The only thing Larry Drew likes more than preaching about the importance of energy and effort is a veteran. Case in point is Josh Powell's endless opportunities to prove that he is not a deserving member of the rotation, as well as giving Mike Bibby limitless opportunities to prove that he should not be paired with Jamal Crawford in the same backcourt during the 4th quarter of games. Each experiment resulted in entirely predictable outcomes, while the chance to develop a young guy like Jeff Teague, a cost effective young option who is by no means a world beater, but could get better, has fallen on deaf ears for a franchise that doesn't have a lot of money to spend thanks to Joe Johnson's cap clogging contract.
Which brings us to Zaza Pachulia. Zaza is in the midst of his worst season in the NBA, and his play has not been up to his usual standards. However, as the one backup big on the Hawks who has a proven and recent track record of being a good rotation player, why have his minutes been so inconsistent? Could this be contributing to why he is in the middle of a career worst season? Even despite his poor play, he has easily outpaced his competition in PER, posting a 10.8 over the season. In the last 10 games before the Lakers game (where he logged 8 points and 10 boards in 22 minutes), his minutes have gone like this: 6, 5, 13, 0, 0, 21,22,19,6,1. In 43 minutes between the Portland and Denver games, he combined for 19 rebounds. After 19 fairly empty minutes against Chicago in the next game, he was penalized by playing 7 in the next 2 games. Keep in mind that Josh Smith didn't even play against OKC. We've already discussed the plethora of useless bigs on the Hawks roster, so that doesn't need to be discussed. So why then, must Larry Drew penalize his one proven useful big with inconsistent minutes because of one poor showing?
Zaza's isn't an unbelievable NBA player. Everybody knows this. However, he has proven to be a useful NBA basketball player over his career, in addition to being a wine connoisseur, the best dressed celebrity in Atlanta, a funny guy, and the possessor of horrible bacne (ok, maybe not a positive). Larry Drew needs to realize that maximizing the production out of his one proven backup big will be a key in maximizing what limited potential the Atlanta Hawks have to get better. Consistent minutes would be a start. The others have proven time and again that they can't play. Let's let the one guy who has shown he can play figure out his problems.
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