He does have pretty smooth midrange game, you have to give it to him. Looks spectacular when the shots go in.
Ham is under utilizing him IMO. He’s making $18 million a year and he’s being treated as Prince’s backup. It’s not a commensurate treatment considering his talent level and the investment we made.
Yeah they should reverse the minutes. 30 for Rui and 21 for Prince but Ham has something against him it seems.
It's not all sugar and spice with Rui this year. He has looked a lot better after concussion protocol and back to how he was performing in the playoffs. Start of the season he was getting beat by his man on the glass and not boxing out - similar to last year maybe the team talked to him to get that corrected. Credit to him that last year he took the criticism well and responded in a productive manner
Ham needs to win games. We are on a 3 win streak. We need to win games, not give minutes to Rui for the sake of it. Prince is a better defender and is more comfortable with guards/quick forwards. Rui will have his minutes and needs to make them count. He needs the ball in his hands more and he almost never passes. As he doesn't do much else, he plays less when LeBron/AD are on the floor as Prince/Cam fit better as they don't need the ball, are better cutters and defenders. Rui has his role and he's doing it well since he returned. Hope it continues
Yeah I'd like to see him more of a priority since he's a long term investment. Prince will most likely be gone end of the year. I get what your saying regarding playing him with both AD/Lebron. Someone would have to guard 3's and Lebron and Rui are both 4s mostly. They do have a 2-man net rating of +11.9 per 100 possessions so far though, so that's promising. I agree he is a black hole on offense but with more minutes he might not try to do too much. Pressing to accomplish what he feels he needs due to the pressure of a quick hook. Either way I'm not too pressed. The team is on a run and his time will come. I like what Prince brings in the mean time.
Yeah I get your point, but I personally would prioritize building a winning team now and get in some kind of momentum, we had a tricky start and were 3-5 a week ago. We are still finding the right combos between lineups, we just moved Reaves to the bench that no one predicted a month ago and I would double down on what is working. LeBron and AD will certainly miss time and Rui should capitalize those opportunities and is likely to increase his playing time. I also believe it's opponents' dependent and he should play more in certain matchups. Ham also usually rewards who plays better in-game so if Rui's hot he will get those minutes
Huge in the 4th - happy to see Rui getting crunch time mins. Need more from him though can't always rely on LeBron/AD.
Rui can get you many buckets in a row once he gets in a rythm Ham is a specialist to sit Rui for long periods as it was the case between the "beginning" of 2nd and end of the 3rd though ... Ham is hurting his team by slowing Rui and Austin developements and playing lesser players more or equal minutes
Rui needs to play more minutes than Prince especially if the latter is going to shoot 1-11 like he did tonight.
Rui having blinders on every time he dribbles is a problem. He's just way too easy to guard as he simply is not a threat to pass when he has the defense compromised
What the hell?! It shouldn't keep him out long, but it's just one f***ing injury after another with the supporting cast.
This CLE/PHI/DET/OKC road trip is gonna be brutal: no Rui/Vando (that I've heard)/Cam. And Gabe is due to be "re-evaluated" around Dec 1st. Man... If Max Christie was waiting to just relax and say WTF and hit 3s, now's the time. 5 to 7 3s in each of those games would be nice. 'Cuz we gonna need that jit. I'm not sure if we can ask more from Wood and Hayes. Can we? (Don't answer that.)
