When Jimmy Comes Back Should Snell Stay In The Starting Lineup

Snell's streak of looking like an honest-to-god NBA player is going on two months, and he's recently begun putting together good games as a higher usage guy without the benefit of leaning on the best players on the team.

Since February this is how Dunleavy and Snell compare Head to Head:

Minutes: 28.3(MDJ) 32(Snell)
+/-: 1.5(MDJ) 2.5(Snell)
FG%: 38.9 (MDJ) 47.3 (Snell)
3P%: 41(MDJ) 48 (Snell)
3PA: 3.7 (MDJ) 5.1 (Snell)
PPG: 7.9 (MDJ) 12.1 (Snell)
FTA: 0.8 (MDJ) 1.5 (Snell)
REB: 3.7 (MDJ) 3.6 (Snell)
Ast: 1.9 (MDJ) 1 (Snell)

Snell's been better across the board, with the one exception being assists. I don't think MDJ's advantage there means much since neither is used as a fulcrum for the offense.

I think the argument for keeping Snell in the starting lineup is pretty easy to make. He's a much more dangerous player offensively and it's a lot easier to play the matchup game with Tony than Mike. Snell can create his own shot, Mike can't. Tony can defend all three backcourt positions, Mike can't.

He's been a very good volume shooter as well since the lightbulb went on so you can't really make the argument that Mike's a better floor spacer. And unlike Mike, Tony can actually make you pay for playing too close on him.

Mike's game inside the arc looks pretty much done, as evidenced by his extremely low FTA's.

I actually think a Derrick/Jimmy/Tony backcourt is pretty hard to game plan against. All three can create their own shot and beat you in different ways. Tony also has the benefit of being a capable ball handler, so it might spare us the need to play those extremely unbalanced Rose + Brooks/Kirk lineups we sometimes revert to in order to get extra ball handling.

I remember last year thinking about how much having Boozer in the starting lineup killed us in the playoffs. Boozer would royally stink it up, and then Taj would have to come in and overcompensate to clean up his mess. Mike hasn't quit on the team like Boozer did, but I think it's easy to see that Tony's a harder cover than Mike these days.

The big reason not to do it is that Tony might not be ready for the intensity of the bright lights of playoff basketball and might shit the bed a few times as he gets used to the added pressure. I don't see Tony as a clutch guy.

Then again, Mike might not be ready for it either if he continues to bring no shot creation ability and keeps getting blocked by the rim on open dunk attempts.

 

I like Dunleavy as a roleplayer too, but we'v seen this team continually get killed by having too many low usage guys on the court at the same time in the playoffs.

And it's not like you're making these huge tradeoffs when you put Snell into the lineup. That's why Gar was high on him at draft time......he's very toolsy on both sides of the court.

If we get Washington in the first round, I think a Jimmy/Snell pairing is more advantageous than Jimmy/Mike. Snell's actually a very good matchup against Beale. His length was too much for him to overcome on defense last time we played.

Pierce doesn't really create his offense anymore, except for his inbetween fadeaway game, and Tony's well equipped to guard that.

 

I'm not sure there's a Bulls fan anywhere would wouldn't agree with you rosenthall.

Unfortunately, it's been 5 years and I can't remember Thibiot ever making a change to his starting lineup unless his hand was forced by an injury.

Has he EVER changed a starter just because another player is better and should be getting more minutes?

 

LOL, that's not trolling, it's a legitimate question.

I'll put my vote in as "no freaking way it happens"!

 

Yup, it seems unanimous that Snell should be ahead of Dunleavy from here on out - in fact, in February and March, Snell (29.7 and 34.5) played more minutes than MDJ (24.5 and 31.6).

Now it's just a matter of whether or not McDoug moves ahead of Dunleavy in the rotation. In the last 5 games, Doug has played 66:20, which is the first time he's played over 65 minutes in a 5-game stretch since the first 5 games of the season.

He's shooting 44.4% (16/36) overall and 62.5% (5/8) from behind the arc in the last 5, scoring 7.8 points with 2.4 rebounds in 13.2 minutes (21.3 and 6.5 per 36).
Dunleavy is at 40% (12/30) overall and 38.1% (8/21) from behind the arc in the last 5, scoring 7.0 points with 4.0 rebounds in 30.7 minutes (8.2 and 4.7 per 36).

There's 15 games left in the season, I say give each of them similar minutes the rest of the way and see who's playing better headed into the post-season. If it's close you have to give the nod to the veteran, but if McDoug clearly outplays him, he should get the minutes.

From everything I've seen this year, I think the playoff minutes should go like this:

Frontcourt: Gasol, Noah/Mirotic, Gibson, Nazr
Wings: Butler, Snell, Dunleavy/McDermott, Moore
Point guard: Rose, Brooks, Hinrich

I don't think it should be a lock that Noah get more PT than Niko - if he's healthy and playing like All-NBA 1st Team, DPOY Jo on defense, then he should play more. If not, Niko has improved on defense, his rebounding has been better than anyone could have expected, and he obviously gives us more on offense... we're only talking like a 32/28 or 34/26 split anyway.

And if Brooks is out of his funk and playing the way he has the last two games and the way he did thru January, there's really no need for Hinrich to ever see the floor.

 

That's an easy one. Snell. Doug's played okay in his increased minutes but he hasn't found his NBA game yet.

Also, Doug's really not a very good matchup guy right now because you can still pick on him on defense. I think he'd be a target in a 7 game series. Better to stick with MDJ and leave McLips on the bench.

If his number gets called, then great. It's a 'Next Man Up' kind of league and he'll have his chance to show something. But he hasn't deserved minutes with his on court play as of now.