They appear to be just fine at small forward and center, with Kyle Singler and Andre Drummond ranked firmly in the middle of the league. And while Brandon Jennings has been on the decline lately, he's still among the top 20 starters at point guard.
Josh Smith leads the team in shot attempts and is second on the team in minutes played. Kentavious Caldwell-Pope leads the team in minutes and is second on the team in shot attempts. These two players who are the weakest links in the starting lineups have been allowed to have the greatest influence on the team. And their struggles have been mostly predictable, as their wins produced figures aren't horribly off from last year.
With simple tweaks to the rotation, it's possible that this team may be able to be competitive as is. Moving Butler and Monroe into the starting lineup gives Detroit five players who are in the middle of the league among starters. They'd have the seventh highest combined win shares per 48 minutes in the Eastern Conference, essentially making them look like a playoff team. And that's even before taking into account replacing Smith with Jerebko in the rotation and Meeks returning as soon as tomorrow.
SVG is a smart guy and i am sure he knows this or someone on his staff knows this. Yet he still continues to play with Smith.
Its either he's trying to advertise smith
He's ignoring monroe because he's gone any ways
Or he's over analyzing the simple solution.
i do like that he's force feeding KCP minutes, while its going to suck watching him go through growing pains and listening to all of you call him a bust, its best he gets as much experience as possible.
http://www.detroitbadboys.com/2014/12/1 ... stons-tank