Every year, there are players that get lost in the cracks. Sometimes it’s their own fault for playing so poorly that they drop out of the rotation, but sometimes it happens due to circumstances beyond their control. Roster realities dictate that players who seemingly need or deserve regular rotation minutes get cast aside in favor of teammates that are currently more in their coach’s favor. Surely there are more around the league, but below, we’ll dig into some notable examples.
Willy Hernangomez, New York Knicks
The Knicks have about 437 centers on their roster — not including Kristaps Porzingis, who should be playing center but has played only nine percent of his minutes there, according to Basketball-Reference —‚and Hernangomez has ended up as the odd man out in Jeff Hornacek’s rotation. Enes Kanter is getting the starts and Kyle O’Quinn has usually been the first big off the bench. And with Kanter out the last three games, it was O’Quinn who started in his place.
If it seems strange that Hernangomez, who actually drew Rookie of the Year votes last season, is plastered to the bench. Considering he appeared to be on one of the best value contracts in the league (non-rookie scale, non-max division), it’s quite a surprise that he finds himself riding the pine.
He averaged 8.2 points and 7.0 rebounds in 18.4 minutes per game last year (16.0 and 13.6, respectively, per-36 minutes), and Steve Mills and Scott Perry repeatedly mentioned him as part of the team’s long-term core throughout the offseason. He performed terribly in the preseason, though, and when New York traded for Kanter shortly before the start of the season, he fell all the way down the ladder.
Given the opportunity to dig himself out of the hole he’s in over the last few games, Hernangomez has not necessarily showered himself in glory. His defense has been abysmal and he’s forcing things offensively in an effort to show he’s still got it. His youth, contract, and friendship with Porzingis means he’s likely longer for New York than Kanter or O’Quinn, but for now, he’s way far down the totem pole.
Tony Allen, New Orleans Pelicans
Allen was cast out of Memphis, where the ship currently is sinking. He ended up on a team that likely has the worst rotation of wings in the NBA, yet he’s down to a career-low 13.4 minutes per game.
He’s played more than 14 minutes in a game only five times and has cracked 20 just once. E’Twaun Moore, Dante Cunningham, Darius Miller, and Ian Clark are all playing ahead of him (average minutes-wise), and with Jrue Holiday moving off the ball after Rajon Rondo’s entree to the starting lineup, Allen has seen his playing time diminish with each successive game since he returned from his four-game injury-related absence.
It’s possible he could still grit-grind with the best of them, but we haven’t gotten much of a chance to see that this year.
Kenneth Faried, Denver Nuggets
It’s seemingly been clear for a while that Faried is not in the Nuggets’ future plans, but it’s never been more clear than this season. His playing time has been yo-yoed around all year — he’s been on the floor for double-digit minutes in consecutive games just once, and it was in the Nuggets’ second and third game of the season.
He’s got this year ($12.9 million) and next ($13.8 million) remaining on the five-year, $60 million extension he signed back in 2014. That’s not untradeable, but it might be close given his skill set. He’s a power forward that doesn’t space the floor on offense, protect in space or around the rim on defense, and can’t really make plays for others, either. There’s probably a place in the league for a player with his high-energy skill set, but not at that price and not without a shooting/rim-protecting big man next to him — and those players are rare.
With Paul Millsap out a while after wrist surgery, Faried may see more playing time over the next several weeks and thus boost his trade value — he got the start the last two Nuggets games — but up until now he’s been an afterthought.
Sam Dekker, Los Angeles Clippers
Dekker struggled with injuries through his first two NBA seasons, but for the short time he was healthy, he showed himself to be a usable option on the wing. He averaged 13-7-2 per-36 minutes during his sophomore season, but then he got injured and never really made an impact once he returned. (It didn’t help that he returned during the playoffs, and against the Spurs at that.) Then he was sent to the Clippers in the Chris Paul trade over the summer, and it seemed like he’d provide some quality depth to a team that sorely needed it.
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The Clips looked like a deep team coming into the season, but the depth was smoke and mirrors given the propensity for injury of nearly everybody on the roster. Milos Teodosic, Patrick Beverley, Danilo Gallinari, and now Blake Griffin have already gotten hurt, but Dekker still isn’t getting consistent playing time.
All of the Warriors big men
Pretty much all of these guys would be rotation regulars elsewhere, but in the Bay, only Zaza Pachulia is guaranteed minutes. Jordan Bell, Kevon Looney, and David West have to duke it out for backup center minutes. West is usually first in the pecking order, but you never know if it’ll be Bell or Looney on any given night. All of them have their specific strengths and weaknesses, but they don’t often get a chance to showcase the full breadth of their talents because Steve Kerr prefers to give everybody a chance and because the Dubs go small without a real center for stretches of nearly every game.