The Baffling Benching of Lopez When the final minutes arrived Sunday night and the Nets" offense went to pieces, it was easy point to the absence of Joe Johnson, their dynamic, do-everything shooting guard. Johnson was resting a sore heel, robbing the Nets of their No. 2 scorer. More vexing was the absence of the No. 1 scorer. Brook Lopez spent the fourth quarter on the bench - for the third time in four games - while his teammates sputtered to a 76-72 loss to the Memphis Grizzlies. Of all the moves made by P.J. Carlesimo since his ascension to head coach, none are more puzzling than his sudden lack of faith in Lopez to close out games. Lopez is the Nets" most reliable offensive option, averaging 18.7 points and shooting 51.1 percent from the field. He has been their defensive anchor, averaging 2.1 blocks. Those statistics propelled Lopez to his first All-Star Game this month. The benchings have all come since then. Lopez has looked a little wobbly since returning from Houston, which sometimes happens to young players after making their All-Star debuts. The weekend is chaotic. Still, if the Nets have learned anything this season, it is that Lopez is every bit as critical to their success as their veteran stars, Johnson and Deron Williams. With Johnson out the last two games, Lopez's role perhaps should have increased. Yet Lopez never left the bench in the fourth quarter Sunday, or in the fourth quarter of Friday's loss to Houston. Carlesimo acknowledged his error Monday, telling reporters: "I created the situation, and it's not a good situation. I worry about it that I need to address it, and I worry about it that I need to watch what I do going forward. The only thing Carlesimo did not seem worried about was Lopez's frame of mind, and maybe that is part of the problem. Lopez is a star without ego, which is great for team chemistry but not so great for a team's offense. The dominant big men - Patrick Ewing, Shaquille O'Neal, Dwight Howard - demand the crunchtime  minutes and the ball. Lopez seems all too content to cede his fourth-quarter minutes to Andray Blatche. "I have complete faith in him when he's in the game," Lopez said last Tuesday, when Blatche played the final quarter in his place in an overtime win over Milwaukee. It is a refrain Lopez has repeated many times this season. Blatche was a nice pickup last summer, and a useful backup. But Lopez is the steadier and more productive player, and less prone to untimely gaffes. According to statistics at NBA.com, Lopez has an on-court rating of plus 2, meaning the Nets outscore opponents by an average of 2 points per 100 possessions when he is playing. Only Johnson, at plus 3, has a higher net on-court rating. Blatche is at minus 1.8. Conversely, the Nets are outscored by 2.9 points per 100 possessions when Lopez sits. They are nearly 1 point per 100 possessions better when Blatche is on the bench. Nor has Lopez proved to be any sort of liability late in games. He is shooting 51.8 percent in fourth quarters and actually converts his free throws at a higher rate in the fourth (79 percent) than he does in any other quarter. Lopez has shown a dip since the All-Star Game, shooting just 41 percent over the last four games (though he shot well against Houston, going 13 for 21, and scoring 27). This might not be as much about Lopez, however, as it is about the quest to make sense of the Nets" rotation. Avery Johnson never quite figured it out before he was fired as the coach Dec. 27, and Carlesimo has struggled to find the best combinations in the course of a game. MarShon Brooks and Mirza Teletovic have wandered in and out of the rotation, and Reggie Evans has overtaken Kris Humphries in the starting lineup. But too many of the Nets" role players have been erratic this season, including Blatche, Gerald Wallace and C.J. Watson, forcing Carlesimo to rely more heavily on units that feature his three stars. Leaning on Lopez should be his easiest decision.