I think the key here is effort. Theus isn't going to play Orien Greene 40 minutes and Bibby 10 because Greene is the better defender-- but if Bibby doesn't play hard on defense he'll maybe be playing 28 minutes per game instead of 34. That's the way I interpreted those comments. And yeah, if he doesn't stick to that philosophy it's just talk. Musselman talked the talk but when it got time to play, he didn't walk the walk. Sure it's fair to be skeptical, but I'm not going to hold what Musselman did against Reggie Theus. He's not Musselman, so he should get the same chance Musselman got last season before he blew it. Talking the talk is the first step to walking the walk, now we've just go to see if he can take the next step when the season starts. At this point, I see it as a good sign. Give him a fair shot.
I don't think it's a foregone conclusion that Greene makes the team over Shakur either. If Greene can't run the team, it doesn't matter how good his defense is. Shakur's not a bad defender either, from what I've seen.
It's also quite irresponsible to demand that Justin Williams be the starter. We don't see what happens in practice, we don't know what the gameplan is. Shareef and Thomas are going to get minutes if they play hard as long as they're on this team. Like I said before, the bit about earning minutes by playing defense is not as simple as adding up blocks and steals and rebounds and dividing the minutes accordingly. It's about effort. Kenny Thomas has shown he can be a solid rebounder when he puts forth the effort. Just as it's only fair to wait until the season starts before accusing Theus of not practicing what he preaches, it's fair to give everyone the chance to show they want to play before deciding the starting lineups based on how much we like them or how much effort they've shown in the past. New season means everyone starts with a clean slate.
I would expect that Justin Williams will eventually be getting more playing time as the seaons plays out considering he's got the size and defensive skills to help where we most need it, but you've got to give time for these things to play out. That's what's exciting about a new season, everything starts over. Everyone gets a new chance to prove themselves. Can't we atleast wait until the season has actually started before we start slinging accusations?
