Van Gundy has repeatedly said that he doesn't think there such a thing as playing too many minutes. I like JVG as a coach, but the level of energy of our players has declined mainly due to their injuries. The defense played in the last couple of games is a good indicator of how much "juice" they have left. All season long, he has asked T-Mac to initiate the offense and play top notch defense while averaging 42 minutes a game.
TMac doesn't have to do point guard duties since early this season for the most part. Our team isn't that deep at the 3 either.
I'd probably be a little more worried if McGrady's game were about banging for inside position (ala Shaq, Yao, or Dream) or if it were about being hell-bent to get to the rim (ala Iverson or Francis). TMac plays the game with an economy of motion that reminds of the great ones who didn't force things...MJ, Bird, Magic, Dr J... I'm not making a talent comparison so much as a stylistic comparison.
JVG's opinion may be right concerning energy level. But I think he neglected the injury factor simply from a statistical point of view. If you have a certain percent chance of getting injured every minute you play, then the more minutes you play, the more likely you'll get injured. So yes, there is such a thing of playing too many minutes.
I think you have a really good point Easy. I'm not sure how much our lack of depth motivates JVG, and the situation may be circular is some sense, but he plays guys he likes a lot of minutes. He did this with JJ, Cuttino, and Stevie last year, and he's doing it this year too. He might be doing it because of our lack of depth, but he doesn't seem to like to play young guys either, so maybe he creates a sense of a lack of depth. Either way, I think it's certainly his style to play his best players as much as possible and part of the wear on this team is the cost of doing so -- especially considering how old our team is.
