Grizzlies at Suns: What I'd like to see tonight...

Woe goes the Bench

While the Grizzlies are blazing through the front of their NBA schedule, standing 4-0 for the first time in franchise history, this has largely been in part to extraordinary efforts and heavily played minutes from the starters of Memphis.

Through (4) regular season games, the Memphis Grizzlies bench has scored a total of 70 points off the following shooting performances:

• 3 of 16 vs. MIN
• 8 of 21 at IND
• 7 of 24 at CHA
• 10 of 24 vs. NOP

That's 28 made shots on 85 attempted shots AKA 33% shooting from the field.

/dryheaves

The Grizzlies' starters aren't going to be able to keep rowing the boat by themselves. If they're going to keep playing ugly basketball, the bench has got to provide at least a few minutes of cohesive basketball. What we've essentially seen up until now is Beno Udrih sprinting through the paint and everyone else missing shots, getting outwrestled for rebounds, and racking up fouls just trying to look busy and get out of his way.

Part of this is probably on Dave Joerger, but I don't think DJ is encouraging the pattern of shooting that's led to a paltry 70 points in four games. To give you an apt comparison, the Phoenix Suns bench, just last night -- not even 24 hours ago, dropped 53 points on the Lakers. If I scoured the scoreboards I could probably come across a team whose bench has actually outscored the season total of the Grizzlies bench in a single game.

Let's end that tonight. We saw some life from Beno and Vince Carter against the Pelicans on Monday, but they've got to find a way to get some of the other guys some easy baskets. This becomes doubly magnified if Mike Conley is limited with his tender ankle. I'm not sure how much Joerger trusts the newly signed Kalin Lucas, so we could end up seeing some Tayshaun-Point-Forward tonight.

I'd love to see Memphis improve to 5-0, and I think the bench will have to step up to make that happen tonight.

2014/15 NBA Season
	vs
2014/15: 4-0 (2-0 road)		2014/15: 3-1 (2-0 home)
November 5, 2014
US Airways Center, Phoenix, AZ
8:00 PM CDT
Fox SportSouth / 92.9 FM ESPN
Possible Starters
Mike Conley	PG	Eric Bledsoe
Courtney Lee	SG	Goran Dragic
Tony Allen	SF	Marcus Morris
Zach Randolph	PF	Markieff Morris
Marc Gasol	C	Miles Plumlee
2014/15 Advanced Stats
94.6 (22nd)	Pace	99.2 (7th)
97.2 (23rd)	OEff	105.7 (11th)
89.5 (2nd)	DEff	103.1 (14th)