Doc's Rotations

[mctyson]

To be fair, the injuries to Pierce and to a lesser extent Bradley have messed up the rotations a bit.  I think Stiemer might be hurt too, but I think Doc sat him in favor of Hollins for energy.

I think Doc has been too reluctant to use Pietrus over Pierce however.  Anyone watching the games knows Pierce is having trouble with that knee.  We have to trust our bench if we want to go anywhere this year.  We can't run our starters into the ground.  If you give Pietrus the minutes he can get in a rhythm offensively.

[Fafnir]

Was at the game. Agree it was not Doc's strongest. However IIRC KG was at the scorer's table for a solid minute anyway wating to check in in the 4th quarter. One of my sons asked "where's KG?" I said "right there waiting for a dead ball."

KG needed a blow, so that's how it goes sometimes you have to wait unless you want to burn a time out.

In such a close game burning a time out is also rather bad.

[RyNye]

A big part of any coaches rotation decisions are determined by what they see in shootarounds and in practices between games, which we as fans never get to see. At the end of the regular season, Doc had his 8-man playoff rotation set, and it was pretty [dang]ed good. Hell, even the 10-man rotation ain't too shabby.

I think it's obvious to me that everyone is hurting in some way or the other, and Doc is seeing it in the practices and shoot-arounds, so he is having to experiment with some new line-ups on the fly.

[looseball]

Donnie Marshall talked about this on Post-Game Live.  Normally Doc is great with his rotations but idk what he was thinking tonight.

He should have never left Ryan Hollins in the 4th as long as he did and should have put Pietrus in instead of Daniels. 

I think Doc is anything but great with the rotations.  tonight was just another example of it.

Agree......think about it. In the second half of the season Doc went with an eight man rotation. The shorter the rotation the less chance of screwing it up. He cannot manage multiple rotations.

Also, the shorter the rotation the greater chance of running out of gas.

[Celtics18]

I didn't have a problem with Doc's rotations for the most part last night.  The one move that I questioned was going small by bringing in Marquis for the last defensive possession.  It ended up working out, though.  Once the Hawks got the ball in to Horford, Marquis committed a very good foul making sure he wrapped him up with no chance for a three point play. 

Horford's a solid free throw shooter, but not a great one.  There was a pretty good chance he would go 1 for 2 there. 

[17wasEZ]

I didn't have a problem with Doc's rotations for the most part last night.  The one move that I questioned was going small by bringing in Marquis for the last defensive possession.  It ended up working out, though.  Once the Hawks got the ball in to Horford, Marquis committed a very good foul making sure he wrapped him up with no chance for a three point play. 

Horford's a solid free throw shooter, but not a great one.  There was a pretty good chance he would go 1 for 2 there. 

This was written a little while ago.  It is one guys perspective regarding Doc's move:

http://www.celticsblog.com/2012/5/11/3014029/doc-is-clever

He basically says Doc goaded Atl and in particular Josh Smith, into passing the ball to Horford.

[Celtics18]

I didn't have a problem with Doc's rotations for the most part last night.  The one move that I questioned was going small by bringing in Marquis for the last defensive possession.  It ended up working out, though.  Once the Hawks got the ball in to Horford, Marquis committed a very good foul making sure he wrapped him up with no chance for a three point play. 

Horford's a solid free throw shooter, but not a great one.  There was a pretty good chance he would go 1 for 2 there. 

This was written a little while ago.  It is one guys perspective regarding Doc's move:

http://www.celticsblog.com/2012/5/11/3014029/doc-is-clever

He basically says Doc goaded Atl and in particular Josh Smith, into passing the ball to Horford.

Thanks for posting that.  It's a wee bit of a crazy theory, but at the same time somewhat plausible.  In that situation, the one and only thing that you absolutely cannot allow is a three pointer.   Joe Johnson is one of those guys who if he gets the ball can make a long, improbable three if he even gets a tiny sliver of daylight.

With Marquis on Horford in the post, you have something else going for you other than banking on Horford missing a foul shot; the pass in with Marquis fronting hard has to perfect.

The pass was perfect.  Then is when Marquis is required to foul and make sure he wraps up.

Maybe it's not so crazy after all.  Good call, Doc.  Good play, Marquis. 

[bruinsandceltics]

How many times does he have to mess these up before he gets called out for them?

I hate when people call him an elite coach. He is a good coach, with good talent. But Doug Collins is taking him to school after Larry Drew took him to school in Round 1.

[Yoki_IsTheName]

Man DOc's rotation killed us tonight.

I mean the collapse was part of it, but the 4th was really the one that sealed it. We were being out rebounded and he insisted to go small against a much better athletic team.

I don't know what he's doing.

[bruinsandceltics]

Man DOc's rotation killed us tonight.

I mean the collapse was part of it, but the 4th was really the one that sealed it. We were being out rebounded and he insisted to go small against a much better athletic team.

I don't know what he's doing.

The players sure have to take some blame for not hitting shots in the 2nd half and the bad defense.

But when a player is as ineffective as Ray was you have to go with someone else no matter what the foul trouble is.

What is Ray doing that Pietrus isn't?

[goCeltics]

My problem with doc rotation is he likes to play unproductive players like hollins, ppl post the bench scoring and rebounding numbers like it's a surpise, but there is one ryan has proven in the league is that he not a scorer or a rebounder. Think if he played greg we could get some block or steals and that lead to transition points.

He also clearly overplayed kg and ray

kg was 3-12 and had 7 turnovers

[Yoki_IsTheName]

Man DOc's rotation killed us tonight.

I mean the collapse was part of it, but the 4th was really the one that sealed it. We were being out rebounded and he insisted to go small against a much better athletic team.

I don't know what he's doing.

The players sure have to take some blame for not hitting shots in the 2nd half and the bad defense.

But when a player is as ineffective as Ray was you have to go with someone else no matter what the foul trouble is.

What is Ray doing that Pietrus isn't?

There were misses by Philly in the 4th when we were up by 3 or 2 and those offensive rebounds kept th close. KG was the only one in the paint trying to grab some and everybody else being out hustled.

Subbing Pietrus out was a mistake too. Although Ray hit that big 3, he gave up a ton of space in defense. Clearly he's not in game shape yet.

The collapse like I said was part of it. But I put this one on Doc for his ugly rotations. Going for the guys he wants in rather than the guys who needs to be in.

[thestackshow]

As long as Ray Allen never plays again in these playoffs we will be fine, dude must be severely injured, cause hes worse then a D-League scrub out there.

[Smokeeye123]

Garnett played like the final 9 minutes...That's all on Doc. Where was Bass down the stretch? Wasn't he our leading scorer for most of the game??? if we need scoring, why not put him in over Allen???

[TheReaLPuba]

The Allen, Dooling, and Pietrus lineup needs to go.

None of those guys can handle the ball against a ghost let alone the Philly guards.

We should have been up 20+ at halftime.