Curry’s decision is not to make a decision at all

Michael Curry: Richard Hamilton, Allen Iverson both to start tonight vs. Charlotte Bobcats
by A. Sherrod Blakely
Tuesday January 13, 2009, 12:43 PM

The biggest question facing Detroit Pistons coach Michael Curry has been about how he would handle Richard Hamilton’s return to action.

Would Hamilton keep his pre-injury spot in the starting lineup? Or would Allen Iverson keep starting alongside Rodney Stuckey?

Well, contrary to recent speculation, it’s going to be both, Curry said at practice today. At least for now.>>

http://www.mlive.com/pistons/index.ssf/2009/01/michael_curry_richard_hamilton_2.html

Look like Curry made a decision to go back to small ball.

Good luck tonight Curry, your Pistons will need it.

Actually Curry did make a decision.

It was just the wrong one.

He sent Johnson to the bench which was the correct thing to do but he should be starting Kwame as bad as he is.

small ball will never get it done.

Any more than 10 minutes a game of 3 guards on the court at any time is too much time for small ball.

Expct to see small ball for atleast 25 – 30 minutes tonight or even more.

I expect Charlotte to win if this is the case.

I thought we killed this monster. We burned it horribly, and shot it, and stabbed it. But it crawled into a cave somewhere, nursed its wounds, and came back… this Summer, prepare yourself for Small Ball 2: The Shrinkening. Rated MCIAFI

I think they’ll be OK here. Why get one of your two stars mad when you can still control the minutes? If you start them both and then go big early in the first, what’s the difference? As long as Johnson still is in the rotation, I’m OK with it.

I wish I had tickets to this game so I could boo Curry from the minute he steps out of the locker room, through the entire game, and then when the game is over, I’d wait outside the palace to boo him as he gets to his car (his car which I would have egged earlier). And I’d be tempted to try and follow him home so I could boo him some-more.

I’m actually fine with this. I had the impression that the Pistons got off to fine starts with the small line up, they were just punished as the game went on. So I’m fine starting small and subbing early. I think that the small lineup was very effective in spurts for us and shouldn’t be abandoned completely.

If it doesn’t end up working Curry will be able to say that he tried every option before putting one of his all stars on the bench.

My Curry Fury has been re-ignited.

The line about limiting the minutues for small ball is total BS.

Curry has been spouting about how important it is to have your best defensive team out there.

By going back to small ball tonight he is doing two things which will bite his butt big time.

1. He is kowtowing to Hamilton and Iverson
2. He is insulting Larry Brown and his Bobcats.

Don’t anyone think for a moment that Brown won’t use to inspire his Bobcats on tonight to victory.

The Pistons beat them by only 4 points in the last game and that was Diaw’s first game for them. He had a horrible game which allowed the Pistons to win.

Since that game the Bobcats are 7 – 7.

If the Bobcats win tonight in the Palace it will give Davidson and Dumars big time heartburn.

Curry is pissing me off!!!! He needs to grow some balls!!!!!!!!!!! This lineup is going to get us no where!!!!

If it doesn’t end up working Curry will be able to say that he tried every option before putting one of his all stars on the bench.>>

It already ended up not working when Curry did it before Hamilton’s injury.

There is no need to put the Pistons fans through this garbage again.

Curry needs to grow some balls!!! I dont care what AI USE to be, I dont care how much money he is making this year….AI would be great coming off the bench…He said in November that he would do whatever ut takes to win….CURRY NEEDS TO GROW SOME BALLS!!!!!!!

@Rob G:
“I thought we killed this monster. We burned it horribly, and shot it, and stabbed it. But it crawled into a cave somewhere, nursed its wounds, and came back… this Summer, prepare yourself for Small Ball 2: The Shrinkening. Rated MCIAFI”

Where’s the movie poster?

I don’t know if this will work

http://www.pistonsforum.com/xmicro/small-balls.jpg

Uggghh. This blows. I was pumped for this game; hoping we’d have a real line up.

“for 32 minutes (of a game’s 48 minutes) we need to be big.”

Curry is getting closer to the truth. Smallball should be for more like 12mpg than 16mpg, but we are getting closer.

Don’t forget, folks, before Rip staged his mini-strike, we were playing around 30mpg of smallball. This is progress…

The only problem here is the concept of increasing Bynum’s minutes, which likely means fewer minutes for Afflalo. And that ain’t good.

With Iverson, Stuckey, Afflalo, and Hamilton on the roster, Bynum shouldn’t get tick unless someone is injured. (And I actually dig Bynum.)

Guys, guys, guys… small ball never died! We started both halves with Kwame and Amir for about four – seven minutes and that was it. Seriously, that was it. I don’t get this confusion. We only had two bigs on the floor for very limited strethes during this injury string of games. It’s been AA that’s picked up the bulk of Rip’s minutes not a big. Also, if we’re counting Amir as a “big” than what’s so bad about Prince as a “big”. They’re the same height. Amir is stronger, yes, how much, negligible especially when you consider Prince’s defensive reputation allows him to get away with much more physicality than Amir – who can do nothing. Small ball only died in the opening minutes of each half – after that it was a one man Antonio McDyess cake with sprinkles of Amir. It seemed like it died because McDyess can pull down double digit rebounds in three quarters and it takes Rasheed three games.

Petey: That’s a good point about Bynum. My blinding rage made me overlook the fact that Curry even mentioned his name in the interview and said he needed minutes. That’s crazy talk to me. Bynum is an awesome 12th man/fan favourite kind of guy, but there’s just no room for him. Until now, I guess.

I really like Bynum…BUT, he can not stop anybody!!! He may actually be worse on D than AI, AND THAT IS BAD!!!!

@bc:
are you insane? seriously, are you insane?

Games 3 and 4 of the season Will Bynum looked like he was pretty legit – so much so that the fact that since then he’s been nothing but awful hasn’t taken him out of plans for minutes. Meanwhile, Jason Maxiel may or may not play, ahh… the joys of Michael Curry’s genius.

Friggin ridiculous. If we lose more than 2 of our next 5 I want his head on a stick!

am i wrong mr payne?

The idea behind Bynum is that Curry has come to realization that Iverson is no point guard.

That also has something to do with Curry not wanting AI to come off the bench since he would presumably only have Rips left over minutes.

By going to small ball it will allow Curry to bring in Bynum behind Stuckey at the PG, keep AI at the shooting guard.

Presumably Afflalo will back up Hamilton at the small forward Dyess and Maxiell will get the bench minutes from Tay and Sheed.

The minutes as I see them.
-———————————
Sheed 35
Tay 35
Rip 35
AI 40
Stuckey 35
Bynumn 13
Affalo 12
Dyess 25
Maxiell 10
-—————
Total 240
======

This didn’t even cross my mind as an option – I’d rather have Rip come off the bench than play small ball. Is it so much to ask that, along with having your best players on the court, you have them playing their best position? Sigh.

@bc:
Yeah, sorry— didn’t mean to be a prick I was just a bit shocked. He is a shut down defender, one of our team’s best. He’s undersized, but makes up for it by sticking on his man from head to toe. I didn’t know much about him before he played in the summer league, but my instant reaction was “hell, this guy is like a younger lindsey hunter”. He has the same defensive character, getting in a players space, forcing turnovers, reaching in, causing 8 second violations, stripping the ball— just like hunter used to do. He continued to do that in the pre-season and in the regular season as well, but due to inconsistent minutes he’s played less-than-ideal on offense (even though he’s shooting 47%).

While I don’t have stats to quantify his defense, I’ll just show my favorite video of the guy (which has nothing to do with anything, really):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlSZMlJ1tS8

Curry punted. Eventually the 4th quarter minutes are going to be an issue and Curry can’t punt on that one. Now the big question is how he manages the minutes. With ’Sheed and Rip back in the mix will Curry continue to give the Afflalo and Amir minutes? I just wish for once I got the feeling that Curry was ahead of the curve with this team and maybe he is but it never comes off that way in the press.

This is why you don’t trade a PG for a SG when you already have an all star SG… not really fixing your needs. Although I’m pro-trade. Iverson can run the point he just can’t defend it.

Yeah, that minute breakdown, well possibly accurate is a nightmare – Maxiel 10, no Amir, no Kwame, Bynum playing, Sheed getting 35 minutes…

As juicebox mentioned up above- you kinda have to marvel at how F-ING amazing it is that Michael Curry has created a rotation where somehow (6-0 guard) Will Bynum’s minutes come at (PF) Jason Maxiell’s expense. That is incredibly strange.

Curry is a ween. A puss. A bald mound of gelatenous failure.

Once again, this plan’s utter failure will prompt Curry to admit to a problem the DBB saw a month in advance. Give it two weeks. And then, once again, he will do exactly what we’ve all been saying all along (fucking bench somebody, anybody) to fix it. He will then take all the credit as if a bunch of jackoffs on the Interwebs didn’t think of it first.

No matter what side of the fence you’re on (AI vs Rip), can we all come to agreement that we have one of the worst coaches in professional sports right?

Bubbachuck on the possibility of coming off the bench:

You always are supposed to do what the coach asks you to do. I’m not trying to be a distraction. Obviously, it would be difficult for me. It’s something I’ve never done in my career. It would be different. We’ll see what happens.

Rip on the possibility of coming off the bench:

That ain’t happening. I’ll kill every one of you if it happens. And your families too. Plus, I demand to be named the King of Siam and allowed to wear a tiara. Attention must be paid! I am the coach. I am the walrus.

(Note: the final sentences of Rip’s quote are slightly dramatized.)

right now

Actually this was a safe play by Curry – Psych 101 (Interesting)
He’s substituting AI or RIP/ early and have one or the other play with the second unit. Neither one, loses their “starting status” -

And Curry doesn’t lose his “pussy” status.

Popovich wouldn’t have started them both. Brown wouldn’t have started them both. Riley wouldn’t have started them both. Jackson wouldn’t have started them both. Rivers would have started them both and then praised them for taunting the opposition.

Memo okur to Michael Curry: Ben Stiller already plays a solid Simple Jack, no need for you as well to start acting retarded.

This lineup is a bust; Tayshaun is out of position and will continously defer to the stronger personalities on the court (which, is not a good thing. Tayshaun can make a bucket whenever he wants to. Him deferring and failing to play up to his potential can be a whole ‘nother Mike PayneTrain post) So if RIP returns tonight, does this mean we are at t-minus 2 games for requisite My name is RIP Hamilton and I’ll take that costly late-game technical foul?

and…. Joel and Garrett tie for win of the thread.

Here’s where the rotation SHOULD be by the all-star break:

96 guard minutes to divide up. 48 small forward minutes to divide up.

36m Iverson
34m Stuckey
20m Afflalo
27m Hamilton
39m Prince

And that leaves us with precisely 12 minutes of smallball per game, which seems just about the perfect number to me.

As always, all I ask is that all of Afflalo’s minutes come with Iverson on the floor.

With 12 minutes of smallball, that leaves 84 big minutes to divide up.

34m Rasheed
24m Dice
26m KwaMirMax

I don’t mind Curry screwing around right now, but we should start to get to where we need to be during the next month of games.

@Petey:
Did you just copy and paste that post from a couple days ago?

I know that Amir is listed at 6’9", but my impression was that he had grown 2+ inches since being drafted. I remember reading something to that effect on the pistons web site last year. Also, he looks taller than Prince to me, but camera angles can be deceptive. What say the rest of ye?

The ’Let’s Abuse Tayshaun’s Willingness to Take One For the Team Because I’m Too Weak to Make a Decision’ lineup returns! The more I think about Tayshaun sliding to the 4 to enable Curry’s timidity and AI & Rip being selfish the more pissed off I get.

“Did you just copy and paste that post from a couple days ago?”

Yup. But I added a frontcourt rotation breakdown.

@ Mike payne:
Bynum can not stop the dribble penetration….the last few games….he has not stopped anything…as much as I love Chauncey, Bynum was letting him go right around him for layup after layup. And we all know from the last couple years…Chauncey does not do that anymore.
I am not too worried about that. I am worried about Curry having NO BALLS!!!

“The ‘Let’s Abuse Tayshaun’s Willingness to Take One For the Team Because I’m Too Weak to Make a Decision’ lineup returns! The more I think about Tayshaun sliding to the 4 to enable Curry’s timidity and … Rip being selfish the more pissed off I get.”

Meh. The whole concept of playing ANY smallball implies Tay playing some minutes at the ‘4’. And considering our roster, we really should be playing some number of minutes of smallball.

The question is how many minutes?

Curry says 16m right now. I say we should be at 12m by the all-star break. Whatever. But, as stated, remember that we were playing close to 30m a month ago…

@ joel:
I do not believe Curry is a bad coach. I do think he is in a very tough situation. I am not sure if it is a good one or a bad one yet. Since when is too much talent a bad situation. I think Curry has the potential to be a good coach. He does need to work on growing some balls!!! Ha!

Petey – I like your posts and I like AI but it’s pretty funny that you edited out the tiny bit about AI being selfish. Not being a big as stubborn as Rip does not equal being a team player. What AI should have done is repeat what he said when he came to Detroit, that he’s happy to do whatever he can for the team.

bc,

That’s an interesting perspective. I remember thinking that Afflalo was playing horrible D on Chauncey. He let him go left all the way to the rack twice. To be fair he was overplaying his right and didn’t get any help in the form of a baseline rotation. Anyway, my point is that most people think Afflalo is a pretty solid defender, but if you went solely off the denver game, you’d think he sucked (imho). Anyways, I think that Bynum is a pretty solid defender. At the very least, it isn’t his most glaring weakness.

Curry has painted himself into a corner. I think his reply is 1: a response after reading Rip’s “it ain’t happening” and 2: not wanting to bench AI and pissing him off. Maybe he starts this lineup, see’s which of AI or Rip has it going and then substitutes accordingly.

Then again, AI brings himself some love from fans if after the next couple of games he “goes” to Curry and says put me on the second team.

Personally, if I’m getting minutes and playing at the end, that’s fine. Whatever happened to “it’s not who starts but who finishes.”

Bynum can not stop the dribble penetration…>>

Lets not forget that that CP can’t do it either, and she has a NCAA title ring and a Gold Medal from the Olympics.

‘Popovich wouldn’t have started them both. Brown wouldn’t have started them both. Riley wouldn’t have started them both. Jackson wouldn’t have started them both. Rivers would have started them both and then praised them for taunting the opposition.’
THEY ALL HAVE BALLS!!!!!!!!! LOL

‘The ‘Let’s Abuse Tayshaun’s Willingness to Take One For the Team Because I’m Too Weak to Make a Decision’ lineup returns! The more I think about Tayshaun sliding to the 4 to enable Curry’s timidity and AI & Rip being selfish the more pissed off I get.’

Coachs are supposed to set their teams up for success. Put the players in the right places…..taking Tay, one of the best 3 defenders in the game and putting him at the 4 where he may be an average defender at best is not good. And the same with RIP…when we play “curry’s small balls” we give up over a 100 points every game….

@ bc:
I do believe Curry is a bad coach. I don’t think he is in a very tough situation. I am quite sure it is a good one. Since when is too much talent a bad situation? It’s not. I dont’ know if Curry has the potential to be a good coach. Maybe he’s just confused and moody because

HE’S OVULATING.

BECAUSE HE HAS NO BALLS.

I’m with joejoejoe on not liking Tayshaun at the 4 (and I’m not blaming Tay for whatever problems he has there).

Small ball in significant doses might still provide a decent number of regular season wins, especially given the surprisingly large number of crappy teams in the NBA this year. But it does not, can not, and will not work in the playoffs. Teams that were more suited for small ball and had better small ball players than Detroit have proven that time and time again.

I guess I need to pay alittle more attention to Bynums D. I have loved what I have seen from him on the offensive end. He is so amazingly fast and quick and athletic. I guess their are a handful of times where I saw him get beat up on D and that has stuck with me. To say he is Lyndsey Hunter like, I think is alittle far fetched. I can not wait to see what unfolds tonight….and yes, I will be thinking the whole game….." GOD I WISH WE STILL HAD LARRY BROWN!!!! " We would have more than 1 championship the last 5 years, that is for sure!!

If I had the means to do it, I would totally piss in Curry’s shoes. The face he would make…

you want my tickets to the game tonight….sec 107 rowjj…i am boycotting!!!

If I had the means to do it, I would totally piss in Curry’s shoes. The face he would make…

He’d just say Amir was out of position on defense.

Bynum has Zero J

K, I hope we lose tonight… I’m only 45% serious.

I’m really glad MC wasn’t coach of America during the Cuban Missle Crisis…

@Shinons

Did somebody order a zing-burger?

Woot! Everbodies favorite line-up has been restored, Small-ball is back and it’s back with a vengence!

http://blog.mlive.com/pistons_impact/2008/06/medium_080610-michael-curry.jpgmmmmhttp://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-images/Arts/Arts_/Pictures/2007/08/07/hitler460.jpg

Yeah, I went there. Wild card, bitches!

Balls. Well, you get the point.

“Woot! Everbodies favorite line-up has been restored, Small-ball is back and it’s back with a vengence!”

Curry should start the second quarter with Bynum, Iverson, Stuckey, Hamilton, and Tay at the ‘5’, then just smile for the TV cameras to see if he can get all of our heads to simultaneously explode.

*vengeance! :D

Petey, the possibility of that actually happening would not even surprise me.

Amir/Kwame/Max – DNPCD

I’ve been watching Portland vs Lakers in April of 03, Rasheed hasn’t taken 1 three in this game, and he hasnt even been our on the perimetere…… man oh man he just busting up people…..

when you make allen iverson look like a self-sacrificing teammate, you’ve got issues.

Tey is way too tall to play the 5… I was thinking Bynum. maybe we should start a lineup of Mugsy Bogues, Spud Webb, Earl Boykins, AI, and Will Bynum.

Petey’s minutes breakdown makes a good point, which is that there are only so many minutes to go around at 1-3, which means we HAVE to play Tay some minutes at the 4, or we HAVE to dramatically reduce someone’s minutes.

If you assume Bynum doesn’t play and Afflalo gets the minutes at 2G when Stuckey is out and Iverson plays point, that only leaves 96 minutes to divide between Iverson, Hamilton and Prince. That’s only 32 minutes per player. And that’s with limited minutes for Afflalo and no Herrmann at the 3. That’s probably not enough. If you want to find more minutes for those guys, it has to come from the 4.

With no Tay at the 4, you are looking at a minutes/game breakdown something like this:

1) Stuckey- 35
2) Iverson- 30
3) Hamilton- 32
4) Prince- 34
5) Afflalo- 13
   Total: 144 = (3 × 48)

And even there you are playing a Stuckey-Iverson-Hamilton lineup for 14 minutes a game.

You don’t think we could swing a trade for Nate Robinson?

“Tey is way too tall to play the 5… I was thinking Bynum. maybe we should start a lineup of Mugsy Bogues, Spud Webb, Earl Boykins, AI, and Will Bynum.”

When Iverson first arrived in Denver, Melo and JR were suspended. So the backcourt was Iverson and Boykins for 35mpg. Those were some craaazy looking games.

How ‘bout Herrmann at the ’5’ then?

Someone should kick Curry in his small balls.

@Matt

Given this roster, I think Prince becomes the indispensable man to have on the floor. You’ve got to play him as many minutes as you can without wearing him down. And given his age, I think he should be able to do 38 – 40 mpg at a high level.

First, we’ve still been playing small ball this entire stretch of games – except for the first six minutes of each half. So, this reaction is crazy.

Second, what Petey started and what Matt added to is a great point in Curry’s defense. That if Prince never plays the 4 – then each of Stuckey, Prince, Hamilton, and A.I will be around the 30 point – and that’s with AA at 13 – where he has been getting around 20-25 as of late. Personally, I want to see those guys at 35 each and AA at about 18 – which I think DBB will pretty much agree – and if that’s the case Prince would be playing around 12 minutes of PF – if that is the start of each half, so be it.

I don’t think the small ball lineup hurts us because Prince can defend most 4’s (read: Rashard Lewis, Ben Wallace, Marvin Williams) – what kills me is this means we’re going back to no Amir, no Maxiel and no Kwame. Small ball could work if you put in a C that is committed to paint protection and rebounding. Phoenix never really had that, Dallas never really had that – we could but that’s where Curry fails at this strategy.

Juicebox -

You’ve asserted that we played the same amount of small ball without rip as we did before. Is this what you gathered from watching games, or did you look up stats that prove it? My impression was that we were playing more minutes with a big line up. Of course, that was my impression so I could easily be wrong. Just interested to see if you have anything to back up your assertion.

JB, dallas was running Dampier and Diop. Not exactly striking fear into opponents hearts, but they stayed at home and blocked shots.

I think I’m going to take up knitting so I’ll have something to do while the team crawls back from consecutive 15 point deficits. After they cut it to three in the fourth, and then fall back by 8 within the next three possessions, I’ll go get a glass of Scotch. Ahhh, small ball… so relaxing, so futile…

@Petey – Tay may be 28, but he has played 82 games for the past five years straight plus an additional 15-20 in the playoffs plus spending the summer on the Olympic team. He already wears down at the end of every year (if you were a fan of this team before this year, you’d know that) and now we’re asking him to play out of position in addition to the defensive stopper role. And he’s playing a career high in minutes. Gee, I wonder what kind of shape he’s going to be in come April.

Petey- I agree with you. I don’t think that’s enough minutes for Prince…or Afflalo, Hamilton or AI. And of course that’s the point. There just aren’t any more minutes to go around unless you play Tay some minutes at the 4. And if you’re goint to be doing that anyways, I don’t see the huge problem with starting them there, even if only to protect the delicate egos of Hamilton and Prince (and so long as he still plays most of his minutes at the 3).

Juicebox- Exactly. I am concerned about Amir and Max getting minutes. But if Prince plays 12 minutes a game at the 4, it only leaves 84 minutes for the bigs. Ideally, Amir comes off the bench half way through the first quarter in place of Hamilton or AI and Prince slides back to 3. I’d like to see something like:

 Sheed-30
 Dyess-22
 Amir- 18
 Max- 14

Obviously, that should say delicate egos of Hamilton and AI.

Colin-Both. Statistically, Kwame Brown, Jason Maxiel, Amir Johnson, all together have only played slightly more minutes than just Rasheed has been playing throughout the season. They’ve been at about 40 total – Rasheed 35ish. I think there may have been one exception to this statment in the games that Rasheed and Rip both missed.

When just Rip was out and we inserted Amir – Amir really just cut into Rasheed and McDyess minutes as opposed to Princes – who still hovered around 40 in those few games.

Look at the fact that if Stuckey, Iverson, Prince and McDyess have all been playing the same minutes when Rip was out – and Kwame/Maxiel/Amir were taking just a few more than Rasheed usually gets – then that’s not the death of small ball. Unless spot duty of Herrmann and doubling Afflalo’s minutes counts as killing small. I think this stretch has given the allusion of small ball having gone away because it’s been 3 guys (Kwame, Max, Amir) taking Rasheed’s minutes – there have been more times with 2 bigs on the floor – but the bigs are just taking the bigs minutes. Rip’s minutes have been dispersed to the starters, Afflalo, Herrmann even Bynum has gotten into games – they haven’t been given to Maxiel or Kwame – as we all know.

If you watch the games you’ll notice that Kwame and Amir play until about 4:00 left in the first and then in comes AA and McDyess – that is small ball. Istead of having Rasheed play the whole first quarter (12 big minutes) we’ve had two bigs plays half a first quarter. At the end of games it’s been AA on the floor almost every game since Rip’s abscense – that’s a guard replacign a guard in the lineup, not a big replacing a guard and in turn killing small ball.

The only difference is we’ve started big and then gone small – when we we’re playing with the small ball linenup we’d start small and then end up with Sheed and Dyess out together or Dyess and Amir – the amount of small ball hasn’t changed (at least not drastically) – only when we play it has.

“Tay may be 28, but he has played 82 games for the past five years straight plus an additional 15-20 in the playoffs plus spending the summer on the Olympic team. He already wears down at the end of every year (if you were a fan of this team before this year, you’d know that) and now we’re asking him to play out of position in addition to the defensive stopper role. And he’s playing a career high in minutes.”

I’m already cognizant of all of this, Shinons, and I still think playing Tay 38mpg is our best option. (I’ve watched you guys pretty closely in the playoffs in the pre-Iverson era.)

Playing Tay for max minutes definitely has some problems associated with it, but I think it’s better than the alternative.

According to 82games Tayshaun Prince plays just shy of 1/3 of his minutes at PF (12 min), just over 2/3 (25) at SF. I’m not saying it’s wrong for Prince to ever play PF but Tay’s fatigue playing the 4, fewer development opportunities for Amir, and potential playoff matchups (Pierce, LeBron) should all be factors in deciding how the team should play now. Is that why Curry is going back to the smallball starting lineup?

And ‘Sheed should maybe speak up and tell everybody to STFU about minutes and starting and just play. It’s not Prince’s style to do so and that leaves ’Sheed as the only one on the team with the standing to do it.

And for anyone trying to track rotations, here is where to look.

And as to the question of “were we playing less smallball when Rip was out?” check out this example from the un-Rip period before Rasheed got injured where we played precisely ZERO MINUTES OF SMALLBALL.

Is it wrong to want old, boring consistency again?

“Is it wrong to want old, boring consistency again?”

Dunno.

But it’s right to want whatever has the best chances of winning sixteen times when it counts.

@Petey – Tay may be 28, but he has played 82 games for the past five years straight plus an additional 15-20 in the playoffs plus spending the summer on the Olympic team. He already wears down at the end of every year (if you were a fan of this team before this year, you’d know that) and now we’re asking him to play out of position in addition to the defensive stopper role. And he’s playing a career high in minutes. Gee, I wonder what kind of shape he’s going to be in come April.

Thank you Shinons!!!!
Curry grow some balls!
We have not been playing small ball w/o rip
i gave away my tix tonight….boycotting!

I think we can all agree now: Fuck Michael Curry.

Like I said before, Curry is clueless. He has an abundance of talent and doesn’t know what to do with it. I know he’s a novice coach, however, he’s supposed to be a leader, a general. A general is supposed to lead the soldiers into battle, not pamper them with this “I don’t want to hurt Iverson or Hamilton’s feelings/ego thing”. Just assign AI to the 2nd unit with Afflalo, Maxiell, McDyess & Kwame. Once and for all. Stop playing guys out of position. Have all “zoo crew” members sub for one specific player. For example: 1. Stuckey/Iverson,2. Hamilton/Afflalo, 3. Prince/Maxiell, 4. Johnson/McDyess, 5.Wallace/Brown. However, I know Curry is hard headed and will mess things up. If we want to be taken seriously as championship contenders, this nonsense has to stop! It’s hard to tolerate Curry. If I had the power, I’d hire Laimbeer or Nolan Richardson in a heartbeat.

This is a sacrifice that Hamilton shouldn’t have to make. He’s been a PISTON for 6 years plus. He’s been the leading scorer every year. Although he can’t get his own shot, when the game is on the line and a basket is needed, he’ll deliver more times than not. That last shot should have come from Rip or Stuckey, not AI who is in a shooting slump.