Mike Woodson said J.R. Smith could start at shooting guard in his season debut Sunday, supplant Iman Shumpert in the lineup.
Smith was expected to first have to get his feet wet before Woodson would make the plunge starting last season’s Sixth Man Award winner, who is serving a five-game pot suspension.
Not so, with Woodson indicating he has a difficult decision on his hands.
“He possibly could be. Absolutely,’’ Woodson said before Tuesday’s game against the Bobcats of Smith starting. “He comes back Sunday, and when he comes back we’ll just play it out.’’
“We don’t have a lot of practice time between games. It’s hard to practice and determine who’s going to be at that spot. Bottom line is I’m going to have to make a decision and we’re going to live with it. Hopefully that decision will work. If not, I have enough pieces to juggle. It’s a matter of getting all the pieces in place and getting a nice rotation because we’re not there on rotations yet.’’
On Tuesday, Woodson started the big frontcourt that features Andrea Bargnani at power forward and Carmelo Anthony at the 3.