Iman

I'm starting to swing more along Diesel's way of thinking on JT. Even back in the Kukoc days he seemed to be a very nice player. He is a great shooter even if a little streaky. I dont know if anyone in the league is faster or much quicker. He dribbles well but overall as a ball handler I'd just say he's around average for a guard, definitely not on the level of a normal point guard. He can get assists by getting the ball to the open man but he rarely makes any of those nice thread the needle type passes. Shoot, lots of times he cant even make good passes into the post. It seems that we had plenty of time to find some ballhandling helpers but we practically went the other way, Dermarr, Dion, Jackson, Dogg, were all exactly the opposite. Even just picking up Jacque and Dickau hurts due to their similar size problems. I'm glad we finally found someone that fits in Diaw and hopefully we'll continue smart moves like that. Maybe we can move Dickau for Reese Gaines and then drop JV by next year. But overall really it doesnt seem worth it, all this struggling just to make a player fit, I guess it woulda been better for us if Andre Miller had slid to us during JT's draft. We coulda fixed it by now with a trade but now I doubt we ever will.

I'm going cause I like the hotdogs. And Lebron will be interesting but I'll still root for the Hawks to win. I think Ricky Davis and to some degree Darius Miles are the keys to Cleveland. If they are hot we might be in trouble, otherwise I look for some hard play after taking last nite off on the court. And Sevendust might be worth staying over for too. I guess I should be easy to spot if your looking for me, I'll be one of the few Hawks fans plus I'll be eating a hotdog..lol.

I agree with comments from other posts that we need to wait longer, maybe until around midseason or so. I looked at the early schedule before the season started and kinda figured we'd be around 4-9 or maybe even 3-10 before the schedule let up and I was pretty much right. Now let's see if after San Antonio we can get on a little run and get back to around .500. Moves that I would like to see would be maybe deal Dickau for some other point guard type project that happens to have size. Tracy McGrady needs some shooters to help him bust the zone and while Orlando is making moves let's go for a Dickau for Reese Gaines trade! He's not looking good at all so far but if he did come around he does have size. Then I'd play Crawford a few more minutes until he gets hurt and then pick up a rebounder for the bench. Where is Alvin Jones Jr? With our good coaching staff's help, Jones might finally play up to his potential!

I think something was/is going on in the Omni/Phillips this time of year. I'm pretty sure it's the Ice Capades.

Interesting stat Hotts, I like how you dig this stuff up for us. We're way below the other teams too but then again all teams are within a few inches. I bet we'd be on the bottom if they factored in weight too, no doubt we are small. I'd still bet that by the end of the year our rebounding stats are fine. The Clippers killed us and then some home games and Hendu will help. Plus I doubt Jacque will get so many minutes as Diaw matures and he seems to be a good rebounder. I'd still like to see us go get Alvin Jones for the bench though.

I think the only way Stotts will start Diaw over Dion or Jax is if we go into a slump, especially a slump of bad play, like 3 Golden State games in a row. I think Jax and Dion are fairly similar players and either could be benched whereas Diaw brings a completely different game. I think Diaw fits much better with the starters than either Dion or Jax and I think Diaw fits horribly with the other bench players. But I think Stotts will favor the more traditional balance and experience of the current starters over bringing in Diaw and his roleplayer style. My actual guess is that Diaw wont truly be a starter for the Hawks until next year (excluding injury replacement type starts). I like Diaw's game. I hope he learns how to shoot a consistent set shot and free throw but then still only takes his shot as a last resort. He could be very valuable to us if hat was the case, especially when he figures out the NBA game and his teammates a little better.

I think Ratliff's poor shooting has pretty much cost us the first two games so I cant say I'd agree that's he's playing great. He is playing great defense. Mohammed has looked a little better than usual and Jackson is doing about what I'd expect, not great but a solid player. Dion needs to play a little smarter and then if Reef and Ratliff get a little offense going we'll be fine. This early road schedule may break us before we get going however.

Yup, you heard alot of commentary about point guard needs last nite. They were suggesting that Francis and Mobley dont fit together since both have scorers mentality, especially if you add Yao Ming to the mix. They also suggested that Cleveland needs a point guard. I'm not so sure on that one myself. Paul Silas has gotten Darius Miles under control and now if he can just control Ricky Davis a little then Lebron will be able to control the pace of the game and the others can help him some with ball handling. JT will never be much at controlling a game but at least he wont look so bad as long as he isnt playing against a few of the hard pressure defenses, especially ones with more than one quick player. I even remember JT having problems with Speedy Claxton a few years back, otherwise he's not so pressure defense susceptible. We just need to add a point forward type player on the court to supplement him a little, like when we had Kukoc, and maybe Diaw will be able to do that.

Oops, just realized I called the topic King as opposed to Knight, I always do that, Billy King is just more of a basketball name in my mind I guess..lol. Yup, they kept the talk very politically corredt. I liked how Stotts kept apologizing to Big Dogg and his skills about how happy he was about the current roster. I guess the most interesting topic for those who missed the show were the comments about Dermarr. A caller asked how we let an athlete/draft pick like that get away and Billy Knight explained that they didnt offer Dermarr a contract extension offer and he went to another team (Memphis) and basically they just planned on not having him. Matt Stewart, the host, mentioned that Dermarr had now been cut by Phoenix and that was it, they went to another topic. Basically it sounded like they figure what we have (Dion, Jackson, Diaw) has about the same upside as Dermarr. I really liked Dermarr but I have to agree. Other topics were how they liked players that could play multiple positions and even mentioned that to be a strength of JT. They mentioned how Shareef's back would have kept most players out of the last 20 or so games last year. They figured Crawford may get some minutes at PF but they didnt think he had the same explosiveness he had before the injuries. Knight wouldnt say that Ekezie would have made the team if not injured or that he would have even helped much. Overall they seemed to be trying to hide their optimism. Coach Stotts even had a nice analogy that we really didnt lose 20 ppg losing Big Dogg, we just lost about 5ppg because Jackson will probably give them about 15.

Sports Unlimited on Comcast Sports South has the Hawks duo on tonite at 6pm.

Hottlanta, I dont think anyone is gonna leave this board due to your posts. There have been a few times where I just didnt read them for a while. I can say the same about most posters here. I'd even say that a few times Jaywalker, Traceman, etc. even seem off to me but that's the fun of it to see what other people think. Sometimes we need some negativity to make us realize what 'homers' we are being. I'd actually say the way you use the quote option instead of just responding bothers me more than your negativity. Your pessimism can be kinda cool because occasionally you can read how your optimism is improving but your still negative. Funny enough I've thought some of your posts have been very informative the last 6 months or so, and I hope you continue your team by team breakdown. Actually that's why I signed on today to read about your next team and see if you responded to what I said about your last breakdown. I guess you slept too much last nite to get to it but I'll look forward to your next team breakdown soon! If your feeling too pessimistic just go post on the Falcons site, I'm sure no one will mind there about now..lol.

Hotlanta, I pretty much agree with your final estimates but not how you got there. First off, Cleveland is tough to compare due to their multiposition players, just like we'd be if we started Diaw. I think Lebron will lead Cleveland in assists, followed by Ricky Davis and I doubt Miles bring the ball up the court more than either of them either so who really is playing what position. I didnt see the preseason games but I gotta believe the on floor matchups had Ricky Davis on JT most of the time so that's how I'd compare them. I think JT is a little less explosive than Davis but JT is overall better, for a better comparision let's use their career stats. So there I take JT. Lebron and Miles have huge upside but Dion and SJ are more solid, I'd call those two positions slightly for Atlanta. Big Z seems to just disappear at times but his size causes me to give Cleveland a slight advantage there. Shareef vs Boozer; sheot, I'd take Hendu or Nazr or maybe even Ekezie over Boozer. Both benches suck. Paul Silas is such a good coach that all he needs is a few things (BigZ healthy, Wagner and Lebron panning out, I've about given up on Miles already) to fall the right way and Cleveland may be tough but I doubt it'll happen anytime soon, or honestly maybe no time this decade but we'll see.

That's always been my choice, Alvin Jones Jr. Barring injuries, I really dont see our 5th bigman getting any playing time but it would be good to have backup just for those few foul/injury problematic nights. I really think we need more of a center body like Jones over Ekezie anyways.

I think Gerald Wallace has huge potential. I think Sacramento agrees or they might have let him go by now. Plus Sacramento is so deep they really dont need to risk giving him up. Maybe they really want Theo and would give up Christie and Wallace for him or something like that.

I never really believed all of Diesel's posturing that McDavid didnt have enough money but this makes me wonder whether maybe he's right. I wouldnt have guessed that McDavid would have actually made a non-basketball man GM but I would have thought he would have at least felt that a bigname coach was needed, if nothing else just to get up fan interest. Maybe the plan is get a cheap solid coach and then make the fan favorite Domique the top assistant. That would still help fan interest. We should have a more coachable team next year, maybe Stotts will surprise us. If not maybe ticket prices will go down, or if not at least it'll be easy to get good ones!!

I'm with DocHawk and some of the others. This time a year ago before the Dog trade we were thinking we should look solid for the playoffs once we added Theo to our roster. Our biggest risk was the fact that many of our players were repeatedly injured, Theo, Kukoc, Dion, even CC and Hendu. We dropped Kukoc and his salary and bad health for Dog, a known reliable player with obvious defensive weaknesses and a large salary. Still when you broke it down and looked at the stats it looked liked we might be among the top in the EAst, at least it looked that way to me. We even started the 2003 season fairly well then we saw that it just didnt work, mainly JT was our only ballhandler and our forwards really gave up alot defensively. It would have been interesting to see if a Coach and more time together in combo with a ballhandler or two might have solved the problem. But a safer solution, especially when you consider salaries was just to dump the Dog. Now we're back to needing to figure out who will be our third offensive threat. The Dog gamble cost us an 8th pick last year for who knows what kinda pick in 2005 or so but it did get us out of our injury risk problems and Kukoc's salary. So to me the question is who will be our Coach and who will be our third scorer. If we get lucky with those positions I dont see why we cant be a midlevel Eastern playoff team.

I'm sorta with you Traceman. I thought a ballhandling guard(Diaw) and a good coach(Fratello) could turn our "4 potential all-star" team into something. I think it looks good on paper just as it did going into last year. Maybe they just needed to play together longer. But after watching how poorly we played at times last year I just dont think it was worth the risk. I think we have a better chance of being good without Dog and we save a few $million. Now we have some financial flexibility. I think you pretty much had it last year yourself. You said Dog and Reef just dont fit together because neither play solid defense and neither can ballhandle. Was that gonna change this year? I say we stick DJ and Diaw out there with Theo for some long arm defense ran by Fratello. JT and Reef will get us 20+ per game. Maybe we'll even let Reef play a little SF again this year and get Hendu and Nazr some more time. We'll be fine. Maybe we'll even make the playoffs if some Dickau and our rookies can give us something.

I agree, I think we need to play the players we've drafted the last few years and see what they have. I think Dickau will come thru and have a decent backup PG year. I'll take DJ for sure. He'll come cheap, has upside, and he would give us defense while also spreading the floor with his 3pointers. Alvin Jones Jr is perfect for imo. Young muscular bigman who likes to get rough. I hate to say it but I'd dump Dion for either Jumaine Jones or Anthony Peeler, whichever came cheaper. Both seem to be able to play from the bench, Dion so far hasn't.

I think Ira offers a lot to a team. I actually think he is a solid NBA offensive threat, not great, but he can hit the open shot or cut to the basket. But he doesnt fit our team. Ira is a SF but we try to use him as a SG where his lack of ball handling kills us. DJ also is weak in this area. That's why I think we drafted Diaw and even Hansen. Both supposedly bring good defense but also can handle/distribute. If that's true we wont need Ira and even though DJ may come back, and he did turn out to be a wasted draft pick, we wont really need him either. I'd still sign Dion and then a cheap backup bigman and see what Fratello can do with those guys!

I'd assume that unless AOL is self-financing that when they make the sale they'll be paid the same whether McDavid pays cash or has someone finance him. I'd guess McDavid doesnt want to sale assets to pay for the deal so he'd rather get financing. The deal on Phillips is interesting however.

I'm from Emerson, which is between Cartersville and Acworth. I had planned to go to Berry two years then Ga Tech for engineering. After leaning towards a Doctorate type degree I stayed at Berry, plus I liked Rome and had mostly pre-professional type friends there. Plus ROTC was paying my way at Berry. The last assignment in the Army stationed me at Ft McPherson in downtown Atlanta so I got a condo in Buckhead and I still stay there part-time and at Lake Lanier part-time.

I heard on Fox Sports South tonite that David McDavid is coming to Atlanta on Wednesday and things are getting close!!

Yep, I went to Berry in Rome 81-85 then UAB Optometry School 85-89. I'd say that I'd do it the same way if I had to do it again too, I like the more casual environment of an Optometrist. I actually work more in the winter and less in the summer so I can go to the lake, etc more.

I'm not sure where you can find people to chat on this subject but there's really not that much general info they can give you, specific questions might be easier. I got into MCG but decided to go to Optometry School at UAB instead. In general you'll need around a 3.4 gpa at a solid college to have a 50/50 shot of getting in. Other factors are considered but gpa would be first, then mcat scores. Scoring in the top half of applicants would again be a solid score. Some people specifically study or take prep courses for the mcat, I'd say wait and see how close your gpa is and then if you need a good score take a prep course and study, otherwise it probably wont help that much anyways. One thing that got me was I scored better in areas where my basic courses were more recent. For example I was a Chemistry major and I'm sure among the tops in my school (Berry) in Chemistry but I scored better in Biology, probably because the mcat type question lean more toward the basic stuff that I had sorta forgotten already. Professional school in general for most people who are able to get in isnt as "hard" as you might think. The main thing about it is that it's a full time thing. In undergrad to go to class about 20 hours per week and study variably, lets say 30 hours per week. Well Med school, etc will be practically 40 hours per week so you'll have to study proportionately also, ie 60 hours per week. After the first two years the studying drops off as clinical time goes up. Good luck, talk to you as needed here or elsewhere.

Big Dog is just one of those NBA scorers that is pretty much unstopable if he's on. The problem is the rest of his game (other than maybe his rebounding) SUX. He'd be a great offensive weapon to have off the bench. If you cant score bring him in and he'd throw it up there. If he's off, no big deal just throw him back on the bench. The problem is no coach would use him that way, especially with his paycheck. I'd like to see us keep this team intact, including resigning JT and DG and DJ. Then trade Big Dog for anyone that would help us off the bench and help us distribute the ball. Then all we need is another proper fitting player and we'll be fine!