Kickin’ It Old School: Why A Veteran Lineup Works for the Grizzlies
Until Mike Conley returns, Coach Dave Joerger may opt for very-advanced-in-age lineups that feature no point guards at all. It’s a bold strategy for the Memphis Grizzlies, let’s see if it pays off for them.
Since relegating Zach Randolph to a super-sixth man role and starting Matt Barnes at the four, Dave Joerger has experimented with and test-driven a multitude of diverse and interesting lineups this season. We’ve seen Tony Allen disappear and reappear, minutes fluctuate for every wing player, Jamychal Green play everything from small forward to center, Mike Conley and Mario Chalmers run a double point guard backcourt, Courtney Lee start at point guard, etc.
And now that we’ve seen a Jeff Green-Tony Allen-Vince Carter-Jamychal Green-Zach Randolph lineup, we may have officially seen it all. In the second half against Boston, just when you were wondering if Coach Joerger was finally going to bring Elliot Williams back in to run the point for another spell, the aforementioned five-man wrecking crew took the court against the Celtics, and dominated for a few glorious minutes.
The lineup not only conspicuously lacked a true point guard, it lacked a true guard. It made no sense, and the median age for the lineup is somewhere around the AARP threshold.
And, yet, when this group took the floor with the Grizzlies losing by double figures, the Grizzlies’ elders lead the charge to make it a competitive, winnable ballgame. In doing so, they earned some major style points along the way and brought the crowd to near pandemonium with critical stops on defense and big plays on the offensive end. Older players like Tony Allen, Zach Randolph, and Vince Carter were the heroes of this game.
Having never played together as a five-man lineup before, the four total minutes played by this OG (old guys) squad is an admittedly preposterously small sample size, but according to NBA.com advanced statistics, this particular lineup has an impressive defensive rating of holding opponents (i.e. the Boston Celtics for a few minutes that one time) to the very low average of 63.5 points per 100 possessions, with a net rating of +22.3 points per 100 possessions for the Grizzlies.
Statistically speaking (sort of), based on the ridiculously small four-minute sample, there are only a few ways the Grizzlies could improve on this potent lineup, and the simplest, would be replacing the relatively young Jeff Green with 35 year-old veteran forward Matt Barnes. When you make the lineup even older by adding Matt Barnes to the equation, the benefits and effectiveness of this lineup skyrocket. The well-aged, lineup of Allen, Barnes, Carter, Randolph, and Jamychal Green has an unbelievable, (“unbelievable” in the most literal sense) net average of +99.8 points, scoring 133.1 points per 100 possessions while holding opponents to a minuscule 33.3 points per 100 possessions.
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Now, is it true that the sample size for the lineup’s averages consists of a grand total of only 3 minutes out of the entire season? Yes. Does that make those averages statistically insignificant, unreliable, unproven and inconclusive? Yes, it does, but maybe Coach Joerger needs to grant more playing time to this lineup of wiser, more mature players, so we can find out how well it really works.
For all the various small-ball and odd-ball lineups Joerger has utilized this season, the aforementioned Mothball lineup is by far my favorite.
If this past week tells us anything, it’s that Coach Joerger needs to continue to roll the dice on a lineup that is First Team All-Geritol, because the Grizzlies’ oldest players have still got it.