PLAYOFFS ROUND 2: #1 PHX (3-4) vs. #4 DAL (4-3) | DAL advances to WCF!

[mvossman]

It's not so much me personally. There are reasons Green isn't playing now. There are reasons Frankie doesn't play much.

For Green, it may be that he is simply not very good at making quick decisions. Maybe his instincts just aren't enough for the professional game. It may be that he gets confused on the court in certain situations. I don't know, but I'm pretty sure the coaches know.

All we see as fans is that the guy has energy. The G League is full of those guys. But I don't think it's fair to assume that the NBA game can translate because he's athletic. He's had over a year and he can't stay in a professional game for very long. If Josh is a better-than-average defender, why is Frankie playing his minutes? The coaches trust Frankie more than Josh at this point, and it could be for a lot of reasons that have to do with Xs and Os.

There are always players who sometimes figure it all out a little later. Maybe Josh is one of them. But a sophomore player like Josh who can't get minutes almost never becomes a full-time starter on an NBA team. You're spending time and money grooming a player who can't be played in a playoff game.

My point is not that Josh couldn't eventually find his way to more minutes. He might. My point is that this team is thin. Josh's "potential" isn't important enough gamble with when you have a playoff team that needs upgrading badly. I think it's fairly clear he is not going to be a starter, and he's struggling to be a rotation player. This team is better off with an experienced bench.

There are a lot of factors going into minutes by rookies and sophomores.  They are going to get more on bad teams and less on good teams.  But lets look at some examples.  Green got 16 minutes a game this year.  Some of the other players on the team in their sophomore years:

Maxi: 21 (5 years older)
Dorian: 21 (3 years older)
Brunson: 18 (2 years older)
Powell: 14 (3 years older)
Dinwiddie: 13 (1 year older)
Bullock: 9 (2 years older)

Does not really seem like Green's minutes are that different from most of our starters and he is younger than all of them in his sophomore year.  If minutes are our metric, then he is doing just fine.