Forget Offense and Defense: The Bench is the Problem!

It seems wierd to say this, but let me be the first to do it.

Darius Songaila's injury and the effect it has had on the Wizards bench is the primary reason why the Wizards are 4-9.

Okay, maybe Songaila himself isn't the only culprit. Gilbert Arenas has been hot and cold all year. Antawn Jamison's shot has deserted him. The two have been inconsistent all year, and the overall defensive effort still needs some work.

Still, the injury to Songaila, while not playing a major role on its own, has exposed the Wizards absolute lack of a bench. It is my firm belief that this problem has caused all the other problems and needs to be fixed.

Commenter Mel Turpin had this to say.

One of the biggest problems with this team is a total lack of any fire power off the bench. Good teams in the NBA get thirty or forty points per game from their bench. The Wizards are lucky to get ten points.

I'd agree with the sentiment of the statement, but I'd slightly amend the meat of it. A bench doesn't necessarily need to provide scoring, and between Antonio Daniels and Jarvis Hayes, they usually get 10 points most games. What is necessary from a bench is a spark; a player who can play 20-25 minutes and potentially provide the necessary offense, defense, rebounding, or playmaking necessary to win a game. In lieu of one player, many teams like Dallas and San Antonio rely on a lot of bench guys to be successful.

Either way, you have to have one or the other to be a successful team. San Antonio makes up for the lack of star power with a ton of options, including Brent Barry, Michael Finley, Fabricio Oberto, Francisco Elson, and Beno Udrih. Dallas is very much the same way, but they also have a potential impact player in Jerry Stackhouse. Phoenix relies on the offensive spark of Leandro Barbosa off the bench to win games for them. The Lakers are at least two deep at every position, and Orlando often gets more production out of bench players like Carlos Arroyo and Keyon Dooling than their starters. Even Utah gets a lot of intangible qualities out of guys like Matt Harpring, Ronnie Brewer, and Paul Millsap, and this change has arguably been one of the catalysts to their sudden improvement. Good teams therefore either need to have one of their best players come off the bench (like Barbosa, Harpring, and Mike Miller on Memphis last year ) or have a multitute of options so that someone invariably emerges every night (the Dallas-San Antonio-LA Lakers strategy).

This is ultimately where the Wizards have failed this year. The offense and defense have struggled, but I think it's all tied back to the bench. Only 7 players on the Wizards have a PER (player efficiency rating) over 10. The Hawks, Nets, Heat, Bobcats, and Sonics are the only teams that have a similar lack of efficiency from their bench.

The Wizards bench can basically be summed up as follows.

• Antonio Daniels: Nice player, a personal favorite, but best suited to being a 7th man. Probably isn't good enough to start on a playoff team. If there were 3 players as good as Daniels on this bench, it would be a solid unit, but there isn't.
• Brendan Haywood: Pretty solid backup center, but way too inconsistent to provide a spark every night.
• Jarvis Hayes: Has been really bad this year, with a PER under 9. He takes too many shots and doesn't make enough of them.
  
• Michael Ruffin: No offensive ability, pretty poor defensive ability, average rebounder, commits tons of fouls, and the team's +/- with him on the floor stinks.
• Calvin Booth: Michael Ruffin, but with slightly more defensive skills and worse rebounding skills.
• Roger Mason, Donnell Taylor, Andray Blatche: Unproven.

With this cast of characters, the Wizards' bench fulfills neither requirement presented above. There are no consistent impact players on the bench, and there isn't enough depth to ensure that the team will get something out of this unit no matter what. Daniels comes closest to being an impact player, but he doesn't really add a new dimension to the team game like Barbosa, Millsap, Ben Gordon, or Jerry Stackhouse do. Haywood is a decent backup center who would be a real asset if the bench was deeper. Hayes and Ruffin receive too many minutes, and nobody else really plays much.

Coming into the season, this wasn't expected to be a problem. At the end of last year, a lack of a bench really killed the Wizards, and Ernie Grunfeld went seeing a remedy to the problem. Songaila and Stevenson were brought in, and combined with the continued maturation of Blatche and the healthy return of Hayes and Etan Thomas, the Wizards were all set to be two-deep at every position. Songaila in particular was a particularly good pickup; he probably would have averaged a solid 10 points and 7 rebounds a game in this system. He would have been a versatile impact player off the bench for the Wizards all year and would have singlehandily significantly upgraded a sore weakness for the Wizards.

Then, Songaila got hurt and threw everything off. Injuries happen, and I'm not blaming the Wizards season on an unfortunate event. But the Wizards have dealt with this setback horribly thus far this season, as Eddie Jordan's shortening of the rotation have put too much strain on the starters all season, which has caused them to press and be prone to spells of inconsistency.

Entering the season, a great point of comparison for the Wizards in terms of their benches were the Sacramento Kings. The biggest knock on Sacramento entering the season was their lack of depth, made possible by a bench that seemed to only include Kenny Thomas and John Salmons. Any injury to their top seven would have potentially killed them. As John Hollinger said:

The Kings are so lacking off the bench, with their best reserve a year ago ([Kevin] Martin) now forced to start. The frontcourt has obvious weaknesses, but the backcourt is no picnic either -- just to have a decent seven-man rotation would require either [John] Salmons or [Francisco] Garcia to play much better than a year ago, or [Quincy] Douby to hit the ground running.

So far this season, the Kings have suffered a loss from one of their top 7 (Brad Miller) and survived okay. Instead of shortening his rotation, coach Eric Musselman lengthened it, giving extended looks to youngsters such as Salmons, Garcia, and Ronnie Price and old relics like Corloss Williamson. The end result is that Williamson has experienced a revival and Price has emerged as a solid backup guard, thereby giving Sacramento more sources for the spark they desperately need. What was once a putrid bench is now a solid one now that Miller has returned to the lineup.

For the Wizards to improve and snap out of their slump, they need to develop the same type of bench Sacramento did when they lost Miller. Eddie Jordan needs to play the young guys more so they can gain experience where they can be potential sparks off the bench for the rest of the season. Instead of playing Michael Ruffin 8 minutes, why not play Andray Blatche? The kid is still raw, but the only way he will significantly improve is if he gets more playing time. Instead of playing the Big 3 over 37 minutes a game each, why not cut their time down to the 35 minute range and give the remaining minutes to Roger Mason and Donnell Taylor? Mason impressed Jordan in camp, but he barely even gets a look now. If he's not going to play, I don't see any reason to have him on the team.

Here's the current average minutes breakdown of the team, rounding up the decimals.

Jamison: 39
Arenas: 38
Butler: 37
Stevenson: 27
Daniels: 27
Thomas: 22
Haywood: 18
Hayes: 16
Ruffin: 8
Blatche: 7
Booth: 6
Taylor: 5
Mason: 5

Here's what I would propose until Songaila comes back.

Arenas: 38
Butler: 36
Jamison: 33
Stevenson: 27
Daniels: 25
Thomas: 22
Haywood: 20
Hayes: 12
Blatche: 12
Mason: 10
Booth: 8
Taylor: 7
Ruffin: 5

In each situation, the total minutes are the same, but the three youngsters, along with Haywood and Booth, see a hike in their minutes. To compensate, Jamison sees his MPG drop by 6 and Ruffin and Hayes see much less of the court than before.

More minutes for the youngsters is the key to improving this team. The Big 3 are currently forced to do too much, and when they're having a bad game, the team suffers significantly. The Wizards need to develop a decent bench, or else their fortunes will continued to be tied to Gilbert Arenas' shooting. The only way to do this is to give Blatche, Mason, and Taylor more playing time in the hope that someone can emerge as a decent threat, a la Ronnie Price. Only then will the Wizards make that jump into the East's upper eschelon.

So Eddie, What's the Rotation?

[As a sidenote, be sure to check out the must-see Bullets Fever team preview here and here.]

The Wizards closed the preseason with a 110-105 win over the Hawks and a 101-94 loss to the Pistons, meaning that they ended with a 4-4 record.

Interestingly enough, when you look back at the 5 things I said to watch out for, they were either answered very quickly or not answered at all. Stevenson took the shooting guard spot right away. Songaila's injury raises questions about the division of minutes in the frontcourt, we still don't know about defense or Gilbert Arenas, and the mentality really was only a factor early on.

The two biggest stories were ones I didn't anticipate.

First, it sounds like Etan Thomas is going to start over Brendan Haywood at center. At the very least, Thomas appears to have the upper hand after a really strong performance against Detroit. 3 blocked shots in 12 minutes speaks loudly, even if it was the preseason. From what I've observed, it doesn't appear like this is just a message to Haywood anymore. Both players have had pretty good preseasons, so for Thomas to wrestle the job from Haywood, he had to really impress Jordan. From the sound of it, he has done just that.

When I went on the Hoops Addict podcast, I talked about how Thomas may be the key to the season for the Wizards. Of all the guys on the roster, Thomas is the closest thing to the 4/5 athletic center that an up-tempo team really needs. When Haywood is in the game, he slows down the Wizards' offensive sets and isn't all that great in transitioning from defense to the fast break. If Thomas is all the way back to his pre-contract level of 2004, the Wizards will be a significantly better team. He's faster than Haywood, a better rebounder than Haywood, and, from the looks of it, a better defensive center than Haywood. If you ask me, the news that Thomas has earned the starting job is fantastic for Wizards fans.

If Haywood does indeed start on the bench, I wonder whether the Wizards are admitting to themselves that he has wasted their time. Haywood doesn't strike me as the type of player who would want to come off the bench. He doesn't provide the same type of quick spark that Thomas could provide, instead relying on defensive consistency and a stabilizing presence in the middle. Thomas and James Lang's preseasons may indicate that the team is heading in another direction inside. I severely doubt Haywood will be traded--after all, he's the only 7 footer on the team--but he may have reduced minutes.

The one trade I'd like to see happen would be with Memphis. The Grizzlies have long been searching for a traditional big guy in the middle, and they have classic tweenter Stromile Swift stuck behind Gasol (when healthy) and the rest of the frontcourt. Swift is a miscast in Memphis, but his style is perfectly suited for the Wizards up-tempo game. Wouldn't a Haywood for Swift swap make some sense? The problem is salary, but the Wiz could throw in a guy like Calvin Booth or Donnell Taylor to even things up.

Second, and more significantly, the Wizards have had significantly more success with the starters in the game than with the reserves. Preseason games have followed the same type of script. Starters give Wizards the lead, reserves cough up the lead, rinse and repeat. There are two ways of looking at this. One way is to say that it doesn't matter much, because the players on the floor were guys like Donnell Taylor and Andray Blatche, players who aren't a part of the regular rotation anyeay. The other way is to say that it does matter, because injuries and the long season are both going to force these guys into action. I tend to lean closer to the second view.

I'm particularly concerned about Andray Blatche. After a great summer league, he looked lost this preseason. The Wizards let go of Jared Jeffries partly because they believed Blatche could at least help to fill the void. After this preseason, I'm not so sure he's ready to play much at all. Making matters worse is the Songaila injury, which sounds like it could bother him all year. With Songaila out, the Wizards need Blatche even more than before. Up front, the rotation now is Haywood, Thomas, and Michael Ruffin. That's not going to get it done. Blatche was supposed to fill the void, but it appears he's not ready yet.

The lone pleasant surprise deep off the bench has been Roger Mason, a personal favorite of mine back when he played for Montrose Christian and Virginia. Mason's a local boy if you've ever seen one, and it looks like he's making Donnell Taylor expendable. If he can carry over his strong preseason to the regular season, he could even make Jarvis Hayes expendable. He's a strong shooter in rhythm, has international playing experience, and has worked hard to become a better ball-handler. If he can keep this up, it stings the blow of passing on Marcus Williams and Rajon Rondo in the draft.

Here's my projected rotation. I'm assuming Mike Hall is the final cut, as he's injured and Mason pretty much makes him redundant. I don't imagine they'll cut James Lang considering the lack of frontcourt depth, so Hall is a pretty logical cut.

PG: Arenas/Daniels/Taylor
SG: Stevenson/Mason
SF: Butler/Hayes/Blatche
PF: Jamison/Songaila/Ruffin
C: Thomas/Haywood/Lang/Booth

Ideally, they'd cut Calvin Booth, but he is under contract. If Songaila wasn't hurt, I'd cut Lang, but with the injury, Hall makes perfect sense. Lang's been good this preseason and if the Wizards decide to trade Haywood, he may end up playing a role.

What's been the biggest story of the Wizards' preseason in your mind? Do you think the Wizards have shown progress in solving their most important questions?