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yeah hope mason plays tonight against memphis to get his rhythm back.......
Will they play against Memphis? It will be interesting to see if Dice is recovered and in a grove enough and if Mason is still in Pop's dog house. With a back to back, Pop may just let a PO'ed Mason play to give others a little rest.
Thoughts?
yeah hope mason plays tonight against memphis to get his rhythm back.......
I think they will both play tonight because Pop will want to try to limit the minutes of the big three. However, it will depend on if the Spurs are able to build and maintain a significant lead or if, by some horror of horrors, the Grizz blow out the Spurs.
Memphis is below the Spurs in the standings, so anything other than a good win by a significant margin should be cause for concern.
Mason's relegation to the bench is partly because he is still not shooting well and partly because of his drama queen "trade me" act. I'm betting he is nowhere near the playoff rotation.
I agree. I'm simply wondering if he's part of the "back to back" rotation.
Probably not. I don't think he will get much more than spot minutes from here on out.
McDyess should play though.
Honestly, RJ changes everything. If RJ would play like a man and attack the rim game in game out and play hard on the defensive end we wouldnt have so many lineup changes in the first place. 15pts a game with 6-7 ft would make me happy. Out of all the players we have on this team he is one of the few that can play 35-40minutes consistently. If he did that, Pop could probably rest Tim or Manu more on b2b, and Bogans contributions or lack thereof wouldnt make a hige difference, Parker would be forced to give him the ball more instead of dribble. RJ changes alot of things, and dont even get me started on what his contract might mean when it comes to resigning Manu. Mason Jr. , Dice are nice pieces but they dont put you over the edge, thats on RJ.
i think Mason is in Pop's doghouse for sure. which is a hard thing to to do considering the level of suckage that Bogans regularly displays.
Bogans plays hard, ill give him that and that only. His 3pt shooting is overrated, and unfortunately he is like RJ in the sense that if he plays well for a game then some spursfans think all is well. Bogans hit a bunch of 3's yesterday. However the looks he got yesterday were the same looks he's gotten all season. Same with RJ the shots he gets when he scores 20 are usually the shots he gets everygame. The problem with RJ is that he settles for 17ft jumpers. I wish he would be more like TP and be kinda selfish.
Portnoy's right about RJ. His minutes can expand if he produces.
After all the changes, Pop has apparently settled on an 8-man rotation with 5 perimeter players and 3 bigs.
On the perimeter, it's Parker(1), Hill(1,2), Ginobili(1,2,3), Bogans (2,3), and RJ(3). Those five players will cover the great majority of the 144 perimeter minutes every night. RJ and Bogans will combine for 45-55 on any given night, with the ratio based on performance. For example, in the Phoenix game, RJ played 35+ and Bogans played 11. Last night, Bogans played 28 and RJ played 26.
With the bigs, Pop had settled on a 3 man rotation of TD, Dice, and Blair. In the 4 games prior to Dice's injury, Bonner had a DNP-CD and then played 1:22, 7:35, and 7 seconds. He's played as the third big in the two games Dice has missed. I'm sure Dice will move ahead of Bonner once he is healthy enough, but Bonner's reasonably decent performances in the last two games plus 23 games in 40 days point towards a slightly larger role.
Mason may see some time as a designated shooter, but I can't see him back in the regular rotation without an injury to a player ahead of him. Barring injury, Malik and Ian will wave towels and appear in garbage time.
A very informed and well-thought-through answer. My hat is off to you.
I agree. I also think Bonner will have a regular space in the big rotation going forward.
Again, very well done.
Bill
Pop regularly puts better players in the doghouse for mysterious reasons while playing guys that stink . It makes perfect sense.
The whole being aggresive thing with RJ has to do with him driving to the basket. I dont give a crap about how he shoots from the field, I wanna see him get to the free throw line 6-7 times; especially if he is having a bad shooting night. I kinda want the Manu effect, if thats possible. Manu couldnt hit a shot for a long time(months) and lets face he is old, however his contributions were never questioned, he passed, defended and did every little thing possible to help his team win. I want that from RJ and TP. If RJ aint hitting I wanna see free throws and him using his energy and athletism to have the same intense/tenacious D that bogans brings, just with better footwork. From TP I wanna see a Consistent willingness to just keep the game flowing offensively. Which means moving the ball from side to side and setting guys up. If Parker has a bad shooting game thats fine, as long as he finds ways to help the team, which in his case means passing. Blair/Hill have overachieved IMO so to expect more from them and not get much from others ( Dice/RJ/TP) is unfair.
Until last night I was favoring Mason. I think it may be a good idea to leave him out of the rotation. Bogans has way more heart and is starting to bring his intangibles to the table. He may just need consistent PT and the right squad on the floor to play with. I am over Mason...goodbye.
The thing is, RJ's bad shooting nights happen when he settles for jumpers. You can tell in the first few minutes he's on the floor how he's likely to shoot for the game.
Yeah, last night he didn't attack as much. I think he will come out this game in attack mode. If not, I have no more faith in him. It's down to the wire. Even though his offense wasn't necessary for the win against a mediocre team, he should still play like its the top tier. Bogans made him look bad last night. Bogans plays every play likes it his last.
true. i was going to say it actually isn't an abberation at all.
Pop, imo, has just ed this whole season up. sure there were other factors (ie Parker's injury, Manu coming back), but his overplaying of Bonner and Bogans, is the biggest injustice for this team. people act like Bonner having a good game is going to translate into the playoffs, but it isn't going to. LA Denver laugh at a frontcourt rotation that includes Bonner. and Bogans isn't going to stop Kobe any more than Mason or Ginobili. he'll toy with them all.
Theo, Mahinimi, Hairston, and Mason should have seen as much time as Bogans and Bonner, if not more, to get accustomed to playing with everybody.
the Spurs aren't going to win this year, and at the end of the season i'm going to look back and say "what if so and so played."
Pop has been the biggest dissapointment of all this year.
I think Mason will get "relief" minutes in B2Bs until he proves he doesn't deserve them.
This is an argument for learning to keep your mouth shut. Had Roger done so, he probably would have had Fin's minutes automatically drop into his lap.
I think it's less about that then it is about two things: 1) the Spurs wanting to have a wing stopper in the starting lineup and their belief that Bogans is best suited to filling that role and 2) the emergence of Hill. Due to these two things, the Spurs will generally only play five perimeter players in their rotation and that's mostly due to the need to have Hill play more than 15-20 mpg.
Nowhere near the playoff rotation is overstating things. It looks like we'll see a nine man playoff rotation, but depending on match-ups, someone struggling, etc., Mason will be next in line for minutes. The Spurs, more than any other team, even come playoff time, usually have a lengthy rotation.
this last game, Bogan's made more of an impact than RJ. I was surprised Pop praised RJ's defense on Peja, I thought Peja was just off. But 3 pts. and what like 4 rebounds in 20 + minutes, man give me a break. I believe those were RJ's numbers for Friday's game.
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