Mikal Bridges is second in the NBA in minutes per game (37.8) and he claimed this week to have discussed the situation with Tom Thibodeau.
“You know, I’m on that side because I’m a starter and I’ll play a lot of minutes. Sometimes not fun on the body. But you want that as a coach, but also talk to him a little bit, knowing that we’ve got a good enough team where our bench guys can come in and we don’t need to play 48, 47 (minutes). We’ve got a lot of good guys on this team that can take away the minutes, which helps the defense, helps the offense, helps tired bodies being out there and giving up all these points. It helps us keeping fresh bodies out there.”
Bridges then said he and Thibodeau have had a conversation about it.
“Yeah, no, he’s not really, he’s not arguing about it,” Bridges said. “Sometimes I think he just gets in his ways and he gets locked in and he just wants to keep the guy out there. Sometimes you have to tell him like, Landry (Shamet) for example or somebody, keep them out there, they’re playing well.”
Thibodeau denied Bridges' claim that the two discussed the minutes situation.
“For one, we never had a conversation about it,” Thibodeau said. “The facts are the facts. When you look at our team, and the way it works, Jalen (Brunson) plays 35 minutes, and I think he’s 20th or 21st in average minutes played. (Karl-Anthony Towns), who is a primary scorer, plays less than Jalen. He’s like 25th in the league in average minutes.
“Your wings play more, right? They’re matched up with primary scorers. The way it works, if Jayson Tatum is in the game or Jaylen Brown is in the game, OG (Anunoby) will be in the game and Mikal will be in the game. When those guys go out, (our) guys go out. When they come back, (our guys) come back. We try to keep them matched up. If you look at the league, all those guys are playing 36, 37 minutes — whether it’s Durant, Tatum, Brown. The wings are going to play more. They are primary wings defenders. That’s the way it works. And then sometimes you’re caught in matchups. The Lakers are big wings, so sometimes you deal with that.”
Bridges ranks 13th in the NBA in minutes per game since Jan. 1.
