How Much Will We See Jason Collins On The Court?

The Celtics would at least appear to be finished making personnel moves for the time being and there are some that might say that we could still use another big man. However, the team did sign Jason Collins, adding him to a center rotation that starts with Kevin Garnett and also includes Chris Wilcox and perhaps even Fab Melo.

So one question that the folks at ESPN Boston posed was how much Collins would play. They approached it as part of their over/under series. Both Forsberg and Payne thought that he would play under 10 minutes. Forsberg used Ryan Hollins as an example and pointed out that the Celtics would likely utilize a number of small-ball lineups. Here's Payne's analysis.

Over/Under: Jason Collins - Boston Celtics Blog - ESPN Boston

Collins will likely be ahead of Fab Melo should any personnel emergencies crop up, but otherwise, he'll be used sparingly. Collins is really here to help combat the Dwight Howard and Andrew Bynums of the world, and even that won't really matter until the postseason. The good thing about a veteran like Collins is he won't need a ton of burn to be productive in spot situations. He's here to be a big body and a big obstacle for opposing teams, and Doc Rivers won't need to play him every game for him to fill that role effectively when needed.

I'm still getting up to speed on Collins but if he can defend then I'm sure we can find time for him to play, regardless of how poor he is on offense. A guy named Kendrick Perkins used to start for us, despite being offensively challenged (except in terms of setting hard but sometimes moving screens). At the very least, he's a big veteran body and a quality emergency option over the likes of Hollins or Sean Williams.

p.s. I'm predicting that at least a few folks skip past reading the content of this post and immediately write "hopefully not that much" or something of that variety in the comments section.