Nurse Riding Starters Too Much?

[johanliebert]

Team (nurse)needs to accept this is a development year.

Watanabe , Banton, precious, Flynn all should get solid minutes. It's ok to lose games.

Watanabe is 27 and Flynn is a 4 year college player, they don’t get many opportunities. Banton/precious and Barnes are all in the rotation.

[Marmoset]

Team (nurse)needs to accept this is a development year.

Watanabe , Banton, precious, Flynn all should get solid minutes. It's ok to lose games.

An issue for me is that they are losing games anyway. It's one thing if playing our starters for 40 minutes is winning us games. Our team is 7-8 and some of the wins are games where Banton, Svi, etc. played a lot more than they did in Portland. Sometimes guys are having a bad night and shouldn't play but I don't think that's what happening overall; I think it's a reluctance to play some of these guys.

[ATLTimekeeper]

Team (nurse)needs to accept this is a development year.

Watanabe , Banton, precious, Flynn all should get solid minutes. It's ok to lose games.

It's pretty obvious to me that Banton needs rotation time because he's good enough, but he has to play with another lead ballhandler.

He's great with Fred. He's bad with Svi. He was really good in a limited run with Flynn. I think Nurse might have some size bias right now. If the ball is forced out of Banton's hands and Svi is the next ballhandler, it's going to be a bad possession.

5 man bench unit of Birch-Yuta-Banton-Trent-Flynn.

[kalel123]

I think this should be concern no matter which side of the fence you sit on.

We have starters playing way too many minutes. You are not going to be very successful doing that when it really matters in the playoffs even if you get there. So even if you win, you accomplish nothing.

If you take long-term view of things, you have to let your bench figure things out on the court especially early in the season. If you lose in the short-term, so be it. If you happen to be out of playoffs, it just means the team wasn't good enough to begin with. In what the management admitted will be a developmental year (not sure what was the exact word), it's not the end of the world. You hopefully did enough to develop a bench guy or two and then you shore up your depth with a decent first round pick for next year.

We have some interesting long-term pieces on the bench, let them play more and develop.

[Jadoogar]

I don't understand why we're not playing Dragic and the bench more. What's the point in riding the starters if they're gassed? The team needs to decide whether we are trying to develop our young ones or trying to win?

because Dragic sucks?

[Jadoogar]

Our depth hasn't been as dependable as we hoped, which puts more pressure on the starters to produce. Last game the starters gave us 101 points the bench gave us 12...12 points.

And some added perspective, Larry Nance had 15 off the bench alone.
I wonder if sending Trent or Barnes to the bench will help. Atleast we would have one good player coming off the bench.

[Rokutime]

Team (nurse)needs to accept this is a development year.

Watanabe , Banton, precious, Flynn all should get solid minutes. It's ok to lose games.

Watanabe is 27 and Flynn is a 4 year college player, they don’t get many opportunities. Banton/precious and Barnes are all in the rotation.

Yuta was a regular rotation player for most of last season and was expected to be in the rotation this season before he hurt himself.

[Appostis]

Team (nurse)needs to accept this is a development year.

Watanabe , Banton, precious, Flynn all should get solid minutes. It's ok to lose games.

An issue for me is that they are losing games anyway. It's one thing if playing our starters for 40 minutes is winning us games. Our team is 7-8 and some of the wins are games where Banton, Svi, etc. played a lot more than they did in Portland. Sometimes guys are having a bad night and shouldn't play but I don't think that's what happening overall; I think it's a reluctance to play some of these guys.

Team is 5-5 is last 10.

Even or better then Celtics, hawks, Bucks, Pacers, Knicks, Hornets, 76ers, Grizz, Portland, + the bottom feeders.


Being a tad dramatic.

Team has issues, and are playing a rookie major minutes. Year is going have growing pains.

[FreshyFlames]

Weren't people saying our bench unit would destroy other teams because of guys like Svi and Birch? whole lot of Stephen As in here

[WaltFrazier]

I'm not a huge Flynn fan. But he went out there and produced in a short period and then didn't get any more burn.

We need to start letting our bench guys fail and maybe lose games. Keeping them on a short leash isn't doing anyone any good.

I agree completely - Flynn needs to be given more rope. Banton has been amazing, but he doesn't yet have the playmaking chops Flynn showed last season. I think Flynn can run the second unit if given the chance.

BUT - I understand NN's reasoning as well. Last night Fred was +6. Flynn was -7 in 2mins of action. The team just falls apart without Fred on the court.

I was having this exact thougth last night. I love Banton, but having someone like Flynn next to him makes sense. Banton off the ball isn't a terrible idea.

Yes it's nice to have that second ballhandler. It worked for years with Kyle and Fred despite being a very small pair. But now we have long ballhandlers in Banton and Barnes. Play one of them beside Dragic or Flynn when Fred sits, then you have another ballhandler to help the small PG, and don't give up size.

[WaltFrazier]

Weren't people saying our bench unit would destroy other teams because of guys like Svi and Birch? whole lot of Stephen As in here

But...Yuta is coming

[WaltFrazier]

Nurse has no choice because our bench has been so weak it's killing us on defence and most of the time on offence as well. Opposing benches have been scoring at will. Hopefully as they get healthier things will get better because right now they are playing G-League ball. Yuta where are you?

Yet when Precious was healthy he was starting. If you're playing him for development reasons, why not some other bench players? How can Flynn and even Boucher work themselves into the rotation without getting minutes.

[geokilla]

Nurse has no choice because our bench has been so weak it's killing us on defence and most of the time on offence as well. Opposing benches have been scoring at will. Hopefully as they get healthier things will get better because right now they are playing G-League ball. Yuta where are you?

Yet when Precious was healthy he was starting. If you're playing him for development reasons, why not some other bench players? How can Flynn and even Boucher work themselves into the rotation without getting minutes.

I think Boucher's play tonight answered your question. I still don't understand Nurse's love for the starters. It's clear they aren't performing and things needs to be changed.

[Indeed]

We got Trent and Barnes played near 40 mins.
With back to back games, I wonder how the minutes work for tonight.

[alienchild]

We got Trent and Barnes played near 40 mins.
With back to back games, I wonder how the minutes work for tonight.

Probably fine. We play tomorrow, not tonight

[Indeed]

We got Trent and Barnes played near 40 mins.
With back to back games, I wonder how the minutes work for tonight.

Probably fine. We play tomorrow, not tonight

Ah right, it would be Friday.
Not sure if OG will be back if given another day of rest.

[geokilla]

So what's the excuse now? What's the deal with Nurse not playing Birch, Banton, and Yuta? They can't even play for 2 minutes each?

[DatHomieYouHaTe]

Minutes are not an issue for me since there's not much depth on the team.. Precious and Boucher seem to be the only playable bench guys if you want to win.

[CANsportsguru]

Honestly he is but we really have no other options. Our benche is very thin. Its ranked like 22nd just slightly better than the Lakers.

[lolekszmolek]

Nick Nurse and his crew are able to evaluate which players are situated to be on the floor based on match-ups etc. and if he thought that a bench player could contribute he would surely use him. Anybody know if we are getting OG back this season? We need him.