Mavericks 124, Clippers 73

[mavsluvr]

A couple of rotation notes.  This is through three quarters.  The third quarter started out as a repeat of the first and then it was deep bench the rest of the way once we got to the fourth:

We are getting further away from the platooned lineups we saw in pre-season and against Phoenix.  Sunday we saw Luka/JRich stay on with the first wave of subs as Powell/DFS/THJ sat.  Carlisle is constantly experimenting.

THJ was 1 for 4 and +0 when JRich was on the floor with him.  He was 6/10 and +25 when he was on the floor without JRich.

Carlisle seems willing to play Finney with a single big IF Luka is out there also.  If Finney plays without Luka, it tends to be with two bigs.  Another way of looking at that is Luka is the PF when we play the current starters (or Luka makes is OK to call DFS a PF). 

B & B were not paired yesterday.  Burke came in as part of the first bench waive to be on the floor with Luka.  He and Luka left when Brunson came in to run the show.  I never believed B & B would be a thing as Burke does his best work alongside Luka.   KP and Brunson were fantastic together last season.  When KP returns we will probably see him sit quickly (like Powell did the last two games) and come back in with Brunson when Luka sits.  

We run two bigs together except when Powell is in (unless you consider Luka/DFS to be kind of "bigs" next to Powell).  Maxi and WCS came in when Powell sat.  Then it was WCS/Johnson.  Then it transitioned to Johnson/Powell briefly and then we finished the half with Powell as the lone big again.  This probably sets up for KP to replace Powell leaving DFS in the starting lineup most nights.  It is important to note though that the "starters" are together for about six minutes in the 1st and 3rd and then there will be a long stretch of Luka with 3 bench guys as KP sits and then KP with 2 bench guys when Luka sits.  The most interesting thing will be to see how we end the 2nd and 4th.  THJ has been the odd man out a few times so far this season.

Redundancy is going to be helpful in 2021.  But, when KP comes back it is going to be hard to find minutes for both WCS and Johnson.  My interest perks up when Green enters the game.  But with everyone healthy, it will be hard for him to get much more than a 2nd quarter cameo in games that are not blowouts.

Interesting observations. Thanks for sorting this out for us!