Monday, July 25, 2005
Musings on the rotation
Let's assume LB pays lip service to rebuilding for a moment. We'll assume there will be no Darkos on this team. OK, what do we have (or what should we have):
Point guard -- Steph/Nate
SG -- Jamal/QR
SF -- Ariza
PF -- Tim Thomas/Sweetney
C -- James/Frye
That's my 9 man rotation. First observations: (i) you will have a three guards rotation playing real minutes without many minutes for Rose/Taylor/Jerome Williams; (ii) those three are not much in the way of trade bait; (iii) we are two trips to the DL away from being lousy; and (iv) note that Penny and Allan Houston don't even make the list.
This group does not make the playoffs. It can overachieve to .500 ball, but that won't be good enough. Put simply, the East is much improved all around. Other bad teams are improving quicker than the Knicks -- the Bulls, the Hawks and the Magic won't play in June, but they are getting better in a hurry.
So what does that line up yield? A chance to draft a real scoring small forward, or god forbid a real center.
Point guard -- Steph/Nate
SG -- Jamal/QR
SF -- Ariza
PF -- Tim Thomas/Sweetney
C -- James/Frye
That's my 9 man rotation. First observations: (i) you will have a three guards rotation playing real minutes without many minutes for Rose/Taylor/Jerome Williams; (ii) those three are not much in the way of trade bait; (iii) we are two trips to the DL away from being lousy; and (iv) note that Penny and Allan Houston don't even make the list.
This group does not make the playoffs. It can overachieve to .500 ball, but that won't be good enough. Put simply, the East is much improved all around. Other bad teams are improving quicker than the Knicks -- the Bulls, the Hawks and the Magic won't play in June, but they are getting better in a hurry.
So what does that line up yield? A chance to draft a real scoring small forward, or god forbid a real center.
