easy, coach said that he likes ricky off the bench for his energy and it helps the bench. sorry but don have an article link to prove but if i remember correctly, the team likes jiri welsch. or at least wants him to succeed-ish.
when jiri was coming off the bench, he was terrible. couldnt do anything right. they experimented him starting and it worked. or at least was a lot more effective. and ricky D helps the bench scoring. his energy is very high so it really helps the bench players' morale (i think). no matter what, he's capable of scoring a load of points.
its similar to tyson chandler case. he's better than AD and othella harrington overall, but they want his energy off the bench. AD and othella are/would be shitty off the bench. age maybe? sure, but its probably because tyson chandler (and eddy curry) are in their contract years..
