My opinion or the highway...

[Dave85]

"Yes, you can pull out your ready-made excuses for late season losses and dust them off. They include “the starters are tired because Boeheim never uses his bench” and “if Boeheim had played them earlier in the season, they would be able to help the team out.” You will have plenty of chances to use them.

But, they are uncalled for. Simply put, Boeheim does not have the margin for error that he has had with some recent teams where he regularly played eight or nine guys if he wants to win games and make the NCAA Tournament."

http://sujuiceonline.com/2015/01/02/the-state-of-syracuse-basketball-heading-into-acc-play/

This is a strange argument. It is "uncalled for" to have the opinion JB should try harder to develop the bench for the end of the season yet he says "you will have plenty of chances to use them." Why would you take this opinion if you are assuming playing a short rotation is the only answer? It seems to me having the opinion developing a deeper bench is supported by how many times key players end up getting injuried during the 2nd half of the season. But if JB makes a deep tournament run with a short bench people who think their opinions are facts are going to be all high and mighty. As if all their opinions, uh, facts are absolutely true and everyone else is an idiot.

 

[orangefan13]

Good post and agreed with this all offseason.
last years team had trouble hitting jumpshots in the halfcourt late in the season, and they lost grant late in the season he only finished with 2-3 strong games of syracuse last 10.

Roberson, BJ and Ron, obvisouly weren't ready, and wouldn't have helped with jumpshots. And all that offseason talk about developing them more last season so they would have been ready for march has proven itself false, with the offseason and cooneys early season struggles.

Only thing that could have possibly helped the offense was to spell cooney a breather here and there, as it might have helped his shooting.

 

[two3zone]

I have to agree with you this year. There is no margin for error this year with wins and losses. If we're blowing somebody out, fine, work the bench in, but this isn't a time to be throwing guys to the wall just to see if they can stick. JB is going to do what JB is going to do and that's go probably 6.5 deep, would I like it more, sure, but we don't have the personnel for that, we just don't. I don't think coach is perfect, but I do think that he plays to win every game he's a part of and he's done that since I've began watching Cuse hoops. If we're going to make it to the tourney he's going to play the best players we have to win every game we need to get us there. If we don't get there, it's not because he didn't play Chinoso, BJ, or Buss.

 

[Dave85]

I have to agree with you this year. There is no margin for error this year with wins and losses. If we're blowing somebody out, fine, work the bench in, but this isn't a time to be throwing guys to the wall just to see if they can stick. JB is going to do what JB is going to do and that's go probably 6.5 deep, would I like it more, sure, but we don't have the personnel for that, we just don't. I don't think coach is perfect, but I do think that he plays to win every game he's a part of and he's done that since I've began watching Cuse hoops. If we're going to make it to the tourney he's going to play the best players we have to win every game we need to get us there. If we don't get there, it's not because he didn't play Chinoso, BJ, or Buss.

I agree with you about your no margin for error comment. But...it's kind of like Fab Melo making a jump shot. If he makes it he looks like a genius. If he misses, he suffers the wrath of JB. I think both points of view are probably valid before whatever happens happens. And depending on what happens will determine who can be high and mighty about which opinion was obviously the correct one!

 

[orangefan13]

This team is different they need help making shots against tight defense, more then jumpshots.

If Buss,or BJ can bring a defensive spark off the bench we could use that, last year buss, bj and roberson would not have made the defense any better, or the offense(as early this year showed). Thats a key point.

Also note
1.we probably have good enough offense to spell, kaleb, mccullough, gbinije a breather. Not so sure last year.
2.This can possibly add a 6th man element as Joseph,Gbinije,roberson, mccullough can come back off the bench and have 6th men stretches of 5-10 points.
3. one of our forwards is our backup center which opens some minutes at the wing anyway,
4. we don't need Kaleb to play 35 plus minutes like ennis.

 

[stuckinbig11]

Bottom line: JB trusts Trevor and Rak; they will be on the court as much as possible; others are more interchangeable. With all the timeouts, 40 minutes is possible for guys in shape.

 

[MadNY3]

Bottom line: JB trusts Trevor and Rak; they will be on the court as much as possible; others are more interchangeable. With all the timeouts, 40 minutes is possible for guys in shape.

No to mention in a year like this, going 7 guys means using the rare end-of-game blowouts on combinations like McCullough at the 5 and BJ/Roberson on the wings. To me, that IS development...people can overindex on individuals getting time versus lineups.

 

[stuckinbig11]

No to mention in a year like this, going 7 guys means using the rare end-of-game blowouts on combinations like McCullough at the 5 and BJ/Roberson on the wings. To me, that IS development...people can overindex on individuals getting time versus lineups.

Lineups are indeed the key. My observations on JB's substitution patterns are that, when he has the luxury of doing so, he is trying different combinations to see what works, not simply giving individual players some PT.