These two wins moved us in front of Indy, Orlando, and Utah and is severely detrimental to our chances at landing a high draft pick. It really makes no sense to win games with our roster as constructed.
Exactly. I don't think Prince or Thornton or probably even Bass are part of the future, yet these guys are getting important minutes. So frustrating. What's the point here?
I don't get it either. These are NBA veterans. Regardless of recent performance, every GM, incompetent or not, knows what they're getting if they choose to acquire these players.
More than anything, it shows that tanking comes from management and not as much from coaching. You generally win games with veterans and lose games with youth. Stevens is trying to win games, despite what some people believe.
Which is why it continues to puzzle me that we have to 'showcase' these guys. Umm, hello, they are who they are as players by this point in their respective careers, so it's not like other gms should have to see that they can contribute consistently. It just...there are no words. Ugh.
If it makes no sense, then why are a lot of you still saying we are showcasing them? No one within the organization has said that's what we are doing but a lot of you keep saying it. Maybe the coach is just playing the players that are good enough to play... take the winning out of it, all of our players deserve and have earned playing time.
Like another poster said, we lose people say we have no talent, when we win you say it's too much! Make up your minds!
Brad Stevens' rotations make no sense, and yet he continues to be predictably unpredictable with his substitution patterns, so just because something may not make any sense doesn't mean that it won't continue to occur. How's that for a double negative, lol?
Also, if you want to take winning out of the picture, as Ainge has tried to do by his wheeling and dealing, why don't all of our players get playing time? If winning is the focus, Stevens will continue to go with guys like Thornton, who have no future here, when he should be focusing on teaching the young guys how to play, and eventually win (if he even knows how to do that). I've consistently stated that we should be giving guys like Smart and Young big minutes, regardless of the outcome of a certain contest, because they need time to develop, and yet it was only because of injuries that Young actually got a chance to play, smh. You don't grow as a player sitting on the bench. I hate to cite this guy as a source because he's such a prick, lol, but Rick Barry once pointed out in a clip from an old nba draft that one NBA season is equal to 3 seasons of college basketball in terms of games and development, so there's a lot of time to improve. You don't get these days back as players, and they've essentially already wasted an entire year of James Young's career. Honestly, I knew that we would be crap again this year, so I don't care about wins and losses. I care about player development. Smart should have played until he fouled out, and Young should be given the same opportunity instead of waiting for established players to get into foul trouble before you sub them in (if you ever do).
They haven't wasted his season, he has played a lot of ball in Maine. Young has said he knew he wasn't ready to play with the big boys physically... they are working with him and allowing him to play ball at the same time. The only thing stopping him from playing is injuries and illness. Stevens has let him play and aside from the outburst he has looked like a fish out of water when out there. He doesn't deserve someone's minutes no matter how old they are unless, he has earned them. That's the way Stevens does it, he's the coach, it's time you get use to it until he isn't.
He probably would be playing his way into more minutes by now if he was actually healthy long enough to play.
S/N: I want Young to play when he's ready and I was happy we chose him. I was fine with Smart being picked because I thought he was BPA but I was very excited about Young, I think he's going to be a steal once he gets his body right. He already has the mentality of a "killer." When someone is playing bad (gone) is when we should see him but he has to be healthy first.
Ditto. At least that's what I'm hoping for. Where we disagree is that I don't believe that d-league minutes are nearly the same as nba game minutes, especially when it comes to developing players. Sure, at least he got to play, but I'd honestly rather watch him look like 'a fish out of water,' to use your words, for the majority of the season than looking at youtube highlights from the red claws, lol.
I also disagree about him and Smart having to earn their minutes. Now, until Rondo was traded
, it was obviously going to be at least a struggle for Smart to get on the court, but after the 'trade' with Dallas, he should have been starting, but that's just my personal preference. I understand what Stevens is doing by saying that they have to earn their minutes, but I also think that he needs to be a little bit more realistic about the situation. James Young isn't vying with other guys to back up Paul Pierce on a contender - he's a roo0kie in a rebuilding situation. To me, that means that he deserves priority, but to each their own.
I just want to see both of them play. A lot. It's not that I'm impatient with rebuilding. On the contrary, I actually enjoy seeing guys grow. My only gripe is that Ainge should have moved a lot more of these older guys earlier, or at least in one fell swoop when he traded Rondo, so that Smart and Young could get even more playing time.