If doc is a good coach why does he do this?

[fairweatherfan]

Before this completely turns into dueling strawmen, I agree that keeping Ray in was questionable at best - I don't know why any starter played at all in the 4th.  And I think we should've gone Quis/Pierce at the wing more and Ray/Quis less.  But we are lacking depth there, and I don't trust JR for a full quarter even with a 25 pt lead right now.

I gotta say if you can't trust someone with a 25 point lead you may have trust issues in life.

Also you don't need to trust him. There are 4 other guys. Trust them

I also don't trust the Bobcats to come back from 25 points on the road even more

Am I making the substitutions now?  I'm saying I'd rather Ray played less too, but this is why I don't have as big a problem with it as some others in the thread.  I have even less of a problem with it now that I find out Doc did it because Ray wasn't feeling comfortable and asked to stay in.  Crownsy and Nick are right, this is pure mountain out of a molehill stuff.

[Spilling Green Dye]

Doc is not good with substitutions, but I don't think there is a big issue with Ray being in there.

We all talk about "age is over 32, up by X points," but I recall hearing multiple times that Ray wants to be play extended minutes sometimes to get his rythem for the season.  His conditioning is so good from an endurance standpoint that it doesn't particularly tire him out, and it ultimately comes down to repetition.  The more repetition with Ray, the better he becomes.  This is why, after playing a ton of minutes last season, he looked great against Chicago.  

I seriously doubt Ray was in the game wondering "why doesn't Doc take me out?  Has he forgotten?"  It's probably something pre-arranged between the two.

[Donoghus]

2 games is, by far, too small a sample size for me to get worked up about this right now. 

[Eja117]

Maybe next game he can play Ray 48 minutes cause he gets a "funny feeling" and can play KG 45 minutes cause "I want to see what happens"

Who's the coach? Ray or Doc?

[Roy Hobbs]

Question:  how many of the "it's okay, Ray asked to stay in" folks were criticizing Grady Little when he left in Pedro to melt down against the Yankees, because Pedro wanted to stay in the game?

Coaches are supposed to regulate minutes.  And yes, if people choose to ignore the past two seasons and focus only on the first two games, it's a small sample size.  However, people have 150+ games to judge on, not two.

Ray Allen should not be playing 38+ minutes on back-to-back nights, period.  This is especially true when we have a 30 point lead in the third quarter. 

[BballTim]

In terms of whether this is a trend:

In '08-'09, Ray played 38+ minutes in 30 games (out of 79 played).  Ray admitted that by the end of the year, he was fatigued and injured.

In '07-'08, Ray played 38+ minutes in 33 games (out of 73 games).  Ray admitted that he had been playing in pain for the first half of the year.

I don't think anybody is calling for Doc's head, but come on:  this is an ongoing issue.  No matter what Ray's conditioning is, he's 34 years old.

  Did Ray say he was tired and injured before the playoffs or after? And was the pain just leftover from ankle surgery the previous year? We shouldn't run the old guys into the ground, but they're not china dolls. In 06-07, Ray played 38+ minutes 45 times in 55 games. In 05-06 it was 55 times in 78 games. His load is a lot lighter than it always has been and he's not carrying as much of an offensive load as he's used to when he played.

[RockinRyA]

okay so now all the detractors have shifted gear and changed their arguments to "doc shouldntve listened to ray" from "what was doc thinking putting ray in for no reason"

[nickagneta]

In terms of whether this is a trend:

In '08-'09, Ray played 38+ minutes in 30 games (out of 79 played).  Ray admitted that by the end of the year, he was fatigued and injured.

In '07-'08, Ray played 38+ minutes in 33 games (out of 73 games).  Ray admitted that he had been playing in pain for the first half of the year.

I don't think anybody is calling for Doc's head, but come on:  this is an ongoing issue.  No matter what Ray's conditioning is, he's 34 years old.

And in 2007-08 Ray played 10 of those 38+ minute games in the first 15 games  OF THE SEASON because, just like tonight, he said he wanted more time to work himself into shape and work on his shot. He started off shooting bad and after that first month or so started shooting much better.

In 2008-09 Ray played 14 of those 38+ minute games during a 30 game stretch during December, January and February when Tony Allen and Brian Scalabrine were hurt during extended periods and the only other answers at the wing position were rookies that haven't even looked good this year nevermind last year.

Is it a trend? Sure, when Doc has little other option but to play Ray he plays him. The guy is one of the most freakishly athletic and finely tuned athletes anywhere and has the body of a man 5 years younger than him.

[MattG12]

Question:  how many of the "it's okay, Ray asked to stay in" folks were criticizing Grady Little when he left in Pedro to melt down against the Yankees, because Pedro wanted to stay in the game?

Coaches are supposed to regulate minutes.  And yes, if people choose to ignore the past two seasons and focus only on the first two games, it's a small sample size.  However, people have 150+ games to judge on, not two.

Ray Allen should not be playing 38+ minutes on back-to-back nights, period.  This is especially true when we have a 30 point lead in the third quarter. 

You can't compare Pedro, the most important player on the field asking to stay in during an elimination game in the playoffs to Ray asking to stay in during the second game of the season.

[RockinRyA]

Question:  how many of the "it's okay, Ray asked to stay in" folks were criticizing Grady Little when he left in Pedro to melt down against the Yankees, because Pedro wanted to stay in the game?

Coaches are supposed to regulate minutes.  And yes, if people choose to ignore the past two seasons and focus only on the first two games, it's a small sample size.  However, people have 150+ games to judge on, not two.

Ray Allen should not be playing 38+ minutes on back-to-back nights, period.  This is especially true when we have a 30 point lead in the third quarter. 

so i guess you knew ray better than doc then huh?

[Roy Hobbs]

okay so now all the detractors have shifted gear and changed their arguments to "doc shouldntve listened to ray" from "what was doc thinking putting ray in for no reason"

It's the same argument:  Ray played too many minutes, regardless of the reasoning.

[fairweatherfan]

Question:  how many of the "it's okay, Ray asked to stay in" folks were criticizing Grady Little when he left in Pedro to melt down against the Yankees, because Pedro wanted to stay in the game?

Let's see - player wants to stay in for 2 extra minutes to get into a regular season groove with a 26 pt lead against a bad team in the 2nd game of the season, player wants to stay in against a very dangerous archrival with a 3 run lead in Game 7 of the ALCS...yup, perfect analogy, no relevant differences here  

[Roy Hobbs]

Question:  how many of the "it's okay, Ray asked to stay in" folks were criticizing Grady Little when he left in Pedro to melt down against the Yankees, because Pedro wanted to stay in the game?

Coaches are supposed to regulate minutes.  And yes, if people choose to ignore the past two seasons and focus only on the first two games, it's a small sample size.  However, people have 150+ games to judge on, not two.

Ray Allen should not be playing 38+ minutes on back-to-back nights, period.  This is especially true when we have a 30 point lead in the third quarter. 

so i guess you knew ray better than doc then huh?

We'll see.  I know that Ray was worn down at the end of last year, and I know that Pierce publicly complained about he and Ray not getting enough rest.

[MBz]

He has done it way too often the last 2 years.  I do also agree that Giddens should have been in there.  Like a poster mentioned earlier, it's not rewarding Giddens, it is rewarding the starters with rest.  We all know that the starters are more important then the 12th man on this team and thats what Giddens is, he's the 12th man.  Do we really expect him to play that well?  How many 12th men in the league are actually good players?  If he plays bad, who cares?  It almost never will change the outcome of a game and it definitely wouldn't have tonight.  Whether we win by 30 or 15, it's still a win.  He seems to get the picture with Garnett who only played 26 minutes tonight,

[crownsy]

Maybe next game he can play Ray 48 minutes cause he gets a "funny feeling" and can play KG 45 minutes cause "I want to see what happens"

Who's the coach? Ray or Doc?

 and were the ones being unreasonable in not being with you guys on this?

You just did the ultimate strawman. blow the facts way out of proportion and then defeat your own exaggeration.

You would rather the coach of an NBA team tell one of his vets that 3 extra minutes was unreasonable, he doesn't know his own body (this is ray freaking allen we are talking about) and take a hardline stance on those 3 minutes two days into the season then just let him play a few possesions.

 Unbelievable.

It's wild exaggeration posts like the above that make me laugh in these threads.

And no, before you ask, i Have never been a huge fan of doc. I think he's a good coach for this team, but not a great coach. I also criticized his minute management all last season, as game threads and other's here can speak to. If he continues to play ray 38 minutes in blow outs, i will agree it's a concern.

@ roy: this guy right here, you can ask my roomate. I was ticked off the minute pedro came back out. he had struggled the inning before that and looked very vulnerable, and we had a very good bullpen that year.