The Interchangables

In the Charlotte game last night, the Blazers played their best basketball in the 4th quarter, and they did it with an interesting lineup. As one would expect after a 52 point performance and a stellar month of January, Andre Miller was at point. But the only other starter on the floor was LaMarcus Aldridge, who was nominally playing center. The other three guys were Rudy Fernandez, Nicolas Batum, and Dante Cunningham. This lineup gave Charlotte all kinds of problems, on both ends of the floor.

On defense, both Batum and Cunningham have super long arms and excellent instincts. They are the two best help defenders on the team, and they are both quick enough and long enough to guard every position, at least in pinch. When you combine them with Aldridge (who is very agile for a big), Fernandez (who is very long for a guard), and Miller (who is very tough for a point guard), you get a group of five guys who are capable of playing a true zone and/or switching on every pick. This is as interchangeable a group of guys as you will find in the NBA.

Against a lineup like that -- as Charlotte found out last night -- it is very hard to run a pick and roll or free guys up through screens. The defense just switches or rotates. It's hard to create mismatches. Even Miller, the shortest guy on the court, does pretty well when temporarily switched on to bigs. He probably prefers that to chasing around speedy point guards. And the collective wing span of the rest of this group is incredible, making it very difficult to make clean passes or get uncontested shots off.

On offense, this is a potent lineup as well. Miller, the best lob passer in the league, is surrounded by long, quick guys who can finish at the hoop. He can hit them with outlet passes for easy buckets in transition or feed them as they cut to the hoop in half court sets. Batum and Aldridge were the recipients of a number of such assists last night.

Moreover, it's not just this group that is capable of playing like this. Brandon Roy, Martell Webster, and (when healthy) Travis Outlaw all fit this mold and can be plugged in easily. In other words, there are a number of combinations of personnel that can create the same effect and allow for the same style of play. The key is having Aldridge move over to the five and having only one of the point guards in the game at a time. Essentially the lineup looks like this:

1: Miller, Bayless, or Blake
2-3: two of Roy, Fernandez, Batum, or Webster
4: Cunningham, Batum, or Outlaw
5: Aldridge

I'm not saying the Blazers should exclusively utilize this sort of lineup, but I'd like to see them use it, at minimum, half the game, at least until we have a true center back on the active roster. The reason I like this sort of lineup is because its length and interchangeability compensates for the Blazers' lack of size in the low post. This lineup has the potential to be defensively suffocating and offensively explosive.

Though we're lacking in bigs, the Blazers have an abundance of talent at the wing positions and they should try to take advantage of it. Versality can be a power weapon in the NBA.