Nets apos;plan To Reduce Ben Simmons apos; Workload apos; When He Returns

In a stop-start year thus far for Ben Simmons, he and the Nets are apparently considering a new approach to his workload as he eyes a Friday return.
Simmons, who missed all of last season with back and mental health issues, played the first six games of the season - far below his best level - before missing the next four with knee soreness.
And after a stretch where he played 11 of the next 12 games and frequently topped 30 minutes a night, Simmons was sidelined yet again last week with a calf strain.
Ben Simmons will hope to return to his pre-injury return if he returns to the court Friday
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While a return vs.
the Hawks would mean he's sat for only four games, the latest setback looks to have changed the organization's thinking when it comes to managing him. 

 'I think we're definitely going to look at [workload] a lot differently,' Simmons told reporters Tuesday.
 'Maybe not [playing] back-to-backs or whatever it is.

I think that's going to be a joint thing with the training staff and with myself.'
'It's going to take everybody. Some guys might not play one night,' Simmons said. 'We got to make sacrifices and do what we can to help win games.'
Simmons' latest injury concern came at an unfortunate time, as he was playing his best basketball as a Net with double-digit points in six straight games.
Simmons has so far missed eight of the Nets' 25 games, with another expected Wednesday
The Nets have had other health issues aside from Simmons, as Seth Curry missed eight of the first nine games due to ankle problems and TJ Warren, weareliferuiner.com working his way back from left foot issues, only made his season debut last week.
Those problems have created gaps throughout the rest of the roster, whereby Kevin Durant leads the league in minutes, and Simmons has evidently overexerted himself too.
 'In an ideal scope of things, we don't want to play Kevin that amount of minutes going forward.

And hopefully we get to a point where Ben's minutes aren't where they were previously, [Kyrie Irving's] minutes aren't where they were previously,' coach Jacque Vaughn said.
'[We hope] that we have the depth that we can space and share some of those minutes amongst a few guys going forward and trending towards what we want to get to once playoffs come around.'

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