I think that there's room for scheduled rest.
Right now, if our goal is first in the East, we've built a pretty comfortable lead. It's going to be close to impossible for Milwaukee, Philly or Brooklyn to catch us unless we really fall into a nosedive. That being the case, why not rest our guys when we can? It potentially gives Hauser, Pritchard, or any guys we sign to get a chance to work themselves back into the rotation.
2 weeks ago, Brooklyn was 0.5 games back and Milwaukee was 1 game back. Boston doesn't have this giant lead that can't be caught especially given how well Philly has played the last few weeks and their upcoming schedule vs. our upcoming schedule. They could easily pick up a couple of games before the matchup on February 8th.
If Tatum is banged up some, then sure give him a day off here and there, but if he is healthy, he needs to play, just like everyone should. I don't think the resting concept holds much historical merit with respect to winning championships, if anything as we've seen from the Clippers it often has more negative consequences than positive ones. If you are healthy, you should play. That is what you are paid to do.
Haven't you advocated "load management" and rest for guys like Lebron in the past?
Yes, teams can still catch up, but the chances aren't great. We've got 36 games left. If we play at, say, a .600 winning percentage, we'd finish at 56-26. To match that, Milwaukee and/or Philly would have to play significantly better than they have to date, going at least 27-10 to catch us. Is that doable? Sure, but it's not likely. And it's also not likely that we go from winning 74% of our games to only 60% of them.
The team has survived giving Horford and Timelord extra rest. We just rested Jaylen more than we probably needed to. There's no reason we can't do that with Tatum. (For whatever it's worth, how do you define "banged up"? Because, Tatum has mentioned several times that he's playing through injuries, and his fingers are still taped.)
No, I've always said guys should play if they are healthy. In fact, I've had the exact opposite discussion about Lebron stating that if he plays, he should play his normal minutes (unless the game is truly out of reach). Load management creates more problems than it solves as it makes it difficult to truly ramp up and play big minutes without injury when you need to in the playoffs. Now legitimate injuries are different. And certain guys prone to injury probably need to rest more frequently, from the C's that would be someone like Rob Williams. Perhaps Horford because of his age and injury history, but Tatum, Brown, Smart, White, Brogdon, Grant, etc. if they are healthy they should play. Rest for the sake of rest just isn't a good strategy. It doesn't create a winning environment.
As for catching us, Philly has been playing awesome. They were 12-12 at one point this season and have gone 17-4 since, which correlates almost exactly to when Harden came back from injury (and Embiid has missed only 3 games during that time). The Sixers are firing on all cylinders. If Boston gives games away because they are resting Tatum, the Sixers will catch the Celtics. And I do think that matters because Milwaukee is almost certainly finishing 2nd or 3rd and I want to avoid Milwaukee as long as possible in the playoffs (good chance Miami is in the 6 or 7 slot as well, so you want to avoid them in the 1st round because it will be a physical series).
And I do think resting Tatum is a recipe to give games away. I think everyone knows by now what I think of Tatum. He is the engine of the team. He is the guy that drives wins and losses more than probably every other player on the team combined. Tatum needs to play or Boston loses, and loses a lot (not every game, but a lot of them).
Topic: C’s Need To Prioritize Resting Tatum Now (Read 7091 times)