crimedog

I loved Craw as a sixth man, I'd just like to see what we have in Teague and Crawford. Locking him and Joe up to long-term deals in the same summer would be silly - I just don't believe Sund thinks that it would be a smart way to build a team. I would imagine that he will wait until closer to the deadline and then trade Craw to a team looking to cut some salary. If we can pick up more frontcourt depth, I'd be happy with that because I'd hope that at least one of our two young guys can be a gamer.

Josh. Dominated the glass. Set up other guys and screwed up the Bucks D. Was absolutely everywhere on D. Almost a completely perfect game. Joe hit some big shots down the stretch and played some nice D on Jennings, but seriously, Smith was as close to perfect as I've ever seen him.

I really don't think we have to worry about Josh. If there is anything I've seen him do consistently since he's been drafted, its congratulate his teammates, go nuts for his teammates, and talk up his teammates.

As far as whether he should have made the team, that is pretty plainly obvious. Hollinger on ESPN.com thinks that Smith is among the biggest all-star oversights ever. Type in Josh Smith all-star snub in google and you'll see tons of articles (for example, one of Canada's two national papers, the National Post, says that Smith is "the biggest all-star snub of them all." The thing is though, a lot of people wouldn't realize just how important he is to this team without reading this stuff (half the people who are NBA fans wouldn't realize that Josh is one of the best passing PFs in the game right now even though all you have to do to see that is look at his stats). I think that, without a doubt, Josh will try and prove people wrong. I think that without a doubt Josh wants this team to win now more than ever. I just hope he doesn't think he has to score to prove it. If he keeps playing like he's been playing all year, he will prove that he was a HUGE snug.

Jordan. Jordan was the most skilled, most complete, hardest working wing ever to play the game. Bird was also a killer. I think Magic is the more dangerous player but Bird is the guy who can put the dagger in you from anywhere on the floor. Duncan has that quiet ultra-competitiveness. You don't know what drives him, just that he can put up a 20-20-10-8 game in a finals clincher while holding his counterpart to 1-16 shooting.

As far as Lebron. Talk trash about him, but he's the only guy in the league right now who can lead a team coached by mike brown without another legit all-star to 66 wins. I guarantee you there is not a wing in the game who takes a matchup with a 29-8-7 guy lightly.

The Lakers look like they'll have a free ride to the finals right now. That being said, its early in the season and their schedule is absurd - 4 away games so far.

Its even more obvious this season that Chilz doesn't fit. Chilz played well on the baseline, Chilz attacked the offensive glass, and Chilz moved off the ball for points under the hoop. Our big men are doing that and our wings are spacing the floor and our offense flows better. We no longer have 3 guys clustered under the hoop. We don't want that. Plus, Marv/Mo aren't all-world defenders but they are better than Chil was. We have enough of a liability out there on the wings with Bibby.

Chil is a cool guy. I hope things work out for him. I don't want him back here.

I think losing 10 pounds during training camp has helped him too cause he's looking nimble as ever. I'm guessing MW is still pushing 240-250 and he should target 220-225 area.

He's actually playing tougher than ever with a little less weight. He's also getting more highlights than ever because he's playing closer in. This is a Josh I could really get used to. Instead of worrying about whether he goes back to bad Josh, we should be reinforcing good Josh. If you go to the game, try and make it known that the rebounding and inside play is what we want to see.

Paul Shirley, in an interview with Bill Simmons, said that Joe had the biggest entourage on that Phoenix team. I wonder if he's toned that down since coming to the ATL.

Anyway, I'm happy with Joe but Roy is a fantastic player too.

where you can find a way to watch games that were already played? I missed the Nuggets game the other night and I don't have league pass. Looked like a game that would be fun to watch.

Thanks.

Wish I could make it down for the game. Represent for the Squawk!

http://myespn.go.com/blogs/truehoop/0-45-42/Memo-to-a-Young-Baller.html

Talks about why his +/- numbers might be so bad. Specifically his inability to run the pick and roll and his two main weaknesses on D; challenging spot up shooters and defending the PnR.

Kinda cool to see someone go more in-depth in their analysis of a player than just "he scores a lot and works hard and is therefore a superstar"

That's surprising. My brother has met Smith on plenty of occasions and has nothing but positive things to say about him. He's taken a pic with him and gotten his signature. He had good things to say about the other guys as well.

Yeah, I had a buddy that worked at a store that Smith came into and he said Smith was really cool, talked to him for a minute in the check out line. Had another friend who met Joe and said that Joe seemed like a nice enough guy but he just kinda wanted to go about his day and not deal with people bugging him... which is fair enough.

Unfortunately I've never seen Siler play so I have to go off a bit of circular logic. Unless he really impresses, I'm going to assume that there is a reason that no one drafted him since he's such a big boy and there are a lot of guys that get drafted just because they are big. On top of that, we have a deeper big man rotation than we did before and its unlikely we would play Siler as much as a guy like Hunter who might actually be able to contribute right now.

I hope Rio continues to crush it during the preseason. I love having him on the team and I'd love to hear he made himself too indispensable to let go.

Regarding Siler, if someone can give me more info that what I have, that he has potential beyond just being big, I could be convinced.

Acie may not have been given a fair chance... in fact, I'll go out and say that I don't think he was. That being said, I don't think Acie ever had the potential that Teague does - he was a marginally athletic guy with a below average jumper who dominated guys who were generally a lot younger than him. Teague may not be a natural distributor, but Acie wasn't either. At least Teague has the assets that could make him more dangerous in the pro game.

Teague has the chance to be a legit change of pace guy, a guy who can use his speed to get the the hoop and his hops to be able to cause some damage once he gets there. Hopefully, he can be like a bigger Aaron Brooks for us, although I have no idea if he's as quick or as good a deep shooter.

Informative and well written post mrh. Thanks for puttin it up.

Yeah, he's a free agent and the Knicks have money, so it is definitely possible.

In other news, the NY Post is the worst newspaper in the world.

Out of those 3, I'd be thrilled with Joe Smith. Big Ben looked entirely tapped out last year but it was hidden pretty well because he was playing next to Bron in a fairly deep if somewhat limited rotation. I'd be happy with Bruce too, but not at the expense of a frontcourt player. I don't know why you think Bowen has any character issues that would be a problem with the Hawks, I think he'd be a good mentor to Marv on defensive positioning, he is one of the best ever at that sort of thing.

This is what I think of reporters dissing the Hawks....

FAIL

Why must they keep dissing us?

I don't think dude was dissing us, I just think he wrote a weak article.

I voted no. I don't think of Josh Smith's moves as 'posting up'. If he does post up, he doesn't do it like most bigs do.

I guess it depends on your definition of posting up.

I always thought it was what Shaq, Dwight, and Yao do.

Those guys all post up in different ways, as does Josh, who plays PF instead of a large C like those 3 guys.

Isn't his name Brandan?

Sorry I'm not a fan of homosexual porn. I guess I'm in the minority on this board.

yeah, but you gotta give it credit, it was probably the highest grossing and most critically aclaimed gay porn of all time.

Not my all time favorite or anything, but it kept me entertained. I had low expectations for this and only went because some friends who I hadn't seen in a while were going, I was pleasantly suprised.

I like the show better for both Borat and Bruno.

They do have some nice bangers now. It will be interesting to see if Lewis moves over to the SF and Bass becomes the PF or Howard moves to PF and Gortat starts at Center.

I think Howard/Gortat would be monstrous on the board, but both those guys are strictly low post players and they would screw eachother up on offense. I'd imagine that Shard will stay at the 4 for most of his minutes just because it worked so well last season.

Jameer/AJ

Pietrus/Reddick

VC/Shard

Shard/Bass

Dwight/Polish Hammer

Will be the primary rotation I'd imagine. That is a very very very solid 9-man rotation.

wow

a) Orlando has a freaking nasty frontcourt

b) the Mavs just got played, they lost what looked to be their starting C and they lost their top backup big last season with nothing to show for it -- they're gonna have to make a trade, no?

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