HawksBalla

Evans will play less then 20 minutes because he doesnt do much well offensively other then shoot wide-open 3's, and his D is overrated. Crawford will be making too much money to only play 20 minutes a night, plus he's another one of Sund's players. I see Crawford in the role of Woody-stlye 6-man that plays 30+ minutes a night, subbing in for Bibby, JJ, and Marvin on occasion.

Way more penetration in the half-court offense and off of defensive rebounds, where their superior speed and athleticism would make us an exciting running team.

I'm 60% happy we are keeping him, 40% not happy. Pluses: -Great 3-point shooting -Leadership -Pretty good passer -Hussles -Runs the offense the best Minuses: -TERRIBUL defense -Slow -Can't penetrate -He will deny minutes to Teague, who is the designated future at pg -Keeps the Iso-Joe boring offense intact The last one is what hit me the most. I don't know if a Flip-Teague-Crawford rotation at pg would have worked, but it would have been damn entertaining to watch. Instead, with Bibby at the helm we'll never be the running team we could/should be.

I believe Chills would be an upgrade over Evans at backup sf. And you could run lineups with Evans at sg and Chills at sf, or visa versa...Woody would almost be forced to rest JJ to get Evans and Chills both 15 minutes a game.

It would take at least #19 and Chills, though my first reaction was #19 and Marvin.

Yes, I would.

I wouldn't sign Bibby to more then a one-year deal. -He is a HUGE liability on defense. -He is slow -He can't drive -He is a HUGE liability on defense. -He doesnt generate offense for his teammates ( JJ had more assists then our "pg") -When he's cold, he'll shoot the Hawks out of the game -He is a HUGE liability on defense. -He's old +Clutch shooter +When he's hot, he can carry the offense +Above-average passer +Makes good decisions +Well liked Too many negatives, and the positives arent enough. We need to be more athletic in our back court. We need more speed. We cant have such a black hole on defense, especially with Deron Williams, Chris Paul, Devis Harris, Felton, Ford, Tony Parker, Rose, Nate Robinson, Chauncey Billups, Jameer Nelson, et al being able to exploit us. The way I see it, we're probably going to build around JJ and Josh Smith, with maybe Horford (if we're ok with being short at center for the next 5-7 years) or Williams (if we're going to try to utilize his shooting touch and keep drinking the "he has potential" kool-aid). So we HAVE to upgrade either at point guard, shooting guard (and move JJ to sf) OR sf (lose Marvin), or center (trade Horford). Power Forward is the only lock because we have Josh and Horford. I think if we had a quicker, athletic pg, the rest of our starting lineup would be good enough to get us 50 wins. New point guard (Sessions, Felton, or take a shot with Acie though I know that wont happen) JJ Marvin Josh Horford Flip Mo Zaza Chills I think we could grab at least the 3-seed with that team.

Both Sekou and the Boston Globe seem to think we're trading Acie Law. Where there's smoke, there's a trade. Add Acie to the list of draft misses of Billy Knightmare. Chills, Marvin, Shelden, Acie. If we dont whiff as bad as we did on just two of those picks, we could have been MUCH better at this point.

I saw this on RealGM. Pretty disappointing that we're hurting for money that bad. If we trade him for no players, I dont see how that will make us better...unless we're using that money on another player who is as good if not better then Marvin.

I would keep Marvin and sign Chills back. But if we have to bid more then 6.5 million for marvin I say let him walk.

Bobby Knightmare isnt here to protect his sacred cow anymore.

Trade his rights for a low 2nd-round pick (Camby-style trade), then used the freed-up money to bring Chills back. With the same starters as this year, I think we'd win at least 50 games. Our 2nd-unit could run other team's benches off the court.

We can hang with Boston because they are aging and will become more injury-prone. Who knows how much Pierce, Allen, and Garnett have left. No one really scares me on the Magic except Dwight Howard. They dont have the depth to exploit us, our wings match up well with theirs, and they dont have a good-enough pg to exploit Bibby. The Cavs are going to run away with this conference year after yearunless Mo Williams or Lebron get hurt. or Lebron leaves for Nyc. They have tons of depth, and thats going to continue a la Spurs or Lakers. Vets will take pay cuts to get the exposure and chance at a ring that the Cavs will offer. Lebron is only going to get better, become a better jump shooter. They have guards to exploit our lack of depth. They have shooters to make us pay for doubling Lerbon. They have the height, size and depth to punish our bigs. The Heat have a ways to go. The Bulls are going to lose Gordon, so that will reset them. So basically, we have to now design our team to beat Clevland. We are going to need another shooter, another slasher, more big man depth, and another scorer. That might come from our existing lineup, or from new players. But until we fill those weaknesses, we going to lose to Clevland, along with the rest of the conference.

I say we trade either Josh or Horford for the biggest star center/pg we can get. The problem with trading Marvin is that we have no one else to play at sf, while trading Josh or Horford always us to solidify the power forward spot. Josh Smith has more upside. Trade Horford. Trade Josh only if it involves getting someone REALLY good, like Chris Paul.

There is absolutely NO reason why Joe should have been on the court. The game was LONG over at that point.

This is embarrassing. How many times do we have to be blown out on the road before Woodson takes some heat? When I saw Othello Hunter in the game, I was convinced that I had somehow passed through a wormhole that took me to an alternate dimension.

Go away

Part of the problem for our Pace ranking is the fact that Bibby is slow and cant take the ball to the hoop. But I still believe it falls on Woodson's joke of an offense. The bummer is that there is NO WAY we get rid of Woodson. You dont fire the coach that got you to the 2nd round for the first time in ten years. Especially not with us owing him another year on his contract. For better or worse (mostly worse), we're stuck with him.

Al's jumpshot isnt good enough (or maybe I should say, consistent enough) for him to be a go-to scorer. And because we play him at center with Josh Smith on the court, he almost always will be stuck trying to post up a player that is stronger and taller than he is. He will always have a tough time in this league as a low-post offensive player at center. His only chance to score anything over 12 ppg is to develop a fade-away jumper, a la Boozer. I am open to trading him, though I am trying to remember he is hurt and how helpful he has been in the past. He is a good rebounder and his shot-blocking has improved. He can run the court, he is a leader. These are all good qualities. Really though, right now I am open to trading everyone not named Joe, Josh, and Zaza (because he fits the roles of backup center and enforcer perfectly). Josh Smith is hopefully starting to see how good he can be on the low-post. That makes Horford expendable. The problem is I can't think of too many centers that we'd want in his place. Think Portland would do a Oden for Horford? Would we?

Of course Joe is tired. He's been playing an absurd amount of minutes two years in a row, along with two postseasons in a row and two all-star breaks in a row. Plus he's forced to defend the other team's best guard in every single game, and he carries the burden of being the main focus of our iso-Joe offense. I blame this 100% on Woody. We had all year to try to develop Law or West to give JJ 12-15 minutes off a game. We had all year to develop a half-court offense that doesnt require JJ on the court. Woody failed on both fronts. I hope Sund either finds a player that Woody will actually play off the bench, or Woody forces the issue with Sund. What sucks though is how the Spirit group eats out of Woody's hands. We'll never win a championship with JJ averaging 40 minutes a year. Period.

We wont be able to "make" the refs call anything on LeBron. He gets the Jordan rules, just like Wade except to an even higher degree. If we so much as breathe on LeBron, we're getting a whistle. We dont match up that well against the Cavs. Factor in their dominance at homecourt and the refs and it could get ugly. We're going to need to play very well as a team and try to take out LeBron's teammates and force Lebron into a jump shooter.

After watching today's game I believe that JJ has the TALENT to be a superstar, statistically. The problems that are holding him back are two: 1. His coach runs him into the ground with all the minutes played. 2. He forces his game too much. Is it because he feels like he has to do it all by himself because his teammates arent good enough? Does he feel pressure to be THE man? Is it coaching that is pushing him to force jumpers? Is it our playbook and offensive scheme? #1 can be easily fixed, and I hope Sund does something about it. So really, the problem is #2. Because today was a perfect example of how good JJ can be when he lets the game come to him, as Mark Jackson said. He wasnt forcing those double-teamed jumpers. He was passing a lot. And we were running plays to get JJ open off screens. I think JJ could score 25 a game if he played three less minutes a game, wasnt forced to bring up the ball as often as he does, he relied on his teammates more, and we run more plays that get him open. BTW I would have done the Tmac for JJ trade, but then I remembered the surgery Tmac just had. Pass.

Zaza. He was the x-factor, the one player they couldnt match. He took out Jermaine O'Neil, which was huge. He got under the skin and inside the head of the entire Heat team. He galvanized the crowd. He had the Hawks' best effort in the most important game of the series, game 4. He also was able to play big minutes with Horford being ineffective or hurt. King Zaza, indeed.

Agreed. Our offense seems miles better when joe isn't bringing up the ball, like last night.

Aldridge is almost as untouchable as Roy to Portland. Why? Because Oden looks like a injury-prone, foul-prone, out-of-shape bust. Plus you don't trade your centerpiece big for a dime-dozen small forward.