Starters PG - Damian Lillard SG - CJ McCollum SF - Evan Turner PF - Al Farouq Aminu C - Mason Plumlee 2nd Unit PG CJ/Turner SG - Allen Crabbe SF - Harkless PF - Davis C - Ezeli Third String PG - Shabazz Mohammad SG - Pat Connaughton, Luis Montero SF- Jake Layman PF - Noah Vonleh When Meyers cone back he will take minutes from Davis and Ezeli who we will rest anyways Crabbe will take over the starting 3 around mid season
What I predict and what I want are probably two different things. One thing I am certain about is that who finishes games.....will change every night based on the score and the opponent. We definitely have some flexibility to throw some different looks at teams. As for the rotation.........It all comes down to CJ and to a lesser extent Aminu. If they continue to both start like they did at the end of the year, then I think we need to go big at SF and continue to start Harkless. Bring ET off the bench to play with CJ when Dame goes to the bench. Bring Crabbe in as well to offset ET's lack of 3pt shooting. ET should always have two great 3pt shooters in the game with him. That should be easy to do. (Either Dame and CJ or Dame/Cj and Crabbe. So I would limit ET's minutes with Harkless on the floor. (except maybe against GS when we need to have Harkless on Durant and ET on Klay-in this scenario I would maybe start Leonard at Center to spread the floor) If everyone is healthy: Dame-CJ-Harkless-Aminu-Plumlee CJ-ET-Crabbe-Leonard -Ezeli/Davis The dilemma for me is where to insert our 3rd big man. How often can we play Ezeli and Davis (or Plumlee) together? Maybe against some bigger teams, (i.e OKC) but not too often. These three guys just do not complement one another. So one of them needs to sit each game. But at least they will be rested on those long road trips. And we don't have to worry about them getting in foul trouble. Again I think injuries will work this issue out. It's a long season.
Regarding the big man dilemma...I think we will try out the Aminu at PF small ball lineup for a bit,vand then maybe move him back to the 3 once Meyers comes back. Playing Aminu at the 4 crams the big man rotation. With resting Ezeli, moving Aminu back to the three will alleviate that...we will just have to see how it plays out. Too, with such a big payday Crabbe wants to start, but staring him will mess up the bench rotation. Turner would have to play some 2 with Harkless at the 3. I suspect as you noted the lineup is going change night to night, depending on who we are playing, adjusting for resting Ezeli, and Meyers return. Some nights certain guys will play, and others won't, then the next game the other guys will play. I think we can use our deep roster to our advantage to keep guys from wearing down as the season goes on. Whatever we do its going to be interesting to watch.
I am not sure Aminu will move back to SF, except on occasion against players like LeBron. (Which is seldom) All it would accomplish IMO is making the SF spot more "crammed' instead. Neither of our other bigs, including Vonleh can cover the perimeter as well as Aminu, and plenty of teams have a stretch 4. I am pretty sure he is a lock for the 4 spot.
I pretty much agree with you. However, given a few factors I'd like to see Meyers as our starting C. Regardless of what you (not you) think of him, Dame/CJ seemed to play better with him on the floor, and likewise Meyers seems to play better when he has them on the floor rather than secondary players. Moving Plumlee to the back-up spot should help Turner in the play-making department, where the two of them can hit Crabbe/CJ for open shots or pass to each other on a dive to the basket via give-and-go or screen/rolls. I also think Plumlee's game would improve playing against other 2nd units, unlike Meyers. Neither Plumlee nor Meyers are rim protectors, but Meyers has more size, and therefore more ability. I think Meyers/Aminu/Harkless poses more of a deterrent than Plumlee/Aminu/Harkless. We've seen that Meyers can pose problems for true centers - of which there are more than there were just a couple years ago. Basically, I think you maximize the talent of both Meyers and Plumlee by swapping their roles. PG - Dame SG - CJ SF - Harkless PF - Aminu C - Meyers Back-ups: Turner Crabbe Plumlee Situational/Garbage: Davis Ezeli Vonleh Montero Pat Layman Mid-season trade Davis/Vonleh/Crabbe.
Hmm that make some sense........except what happens to Ezeli? Can he play with Plumlee or Davis? When I first started looking at the rotation I did not even have Leonard in the 2 deep. Then I realized none of my other lineups down low would mesh together on the 2nd unit....so I slipped Meyers in over Davis. Not because he is better, but just because of our need for spacing with Ezeli on the floor. Who is your PF with the 2nd unit? Along side Ezeli? Plumlee? I guess it could work with CJ and Crabbe bombing away.....
I'm looking at Ezeli as a specialist, rather than a rotation player. It's far more important that he's healthy and in shape for the POs than it is that he plays regular minutes in the regular season. I also really hope we make a consolidation trade for a real PF. For once we have too many hustle guys...unfortunately they lack skill and/or size. But working with our current roster Stotts will have to stagger the line-ups to account for the fact that we don't have anyone behind Aminu. By staggering line-up changes we can primarily use Aminu and Harkless at PF with spot minutes going to Davis/Vonleh/Ezeli. Say we start: Dame CJ Harkless Aminu Meyers Dame goes to the bench, Turner comes in for a Turner/CJ pairing. A few minutes later CJ goes the bench, Crabbe comes in. Meyers goes the bench, Plumlee comes in. Now we're playing with: Turner Crabbe Harkless Aminu Plumlee After a 3-4 minute blow we bring Dame back in and Aminu gets a breather. Now we're playing: Dame Crabbe Turner Harkless Plumlee Another few minutes and we bring CJ and Meyers back in, and give some spot minutes to Davis/Vonleh/Ezeli for Harkless to rest. Dame CJ Turner D/V/E Meyers Now Aminu can come back in after being spelled first by Harkless sliding over for 2-3 minutes followed by 2-3 minutes from D/V/E. The changes will be more like hockey changes, rather than platooning that we often see in the NBA. But over the course of a season this could work in our favor - everyone will have experience playing with a wide variety of teammates and line-ups, and that familiarity should help if we face any injuries.
The key to the rotations is which player starts at SF? My guess, Turner will backup both Dame and CJ. We have a better balance of skills if he comes off of the bench. I have no clue if the starting SF will be Moe or Crabbe. I would lean towards starting Moe because we know it worked at the end of last season. But I would not be surprised if Stotts starts Crabbe. I’m going with the OPs rotation. Good work.
Not to nit pick your long and well thought out post......but these two items above I would question.... Once Ezeli is healthy, he needs to play 20 minutes in most games. I think we need him to play regular minutes or there will not be enough chemistry once the playoffs start. Plus we actually need to make the playoffs. And even though your scenario is only having Dame and CJ both sit at the same time for 3-4 minutes a game, I am not sure it is ever necessary for that to happen, except in a blow out. We can limit their minutes without it, especially since ET will need lots of minutes at SG in order for Harkless and Crabbe to get enough minutes at SF.
Think we often forget how good Plums looked in that Clippers series. He averaged 8pts, 13 rebs, 6 assists, with a steal and block per game in less than 30 mpg that series. Those are prime Joakim Noah numbers. Nearly 6 apg from a center is unheard of. His post defense is trash, but as a release man for Dame traps, he's awesome. I think we will see lineups where he plays PF with Meyers/Ezelil.
I don't know how well thought out it is - I've not put any thought into minute distribution. It was just an example to show that, by staggering substitutions, we should be able to play Aminu/Harkless at PF for 80%+ of the game (this 80% is just an off-the-cuff number). IMO the roster is still a work in progress and it will need to be adjusted via trade in order to bring balance and alleviate a minutes crunch for our under-skilled (yet deserving) bigs. Until a trade happens then at least one of Davis/Plumlee/Ezeli will be playing far fewer minutes than they'd like to be playing. In the early-going I expect Ezeli to ride the bench, and if it were up to me Davis would probably be sitting next to him while we mainly play Aminu/Harkless/Meyers/Plumlee in the front court. But we need to play Davis to maintain some level of trade value. Hopefully Neil makes a nice trade to help solve the problem of which bigs get minutes.
Simplest (but effective) 1-3 rotation would be as follows: 6min Dame/CJ/Moe 6min Dame/ET/AC 6min CJ/ET/AC 6min Dame/CJ/Moe Lather, Rinse, Repeat Gives 36 mpg to Dame/CJ, 24 mpg each to Moe, AC, and ET, with 2 shooters and 2 ball-handlers on the floor at all times. 0% chance it actually happens like that, but it makes sense to me.
These are the lineups Im most excited to see esp with Aminu and Ezeli. Nothing against dame I just think this could be our most effective unit next year. Super balanced with shooters and defense.
Lillard (35) / McCollum (13) McCollum (21) / Crabbe (25) / Turner (2) Harkless (20) / Turner (23) / Aminu (5) Aminu (20) / Davis (20) / Leonard (8) Ezeli (18) / Plumlee (20) / Leonard (10) Lillard - 35 McCollum - 34 Aminu - 25 Turner - 25 Crabbe - 25 Davis - 20 Harkless - 20 Plumlee - 20 Ezeli - 18 Leonard - 18 - Can almost get everybody 20mpg. - Turner, Crabbe, Davis, Plumlee, and Leonard would make up the best bench in the league - Harmless and Aminu fit really well together, especially next to Lillard and CJ. -I like Aminu/Ezeli (Outside/Inside with great defense) and Davis/Leonard (Great Balance) frontcourt pairings. Plumlee is a wild card.
Best lineups: Lillard/CJ Crabbe Turner Aminu/Davis Leonard -4 shooters with Aminu, 3 with Davis who brings more inside. 3 good defenders, 2 ball handlers Lillard CJ Harkless Aminu Ezeli -Tons of defense and athleticism next to McLillard. 3 Defenders, 3 Shooters, 2 Ball Handlers Lillard/CJ Crabbe Turner Aminu Ezeli -4 good defenders while keeping 3 shooters and 2 ball handlers on the court. Lillard CJ Turner Davis Leonard -3 Ball Handlers on the wing, with a great Pick-n-ROLL big in Davis and a great Pick-n-POP big in Leonard. Maintains spacing with 3 shooters (Lillard, CJ, Leonard), while putting 2 solid defenders on the court (Davis, Turner). If the other team is playing a stretch-4 and/or we want a 4th shooter, substitute Aminu for Davis.
Starters Lillard McCollum Harkless Aminu Plumlee 2nd unit McCollum Crabbe Turner Leonard (guards centers on defense) Davis Ezeli used for specific match ups, at least early in the season. for example, against bigger more bruising post centers you'll see more of festus and less of plumlee.
Seems that Leonard would be the better option against bigger, bruising post centers. Ezeli is more of value against teams that attack the lane from the perimeter when we need improved help defense and rim protection.
