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Mapping out the Clippers’ Rotations After the All Star Break
The dust has settled on the Clippers’ trade deadline transactions, and with a couple games with some of the new pieces on the roster in the books, we can start looking ahead to what Ty Lue and the Clippers will do with their rotations in the second half of the season. First, here’s a look at the depth chart, sorted purely positionally.
Point Guard: James Harden, Ben Simmons, Kris Dunn, Patty Mills
Shooting Guard: Norm Powell, Amir Coffey, Jordan Miller, Cam Christie, Trentyn Flowers
Small Forward: Derrick Jones Jr., Bogdan Bogdanovic, MarJon Beauchamp
Power Forward: Kawhi Leonard, Nic Batum, Kobe Brown
Center: Ivica Zubac, Drew Eubanks, Kai Jones
However, we know this is not quite accurate to the reality of the situation. Ben Simmons is the Clippers’ backup point guard – but in his first game as a Clipper, he played a ton alongside James Harden and served as either a power forward or center. Kris Dunn is nominally a point guard but has played most of the season alongside other ball-handlers more as a shooting guard or small forward. Nic Batum is Kawhi Leonard’s backup at power forward, but he too has spent much of the season as a small ball center.
Thus, looking at a revised depth chart grouping more based on spots in the rotation rather than position, I think you land something more like this.
Starters: Harden-Norm-DJJ-Kawhi-Zu
Bench: Simmons-Dunn-Coffey-Bogdan-Batum
Situational Usage: Kobe Brown, Drew Eubanks
Depth: Mills-Miller-Christie-Flowers-Beachamp-Jones
The first thing you might notice here is that there are 10 players set up for rotation minutes. I think that will be the case, at least for the first handful of games after the All-Star Break when Ty will be tinkering. Those top 10 all just bring something to the table that I think will be hard to leave out during the grind of the regular season. Ty has played a nine-man rotation much of the year, but a lot of NBA coaches play with 10-man rotations in the regular season, so this is a pretty reasonable outlook. This will all change if the Clippers make the postseason, as further rotation cuts will happen, but there’s a long distance between now and the postseason in mid-April.
In terms of how minutes are allocated, I think that the Clippers’ top minutes getters so far this season (Harden, Norm, and Zu) will lose a few minutes. The presence of Ben Simmons as a true playmaker for the second unit should allow for longer rest for Harden, and his size and rebounding should allow for more feasible “small-ball” units that give Zu longer breathers. If Bogdan is right, he’s a better Norm sub than was previously available on the roster and can tick Norm’s minutes down a bit too. Additionally, I think Coffey will lose some minutes to Bogdan, Dunn will lose minutes to Ben, and Kawhi will continue to grow his minutes as he gets his legs under him.
Designing the actual rotation is tricky. Ben Simmons is a non-shooter, as is Ivica Zubac, while Kris Dunn takes threes, but teams are happy to let him shoot, which can mess up spacing in a similar way (though teams do at least somewhat guard/close out on him, so it’s a bit different than Simmons). Playing all three of those guys together is probably a non-starter, and even two of them might be tough (though the Clippers played Simmons and Dunn plenty in the Jazz game before the ASB to great success). The Clippers also like to stagger one of Harden or Kawhi with the bench unit, making full bench squads unlikely. Maybe if Simmons and Bogi prove themselves effective the bench will have enough playmaking and firepower to not necessitate staggering, but I’d be surprised if the Clippers went away from the stagger entirely.
Keeping all of that in mind, here are some ways the Clippers can make this work. First, Ty Lue can bring in Kris Dunn and Bogdan Bogdanovic at around the 5-minute mark for Kawhi Leonard and Derrick Jones Jr. That keeps one of DJJ/Dunn in the game to help with point of attack defense while making up for Kawhi’s absence with a good shooting/scoring threat. A couple of minutes later, the Clippers bring in Nic Batum and Amir Coffey for Norm Powell and Ivica Zubac. The Clippers are now a small-ball unit with Batum at center with a still good amount of shooting and playmaking. The danger with this unit is being too small and maybe not quite good enough on defense, but hopefully the offense can outweigh those downsides.
At the start of the second quarter, Ty could bring in Ben Simmons for Harden and Kawhi for Dunn, going with a Ben-Amir-Bogi-Kawhi-Nico unit. This grouping has tremendous size for a non-center unit, but I do worry about it almost being “too big” and not having enough point of attack defense or speed on the perimeter. A solution could be leaving Dunn in and taking Bogi out instead. At that point, the Clippers start cycling back into the first unit, with Norm returning at some point for Bogi/Dunn/Amir, followed by DJJ for one of the other of those guys and Zu for Nico. Lastly, Harden returns for Ben. Maybe at around that time you bring back in one of the bench guys for Kawhi so he doesn’t play the whole second quarter. You’d repeat much the same process in the second half, except tightening things up as needed to play key guys more.
I think most of the units describe above are fairly well-balanced, with enough size, shooting, playmaking, and defense to be sustainable on both ends. They give Harden, Norm, and Zu more rest than they have been accustomed to seeing over the first half of the year while allowing new guys to get their chances. Hopefully with all of the subbing and different units for short stints, Ty Lue can figure out some dynamite combinations. For example, a Harden-Dunn-Bogi-Kawhi-Nico lineup is something I think could work quite well if it ever gets a chance, as could Ben in place of Nico.
The are caveats to all this, however. First, of the Clippers’ remaining 28 games, 12 of them are situated across six pairs of back-to-backs. In those 12 games, therefore, it’s very unlikely we see the Clippers’ full complement of players – Kawhi Leonard and Ben Simmons are both not cleared for them, and I kind of doubt they will be this season. That immediately makes things a bit clearer rotation-wise for those games, though it will be interesting to see if they both sit the same games or if they sit opposite of each other. There is also the inevitability of injury, as 28 games would be an insane length of time in the NBA for there to be no injuries. Hopefully there’s nothing serious, but a couple Clippers will get dinged up down the stretch, and rotations will shift accordingly.
To wrap this up, I’m very, very curious to see what Ty Lue does with his rotations the last 28 games of this season. Ben Simmons in particular can unlock some interesting lineup combinations, even if I remain skeptical on his individual impact. Bogdan Bogdanovic’s offensive capabilities might be able to get the Clippers to places where they haven’t been to reach so far this season in terms of firepower – but will it cost them too much on defense and on the glass? If Bogdan plays very well, does Amir Coffey eventually lose his rotation spot? If Simmons stands out, could we see Kris Dunn lose his? If neither of the new guys looks good, how does Ty Lue respond? I think the Clippers will be a fun group to watch down the stretch of this season, both because they are going to be competing for a postseason spot and because I think they will be experimenting a lot with different lineups. Here’s hoping that the second half of the year is an entertaining one!
Mapping out the Clippers’ Rotations After the All Star Break
Robert Flom