The "weak" bench

[bknova]

I don't think its a coincidence that our bench is playing better without TA on the floor.  The team has settled on a 9 man rotation the last couple weeks (starters plus Scal, House, Pruitt and Baby) and its working cause the ball continues to move as it does when the starters are out there. 

Tony Allen is a black hole on offense.  He gets the ball puts his head down and drives to the basket like a freight train.  Because he can't shoot, he's useless in a ball movement offense, and because he's not as athletic as he used to be, he doesn't make the backdoor cuts or catch alley oops around the basket.  He's just an albatross.

The current bench holds leads and moves the ball to open shooters.  They are also relentless on D.  I think if DA can move TA, he should.  We need shooters and size, not slashers who throw up ugly shots everytime they drive to the hole.

[moiso]

I would say we have somewhat of a frontrunning bench.  When House and others come in with a 14pt lead, the chances are that they will increase the lead to 20+.
As opposed to last year when PJ and Posey were very effective in grind it out close games.

[wdleehi]

The bench still has the same shortcomings and weaknesses it has had all season.

1) All the playable big men off the bench are 6'8 PFs.
2) There is no real backup PG, just small SGs


The difference of late (as Roy mention) is there is more mixing with the starters during meaningful game time (not counting garbage time)  That hides the weaknesses while emphasizing the strengths. 


Plus, Scali getting more minutes has filled some of the hole that was created by the loss of Posey.  Smart defender able to play PF/SF.  Hitting a high % of outside shots. 

[LB3533]

The true test of the bench will be on display when our starters play poorly, which they have not in the last 7 or so games.

[bucknersrevenge]

The reason we're winning games is because the bench minutes are largely being minimized. They're not playing as a unit, because they're horrible as a 5-man group. Rivers is doing a better job sprinkling starters in with them.

  They're not playing as a unit but they're playing about the same number of minutes. I don't think most teams play 5-man reserve units for long stretches of time.

TP for this point. I still don't get why this hasn't been done all season long. To me a bench is best used sprinkled in with the starters rather than wholesale 5-man substitutions. I would not play a whole or even 4 bench players with one starter for more than 2 or 3 minutes. It's obvious bench players play better with starters. I get that this year's bench isn't as good as last years but I wouldn't feel the least bit of confidence that a lineup of Eddie/TA/Posey/Powe/Brown could handle themselves for long stretches either.

[Donoghus]

IMO, this bench is "average at best".  I'm in agreement with others that last year's bunch was better.

What I do think, though, is that the bench players perform best when there is a blending of starters in there with them.  Scals, House, and BBD are all guys that can complement certain mix and matches of bench players and starters.  When they're in there, they seem to be able to work extremely well with KG or Pierce, or Rondo.    

What the combination of starters and bench does is allow the C's to cover up some of the shortcomings and weaknesses of lack of depth that we seem to have this year.

[Tr1boy]

like many of you stated it is best to have at least 2 starters out there and that includes Rondo + allen, kg + rondo etc.

Rivers was making things way too predictable by leaving out only ray allen or paul pierce with 4 reserves.

Nowadays he is bringing scal and big baby in together while sitting down kg and perk. Then scal and ray allen might sit out and bring in eddie house and kg. Then rondo and pierce out and bring in pruitt and powe in etc.

our bench is not weak because one reserve could constantly let the starters down but they actually help the starters even more.