WeekapaugGroove wrote:Zelaznyrules wrote:BobbieL wrote:
but here is where Bender and Chriss control if they want to play and get the pay day down the road
its by earning a job
Russell Wilson beat out Matt Flynn and the rest is history
If Bender/Chriss continue to improve, the minutes will be there for all and the team will benefit
Yes and Billy flipped his burgers better than little Timmy but guess what, it's not the same thing. And it isn't just Bender and Chriss, we have a team full of players that are far from reaching their playing peak. If you play young players they make mistakes. If you're pulling out all stops to win games, you can't afford those mistakes.
To see the risks with this "bring in a star" approach, all you have to do is look at Len, look at the arguments that so many made in favor of the acquisition of Chandler and look where we are now. We all know that a lot of big men develop late. We all knew that Len came to the game late and had a long ways to go. We accepted the idea that Chandler would be a good mentor for Len and that he could learn what he needed in fits and spurts rather than by playing a major role. Our recent history suggests we were wrong.
And now, we have to decide whether to invest big dollars in Alex or let him walk. If we hadn't chased Chandler, we'd have a much better idea what to do right now but his presence delayed Len's growth, ate up the first contract cushion the CBA gave us, and left us in this position. I so hope we don't do this again and find ourselves having to consider letting Bender and maybe even Chriss walk, just as we're considering doing now with Len and Warren.
This is very well put and true. When is comes to development of young guys there's no magic formula that always works. You can find examples of guys who succeeded and failed both getting minutes early and also sitting. And it's not like any of it can be proved since you can't go back in time and change how a guys is developed. But there are definitely more examples of playing time helping guys develop than sitting. You hear from former players all the time about how the opportunity to get on the court was key for a guy breaking out. It's kind of like anything else in life you typically get better at things with reps and learning from mistakes.
Fair enough. Good points
I just am going to take the opposite view though your logic does make sense. I think Bender, Josh, Warren and Chriss can develop while having Blake Griffin on your team.
Now maybe the Warriors had the core group in place and it took adding veterans at the right time to make the team what it is. As if you recall - they traded Monta for Bogut, somehow got Lee, added Iguodala, etc.
For me - I think the young players can develop a winning mindset, get minutes with Blake Griffin on the roster. Let me add - if we do not get Blake Griffin because it means dumping Knight means too many draft picks, or losing Warren, dumping Chandler for nothing - that will not please me as I think the Suns can sign a guy Taj Gibson for much cheaper shorter years