niremetal

Oh.

Trust me, I fear her. Especially around this time of the month.

Holy shit. Are you allowed to tell your bigs to put a hit out on a 5th grader who's slashing to the bucket too much?

I read the title of this thread and knew who started it without having to look

Yup. Josh shooting 3s is like putting all your money on a hard 8 in craps. Sure it'll pay off big every once in awhile. But most of the time, it's just giving the money away. I mean, so I've heard...

So...what will seem like a random question. How much "gossip" is there at the places you all work? How often do people talk about (and especially criticize) co-workers when the person is not present?

Does anybody remember the Deke ad for Charles Schwab in the late 90s? I remember it mainly because they dubbed over Dikembe's voice. Using an actor from Nigeria (whose capital is 2000 miles from Congo's). Without checking with Deke first. Oops.

"Josh Smith is the closest thing to Lebron in the league." - Michael Gearon

That line of commercials from GEICO is generally stupid, but the Deke commercial is AMAZING. The only sad part is that his mock uniform was clearly supposed to be reminiscent of his Rockets' uniform rather than his Hawks'. #55!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Gortat is a goofy player. Don't let the fact that he once backed up a great center fool you.

The Braves failing to sell out playoff games in 1997 and 1998 blows that theory out of the water. I can't imagine any other city failing to sell out baseball playoff games just 2-3 years after winning a World Series title (and 1-2 years after winning the NL pennant, and with a still-active streak of division titles). The Braves actually finished in the bottom half of the NL in attendance in 2004 and 2005. We always seemed to finish behind the Cubs in attendance. I mean, come on. Plenty of other cities endure bad and/or choking teams year after year. Philly went 25 years without a major sports team title, but you never saw 6ers games packed with Knicks fans. Atlanta's the only one I know of that has the problem of having Knicks fans outnumber the home team fans every damn time (even in years where the Knicks suck) or persistently ranking lower in attendance than their position in the standings in every single sport.

If it were only the Hawks who had this problem, but it's not. Not even close. The Dome had a buttload of 9ers fans today AT THE NFREAKINGC CHAMPIONSHIP GAME. And the Braves couldn't sell out early round playoff games starting in 1997 despite being only 2 years removed from a World Series title. And the Thrashers...and Flames... Atlanta does not have a loyal sports fan base, in large measure because more than half of the city's population was born outside the state of Georgia. I think it'll get slowly better over time now that the city's population has stabilized a bit.

Um...

I'm around, but I find I don't have much to say. This season is one of transition. We don't have the roster to make noise (or, frankly, win more than 1-2 games) come playoff time, and we also aren't going to be bad enough to get a top 10 draft pick. And honestly, last season was filled with ugly basketball and little suspense, so I wasn't all that pumped even before we traded away JJ. It looks like that Game 1 win over Chicago will be the Hawks' high water mark for the first 15 years of this century. I just find it hard to stay interested given that.

One of the all-time class acts in sports broadcasting. Good to hear he's doing better.

I totally agree. Duane is way better than Dominique Wilkens. And also Lenny Wilkins.

Remember Salim Stoudamire? His reputation for perimeter shooting coming out of college was probably even better than Jenkins', in both consistency and (most important for the pros) range. The main difference is that Jenkins is 3 inches taller - which makes him merely "undersized" rather than "absurdly undersized" for a 2. And no one was praising Jenkins' athleticism before the draft. On the contrary, they were saying the combination of his short size and mediocre footspeed would make him a defensive liability. If that's changed, I've missed it. Sorry, but I don't see Jenkins' 3-point shooting as being so devastatingly good that I project much of a career for him.

Bingo. Honestly, though, I just don't see this team as being good enough to surprise people for more than a few games at a time. Our team is just too easy to figure out. Leave Smoove open on the perimeter. Set screens to get Korver or Smoove on the ball. Crash the boards hard, because we never have more than one passable rebounder on the floor at any given time. I think we might hit a stretch where we play Nellieball on offense and throw a bunch of different looks at opposing teams to keep them off balance. But even if that happens, it won't take opposing coaches too long to figure out that any team can shred us from the perimeter (if Curry's shot had been on yesterday, we would have been blown out) and that we don't rebound well enough to be an effective transition team as long as the Hawks' opponents get back quickly after made baskets. I don't blame LD for not being able to make lemonade out of urine. And frankly, I don't see John Jenkins as having the tools to be even a rotation player for a decent team. Undersized good-but-not-great shooters with no foot speed and poor defensive skills rarely turn into memorable players. I frankly think this season is almost irrelevant because we don't have enough "players" to be competitive and don't have any prospects worth developing. I hope I'm wrong, though. Seriously.

It amazes me that people think Smoove for Pau is a realistic possibility. The Lakers have no need to cut down on payroll because they could go 0-82 and still rake in a quintillion dollars, so Smoove's expiring contract means nothing to them. And aside from help defense within 18 feet of the basket, there is literally no aspect of the game at which Smoove is better than Pau. Pau is a better shooter, rebounder, on-ball defender, and passer. And oh yeah, he has the best low post repertoire in the NBA.He also has the rare Scottie Pippen mentality - knowing you're good enough to be "the man" on 20+ teams, but preferring to be the #2 on a contender. And willing to subordinate his own game for the good of the team.If Danny Ferry called Mitch Kupchak with that deal, Kupchak would laugh so hard that his mocha frappe would come out his nose.

So I take it you're another early adopter of the McRosot Scarface...erm Microsoft Surface?

The reason he shoots so high a percentage is that he doesn't take 15+ shots per game and thus is not an object of major defensive attention. Ask him to carry the offensive load, and his FG% will go down. Anyway, offensive efficiency won't matter much when your team is getting outrebounded 58-36 by a team with a starting frontcourt of Omer Asik and Patrick Patterson.

It's deja vu all over again: And as dlpin said in response at the time: There's nothing new under the sun on the Squawk...

"Dominate the paint shawty" or GTFOH.

I've always believed it to be an exercise in futility to compare players across eras. Our understanding of everything from childhood nutrition to training regimens to shoe technology has improved enormously since the 1930s (or the 1980s, for that matter). If Bill Russell had grown up in the same era as Shaq, he might have ended up being 7'0 instead of 6'9. If Michael Jordan had to play in an era where shoes provided virtually no ankle support, the resultant dulling of his explosiveness and ability to change direction might have forced him to rely more on his jump shot, and he probably would not have dominated the game as he does today. Conversely, Shaq might have ended up being a 6'8 lump of fat if he'd grown up in 1950s Newark instead of the 1980s version, and John Havlicek might have entered the conversation for GOAT if the 3-point line had been around back in his day. And I don't think anyone wants to imagine what Oscar could have done if modern shoes and training techniques were available to him. Transplanting players to different eras might have had a drastically negative, remarkably positive, or totally neutral effect on their career trajectories. The point is...no one can say. I don't see how anyone can even begin to discuss it intelligently. And that's to say nothing of rule changes (hand-checking, three point line, illegal defense, etc) that have had a major impact on the way the game is played. In other words, both the game and the player have changed drastically over the years. I think you can make "all-decade" teams. But all-time teams...I just don't feel like it's possible to do objectively. I'd rather save my mental masturbation for things that are a bit more apples-to-apples.