I think Doc plays the guys he thinks will help the team win games.
I think he's poor at "force feeding" rookies minutes, although in fairness not a lot of young guys he sat have gone on to do anything elsewhere.
I agree with this. Although I will add another layer. I think he goes by the philosophy that forcefeeding minutes to guys who aren't ready is more likely to stunt their growth than help it.
I think, for example, he genuinely felt that if he put Bradley out there before he was ready, it would have actually slowed down his development, rather than speeding it up. Whether he is right or not, who knows, but I think he has had a lot of success with that philosophy.
One thing that kind of works against Doc is his playing rookies in situations where they'll be relatively successful. It makes them look like they're more ready than they are. I remember the "Doc doesn't play young guys" complaint about either Powe or Baby with the stats that the player produced well when given minutes. The reality of the situation was that when we had matchups that were especially bad for the player Doc wouldn't use him, so people saw him succeed but didn't see him struggle much.
Yeah, it really does play against him. And unfortunately, it is an argument that cannot be won.
Whenever players sit on the bench, and the when they get on the court play well, there is no way to prove whether they are playing well now, because they are ready, and if they had played earlier, they would not have played well, or whether they were always ready, and Doc just didn't play them.
That is why whenever this topic comes up, it drives me nuts, because it is an impossible argument.