PG: Felton 22 Udrih 13 Prigs 13
SG: JR 21 Shump 21 THJR 6
SF: Melo 30 MWP 18 Leslie: D-league assignment for a year/garbage time minutes barring injury to another player
PF: Bargnani 28 Amare 20
C: Tyson 24 Kmart 20 Tyler 4

Obviously line-ups are changed depending upon the opponent and desired style of play, this is just a framework. How would you slice up the pie?

Done. Finished. Through. Stick a fork in 'em.

JR Smith is a question mark. knees are tricky things.

41 minutes on the table

Back court: Felton, Udrih, JR & Shump.

That is four players who if healthy should get all of the minutes for the 1 & 2 positions.

Front court: Melo, Bargs, Tyson, Amare & Metta.

That is all the players who should get burn there baring injuries and blow outs.

And I think that gives you wiggle room to go either big or small, with 2 PGs at times and Shump & JR playing the 3.

franco12 wrote:I don't want to be disrespectful, but I would hope that we never see Prigs get significant minues

Back court: Felton, Udrih, JR & Shump.

That is four players who if healthy should get all of the minutes for the 1 & 2 positions.

Front court: Melo, Bargs, Tyson, Amare & Metta.

That is all the players who should get burn there baring injuries and blow outs.

And I think that gives you wiggle room to go either big or small, with 2 PGs at times and Shump & JR playing the 3.

Seriously....we have too much depth to be playing short handed for no reason.

everyone should be fresh too. .. none of this 40 min Games for our guys. Too much depth for that

loweyecue wrote:The most intriguing thing to me is how Shumpert is used going forward over the stretch. Will Woody give him as much latitude as he gives JR or will he slowly fade into a bench role dog house type thing? I don't think THJR sees any time at all - maybe garbage time at best. The other thing is Felton's durability. Now he is a bulldog with his tenacity but he is no spring chicken and the wear and tear of carrying the team over two seasons will catch up at some point. Unless Udrih/Prigs get solid minutes from the start, I would be worried about Felton.

In the front court I think Stat should get 10-12 mins as backup center. I am not sure if Bargnani should start or not. I am still kind of bemused with that pick up. RonRon and KMart will do what is asked of them. How Woodson works out the front court will be interesting to watch.

What eear and tear he missed a lot of time due to his pinky. Now that There is a pg that doesn't need minutes restricting I think he gets even more rest

codeunknown wrote:

yellowboy90 wrote:talk about the worse defensive starting five or close to it.

Its also the best offensive unit, with a combination considerably greater than the sum of the parts. Play zone on defense, run up-tempo and reduce the game to quick-strike offense. It can be deceptive to think that a mix of offense and defense creates the best line-up, oftentimes leaving a team mediocre on both ends. Stacking either offense or defense can yield dividends in a non-linear way and, given the pieces we have, this likely maximizes our point differential.

When's the last time a team won it all by only playing one side of the ball? There's a reason there are two parts to the game of basketball. A good team on both sides of the ball will beat a great offensive team every time, and there are certainly teams in the league that are strong both ways.

I do agree with your thinking in the sense that dantoni's suns were a much stronger team with their SSOL attack and up-tempo offense than they would have been had they slowed it down and played more conventionally. However, the best teams can run an efficient offense without sacrificing much defense, as they acquire TWO-WAY PLAYERS that bring something to the table on both ends.

Dagger wrote:

codeunknown wrote:

yellowboy90 wrote:talk about the worse defensive starting five or close to it.

Its also the best offensive unit, with a combination considerably greater than the sum of the parts. Play zone on defense, run up-tempo and reduce the game to quick-strike offense. It can be deceptive to think that a mix of offense and defense creates the best line-up, oftentimes leaving a team mediocre on both ends. Stacking either offense or defense can yield dividends in a non-linear way and, given the pieces we have, this likely maximizes our point differential.

When's the last time a team won it all by only playing one side of the ball? There's a reason there are two parts to the game of basketball. A good team on both sides of the ball will beat a great offensive team every time, and there are certainly teams in the league that are strong both ways.

I do agree with your thinking in the sense that dantoni's suns were a much stronger team with their SSOL attack and up-tempo offense than they would have been had they slowed it down and played more conventionally. However, the best teams can run an efficient offense without sacrificing much defense, as they acquire TWO-WAY PLAYERS that bring something to the table on both ends.

Not sure that you understood what I presented. The line-up is not a commentary on prior championship history, nor is it an indictment of defensive lineups. Its easy to arrange a line-up, for example in Miami, when the components are Lebron, Wade, Bosh etc. because those players are both the best offensive and defensive players for that team. Unfortunately, that luxury is not available to us. As such, we are forced to collate players in a manner that maximizes our point differential, whether it be offensively or defensively inclined. Note that the lineup presented was a regular season pan-team solution, designed to prevent grind-out games, and not particularly match-up specific. Alternatives to the lineup I presented that are close to equivalent (and against certain playoff teams, preferable) would be those replacing JR with Shumpert and Amare with Chandler. This is reflected by their high minute counts in the original post.

Dagger wrote:

codeunknown wrote:

Dagger wrote:

codeunknown wrote:

yellowboy90 wrote:talk about the worse defensive starting five or close to it.

Its also the best offensive unit, with a combination considerably greater than the sum of the parts. Play zone on defense, run up-tempo and reduce the game to quick-strike offense. It can be deceptive to think that a mix of offense and defense creates the best line-up, oftentimes leaving a team mediocre on both ends. Stacking either offense or defense can yield dividends in a non-linear way and, given the pieces we have, this likely maximizes our point differential.

When's the last time a team won it all by only playing one side of the ball? There's a reason there are two parts to the game of basketball. A good team on both sides of the ball will beat a great offensive team every time, and there are certainly teams in the league that are strong both ways.

I do agree with your thinking in the sense that dantoni's suns were a much stronger team with their SSOL attack and up-tempo offense than they would have been had they slowed it down and played more conventionally. However, the best teams can run an efficient offense without sacrificing much defense, as they acquire TWO-WAY PLAYERS that bring something to the table on both ends.

Not sure that you understood what I presented. The line-up is not a commentary on prior championship history, nor is it an indictment of defensive lineups. Its easy to arrange a line-up, for example in Miami, when the components are Lebron, Wade, Bosh etc. because those players are both the best offensive and defensive players for that team. Unfortunately, that luxury is not available to us. As such, we are forced to collate players in a manner that maximizes our point differential, whether it be offensively or defensively inclined. Note that the lineup presented was a regular season pan-team solution, designed to prevent grind-out games, and not particularly match-up specific. Alternatives to the lineup I presented that are close to equivalent (and against certain playoff teams, preferable) would be those replacing JR with Shumpert and Amare with Chandler. This is reflected by their high minute counts in the original post.

I'm saying that such a line-up will NOT maximize our point differential. Any team with a decent offense will be able to match ours because our defense will be so bad they will score with ease. It will be high-scoring offense vs. high-scoring offense except our offense will actually be challenged by defensive pressure. By mentioning championship teams I was saying that this strategy of putting all your eggs in one basket has never worked when it mattered most. If you're talking about it as a strategy for the regular season only then consider the disadvantages of adopting that play-style all season and then going into the playoffs and realizing you have to change your entire strategy. It would not be pretty.

Well, I don't agree. High scoring offenses are not all equal, and, again, I think binarizing either side as either good or bad limits the sensitivity of gauging a point differential. Against even great defesive teams, we'd be able to isolate sides given multiple pick and roll options, 5 guys with the ability to shoot from deep and go 1-1, and 3 high level post up options. In other words, its not a cursory gestalt, but rather that those players fit especially well in a 4-high set. Few teams have 3 versatile frontcourt defenders, who can guard the post and pick and roll, that they can simultaneously play. Removing one of our scoring options allows teams to match-up with their best defenders and give help from the non-shooter (usually Tyson). Again, in the regular season, the offensive versatility of this group has intuitive advantages. It would take an opposing team tFg% of 60% to beat us - that's not easy against able bodied individuals.

Shifting lineups in the playoffs is challenging although in some ways an inevitability given the variety of matchups. It's also widely accomplished, including by last year's championship teams. As mentioned, Chandler and Shumpert would start in several playoff scenarios, geared towards rebounding and ball pressure. Note that Chandler, specifically, is not always effective, however, and selective offensive trade-offs are of value here. These are match-up specific notions and likely beyond the scope of pre-season discussion.