I just never understood why we don't have Rondo playing more off the ball. It's what we did when we won the championship, and back then he was awful with his jumpshot, and very hesitant.
Well, this is actually pretty simple. When we had Rondo playing off the ball, KG, Ray, and Pierce were still much more capable of carrying the team offensively, and allowing Rondo to basically be an afterthought offensively.
As they got older, they couldn't do that consistently, which meant the C's needed someone with younger legs to take up the slack offensively, and Rondo did that.
The problem with Rondo is that if you play him off the ball, he is basically useless in the flow of the offense, and he kills the spacing. When the ball is his hands however, he is very dangerous.
I don't think that's true at all.
How do? Could you elaborate?
The notion that playing Rondo off the ball insinuates that someone else needs to carry the team offensively.
Also, as is, Pierce and KG are still carrying a bulk load of our offense... all you're doing with Rondo right now is giving them the ball later in the shot clock.
And I disagree with the "basically useless" aspect of the flow of the offense. If anything Rondo has shown, is that he's become a pretty good spot up shooter. If the spacing is not there, all it means is that Rondo is open for a shot, a shot he's actually taking (it hurts us in previous years because he wasn't comfortable taking it). But he needs to be in a space where he actually can make a shot. What we're doing right now is that once the ball leaves his hands he stays around the 3-point arc, and if you don't have Rondo slashing, then it hurts us.
Rondo with the ball in his hands is only dangerous when, you know, he's actually doing something with it. As is, too often is really not doing anything, and that's a problem. People complain about Chris Paul and Westbrook pounding the ball, I'd take their pounding of the ball and how it affects the offense, over Rondo's version of pounding the ball.
This would be a different story if Rondo thought of himself as a primary scoring threat. Doesn't mean he won't pass the ball, but his passiveness as he waits for plays to "develop" is not very productive in my opinion.
You can constantly play Rondo off the ball, and still have him touching the ball 2 to 3 times in a possession, depending on how it goes within the frame of a more dynamic offense.
All I'm saying is that there's plenty of room to use Rondo more off the ball, and we'd be the better for it.