11 hours ago, JayBirdHawk said:

Parkers deal is a 1+1, team option in year 2.

There is really no risk there for the Bulls. I think it's a great signing.  I thought the Hawks would sign one of these young underdeveloped former lottery picks. Several of them took show me deals perfect scenario to take a flyer on a player that's available likely only due to injury. With no long term commitment why not.

I would rather have Jabari Parker on a 1 + 1  20 million deal than Jeremy Lin at 14. Parker still has elite scorer upside.   At least one of these 3 is going to have a breakout year Hezonja, Parker, or Noel. Good news is they are show me deals and you maybe can get them next year,  but you still won't know how they fit your culture. 

1 hour ago, Plainview1981 said:

And to be fair... CP3 hasn't won anything.

And this is why the players are teaming up like little B's instead out competing. Hots Chris Paul is a hall of fame worthy player already. Only one team can win a ring every year. Don't crap on guys for playing Susie match maker if we are going to keep with this tired argument. 

What series has Chris Paul lost when his team was more talented and favored? He forced himself to Houston to get a ring,  and had the most stacked team in his era on the ropes. If they had bested Golden State he would have some how been validated? Chris Paul  produced more win shares in his rookie season than Dennis Schröder has in his entire career.

4 hours ago, bleachkit said:

The best big in summer league has been....Wendell Carter.

Elton Brand reincarnated. Amazing feel for the game on both sides of the court. A natural in every sense of the word. Would have been perfect replacement for Al in Buds system. 

Off topic Detroit really had a good draft for having only second round picks . Khyri Thomas and Bruce Brown have looked good and should have both gone first round. Bruce Brown got switched on Jaren Jackson and bullied him bad. Guy is a bulldog out there. Their defense in the wing is going to be filthy. 

1 hour ago, kg01 said:

Not sure y'all are 'getting it'.

I'm no Slink fan, but he said we're all-in on this tank-build.  That means we will not be signing free agents, certainly not high-dollar ones.  Signing a guy like Hezonja (if he works out) or Noel (if he plays) helps us win (to a degree).  Right now, we. do. not. want. to. win.  It's that simple.

Now, I'm not saying I agree necessarily but that's where we are right now.  No need to be confused or frustrated.

I should also add that I don't trust Slink so, despite all his comments against signing guys, it wouldn't surprise me to see him sign a guy like Lavine or Parker out of the blue - thus, totally torpedoing the tank-build.

I totally get it, but the point of tanking is to acquire talent. We had talent available that is both young and has upside and cap space. I'm not asking him to sign 34 year old journey men. That would be not getting it. Next years draft is supposed to be very weak according to the experts,  so I would have to think guys like Noel and Hezonja would go pretty high in that class. Honestly what does Clint Capella do that Nerlen Noel can't? A guy like that just signed for a mid level exception. I would gladly pay him 7m for 1 year to come in here and see how he fits with my team and culture. You can't see that with these guys playing for other teams. 

5 hours ago, JTB said:

I know schlenk said we aren’t going to do much in free agency but geeezzz can we move this along a little quicker!

goodness!...the fire in free agency is over with. The remaining players some are good some are just ok...make a decision schlenk so we can just move along to the next phase.

Kinda disappointed with so many players taking 1 year show me deals,  we didn't sign some young high upside players. Hezonja and Noel should have been target's. They both fit our timeline age wise, and have tremendous upside left. I don't think you will find anyone outside of the top 7 next year that will have more upside than these two,  and we had cap space.  Both only signed for one year small deals. Even if you had to overpay one year it would have been worth it to kick the tires. I think Schlenk was determined to not spend the first week,  and I understand that in principle. However,  once talents like Hezonja and Noel started settling for 1 year show me deals you have to adjust. I wonder if he just got dug in because he said he wouldn't do anything early in free agency on all the radio shows? I certainly hope not because if he did he should shut up in these interviews. Things change and you have to adjust don't speak in absolutes. He should have said we don't plan to do anything early in free agency,  but if the right deal comes will make it happen. Why paint yourself in a corner? 

My one criticism of Schlenk so far is he tends to get dug in on his decisions. You can see the DNA on this in every trade he's made which is why other teams are getting the better of him deals. I worked with a guy that would always say "If you want it bad you'll get it bad" you have to be willing to walk away when deals isn't what you want. Even if you want player x gone or desire y player. 

I would like to see the Hawks take a run at this guy and he fits what Schlenk likes, and still has a ton of upside because Orlando is poster child for how drafting best player available without considering team fit backfires. Every one of their players is woefully under developed. 

Best part about it is out might fulfill the Squawk lust for 6-8 Euro wings deemed the next great thing, except I don't have to give up that number 3 pick for this one and he's actually a NBA caliber athlete that seems to have started to adjust to the speed of the game last year. 

38 minutes ago, Bonkers said:

Huerter will be better than Doncic when it's all said and done

That was going be my bold statement, but you beat me too it. I'll throw a little gasoline on the fire though. I think he'll be better more complete player than Trae too. 

1 hour ago, JTB said:

Yup I wanted the hawks to go with a scorer in this draft and personally for me other than Ayton....Porter Jr and Trae Young were the best scorers to get.

I don’t believe you can truly build a contender without the alpha dog scorer and in my opinion we haven’t had a true alpha dog scorer since nique so here’s to hoping Trae changes that ASAP.

All the worry about defense is garbage to me. First off we’ve had some good defenses in those 10 years straight going to the playoffs under woody and Bud but never did we have the true Alpha dog scorer to really put us over the top and that’s no knock on Johnson or Sap as they’ve both had their good scoring games especially Millsap not so much Johnson in the playoffs but at the end of the day your star players have to be able to go get a damn bucket when you need it and those two were more so Robins than Batman’s.

It’s much much much tougher to get the star offensive player than it is to find good defenders.

Many may not agree with my logic that offense trumps defense in the nba but it’s true...one example is the Cavs ! Now I know LBJ is the best in the world but Lebrons defense numbers have steadily fallen greatly  the last 4 years and during the years he had Kyrie in Cleveland (speaking of Cleveland as whole their team defense has been awful since lebron returned...like 20 ranked defense or worse going into the playoffs bad) they knew no team in the east could ever out score them so they just dropped the points and didn’t worry about defense until they got to the warriors in the finals .

Point is if defense led teams to championships in the nba we’d be talking about zbo, tony Allen grizzlies and now the powerhouse defending Utah Jazz but the reality is if you can’t score at with the best of the best you aren’t going far in the playoffs.

 

Not saying you don’t need defense to win cause you do but I like the approach of building a good defense around the elite scorers. Traes defense is not going to be good ever probably  but Schlenk drafted him for his elite offensive skill set and we can put a good team defense around him like the warriors did with curry and like Larry Brown did with Iverson.

JTB while we are in 100% agreement about having a number 1 alpha and it being the hardest piece to find for a championship team, the Warriors aren't being beat without defense. Unfortunately,  for us they are tops in offense and D. The Celtics and Sixers will be high in both too. 

I think if you keep the players we have there are a lot of good mix and match opportunities with the draft picks Baze, Bembry and Schröder. I like the ideas of rookie having to earn time,  and it's one of the things loved most about Bud. I like the idea of being able to pull Schröder when he's not playing D and put in Trae and vise versa. Trae cannot give defensive effort like he gave in college,  or he shouldn't see the floor. The competition for playing time just got real,  and the cream will rise to the top. Nothing should be given, and I hope these guy's came ready to compete. If I know Dennis like I know him, then I expect his best year as a pro because he's competitive as hell. 

2 hours ago, Brotha2ThaNite said:

I dont know but his ball skills look pretty good. What do you all think?

 

I think this is my favorite of the picks we made. 3 level scorer that can finish with both hands around the basket.  Average first step better than Doncic's first step though. Shoots it well enough where he'll be able to get guys too close out hard on him allowing him to get by defenders in the NBA. He's going to be a legit close  to 40% 3 point shooter. He's actually pretty athletic even though his first step is just ok. I think he had a 40 inch vertical at the combine and tested well athletically. 

I think he will end up being a pretty good defender. Moves his feet very well and sits down in his stance. He doesn't have elite length, but true good defenders play defense with their feet and positioning anyway. Length helps you when your beat and challenge shots better when you're late. His leaping ability will help. I would have only taken Jerome Robinson over him at 19.

Here's some good defensive video of him. 

Very surprised Robert Williams is still available. We have to take him at 30 if he's there. 

4 minutes ago, KB21 said:

damn I’m good

I like the Huerter pick

7 minutes ago, EazyRoc said:

There’s a reason why the best Euro league players don’t translate well to the NBA. 

 What you mean the great Milos Tesedosic don't tear up the NBA? 6 time all Euro league and former Euro league MVP. He should have dominated the NBA.

Good for Porter pulling for that kid. Falling isn't always a bad thing,  he can put that Denver team over the top. 

Forgot to add what i think the Hawks will do. 

#3 Luka Doncic 

#19  Khryi Thomas is the right pairing for Doncic , but i think they will take Aaron Holiday. 

#30 Mortiz Wagner 

#34 Melvin Frazier

Alright guys my final board rankings for the #3 pick. I will first tell you what I want to Hawks to do. Then I will predict what they will do. 

• Pick # 3 take Michael Porter Jr, Bamba , Doncic, and Bagley in that order. 
  • I think Porter and Ayton have the highest chance to be #1 options on a championship team, so I'm willing to take the risk of injury. If we don't get a number 1 option we will end up where we were with the last core. I can't tell you how many analyst I've heard say he will be the best player from this draft in 3 years. Even players are saying it. Gary Payton(HOF), Isiah Thomas(HOF)-said he has hall of fame talent, also said the other players in this class that played against him believe it too. Greg Anthony, the other Isaiah Thomas. The list goes on. 
  • If you're still not convinced let me leave you with this thought. NBA tv had a graphic that showed only 5 players in history have completed this trifecta. McDonald's All American MVP, Naismith POY and Gatorade POY. Alonzo Mourning 1988, Chris Webber 1991,  Lebron James 2003, Dwight Howard 2004 and Michael Porter JR 2017. Every single one of those first 4 players is or will be a HOF.
• Pick #19 Jerome Robinson, Kevin Huerter, Donte DiVincenzo, Troy Brown Jr in that order. 
• Pick # 30 De'Anthony Melton, Khyri Thomas , Dzanan Musa
• Pick # 34 Omari Spellman, Mitchell Robinson, Moritz Wagner

Sleepers I like Bruce Brown Jr. I think he will be a good pro, and will go in the early second. 

There's one good Youtube guy I found that has film on just about every college player. If you search the players name you want to find video on and Cody Wright after said players name. then he usually has 2-4 good videos on every player. Not just highlights either, but every make and missed shot in a game. 

He doesn't really do defensive cutups, but if you follow his naming convention you can get a defensive look at a player by just using vs then their team name. So for instance if I wanted to find defensive plays from Bagley I would search on youtube "vs Duke Cody Wright" Then look for a player he would guard i.e. a PF or center and watch the offensive film of that player against Bagley.  If you want just film without all the biasing; this Cody Wright guy is a great find. He only has 400 something subs, so he's a hidden gem. 

Here's a link to his channel. 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgEbcrmmXIlfK4byAz4W4hA/videos

16 minutes ago, NBASupes said:

He tremendously improved even by your expectations 

I think he just went to a situation where he got a tremendous amount of shots.  I knew he would benefit from NBA spacing, but I didn't know he would be this clutch and mentally tough. I knew he was athletic, but that 1 hand put back in the playoffs, I didn't know he had that in him.  

 I think decreasing his usage next year and allowing him to be more selective with his shots will make him better and more valuable. Utah needs to add a second scorer to go with him. I could see them going after Jabari Parker this off season, they have the defenders to hide him. 

On 6/17/2018 at 11:44 AM, benhillboy said:

Yup, see Donovan Mitchell.  If anyone here had him lighting sh@t up like Wade with a 3 in his first season I’ll take their word in this year’s draft.

Hate to toot my own horn, but you asked. Jerome Robinson is the guy I think can have a Donovan Mitchell type impact this year if he goes to the right team. He looks like he's a NBA 3 level scorer to me. Not the athlete or defender that Mitchell is, but he's solid defensively and is a pretty good athlete. I think he will score more efficiently than Mitchell. 

My quotes on Donovan Mitchell last year before the draft. I have to just copy the text because I can't figure out how to copy the whole quote with timestamp from another thread. 

Quote

I really want to the Hawks to trade up for Lauri Markkanen, Donovan Mitchell or John Collins in that order, but I don't think we will. Markkanen looks like he's going top 10 now, but I believe to get Donovan Mitchell we would need to trade up to the Pistons spot as I think they will take him. We can probably get John Collins with Denver's pick. If the Hawks do trade up they'll probably take Frank Ntilikina who has European Iman Shumpert written all over him. 

Quote

Yes I think in general guys that can score and shoot are rising because so many teams lack scoring and shooting. Should sound familiar to Hawks fans. Guys that project as defensive rebounders with less polished offense are falling. Donovan Mitchell is sky rocketing because he projects to do both.

Quote

Guys we would have trade up for.

1. Lauri Markkanen – Would be a star in coach Bud’s system. Perfect fit for Bud.

2. Donovan Mitchell – Poor Man’s D-Wade or rich man’s Eric Gordon with D.

3. John Collins – Super productive big that needs to get better on D, but has the physical tools to be a good defender. Will eventually stretch out to NBA 3.

4. Zach Collins – I’m not as high on him as everyone else, but he you would need to trade up to get him.

Quote

I think the three biggest weaknesses of this team right now are outside shooting, ball handling, and lack of shot creators. We really don't have a single player that can just ISO and get their shot. This is one of the reasons I wanted us to trade up for Donovan Mitchell because he checked all 3 of these boxes plus added defense. Before people bring up Dennis let me say he really is a straight line driver, that's really fast. He has very little wiggle or deception(change of speed) to his game. I don't consider him to be an above average shot creator.

This last quote is from July 12 2017 just after the draft. 

Here's the instructions for how to adjust zoom in chrome. 

Quote

Zoom in or out on your current page

Use the zoom options to make everything on a webpage larger or smaller.

1. On your computer, open Chrome.
2. At the top right, click More .
3. Next to "Zoom," choose the zoom options you want:
   • Make everything larger: Click Zoom in .
   • Make everything smaller: Click Zoom out .
   • Use full-screen mode: Click Full screen 

3 hours ago, Sothron said:

Any updates? This is now day 2 of this nightmare. I can't keep posting here if the boards will remain like this. The posts are seriously stamp sized and the text is even smaller. It is a PITA blowing up every post just to read or reply and then blowing back down for the rest of the internet.

Probably a silly question, but have you  checked the zoom on your browser itself? Make sure your zoom is at 100% and hasn't accidentally rolled to 50% or something making all the content smaller. Also as a short-term fix if it is a issue you can increase your browser zoom to over 100% to increase the size of the content. Try 150% or higher.  You just have to play with the percentages to get what's comfortable for you. 

Was kind of hoping we could get Jerome Robinson at 19, but with him being invited to the green room I'm less sure. 19 players invited by my count and we know Doncic will go in the lottery. 

On 6/14/2018 at 3:51 PM, thecampster said:

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2014/04/hoop-dreams/358627/

 

 

 

 

and yes...the players know this too!

Great article that sums up my feeling about tanking. There's is no silver bullet,  you have to have strong fundamentals to create a championship product. Coaching, development, and cap and asset management will win the day.  Even though San Antonio may lose Kawhai, I trust them to become elite again because they have the fundamentals. Piling high potential players on the teams that are perennially bad just ensures that most of the talent will be completely wasted or sub optimized. 

I thought the Hawks were on the way to having strong fundamentals. We had coaching and development and asset management with Ferry. We actually had a buzz around the league. but now we seem to trending the wrong direction. I'll give Pierce development since he was hired for that,  but will have to see on his ability to coach. Our asset management over the last 3 years has been incredibly bad starting with the THJ trade. We got Taurean Prince and a top 10 protected Cleveland pick for a 60 win core, and a very good coach combined. That doesn't even count the Dwight Howard debacle. Hard to recover from that kind of asset management without tanking. Let's just hope it's not a 7-10 year rebuild. 

13 hours ago, JayBirdHawk said:

So i took a look at the last 10 years at the top 5 of each class - it's not pretty.

That's the scary part Jay bird. As a guy who studies data, I realize the single most likely scenario is we will end up where we were. I'm not disagreeing with the tank crowd it's hard to get the transcendent guy through other methods,  but you have to be extremely lucky to be bad when there is a transcendent talent. I can't say for sure any off these guys will be transcendent. I see two - three guys with that potential, ones going to Phoenix,  one is recovering from a back injury, and one is a raw energy guy that has to develop so much to get there. There's a good chance this could be the highest pick of this rebuild. 

Even if you luck into the talent,  you have to try and fight him from going to bigger markets or teaming up with his buddies in a destination market. Hell OKC drafted 3 MVPs and still got no hardware.

NBA really has to figure out a way to get mid tier teams talent. All these teams tanking is not healthy. Hopefully, the draft reforms are addressing this. 

20 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

Was the Doc talking about the generous population or athletes in that 80%? He's gonna be taking hits, bumps, falls.

Yes the study mentioned in the above article studied athletes. 

Quote

A study done by two orthopedic surgeons from NYU’s Hospital for Joint Diseases, and one from Department of Orthopedic Surgery at Northwestern, compared those who had surgery after disc herniation (like Porter did) and those who chose rehab.

Using PER as a baseline, the study found that in a small, 61-person sample size, those who had surgery had a decline in games played and in PER in the year after their surgery, but showed no difference in the years following. Those who did not choose surgery saw no change in PER or games played, but had shorter careers.

6 minutes ago, Brotha2ThaNite said:

There is talk that we could trade for the 14th pick

I read the ESPN article. I saw where the Kings have been talking about picking him 2nd. NBA teams were feeling very good after seeing his medical records from Chicago. I can't see this guy's talent being over hyped. He has too many basketball people in his life. There is also talk that he is trying to get to a better NBA market. (i.e. Chicago). I also, saw ESPN mention every team in the top 7 but the Hawks are interested in him. 

Bingo this smells like a guy that is scared the Kings will take him and has a promise from someone in the top 10 he wants to fall to. My guess is Chicago, New York or Cleveland to play with LBJ.  

Oh my hip I can't move, but he was just killing it a few days later. We aren't going to be relevant this year,  and I'm fine to waiting a year for Porter to fully recover. He isn't even a year removed from his surgery. This article talks about year one people who opt for the surgery can play,  but the numbers will suffer. Year two they recover fully and usually aren't impacted the rest of their career. 

https://www.sbnation.com/college-basketball/2018/5/17/17337374/michael-porter-jr-injury-history-nba-draft-2018-missouri

I also listen to NBA radio and one of the NYU docs came in from the doctors radio show. He said about 80% of the people recover and don't have on going issues. He referenced the same study in the above article. The only commonality they found with continuing issues is height. The taller the more likely to have on going issues. He didn't talk about how the percentages change as height goes up. It could be material could be nominal.