Your prediction for the Big Men

[JawsGT]

I think JV is going to have his "breakout" season. Nothing spectacular (I'm not talking 20ppg) but I expect him to improve overall and everyone league wide will recognize Jonas as a threat and a key player for this team. Amir will be a beast this season. He is playing for a contract and the right to be recognized as a starting caliber 4. He will start as long as he is healthy.

Both of those things will depend heavily on the guards willingness to get the ball inside and deliver it to the roller on the PnR.

[Heatdreamer]

Chucky and Laundry fields and Bebe for David West

[GLF]

I was not sure where to put this comment, but in light of Paul George's injury, I wanted to remind folks that both Amir Johnson and Tyler Hansbrough had bone bruises this last season. Amir took three games off near the end of the season to deal with his ankle(s), while Tyler missed a whole month. The only cure for a bone bruise is rest, because it can weaken the internal structure of the bone. Untreated, it can lead to injuries such as George's yesterday (not that I am suggesting he had such a problem). Coach Casey put Hansbrough in the dog house for not "fighting through" the injury, unlike Amir. That is really a bad approach to treating an athletic injury, especially when you need your men at full strength for the playoffs.

That had to be the reason why he stopped playing Tyler because Tyler is by far the better player than Hayes. Any issue you have with Tyler in terms of his game Hayes is worse. The only thing Hayes is better at is passing and guarding the post. I don't think those are that important that he should be playing Hayes over Tyler. To me if Washington and Boston were as comfortable as they were playing Kris Humphries at center (which he did a good job at by the way) then Hansbrough should be able to play backup center as well. I know Kris is more athletic and blocks more shots but Hayes is even worse at that than Tyler so what's the point of Hayes? I might as well get over it though because Tyler is in Casey's bad books for some reason.

[caccia]

I certainly agree. Perhaps in the new season, Coach Casey will just forget all that happened and go with what works, with Tyler as primary backup center. I would not make any predictions, though. I put in some numbers comparing the league rankings of Amir Johnson and Hansbrough in the "Everything Tyler Hansbrough" thread, post 32. If you look at diffferent lineup combinations, it turns out that Tyler works well with both Johnson and Patterson, but not so well with Valanciunas and Hayes.

[GLF]

I certainly agree. Perhaps in the new season, Coach Casey will just forget all that happened and go with what works, with Tyler as primary backup center. I would not make any predictions, though. I put in some numbers comparing the league rankings of Amir Johnson and Hansbrough in the "Everything Tyler Hansbrough" thread, post 32. If you look at diffferent lineup combinations, it turns out that Tyler works well with both Johnson and Patterson, but not so well with Valanciunas and Hayes.

Well that's good because if he's playing center he will play alongside Amir and patterson most of the time. Even more reason why he should play center

[OldSkoolCool]

I think JV is going to have his "breakout" season. Nothing spectacular (I'm not talking 20ppg) but I expect him to improve overall and everyone league wide will recognize Jonas as a threat and a key player for this team. Amir will be a beast this season. He is playing for a contract and the right to be recognized as a starting caliber 4. He will start as long as he is healthy.

Both of those things will depend heavily on the guards willingness to get the ball inside and deliver it to the roller on the PnR.

Cannot wait for JV to break out so we can hear all the ridiculous Charles Barkelyness

[OptimalOptimist]

http://grantland.com/features/the-nbas-bigs-problem/

Terrific read :

There are methods beyond shooting to create enough space for a flowing offense. If a team can pair two non-shooting bigs with just enough of those skills, they might be able to forge powerful defense and rebounding combinations on the cheap, without sacrificing too much offense.

Johnson has long been a plus/minus darling and defensive whiz, but he has also gotten good enough at tricky little things on offense to function well alongside another non-shooting big. Johnson developed a nice high-low chemistry with Ed Davis before the Raps dealt Davis in the Rudy Gay trade, he’s a key dribble handoff cog in set plays for DeMar DeRozan, and he can both pass and shoot after catching the ball in the paint on the pick-and-roll:

I recommend reading the whole post