That substitution of Hood late in the 4th OT was brilliant. The guys were so gassed, and here comes Rodney prancing on the the floor. Fresh legs. Two big makes, and then the 3 that eventually wins it. Coach has been fantastic throughout the playoffs. He learned from last year. Timely timeouts. Substitution pattern that works. NBA coach of the month the past few months in row.
It's never made sense to me why coaches stick to substitution patterns in regulation, to keep the starters fresh for the final minutes, only to ride their starters into the ground in OT. If you're afraid of losing the lead in OT with a sub, why not play your starters all 48 minutes leading up? Pick your hottest bench player that game -- in this case Hood -- and insert him for a minute or two for an infusion of energy. It seems like such an obvious move...and last night validated it.
Great decision. I was calling for that at the start of the second OT. I would've put Collins & Hood in for at least 2 minutes. Would've attacked Jokic every time down the court
like people have said, and Stotts confirmed...that substitution wouldn't have happened if Mo hadn't cramped up basically, the MVP of the game was a leg cramp
As you said, asked bout Hood Stotts said (more/less): "I would love take prise for that but IT WOULD NOT HAPPEN if not Moe's injury". So no.
I was asking for Hood at the start of the 4th OT, then Stotts put him in late because Moe was cramping. No props from me on that.
Yeah it has been a pet peeve of mine for a very long time. Most do it and I don't get it when fatigue becomes so obvious. Like you allude to, you don't need to replace players completely , but get an infusion of energy in there. At least after the 1st OT. Now I can see his reluctance to take out Dame or CJ, but rotating in Collins and Hood for Hark, Aminu, and Kanter seemed like a no brainier. There has to be some coaching philosophy I am missing, because they all seem to do it.
Yeah, the big guns stay in, obviously. But, when you've got two starters in Moe and Aminu that are basically just rotation guys, anyway, it makes no sense to leave them in when the main thing they bring in the first place is energy. Guys like Hood and Collins played half the minutes and would have had a lot more spunk. I think it's mostly a fear of being second guessed. If you play it safe with tired starters and lose, you don't face much heat. If you throw a game away with reserves in OT, you might hear about it... Another component might be fewer timeouts and refs blowing fewer whistles down the stretch, so less stoppages of play provides fewer opportunities to rotate players.
I actually think the players bailed Stotts out and that Stotts almost blew an easy win. I give him ZERO credit for this win. Hood was obvious and it wasn't even a decision he made. I firmly believe even playing Layman at that point would've given the team a serious offensive threat that Denver wouldn't have been able to contain given their exhaustion. Instead, Portland barely ran an offense because they were so tired and refused to close out the game despite many opportunities. Hero ball luckily worked only because Denver was just as stupid and failed to inject life into their unit. I think if Malone had put in Beasley it would've been over for Portland likewise.
I like Stotts...very comfortable with his coaching across the board. The defensive improvement is marked..
Stotts did almost lost the game when took out Kanter and we had Aminu on Jokic and Harkless on Millsap and Millsap score with ease and they went 2.
I noticed that too and I figured Stotts probably saw fat boy was so gassed he wasn't the threat he was so he switched and put the bigger stronger Kanter on Milsap. Great move, actually.
