get playing time, possibly through the end, and limit minutes to around 30 for the starters. Sadly, you can't take Rafer out too long for games. It just can't be done as seen to what happened in the Dallas game when he went down for a brief moment. The offense just doesn't seem to run without him or TMac on the court, and you can't force TMac to handle the ball up the court every possession. It really does get tiring and the defense will put pressure just to tire him out and limit his on-the-court time.
This is not a standing prototype, just something to get more playing time for a month or so after Yao comes back. All of this doesn't matter if things don't work perfectly. The extra minutes with Snyder and Mutombo probably won't even cultivate, much less the 20 something from Hayes. This has a lot to do with perfect matchups or something that could keep the offense and defense moving while giving rest.
If Mutombo plays, it'll be 9 anyways. But yeah, 30-36 is a decent amount with a deep bench, and I kinda agree with Snyder not able to do much with token minutes (7 or so). Those minutes will probably go to Battier/Wells with Hayes getting less minutes, IN THE PERFECT ENVIRONMENT. I agree with winning at all cost and I've been supporting JVG all this time. I might not agree with everything, but he's winning and there's nothing to complain about. But everyone's talking about minutes distribution and disruption or not, added minutes will end up wearing a player down, especially a player that had past conditioning problems and off of a surgery.
There is a reason games are played in real life and not on paper. Your setup would give a random bizarre mix of players on the court all the time, with their roles constantly changing and shifting everytime there was a substitution. All it would lead to is a bunch of confusion and total inconsistency - exactly the opposite of what makes this team successful.
i think there will be many times when you don't need Deke and Hayes playing the same game together, or even Juwan and Hayes. so it will usually be only 2 players sharing 33 minutes when they play. also, when Deke plays i don't see how he helps Yao defensively since they will never play together. also, Bonzi doesn't give up much if anything in size to Hayes except maybe shorter arms and worse rebounding and post defense although who knows. Battier doesn't really give up too much in size to Juwan, and although his rebounding is a little worse, he is a far better defender. at the beginning of the season, Juwan and Deke weren't even part of the regular rotation. now all of a sudden they are worthy of 30+ and 25+ minutes each? what happened? did their skills suddenly improve? did they really find the fountain of youth? what happened as usually happens with Gundy is that he was forced to play them with injuries to Chuck, T-Mac and Yao. was it so surprising that they flourished with the opportunity? Bonzi and Kirk have been unhealthy for so much of the season that they have lost lots of time and basically have to wait for another "injury" to happen to get any or more minutes. it doesn't seem to matter how good they actually are or how good they could play given such an opportunity. Gundy only seems to give out these opportunities when someone gets injured. Juwan and Deke are peaking way too soon. there is no way, that they, particularly Deke can continue playing like this. as for T-Mac playing multiple positions, i don't expect him to ever guard PGs unless they're big and slow, or just slow or just big which is quite rare. but he will be the real PG in that when Rafer goes to the bench, there is no one else that can really run the offense. this is when "SG" Kirk or even Luther come in to guard the opposing PG. as a swingman, T-Mac has always played G-F with the varying defensive assignments it entails. i had Bonzi and Kirk playing 28 and 26 minutes. that doesn't mean that they're going to be on the court at the same together for most of the time. their is only a forced overlap of 6 minutes together. realistically, it will be closer to 10-15 minutes which is a little more than one quarter of basketball. mostly when either T-Mac or Rafer (not both which shows the importance of T-Mac as point forward) is not on the court. in my example, i had Kirk as a low-minute starter and Bonzi as the sixth man although this could easily be reversed. this is what i find shocking. that right now, Yao is injured and Bonzi and Kirk still can't both play.
Because Yao being injured does not affect the 2-3 logjam one iota. I don't find it shocking at all. The Rockets don't have a lot of multi-dimensional, interchangeable players - and the ones they do have are all in the 2-3 range. An injury at the 1 or 5 slots really doesn't affect these guys at all.
not one iota? well, i find it shocking, actually considering Gundy, i don't find it too shocking that he would rather overplay Deke at center, and Juwan at PF, and Rafer at PG when he could play Deke less at center, Juwan more at center at much less at PF, Hayes more at center OR PF, Battier more at PF and less at SF, T-Mac more at point-forward and less at pure SG/SF, Bonzi more at SF and even a little PF, and Kirk at defensive PG and more at pure SG/SF. it's kind of like musical chairs. T-Mac, Battier, Kirk and Bonzi are not pure 2-3 players. offensively or defensively, they are more than that. if the Rockets end up playing against Phoenix, Dallas and Detroit in the playoffs and find they have little use for Deke, Juwan and Chuck and a Rafer/Luther backcourt, it's going to be too late to work Bonzi/Kirk into the rotation.
OK, let me stop you right here. Neither Snyder nor Wells can play Mutumbo, Howard, or Alston's position. How much they play has no bearing on the 2-3 logjam, because not one of the rockets 5 2-3 players (with a few exceptions that I will note below) can play their positions either. People will tell you that Wells can play PF. I find that unsupported. Yes, Wells can play with his back to the basket. However he's 6-5 and he's not Charles Barkley, which is why he plays SG and SF for most of his career. He logged less than 1% of Sacramento's PF minutes last year. Why is he a PF all of a sudden? My guess is that he's not. I mean I can tell you that I wouldn't want Wells trying to guard Duncan, Boozer, Garnett, Gasol, etc., and apparently none of his coaches really have either. I used to think Battier should be the regular PF for the Rockets, and he has palyed about 17% of the minutes their this season - but the results have shown otherwise. He gets eaten up on defense and especially in rebounding at the 4 spot. This is apparent from watchign the games as well as the numbers. So - why move Battier to PF - when he's less effective there -- just to lenghten the rotation? I'm not sure what that entails,I guess you mean taking out Alston AND Head. This enhances the load on McGrady considerably giving him the job of bringing the ball up and initiating the offense, and even worse taking out the perimeter shooters he needs to operate. (Alston's shot stinks, but Snyder & Wells make him look like Chuck Person). Again, I don't see how this makes the Rockets better. NO, they're almost all pure 2-3 players. They've played exclusively there throughout their careers. They're almost as pure as it gets. Simply because McGrady is mutlitalented doesn't mean it's best to surround him with some redundant players and force more of the PG duties on to him. And you're forgetting Head - who has been the most effective bench player for the Rockets this year, and whose best position is SG. You want to drop his PT (even though as a shooter he's a much better fit) too, just to work in extra bodies. That just doesn't fly. The bottom line is that the Rockets have five guys who can play 2, 3, or both, and only 96 minutes a game to split between them. Considering that 70 of those minutes will go to Battier and Tracy, you're slicing the pie very thinly for no good reason. Phoenix has 7 man rotation, anyway, why does playing phoenix entail palying their game? It hasn't worked for anybody who has tried it. Ask New Jersey. Ask Golden State. I would rather the Rockets tried to play their own game rather than some mediocre cobbled-together facsimile of Phx (or Dallas') offense. If you really want to match Phx you might as well just sit Yao the entire series.
I went with the box scores of the past couple weeks. They're averaging these minutes and rightly so. By playing them less minutes, you're allowing your team to have a huge size underlap by playing too many swingmen, who has the same type of offensive game that requires a lot of room to work with. The dimensions of the court makes it really hard for these two players to play progressively and keep floor spacing for dished-out shooters.
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i can't help but think of the Bulls (the second three-peat) and to a degree, the first Phil Jackson (i wish i didn't have to bring him up) led Lakers squad. those Bulls teams had three starting swingmen (Jordan, Pippen, Harper) a fourth swingman-sized PF (Rodman), and Luc Longley. only Jordan was a strong 3 point shooter among the starters, and he never had an open shot. notable bench players were a tweener forward (Kukoc), a couple three point specialists (Kerr/Buechler), a half-way serviceable PF(Caffey), ancient or mediocre centers(Parish/Wennington/Salley/Simpkins), a defensive guard (Randy Brown), and a rental forward/center for one postseason (Brian Williams aka Bison Dele). outside of their big three, they didn't have too much, especially in the way of big men, but they still went 203-43 (82.5%) with 3 championships. anyway, i don't know how those teams accomplished what they did without sharpshooters and quality bigs.
Well, they have Jordan who breaks down any defenses. Harper is a tall PG if anything. He's really not a swingman. He does not shoot that much and his sole purpose is to play alongside Jordan, and later on, Kobe. Harper is a great defender on PGs where putting TMac Bonzi or Snyder on a PG might be disasterous, especially if it's TMac and his back. Even more, I wouldn't have TMac play the 4 and try to lean forward to stop opposing PFs from backing on him. That is a recipe for lower back disaster.
