The reaction to Glen Davis signing has generally been pretty good. I like it too. But a few of you noticed that Glen Davis didn't exactly sound psyched to rejoin the Celtics. That's probably because he was hoping to cash in and be a starter... instead of sitting on the bench and fighting for minutes.
And he WILL fight for minutes.
There are 96 combined minutes in a basketball game for the center and power forward positions... which is the mix Davis is in. Kevin Garnett will probably get 30 of them (he averaged 31.1 last year). Kendrick Perkins will get another 30 (29.6 last year). That leaves 36 left, which would mean 18 minutes per game each for Glen Davis and Rasheed Wallace if they were split evenly. And we know Danny didn't bring 'Sheed in to play 18 minutes a game. I'd say he's playing 25... leaving 11 for Baby.
We COULD throw the small forward minutes into this mix for the odd occasion that Doc wants to have 3 bigs on the floor at once. Even if it's Sheed, KG and Perk out there, the numbers will pan out because whatever minutes Sheed eats at SF would just mean more PF minutes are available. Anyway, 48 minutes of play at the SF breaks down to about 30 minutes for Paul Pierce and 18 left over for his back up. Some of that will go to Marquis Daniels... but he'll fill in at other spots too. Even so, a majority of those 18 minutes will go to Daniels. What time will be left over at the 3 for Baby? 5 minutes? 8 minutes? Can't be more than that. Remember, a stated priority was getting Pierce rest. That's what Daniels is here for.
Last season, Baby averaged 21.5 mpg simply because KG was out for a long time and he had to fill in. This year, he'll struggle to reach those minutes again. They just don't exist on this team. And if Shelden Williams gets ANY time off the bench, he'll be playing Davis' minutes.
Baby is here for two more years, and he'll be fighting for time each of those years. And if he lets any of this bother him and affect his play, he'll get even fewer minutes as Doc looks for other options. So when you wonder why he wouldn't be happy about coming back to this situation... it's because he's not going to have much of an opportunity to raise his value here.