I respect the long and well thought out post and apologize for ignoring the rest of the argument but I feel like the entire premise comes apart by thinking any of them would be happy playing 16 minutes a game. They'd be absolutely furious. Especially Goran who is playing for a contract, it wouldn't matter if the team was winning, he would feel like he is getting screwed... and rightfully so.
I don't think it was a coincidence that Bledsoe and Dragic both had really really strong games tonight while Thomas was out. Its the most the rotations have come to being like last season and guys were clearly more comfortable.
I don't think that means we should immediately dump Thomas, but I do think that Goran and Eric are far more important to the team than he is and they need to be allowed to play a regular rotation of minutes without having to worry about getting benched for a half because Thomas just torched some backups in the 2nd quarter.
But all in all... the team is 10-6, despite all the belly aching (and now the doubters claiming the scalps) the guards have easily been the strength of the team and absolutely are among the best back courts in the league... despite some individual inconsistency. The guys are starting to play better, Eric very much so. Hopefully things keep trending the way they are.
I think Goran was pretty much screwed as soon as we caved and gave Bledsoe 14mil/annum. 'Screwed' is relative though because he'll likely get 10 mil, so he will be richer and I'm not sure he'd have wound up with more if we'd never taken Eric on board.
Its going to be interesting to see what Hornacek is going to do... he still likes his idea of dual point guards but I don't see it being of particular value beyond them simply being good players. They don't work especially well together nor do they complement each other so the sum is not greater than the parts - I expected Jeff would do much more in getting them to amplify each other's value and I thought they'd do it on their own if he didn't. Almost zero progress on that front.
I imagine Jeff will tweak IT's role and he'll eventually start Len which might combine to make us a bit better than last year. Maybe tweak the D a bit. Basically we'll be sitting on our hands waiting for Len to progress.
Jeff is a good coach in the sense that he gets the team to win more games than you'd expect given our basic stats. The same was true last year - we were and are very middle of the road statistically. Did San Antonio 'overachieve' in this way last year? No, they didn't, they were the best team statistically. The year before Miami was the best team statistically. Of course, coaches play a role in bringing out the best of their team which is reflected in their statistics to a great extent. Minnesota last year was an example of a team that won considerably fewer games than their stats suggested they should.
What stats am I talking about? Pretty much across the board - shooting pct, FTA, TO's, Rebounds, Assists, Blks, Steals and others. And defense against all of the above, of course.
Phoenix has to improve their statistics by about ten percent to be in the running. That is a big step for a team, not a small step. For example we increased our stats 9% from '12-13 to '13-14, We also underachieved in '12-13.
Edit: (I didn't get around to making my point but had to break off.)
So in order to make a major step this year, we have to shake things up. One possibility is considerably better defense. Bledsoe is capable of it but he's not going to do it playing 32 minutes a game - he has to conserve himself. Zoran might provide a lift on defense and pairing him with Goran might get better D. from him as well as they have lots of experience playing together. Goodwin is a good defender and if he follows Bled's lead he could help him be disruptive - he's quick and he's fast. He can also contribute on the offensive end - when he get's untracked he can score like Gerald Green. He isn't going to get there by himself but we've never seen what he can do if he has a point guard setting the table for him. In the scheme I proposed Eric will be disposed to do just that. Bled with PJ at the 2 and Mook at 3 gives us solid halfcourt D - and PJ may want to get in on the fun of being disruptive. Going big at the 2 - PJ, Mook, TJ - gives a different look which could have its uses - better D against big 2's and better rebounding.
The options for improving our offensive stats are pretty much Goodwin, TJ and progress from Len. Its not guaranteed and it won't be an easy task but its silly to settle for the status quo, IMO. We can go looking afield but why overlook the possibilities already in hand. However it turns out we have a better handle on what we have and what we have to add.
