Depth Chart:

Here are able to set your starters your backups and where you’d like every to possibly play during a game. If a player is listed at a position on your depth chart he could possibly play that position at any point throughout the game. So don’t put a player somewhere you don’t want him playing.

Also players are able to move 1 slot away from their listed position without penalty. (ie pg to sg or pf to sf). There is a penalty for moving someone more then 1 spot (ie pg to sf) although it is not known how much it is and many coaches have been extremely successful doing it, so don’t be afraid to try new things out.

In my opinion to be a great team you really need to have 10 quality players that you can play with. A starter at every position and a backup that plays at one position (of course foul trouble can complicate that a little bit but for the most part). This is again my opinion, but depth can never hurt!

Playing Time:

You can select to get your players PT by either Target Minutes or Fatigue setting. Here is an overview of the systems

Target Minutes:

Using Target Minutes is the easiest way to make sure those promises you made to recruits come true. It also gives you the easiest way to know my best player is playing at least x minutes. The downside (And why I no longer use it) is that too much your players play late in games fatigued. If a player is in foul trouble early and therefore doesn’t play much in half 1 the engine will still try and get him his x minutes, even if that means running him dry in half 2. Seeing as how players don’t play as well when fatigued, I don’t like this.

Fatigue:

In fatigue setting you set your players by when you would like them to exit the game. Your options are: Fairly Fresh, Getting Tired, Tired, Very Tired, Foul Trouble Only, Mopup, Rest. When a player reaches whichever setting you have him at he is removed from the game (at the soonest dead ball and/or a timeout on some occasions).

First off I would never recommend having a player set at Very Tired or Foul Trouble only. Not only will they have an increased chance of getting injured they will also not be performing very well. Rest is used for an injured player. Mopup I use for those player I do NOT want to see any pt. (Usually Walk-ons). Mostly I have my teams set entirely too Getting Tired. My starters usually see 22-27 mpg while my backups get the rest. On occasion when I have a couple freshmen that I’d like to each get 8 minutes or there abouts I’ll put them both at Fairly Fresh at the same position. (Usually do this when I have an abundance of big men). In doing this I have found my teams to usually be well rested for the stretch run late in games and its why I have stuck with everyone set at Getting Tired. Although every team is different so this is another area where you are going to have to mess around with things to find out what suits you as a coach.