Well, that came out of nowhere.
Pat Riley benches Jason Williams in favor of Chris Quinn (who at this time of year should always go by "Santa's Little Helper"), and keeps Smush (who at this time of year should always go by "future Sacramento King") on the inactive roster.
Riles doesn't stop there either, starting Penny Hardaway instead of Ricky Davis.
Now, I could've seen the Davis-Hardaway move happening. After all, when you want to get Shaq the ball early in games, it helps to have two guys who are used to getting it to him. Plus, it adds some scoring balance when you bring Ricky off the bench because he'll be in the game the entire time Dwyane is on the bench. Not to mention it makes life easier on Ricky when he knows he's in there for scoring and not just waiting around for Dwyane or Shaq to do something and working off them.
But the Williams-Quinn move I was kind of shocked by -- especially because it came at the same time as the Ricky move. In that starting lineup of Shaq, UD, Dwyane, Quinn and Penny, you're almost asking teams to send two or three guys at Shaq and Dwyane and not worry about the consequences. It's also surprising because Riles talked about needing more production from the PG spot, and Jason can't exactly score while sitting on the bench (he'd be out of bounds).
Now, it worked this time, with Quinn only needing to take two shots for the game, and Jason playing long stretches in each half that let him get into a rhythm and run the floor, etc. But I just can't see it working long-term. I would think you'd need another threat in Jason if teams come out aggressively against Shaq and Dwyane. That's not to say Chris can't do that, but Jason obviously has more experience as a scorer in this league.
The obvious conspiracy theory here (and there will be one for every move Pat makes until the trade deadline passes) is that he may be looking to trade Jason (seriously, this time). But as I've said all along, there's no way Riley would potentially sacrifice a win right now for a move he plans to make down the road. Each win is too precious to a team that started 3-10 and has sights set on big things. So this was just a move he felt would help the team right now.
The other surprising element on the roster front was Dorell Wright sitting on the bench wearing a suit. He has gone from starter to bench player to no time at all to not even in uniform. At this point, he probably is begging to get sent elsewhere, because it's clear he has no future here.
And finally, the daily praise of Daequan Cook. Man, that kid is shocking the heck out of me. He had such a bad pre-draft camp in Orlando that I thought he was going to be a bust. But he can shoot. And as long as he's not trying to do too much (even though he did hit a few tough shots on Tuesday), then he can be a regular in this rotation any time and be productive. I mean, 19 points in 21 minutes against the 'Cats is pretty darn good.
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