Spurs Try New "Fast Break Only" Defense, Succeed (Or Fail, Depending Upon Your Perspective)
Ugh. Just ugh.
I don't get the starting lineup change. The 76ers telecaster said tonight that Pop inserted Bogans back into the starting lineup for more defense. OK, I can go along with that. But then what logic explains the reinsertion of Matt Bonner back into the starting line-up? Surely the best defensive option on the front line with Duncan is Antonio McDyess. So then maybe the counterargument to that is Bonner is inserted to help make up for the lost offense that Bogans causes. But that is a zero sum game. Add some offense, subtract some offense; add some defense, subtract some defense. Doesn't really do anything. Besides, I'd argue that McDyess is equal to or greater than Bonner as an offensive option. Yes, Bonner gets your more 3s, but McDyess hits the open jumper, grabs offensive rebounds, and can get buckets inside.
Look, I can see the merit in "demoting" Jefferson to the bench. He's been playing lousy, and a shake up could help. And it seems to be helping, as Jefferson is playing with more aggression, passion, and even a smidge more intelligence. But I don't see the benefit at all of taking McDyess out of the starting lineup just as he was seemingly finding his groove and giving us exactly what we needed alongside Duncan.
In the last two games with this new starting lineup we've gotten off to really poor starts, digging ourselves into holes. I know that we always seem to fight our way back, but we don't need to. What if we started even and then surged ahead, rather than just getting back to even?
Timothy Varner at 48MoH recently spoke with Wayne Winston, who is a big number cruncher and proponent of adjusted plus-minus. He studies a lot of things, but one of the things he looks at is what combination of players are the teams strongest units. Take a look at the article.
The first thing that I notice is that we have 2 really good lineups, and they're basically the same--Duncan, Hill, Ginobili, and Parker--with only McDyess and Blair as the interchangeable parts. Clearly, those are our best units, and probably a version of the ones that should close games. I particularly like these line-ups because they give us 2 bigs and 3 ball handlers in the games at all times.
Then there is a next tier of units that are not quite as good as the previous two, but still much better than any other combo that we play. And one of those was our longest running starting lineup of Duncan, McDyess, Jefferson, Hill, and Parker. The other includes Bonner, who also shows up in another of our solid line-ups.
It seems clear that a backcourt rotation of Ginobili, Parker, Hill, and a frontcourt rotation of Duncan, McDyess, Blair, and Bonner works out very well for us, with Jefferson at the 3, and Ginobili taking some time there as well. That's a pretty solid 8 man rotation. Throw in Mason, Jr. when you need some scoring punch, Bogans when you need some defensive tenacity, and Finley for some spot duty, and you're just about set.
It just seems like we spend a lot of time playing units that don't work well together, and very little time playing our best units and our best players. I know we're conserving minutes, and I know we're still tinkering. But it's time to start figuring these things out and winning some games.
We got our butts whupped in the 4th quarter tonight. But I really feel like we could have won this game tonight if we'd played with a smarter rotation. And that's on Pop. He needs to figure out who is playing and when, and he needs to have our best players on the floor playing together as much as possible. That seems to make the most sense in the world, and yet it's something we're still not doing.
Looking Forward:
The road trip ends with a Sunday matinee against the Pistons. A win and we're a respectable (though not great) 5-3 on the trip; a loss and we're 4-4. Either way, we're still a pretty average team.
I don't get the starting lineup change. The 76ers telecaster said tonight that Pop inserted Bogans back into the starting lineup for more defense. OK, I can go along with that. But then what logic explains the reinsertion of Matt Bonner back into the starting line-up? Surely the best defensive option on the front line with Duncan is Antonio McDyess. So then maybe the counterargument to that is Bonner is inserted to help make up for the lost offense that Bogans causes. But that is a zero sum game. Add some offense, subtract some offense; add some defense, subtract some defense. Doesn't really do anything. Besides, I'd argue that McDyess is equal to or greater than Bonner as an offensive option. Yes, Bonner gets your more 3s, but McDyess hits the open jumper, grabs offensive rebounds, and can get buckets inside.
Look, I can see the merit in "demoting" Jefferson to the bench. He's been playing lousy, and a shake up could help. And it seems to be helping, as Jefferson is playing with more aggression, passion, and even a smidge more intelligence. But I don't see the benefit at all of taking McDyess out of the starting lineup just as he was seemingly finding his groove and giving us exactly what we needed alongside Duncan.
In the last two games with this new starting lineup we've gotten off to really poor starts, digging ourselves into holes. I know that we always seem to fight our way back, but we don't need to. What if we started even and then surged ahead, rather than just getting back to even?
Timothy Varner at 48MoH recently spoke with Wayne Winston, who is a big number cruncher and proponent of adjusted plus-minus. He studies a lot of things, but one of the things he looks at is what combination of players are the teams strongest units. Take a look at the article.
The first thing that I notice is that we have 2 really good lineups, and they're basically the same--Duncan, Hill, Ginobili, and Parker--with only McDyess and Blair as the interchangeable parts. Clearly, those are our best units, and probably a version of the ones that should close games. I particularly like these line-ups because they give us 2 bigs and 3 ball handlers in the games at all times.
Then there is a next tier of units that are not quite as good as the previous two, but still much better than any other combo that we play. And one of those was our longest running starting lineup of Duncan, McDyess, Jefferson, Hill, and Parker. The other includes Bonner, who also shows up in another of our solid line-ups.
It seems clear that a backcourt rotation of Ginobili, Parker, Hill, and a frontcourt rotation of Duncan, McDyess, Blair, and Bonner works out very well for us, with Jefferson at the 3, and Ginobili taking some time there as well. That's a pretty solid 8 man rotation. Throw in Mason, Jr. when you need some scoring punch, Bogans when you need some defensive tenacity, and Finley for some spot duty, and you're just about set.
It just seems like we spend a lot of time playing units that don't work well together, and very little time playing our best units and our best players. I know we're conserving minutes, and I know we're still tinkering. But it's time to start figuring these things out and winning some games.
We got our butts whupped in the 4th quarter tonight. But I really feel like we could have won this game tonight if we'd played with a smarter rotation. And that's on Pop. He needs to figure out who is playing and when, and he needs to have our best players on the floor playing together as much as possible. That seems to make the most sense in the world, and yet it's something we're still not doing.
Looking Forward:
The road trip ends with a Sunday matinee against the Pistons. A win and we're a respectable (though not great) 5-3 on the trip; a loss and we're 4-4. Either way, we're still a pretty average team.
posted by secretchord53 at 10:16 PM
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