A discussion with my former Flip player friend led to these obsevations about Flip's substitution style:
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Flip's about winning. When you are payed 2MM+ to win, you are not going to play weak players. The Piston's starting five is MUCH better than any of the subs (except Dyess). There is a significant drop-off in skill when the other bench players come in. So, he will only play them to give the starters a brief breather. (As an aside, Carlisle kept Tay on the bench and played Curry - much to our dismay - until Tay finally demonstrated that he was actually better than Curry). Until one of our bench players demonstrates he is the equal of one of our starters, he's not going to play much. Therein lies the catch-22. How can you demonstrate your skill if you don't play? The history of the NBA suggests that that happens only when a starter gets injured and then you are forced to play someone else. This develope-the-bench idea is simply NOT used by any coach. Only if the starters are so weak that they are no better than the subs, then a coach will be forced to try different players. Developing the bench is for the CBA, NBDL, and College. Top-of-the-line NBA teams look for established veterans (Zo, Finley, Van Exel, Walker, etc.) for the back-up postions. Rookies have a very hard time breaking the line-up of really good teams.
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Flip MAY cut back on starter time as the play-offs approach, but don't expect much of it. In the play-offs, there is actually frequent time-off between games, and no back-to-backs. And both teams get the same time off. Really good players expect to play lots of minutes. Iverson, Jordan, Magic, Bird, etc always played big minutes in the playoffs.