Maybe Precious remembers more details of Siakams game from Toronto times and can ocasionally guard him better than OG who looked like Pascals son in game 2 .
It looked like: If I could score on Kwahi no way OG can stop me. Siakam looked way too comfortable. They got to prevent that somehow.

Hart has to set picks (on-ball or off) and/or cut to the rim. When he stands on the perimeter or in the dunker’s spot, the Pacers are ignoring him. His defender is gumming up the paint and lurking in the passing lanes.

As Draymond Green demonstrates, a non-shooting threat can be an offensive asset. Because he does not draw attention, there is no one nearby to switch after he sets a pick. When he gets the ball, he penetrates until he draws a defender and then he passes for a three or a layup.

I do exist to see some adjustments. Too little, too late? We shall shortly see. I remain convinced we have more talent, but getting that best out of it is where good coaching comes in. Few rosters are perfect (healthy Celtics come close), but that’s why the coaching ultimately does matter you can get by in the regular season with decent coaches and lots of talent, but in the playoffs, every flaw is exposed. The Pacers have them; can we cover our own and exploit theirs?

Again, we shall see.

Big picture, this is a good team that has several years to figure it out. If we lose to the Pacers, though, it’s going to be hard to feel the season was a success.

That’s rather nice.

I’d even argue, you know, it gives us auto contender status.

Now let’s win one today so our collective Memorial Day will be filled with joy.

I’m not mentioning it to beat the dead horse. Rather it seems like we’re solving yesterday’s problem with this reported Mitch move instead of thinking ahead. I’d rather see Deuce start, give the Pacers a 5 out offense to contend with, and keep Mitch in the role that’s working. Just bc he works off the bench doesn’t mean he’ll work against the pacers starting 5.

Thibs, as he’s said multiple times, ascribes entirely to the philosphy that the game tells him what to do. When what the really elite coaches do is tell the game what to do. Thibs is a reactor, not a driver.

In that vein, while I’d sit Mikal rather than OG, I otherwise co-sign EB’s analysis. Josh Hart is one of the best transition weapons in the association (*). Thibs should be leaning into that even more, not just downsizing it in favor of more plain vanilla, plodding, point-a-shot midrange Mikal. Particularly when Mikal would be a nice on-ball point-forward-ish weapon against bench guys — the role he’d carry out best.

Just more reactive, let’s fight the last war, material from Thibs.

(*) The best in my eyes.

Noticed that Precious is not even mentioned here for a few weeks, so I suppose that the board reached the doghouse verdict and sent the memo to Thibs. No Achiuwa i guess who to me seems like a versitile enough defender to spell some minutes behind Mitch and has some experience in playoffs. His o and d numbers in limited minutes suck tho. Play him with Mitch, OG, Mikal and JB for five minutes…if you see somenthing you have one aditional solution.

I think it would be Woodsonian move of east is big against Indianas Novakaine/Copeland ofense and would probably reverse the curse of that Hibert block on Melo and make Rick pee his pants and make us win in 7 .

This isn’t logically sound. The top-ranked defense in the league got lit up by Dallas

Yup. And the top-ranked defense doesn’t play the Playoff Pacers(*) every game. Aggregated season stats can’t be universally applied to a specific opponent.

(*hereby known as the Playcers.)

coming out with that starting unit after halftime in Game 2 was another gift being delivered.

I’m not mentioning it to beat the dead horse. Rather it seems like we’re solving yesterday’s problem with this reported Mitch move instead of thinking ahead. I’d rather see Deuce start, give the Pacers a 5 out offense to contend with, and keep Mitch in the role that’s working. Just bc he works off the bench doesn’t mean he’ll work against the pacers starting 5.

The issue with replacing Hart is that he’s our 2nd best ball handler and 2nd best rebounder in the starting lineup, you’re either giving up the boards or your ability to beat the press and play in transition.

I’m not sure how replacing our second best rebounder with our best rebounder makes the team worse at rebounding? It certainly makes our defense better.

Beating full court pressure is done by the unusual concept of passing the f in basketball rather than trying to dribble through allowed bump and run pressure and an occasional trap.