In Part 1 we discussed the specific struggles of David Lee. It’s not been pretty for him. More times than not he’s been a hindrance instead of a help on the court. Now we’ll delve into potential ways to fix it:
Minutes
This is not to say that head coach Mark Jackson should bench Lee.
Lee is a leader on this team, and benching someone now without a clear better alternative can be detrimental to chemistry and locker room dynamics (a strong point of the Warriors).
However Jackson’s stubbornness to play Lee with the first unit and closing out halves and games is starting to cost them. Lee’s minutes should be cut down, especially when Andre Iguodala comes back.
The success of Harrison Barnes and Draymond Green at power forward is noted and, in general, with the amount of minutes Iguodala and Klay Thompson require on the wings, small ball will be necessary to get the deserved minutes to the younger wings.
Cutting Lee’s minutes to 28-31 per game should have him playing with a higher motor, perhaps attacking the glass a bit more for easy baskets and putting more effort on defense.
As easy as it is to say a player should always do that, minutes fatigue over a long grueling NBA season is a real thing and a coach needs to be able to manage it.
Rotations
Going in line with minutes, a way to maximize Lee will be to run him more often with the second unit. As Jackson struggles to find any sort of bench productivity, it’s become frustrating to see him go full bench mob early in second quarters and lose leads or increase deficits.
Why not substitute Lee out with five or six minutes to go in the first and have him lead the second unit?
This can work two-fold for the team, as Lee is a better offensive option than anyone currently on the bench, and it can get Lee going offensively attacking weaker bench unit players for opposing teams.
The increase in confidence he could see from this could pay dividends for the team long term.
Small Ball
Both Jackson and Bob Myers have been adamant on not wanting to go small, almost to point of stubbornness.
It’s always dangerous when you go small, because you’re giving up a lot of advantages defensively and rebounding, however for stretches it can be quite effective.
The scariest part of Lee’s lack of productivity has been playing with Andrew Bogut.
Lee’s never been the most athletic player, but he’s gotten by with quickness and all around craftiness around the basket. Since last season, when Bogut returned from injury, his offensive game has struggled.
Per nbawowy.com, this season Lee’s true shooting percentage is 52.3% with Bogut on the floor, 59.2% when he is off.
To put that in perspective, the league average is somewhere around 53.5%. It’s the difference between a below average inefficient chucker and a very efficient lead scorer. It’s the difference between current Chris Kaman who can barely move or score and prime Pau Gasol, who was a monster around the basket.
The logic for why this is happening is simple; because of Bogut’s struggles offensively, opposing bigs who guard Bogut are often able to cheat off of him and come over and affect Lee’s shot.
Lee’s inability to finish over them like the more athletic or taller big men has led to shots being blocked, deflected or simply rimming out.
This wasn’t the case last year next to Carl Landry (another undersized power forward) because he posed an equal threat as Lee and opposing bigs couldn’t cheat off him.
Perhaps the answer is to run Lee next to Marreese Speights, another big man who has struggled but can hit consistent mid-range jumpers. The combo has the size to buy some minutes versus second units, and would clear the way for Lee to exploit open lanes.
Conclusion
None of these answers are ideal, and maybe Lee just shakes out of his slump. But until that happens, Coach Jackson has to get more creative to find ways to use Lee effectively.
Despite all the issues related to his defensive ineptitude, his contract, Lee can be a useful player for this team. More importantly, this team needs to get productive minutes out of David Lee in some shape or another.
If that means getting creative, then so be it. But settling for status quo like Jackson has done, and just hoping he works through it is not going to work.
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