Valanciunas will not be able to play 30 - 35 minutes a night this year...foul trouble, rookie wall etc.
Bargnani has played centre or Power Forward his whole life
Nobody in that line-up would be able to effectively guard other teams small forwards.
If that was your starting line-up then presumably you would be expecting Ed Davis to play 30-35 minutes a night. he would get abused by other Power forwards.
Bunch of other reasons but that's probably enough.
Bargnaini can't guard the 3. Plus with Barg at the 4, he can expose the lack of lateral quicks in opposing bigs. A frontcourt of Barg, ED, and Val would get ripped apart by quick, fast paced teams. He's a 4, and Dwane Casey has made that clear
I dont think Bargnani can guard the big name small forwards like Lebron, Durant one on one. But i think he could play the 3 in a 2-3 zone because his defense will be masked. Also, the 3 and 4 play similar roles in that system, where they are on the opposite wings. Correct me if im wrong but i dont think it should be much of a change for him. Although preferably, i would want him at the power forward position.
They tried it a few times when we had JO and CB down low. Didn't work at all. He can't guard SFs and you need to make excellent decisions with your help D at the 3 and we all know his Help is probably the worst in the L. SFs need to pass and rebound. The only thing AB does well that can be viewed as a sf skill is score from different spots from 3 to the hoop.
Can you imagine him guarding KD, LBJ, Melo, Joe Johnson, Truth, Granger, Gay, Iggy, Gallo or even any of the lower tier guys? C'mon now
although Casey likes the zone you simply cannot get by playing zone for 48 minutes in the NBA. Teams figure it out. Then AB is stuck out on an island looking worse than ever.
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