Starting P.J. Tucker over Beasley?

[Saberestar]

Via Paul Coro:

"P.J. Tucker and Michael Beasley are polar opposites defensively at the small forward position. Eighteen games in, even the offense has not clicked for Beasley. Tucker has shown he can defend top scorers, staying with Carmelo Anthony well and forcing him to make mostly difficult shots. At 7-11, the Suns might be close to a time where they consider living with Tucker’s offensive shortcomings to start solid on defense."


http://www.azcentral.com/sports/suns/ar ... recap.html

[MathiasPW]

Bound to happen, sooner or later.

Beasley as a 6th man can be a very profficient scorer, but not sure how he'll blend with Scola.

[pidi]

man, all these changes in the starting lineup don´t mean a thing to me - if gantry want to give tucker big time minutes he can do it even when pj comes off the bench...

[WallabyPie]

man, all these changes in the starting lineup don´t mean a thing to me - if gantry want to give tucker big time minutes he can do it even when pj comes off the bench...

Disagree. It's really hard to win games when you are down double digits after 5 minutes in EVERY game. Benching Beasley should help.

[pidi]

man, all these changes in the starting lineup don´t mean a thing to me - if gantry want to give tucker big time minutes he can do it even when pj comes off the bench...

Disagree. It's really hard to win games when you are down double digits after 5 minutes in EVERY game. Benching Beasley should help.

its hard to win games with this group of guys... beasley is starting material, i don´t think that pj ( with all the respect ) is a starting caliber guy in the nba

[Miklo]

man, all these changes in the starting lineup don´t mean a thing to me - if gantry want to give tucker big time minutes he can do it even when pj comes off the bench...

Disagree. It's really hard to win games when you are down double digits after 5 minutes in EVERY game. Benching Beasley should help.

its hard to win games with this group of guys... beasley is starting material, i don´t think that pj ( with all the respect ) is a starting caliber guy in the nba

While I'm still torn on what the starting lineup should be, and how much it matters, I don't think I'd go as far as to count PJ out as a starting caliber player. I think the case in point right now is Oklahoma City with Thabo Sefolosha. PJ isn't as skilled as Thabo, but it's the same idea - you start a guy who's not going to put points on the board, but will damn sure hustle every play and lock down his man. Then you bring the offensive firepower off the bench. The Thunder are doing very well with this approach between Thabo starting and KMart Junior coming off the bench.

Again I'm not sold on a particular lineup, but for me it's not because I think PJ can't start.

[MathiasPW]

Grant Hill was not in our starting line for his offensive power, as well.

Offense is not or problem, defense is. We are worst in so many defensive ranks, this shouldn't even be questionable.

PJ clearly helps (but not solves) that issue. If you had locked PJ on the highest scoring threat of the opponent in all of our games so far this season, we'd have a different W/L ratio than we have now. Think on how many one-night-heroes we created so far:

[enter immense list here]

[rsavaj]

“We have to stop digging ourselves into a hole,” Michael Beasley said. “When you get down 15, 20 points you need a perfect storm to come back, and I feel like we are relying on that perfect storm in too many games. If we play our system and the effort we gave in the end there is no reason we can’t win games. If we dig ourselves into a hole and then the effort comes out we can’t win games.”

What Beasley’s not saying is that he’s part of the problem in having such a hole dug in the first place. He did not play during the furious fourth-quarter rally, but in the 21 minutes he did play the team lost 20 points. Goran Dragic’s -11 makes him the next closest Sun in this statistic.

This has been a season-long trend as the Suns are nearly 21 points per 100 possessions better when Beasley sits than when he plays, according to the NBA’s stats tool. Almost all of this difference comes at the defensive end, as the Suns possess a superb 95.0 defensive rating when he sits and an abysmal 114.7 rating when he plays.

To put that in perspective, the Suns without Beasley would be the best defensive team in the NBA but they are the worst by seven points per 100 possessions when he’s on the floor, which is a pretty wide margin that covers the difference between the No. 11 and No. 30 defensive teams in the league.

http://valleyofthesuns.com/

Two ideas:

A)You start Tucker instead of Beasley:

Dragic/Bassy
Brown/Dudley
Tucker/Beasley
Markieff/Scola
Gortat/Jermaine

I think it's a wise move. Brown's chucking is balanced out by Tucker in the starting unit, Beasley's chucking is balanced out by Dudley on the bench. The downsides: limited spacing in the starting lineup means it might actually hurt our early-unit's offense. Also, the Duds/Beas duo failed miserably in the starting lineup....I don't think it would be too much better off the bench.


B)You play small ball and start Tucker+ move Beasley to the 4, in place of Markieff:

Dragic/Bassy
Brown/Dudley
Tucker/Markieff
Beasley/Scola
Gortat/Jermaine

Beasley continues to get destroyed defensively, but now at least has a sliver of a chance of exploiting the mismatch on the offensive end as well. Creates an awkward bench unit though, with Markieff playing out of position as a 3. There's also the factor that he's been rubbish off the bench. However...aside from like 2-3 games, he's been rubbish as a starter as well.

I prefer option A. We'll see what the coaching staff does.

If I had to guess, I'd say they continue to start him until about 30ish games are in the recordbook. If we're atrocious at that time, they'll have no choice but to bench him, even if that shatters his seemingly-fragile confidence.

[pidi]

come on guys, we are talking about pj tucker, not ghill, not selfalosha - he is the bo outlaw type of guy with less muscles..
he is just not a starter in the nba - gentry should fire up beasley and get him going.. that would help the most..

let´s start outsoring our opponents again..

[rsavaj]

come on guys, we are talking about pj tucker, not ghill, not selfalosha - he is the bo outlaw type of guy with less muscles..
he is just not a starter in the nba - gentry should fire up beasley and get him going.. that would help the most..

let´s start outsoring our opponents again..

I think we'd need a necromancer to do that

[WallabyPie]

come on guys, we are talking about pj tucker, not ghill, not selfalosha - he is the bo outlaw type of guy with less muscles..
he is just not a starter in the nba - gentry should fire up beasley and get him going.. that would help the most..

let´s start outsoring our opponents again..

At least Tucker is good on one end of the court. Beasley is terrible on both offense and defense.

[RunDogGun]

While I'm still torn on what the starting lineup should be, and how much it matters, I don't think I'd go as far as to count PJ out as a starting caliber player. I think the case in point right now is Oklahoma City with Thabo Sefolosha. PJ isn't as skilled as Thabo, but it's the same idea - you start a guy who's not going to put points on the board, but will damn sure hustle every play and lock down his man. Then you bring the offensive firepower off the bench. The Thunder are doing very well with this approach between Thabo starting and KMart Junior coming off the bench.

Again I'm not sold on a particular lineup, but for me it's not because I think PJ can't start.

The only problem I see with the OKC idea,is they have two guys in the starting lineup that dominate the ball, and can go for 50+ points a night combined.

And as far as Pidi's comment. I fricken love Bo Outlaw. Guys like him need to be on every team. They make things happen.

But I think inserting Tucker into the starting lineup is the right move. It frees Brown up to be a scorer, it gives more possessions in Goran's hand (because Beas will be on the bench), and it gives us a point forward in the second group in Beas, which may increase his output. And if it doesn't work, I don't think we will be any worse off than we are now.

[pidi]

come on guys, we are talking about pj tucker, not ghill, not selfalosha - he is the bo outlaw type of guy with less muscles..
he is just not a starter in the nba - gentry should fire up beasley and get him going.. that would help the most..

let´s start outsoring our opponents again..

At least Tucker is good on one end of the court. Beasley is terrible on both offense and defense.

yah man i gotta agree with youre point.. but beasley can beast offensively, which is more local part of what we are trying to do... i think we are and were a offensive running and gunning team - we should keep that identity and score

[RunDogGun]

Although Tucker doesn't shoot that often, he is one of our best percentages in both field and three. Besides Luke at 50%, Tucker is our best three point shooter right now at 43%. If he can come close to that, he is already better than everyone else we have on the team save Luke, and I think I would feel more comfortable with him shooting than anybody else at the moment.

[pidi]

While I'm still torn on what the starting lineup should be, and how much it matters, I don't think I'd go as far as to count PJ out as a starting caliber player. I think the case in point right now is Oklahoma City with Thabo Sefolosha. PJ isn't as skilled as Thabo, but it's the same idea - you start a guy who's not going to put points on the board, but will damn sure hustle every play and lock down his man. Then you bring the offensive firepower off the bench. The Thunder are doing very well with this approach between Thabo starting and KMart Junior coming off the bench.

Again I'm not sold on a particular lineup, but for me it's not because I think PJ can't start.

The only problem I see with the OKC idea,is they have two guys in the starting lineup that dominate the ball, and can go for 50+ points a night combined.

And as far as Pidi's comment. I fricken love Bo Outlaw. Guys like him need to be on every team. They make things happen.

But I think inserting Tucker into the starting lineup is the right move. It frees Brown up to be a scorer, it gives more possessions in Goran's hand (because Beas will be on the bench), and it gives us a point forward in the second group in Beas, which may increase his output. And if it doesn't work, I don't think we will be any worse off than we are now.

man i also love bo outlaw.. but can you compare tucker to outlaw? i don´t think so..

[RunDogGun]

I don't think we have seen enough of PJ to say who is like, but I don't think Bo had ever shot 43% from three like Tucker is doing now.

I guess I should have looked that up, apparently he did shoot 50% , but he only took two shots from there.

[phrazbit]

its hard to win games with this group of guys... beasley is starting material, i don´t think that pj ( with all the respect ) is a starting caliber guy in the nba

I'd rather start Tucker and get a guy who can play at a high level at one end of the court than start Beasley who sucks on both ends. I dont care if one out of 15 nights Beasley can go off on offense, in the other 90+% of games his offense is so bad that it kills you.

[lilfishi22]

come on guys, we are talking about pj tucker, not ghill, not selfalosha - he is the bo outlaw type of guy with less muscles..
he is just not a starter in the nba - gentry should fire up beasley and get him going.. that would help the most..

let´s start outsoring our opponents again..

We've been trying to do that since the start of the season, and it's just not happening consistently. When Beasley is scoring, he's scoring inefficiently and disrupting offensive flow. When he's not scoring, he's an offensive black-hole and a massive, massive liability on defense.

But I think inserting Tucker into the starting lineup is the right move. It frees Brown up to be a scorer, it gives more possessions in Goran's hand (because Beas will be on the bench), and it gives us a point forward in the second group in Beas, which may increase his output. And if it doesn't work, I don't think we will be any worse off than we are now.

+1 I think Tucker will contribute much more effectively to the offensive flow of the game despite not being an offensively player at all. As much of a "starter" and "offensive threat" Beasley is, he's a total ball-stopper. Having the ball in Goran's hands to orchestrate something would be much better than having the ball in Beasley's hands while four guys stand on the court wondering what he's going to surprise everyone with in that possession.

[rsavaj]

guys guys guys
it was a gamble to bring him in…why would you bail on it now? What are the Suns going to do w/o Beasley, win a couple of more games?

The upside potential if he does play well is greater than the downside potential of playing him while he sucks.

You’ve got to give the “Beasley Experiment” at least until the All-Star Break if not the entire season.

The risk / reward math demands as much.

^^That might be how the FO/coaching staff is viewing this. We're not winning the championship this season...it's a transition/developmental year. I guess they think it's just best to stick it out with the Beas and see what we have with him.

[RunDogGun]

guys guys guys
it was a gamble to bring him in…why would you bail on it now? What are the Suns going to do w/o Beasley, win a couple of more games?

The upside potential if he does play well is greater than the downside potential of playing him while he sucks.

You’ve got to give the “Beasley Experiment” at least until the All-Star Break if not the entire season.

The risk / reward math demands as much.

^^That might be how the FO/coaching staff is viewing this. We're not winning the championship this season...it's a transition/developmental year. I guess they think it's just best to stick it out with the Beas and see what we have with him.

If this is the case, then Brown comes out of the starting lineup and Tucker goes in. We have to have a defender at the wing position. I still don't see how we forgo the season for a guy getting $6 million, while we have a bunch of young guys locked up for a few years. If we are doing this, with the understanding that we are going to lose games, then Marshall should be getting all of Telfair's minutes, which we all know isn't happening.