An In Depth Look at Depth
Now that the men's team has officially finished its season, and we're starting to look toward 2009, I thought we might revisit one of the more talked about and contentious issues of the past few years - depth. It seems that regardless of how many players play, and how many minutes said players play, posters here love to criticize Coach K for not adequately using the bench. So I thought I'd open up a kind of meta-discussion of depth. Feel free to discuss this in the context of individual players, but I'm more curious as to people's broad perspectives on what depth is and what purpose it serves. With that in mind, I pose the following questions:
1) What does it mean to be a "deep" team? Is a team that rotates 7 players relatively equally (everyone between 25-32 min/game) with no other meaningful bench use deep? Is a team that relies heavily on three players (33-38 min/g) with the remaining minutes spread among 7 guys (10-20 min/g) deep? Is a team that gives 8 guys double digit minutes, with 10 guys who play in essentially every game deep? etc.
2) what is the goal of depth? rest for the best players so they're fresh (and can play a greater share of minutes) in the second half? experience for young players, so they can get meaningful minutes against all types of competition? flexibility, so the coach can use many diverse lineups against different types of opponents, as matchups dictate? allowing the coach to use a quick trigger to pull a player who just doesn't have it that day? something else?
3) do all minutes count the same? does depth mean the same thing in preseason, conference, and postseason play? should the goal of having the deep team be playing the same rotation in every game? or should it be used in a way to maximize the ability of the best players to play the most minutes against the toughest competition?
4) is there a team, in your mind, that is a model for using depth (please, if you identify a team for this question, provide sufficient data/information to back up your assertion as to why that team is a model for using depth)?
5) (and I guess this is player specific) Duke will have 12 ACC-caliber players next year - Paulus, Smith, Scheyer, Williams, Pocius, Henderson, McClure, King, Thomas, Singler, Czyz, Zoubek. What do you think is the ideal rotation for that group? And, if the answers are different, what is the ideal rotation against a weaker pre-season opponent? against Georgetown (at Georgetown)? against UNC?
Just be you. You is enough. - K, 4/5/10, 0:13.8 to play, 60-59 Duke.
You're all jealous hypocrites. - Titus on Laettner
You see those guys? Animals. They're animals. - SIU Coach Chris Lowery, on Duke