MarylandHawk

On 1/8/2023 at 11:51 PM, Diesel said:

Trae played exceptionally on offense but his defense... was What!!!

I saw the mitten get a steal (anticipation).. then I seen him double Kawhi and give him some fits. 

 

There was this one possession when the Clippers had the ball and Kawhi was being defended by Dre (quite well I may add) and Kawhi called for a screen with the man Tre was guarding.  Trae recognizing Kawhi wanted Trae to defend him, switched with Murray’s man first so Murray ended up defending Kawhi. Brilliant. Kawhi ended up passing to someone else who missed the shot.  This is the one area on defense I think Trae can excel. He is obviously an offensive savant, therefor he should be able recognize what other offenses are trying to do to him and he can anticipate and gum up their offensive sets. 

1 hour ago, Diesel said:

 

You know…he might be pretty good.  Hmmn?

Let’s go Hawks!

On 1/4/2023 at 4:27 PM, JayBirdHawk said:

 

 

Is it time for the Knife to slice and dice. Huh? Huh?  Where ya at Solo?!

On 12/23/2022 at 3:09 PM, Wretch said:

I made a mention of it earlier in the season, so I've definitely noticed him putting more effort out there.  FWIW, this narrative is not going away...no matter what he does.  If we start winning, there will be less of it.  Though honestly, I can see a realistic scenario where we'd be in the finals and people would still be going on about it.  Meanwhile his peers, who also have questionable defensive IQ, won't get the same scrutiny...because they are so offensively gifted.

One thing I would like to see more of is Trae getting into the passing lanes.  Every now and again you'll see him make a good play on the ball and come up with a nice steal.

Agree. A good example of this is Steph Curry. He is consistently labeled a bad defender but his team consistently boasts a top 5 defense in their championship runs where he avg above 30 mins played. 

He defensive effort has increased, especially the 6 games or so. He is not dying on screens, he is using his quickness to frustrate opponents, his deflections are up and he is being vocal. By contrast, Deandre’s effort is lower, he is lazy on screens he uses his hands too much to hold onto players, which is why he gets so many fouls called on him, he is not vocal and he has never been a steals, blocks, defensive rebound guy. The only place he excels is one on one defense when there is no screen. 

I can’t think of one. If fact I don’t know that anybody has really done that. Boston when they traded for the dude from San Antonio. They ended up in the Finals. 

23 hours ago, Sothron said:

Thank you.

No, he has had several health issues starting in the late 90's with Primary Biliary cirrhosis which is a rare auto immune condition that attacks the liver. He hardly ever drank outside of a beer after work or at a game so that was a shock. He had to have a liver transplant in 2004. He has prostate cancer about twelve years ago and then stomach cancer in I believe 2019. 

That is what ultimately killed him, sadly. They could not do radiation or chemo because of his transplant and he was so weak when the stomach cancer came back he just had nothing left to fight with. He was about six feet tall and only weighed 120 pounds at the end. He simply could not eat or hold anything down the last few months from it. f*** cancer. 

He fought like a warrior through everything and never complained about it. He was there for my mother in law and our family all the way through his life. They were married for sixty years. It would have been sixty one this May.  He was a retired PE teacher and coach and he never stopped coaching. I know there's jokes about hating your in laws but God blessed me with a wonderful mother in law and father in law. I truly gained a second family with Mrs. Sothron. 

I will miss that man. He wasn't the most talkative person but when he spoke it meant something. He shows his love through his actions and not so much the words. I know he loved his family dearly. Heaven gained a good man today.

Memory eternal, Donnie. 

Sorry to hear that. Glad he does not have to suffer anymore. Sounds like a great dude. 

8 minutes ago, Diesel said:

I agree with this.   In the middle of his career, I believe he became reliant on vets to carry his team.   Give little direction, being a players coach, and letting the vets and star players do what they do. 

Well, that won't work with this bunch.  They are too ego driven.   Trae, DJ, and Bogi all have that ball hoggery gene.   Trae, Hunter, and many of the rest can be sometimey on defensive effort.   Especially when Clint is not there barking at them.   JC and Hunter can easily be lost in the sauce.

These are the areas where a coaches voice and presence is needed.   This ship doesn't really right itself.  It will continue to go in that direction unless a new voice arises.   Not a blaming voice.. but a hey.. we have to do it this way voice.   Last night.. even during the breaks, Nate was coaching.   He was talking to guys and they were responding. 

 

 

This is so spot on. Particularly the comment about coaching veteran players. Another reason why that ECF squad was effective. Gallo, Lou, the Knife, Snell, Clint, Bogi and even Rondo early on were guys he could count on to figure it out and rally the other guys. He does not have that luxury now. He has to do it.  Trae, John, and DeJounte are learning how to do it but are running into rough patches. 

21 minutes ago, Diesel said:

Yeah... I think that Nate didn't mail it in last night.   He was engaged.    I think about his situation.....

He's possibly a HOF coach.  Played the game at a high level.   

But...  
Over the past weeks... most of the season, he has had to feel undermined.  Undermined by who?

1.  Ownership.     Nate didn't want to trade away Kev.   I honestly think Kev was one of Nate's favs...  And he was traded for pennies on the dollar. 

2.  Trae.  There's a power struggle going on above Nate's head.. and Trae is in the midst of it. 

3.  Landry.   I think Travis was Nate's guy.  I think Travis protected Nate to a degree.  I think Nate knows the game, Landry is going to want his own guys in place and has the green light from Nick. 

 

We talk about Nate's stubbornness.  I hope he takes the "I'm going to give my best coaching on my way out" approach.   

Keep using offensive plays Nate.   Force them to listen to you.  Everybody's happy when we win.

I think that is a very real perspective for him. If he has to go out, go out swinging. Don’t just stand with arms folded hoping the guys get it together.  If he wants to seal his hall of fame bid, he has to turn this thing around fast and get us back into contention. 

8 hours ago, terrell said:

Overall I thought the team actually looked decent most of the game. 

And props to  Nate this game...for trusting AJ in the 4th & also switching out Bogi for defense with 00..

 

 

I am glad he shut down the Kaminski train early.  He was getting torched. John really stepped up defensively. 

The level of defensive effort by Trae the last few games is elevated and enough for us to start making strides as a team. When Clint is back and we are a full go, I believe we will be a good team. Glad to close out a fourth quarter right. 

Collins played a heckuva defensive game today. 

That’s why you are here DJ!

1 hour ago, JayBirdHawk said:

The tax is an owner decision. Period.

Wether to pay it or not.

@Sothron has also indicated Ressler is also unwilling to pay it next season as well.

I have spoken ad nauseum about the repeater tax and why it didn'tmake sense to be over the tax by a small amount this year. But then, again the tax is not calculated until the end of the year, so depending on how we were playing with Huerter and with Bogi now back - a later trade of some kind would have made sense.

At the time of the trade, I said I understood getting under the tax since it would help in trades being an under the tax team vs over where we get to take back more in salary if initially under the tax.

But then when Fields mentioned keeping the final roster spot open - I saw the writing.

Also if you guys are giving Fields the credit for drafting AJ, then he's also responsible for the DJ trade and the Huerter trade. He was promoted to GM on June 13, draft was June 23rd, DJ traded for June 29th, Huerter trade July 1st, Just saying.

I hear you. We will find out soon enough. I do start the Fields era at that point. The tax is an owner's final decision. I think the only place we disagree is Schlenk’s involvement. I also think it still is the right decision even though the early results are not good. I would love to have the “luxury” of having Huerter here but oh well. 

1 hour ago, BrazilianHawk said:

You've got almost everything right. 

 

But for me there was never a better time as a Hawks fan than 2014-15. Best Hawks team ever, in my book. I miss them, and I also miss Ferry & Bud.

Yeah that’s why I said most exciting and furthest. Lol. Damn Belladabulldozier or whatever his name was. Lol

1 hour ago, JayBirdHawk said:

This isn't it. 

No one will convince me that getting under the tax was Schlenk's idea. If this was the case, he'd just pay the freight and unload an injured Bogi.

This is all Ressler.

 

I hear ya but Schlenk said himself early on he had to convince Ressler not to over spend and his entire tenure has been predicated on generating the most value for the team while staying competitive. Also from a basketball standpoint Heurter, Bogi, Murray and Hunter minutes were going to clash and one of them would have had a significantly reduced role. Schlenk thought that would be Huerter and he was betting on a healthy Bogi at the beginning of the season. Not to mention, we needed to create minutes for AJ. We also have to create room to resign Murray longterm and we gave away 3 draft picks. If Schlenk would have thought keeping Huerter would have made us a championship level team, I think he have really pushed or allowed for luxury tax. Doesn’t make sense to put yourself in repeater luxury tax mode for a couple million dollars this year. Obliviously the decision to trade Huerter was a cooperate one where all agreed even if some did so reluctantly. It would be a none issue if Bogi started the season off healthy and we were winning at the clip we expected.  Of course this is only my speculation and the only real way to know is if Schlenk comes out and says so. The other indication will be if we immediately double down on the Murray/Trae team and trade for others this year that puts us over the tax. 

10 hours ago, kg01 said:

No lies detected.  I hated the A$G but atleast you knew what they were.  Current guy is playing us.

I would be curious to hear your thoughts considering you disagree, @MarylandHawk.  Not arguing, just interested.  Hey, you already convinced me to change my mind on Bol.  Maybe you can go 2-for-2. 

Well here goes. The ASG were constantly bickering with each other struggling for power from the beginning of their term till the end. Their top aim was mediocrity and no one was willing to take real risks to get us into championship contention. There was never really one voice. Then comes Ressler who made a great decision to bring in Schlenk, who in my opinion, did real GM work to get this team into the possibility of contention. He worked miracles in creating draft capital when we had the likes of Schröder, Howard, Prince, etc. Ressler sat back and let him do what he needed to do. Meanwhile, everywhere Ressler could make a difference with his money, he did. New arena, training facility, promotions and events, paid players top dollars and community involvement. All of which blew ASG out of the water. Patience has been his only issue and it seems like he is ready to push more than Schlenk think we need to right now. As a fan, I don’t necessarily disagree with that. It is just a matter of does he really know what it takes at this point. We shall see. I really do think it was Schlenk who pushed for the Huerter trade to balance the books and not Resseler.  But that was only done in response to Nick and Fields and Trae pushing for Murray. We gave up a little too much for Schlenk’s value chart, so he balanced it with the Huerter trade.  We will see at this years trade dead line if that is a true assessment. If Tony doesn’t mind going into the tax, we will beef up the team to compete this year. Oh and we went farther into contention and have been way more exciting to watch than ever before. 
There it is my friend…

8 hours ago, Watchman said:

I'd say the running of the business has been handed to Nick by Tony.  Nick's priority is to appease Trae.  Landry's role is to assist Nick in appeasing Trae.  I'd say this is a recipe for disaster.  In a way, I wish I never really had been made aware of these shenanigans.  Tell me if I am wrong, but I don't recall hearing about Luka purposefully getting GMs and Coaches fired.  I know that some players have orchestrated the acquisition of certain players, but at least the players they fought to get have made it a full season before experiencing "the thrill is gone."  The ownership and front office management is a disaster, and I wonder if things would be this bad if we had not traded to get Trae.  I guess we'll never know.  I feel badly for some of the negative comments I've had about Schlenk.  I did not know people were undermining him early on.  What a mess.

Yeah, I don’t think Trae is that powerful.  He wants to win like everybody else. These power moves are being made by someone higher in the ranks. They are also feeding info to the media. We need to tighten up. I don’t really care who is running the show as long as they take responsibility and produce. 

Trae’s defensive effort has been the difference in this game. 

I have seen enough of Hunter to know he is not the defensive guy we need for a championship. He is not an effort guy. Your best defensive player has to have a high defensive motor. He just does not have that. He is also not vocal defensively. Sliding his feet and his arm length is his only advantages.  

Finally some effort. Led by Young.