_Und3r][D4wg_ wrote:...Might be an unpopular opinion, but I think the bench guys (LK, NV, BG, PP, even JJ) should be fed more minutes on most nights to help get them into rhythm and fully integrated into team chemistry.
Regularly riding the starters in the mid-30-to-40+ mins just to ensure early season wins seems such a rookie coach thing to do... Wear-and-tear slowly adds up over time and increases injury/exhaustion probability to the starters later at a stretch when every W becomes more crucial.
If we want the end-of-bench guys to serve as injury insurance, then they have to be prepped to be effective in that contingency role... 6 mins of garbage time every 3 or 4 games just isn't going to cut it. It's not necessarily because those dudes are absolutely unplayable, but the coach may just be too risk-averse over growing pains (i.e., early season losses) and focused only on winning the immediate game.
A more rationalized PT distribution should lessen late season/post-season injury/exhaustion probability to the starters. Think of it as gradually collecting on your insurance (or increasing it's return value) before the adverse event actually strikes. And when the injury bug does bite later, then there's already much greater value (contribution) to collect from the insurance guys even during the playoffs.
Apologies for quoting a part of what I said in another thread.
Obviously Coach Joe feels differently... I just hope the team doesn't get hit with worst case scenarios in terms of injuries and star players running out of steam later in the season/post-season to the detriment of our campaign for #18.
