P.s.
People criticised me when I suggested we should go after Kevin Martin when he was bought out - but I have to say he would he would have been incredibly useful right now. We could have started Turner and Martin could have covered his bench role.
This is why we really need more depth at the SF spot. Hunter and Young are still quite a way from being ready.
Having one bad defender and another who's a little below average on the team?
Evan Turner is our best player at SF with Crowder out, by a mile. But we cannot afford to move him to the starting lineup, because we would lose ALL offensive production from our bench with Turner and Olynyk out of the bench rotation.
Having another wing scorer like Kevin Martin would allow us to move Turner to the starting lineup in Crowder's place, and Kevin Martin could replace Turner's offense off the bench.
Having a backup SF is always better than not having one. He might have barely played, but in the event of something like this happening he'd be a different maker.
We have a ton of depth at guard and in the front court, and we have practically none at the wing. It's an obvious hole that you just can't afford to have when you are trying to hold on to a #3 seed in a very competitive East. If we lose all three games against Indiana, OKC and Toronto (which we very easily could) then we could drop to as far as 7th seed in the space of 3 games.
But they need defense against the more talented wings in the east, Crowder can do that Smart (to an extent) but not Turner or Martin.
To somewhat compensate for what we lose with Crowder, that starting lineup needs somebody who can at least hold their own on both offense and on defence. If we are putting in a guy who is a major liability on either end of the court, the drop off will be too huge.
Smart is a very good defensive player, but at this point he is a downright terrible offensive player and a major liability on that end of the floor - at least until he uses his brain and stops throwing up 8 threes a game.
Turner is strong on offense and is passable on defence, which makes him a much better option to fill in for Crowder.
Martin is irrelevant because if we did get him he wouldn't be start, he'd be coming off the bench. You wouldn't have him playing against those star wing players.
Topic: Someone help me understand what CBS is doing starting Smart at sf? (Read 6898 times)