niremetal

I was torn between C and D...C-minus really. Given the diminishing protection attached to the pick in future years, we almost certainly are getting a first-rounder in the 16-22 range out of the deal (the Hornets look very likely to be a top-6 seed at some point in the next few years, but probably won't suddenly win 55+ games). That's not nothing. But I'm skeptical this is the best Travis could have done if he hadn't been a bit more patient.

As someone who married a girl from Oregon (we now live in Portland...it's nice to get free childcare from her parents), the Blazers have long been my #2 team. I've followed them closely since the beginning of the Brandon Roy era. I watched most of their games on League Pass. I even posted on a couple Blazers blogs, and followed the online fan chatter pretty closely. Here's what I saw back then: Nate McMillan was rightly raked over the coals by Blazers fans, many times eerily echoing the reasons Hawks fans railed against Woody. For example: McMillan didn't run any sort of offensive system, instead relying on his best playmakers to figure out how to get points on the board. That meant overreliance on ISO plays (and the Blazers didn't have anyone who was as effective an ISO player as Joe), and a lot of guys taking low-percentage shots late in the clock. It led to an offense that frequently stagnated and was easy to scheme against. Lots of frustration over how particular players were used (esp not featuring LaMarcus Aldridge, even though he was clearly the most talented offensive player on the team). Frustratingly stubborn with his rotation, and having particular habits/practices/rotations that he just wouldn't give up, even when it was clear they weren't working A strong tendency to prefer playing mediocre veterans over rookies. So I had lots of concerns when he was made our head coach. But after last season's incredible run, I was hopeful all that was in the past: There still wasn't an offensive system, but the PnR with Trae was so unguardable that it didn't seem to matter He seemed to get the most out of players that had struggled (Bogi, Gallo) or not reached their potential (Huerter) previously, and even seemed to squeeze maximum value out of deep-bench role players (Snell, Hill) He tinkered with the lineups during the playoffs, first to stagger Trae and Bogi against NY, and then to run the big lineup featuring Gallo/JC/Clint against the Sixers. He gave OO meaningful minutes in the playoffs But this season, all my old fears came back: Trae has elevated his game, but teams are getting better and better at defending the PnR against him (I feel like we're seeing at least 2-3x more intercepted lobs this season compared to last). And we don't have a reliable plan B when that isn't working for us. Trae's numbers are up this year, but nearly everyone else's are down. It just doesn't seem like anyone knows what they're supposed to do. We're seeing Cam take lots of contested mid-rangers, and then we alternate between going long stretches never giving JC a touch and trying to force feed him (while telegraphing to the defense that's what we're doing). The lineups are a maddening mess. Why we keep trotting out all-second-unit teams is beyond me. I have no clue why TLC is getting minutes, while Jalen doesn't get at least a chance to get some burn given our defensive struggles. By far the biggest issue, IMHO, is the lack of an offensive system (or at least one that we consistently run). That is absolutely killing us. When the PnR breaks down, it seems like we're seeing more and more of those low-percentage/late-clock shots. And when we don't run PnR, and Nate doesn't make a specific play call, we're seeing poor spacing, little ball movement, and a lot of contested pull-up jumpers. It's also one of the reasons I think Trae takes so many early-clock heaves from 30-plus feet--there isn't an expectation that he'll go down the court and get into a default offensive set. Right now, we're doing well enough offensively because Trae has played like a man on fire. But I feel like in the playoffs, when defensive intensity picks up and teams have the time to strategize against us more comprehensively, we'd be toast. More than that, and as @NBASupes and others have said, the amount of energy Trae has to spend running the offense is probably one of the reasons his defensive effort is so lacking. I still put the blame for those things largely on Trae--he's the one who ultimately makes the decision to take bad shots and loaf around on D. But the lack of an offensive system definitely is an aggravating factor. The inability to correctly utilize JC and our wings is also frustrating and again, I think ties back to the lack of an offensive system. No one seems to know either their role or their teammates'. My fear is that we'll make a big, splashy trade sending JC and/or Cam elsewhere to bring in a low-tier All-Star, only to see that nothing fundamentally changes for us, while the guys we trade away thrive on teams that know how to utilize them. /rant

Taken together, this says to me that as long as Trae is unwilling or unable to give more of an effort defensively, the Hawks are never going to be able to win a title. Because the reality is this: no team has won a title in this century without at least a top 20 defense (in terms of efficiency, i.e. DRtg). The only team that wasn't at least top 10 was the '01 Lakers--a team that finished #1 in DRtg the previous year and was so dominant with two all-time-top-10 offensive players that it was able to coast during the regular season. That was a team, in other words, that was literally the best team in the league defensively when it decided to be, and had already proven itself capable of cranking it up defensively when needed. That ain't us. What am I missing here?

I've always thought Sabonis would be a close-to-ideal offensive complement to Trae. His ability to pass out of the post would just open up the offense so much, both off screen rolls (he makes great touch passes) and by making it so we don't have to rely so much on screen rolls in the first place. But...the problem would remain the defense. Even with Sabonis, we wouldn't be averaging 120+ a game on offense--and that's what we'd need to average to make up for the number of points we've been giving up for the last month (and that's just to play .500 ball, which in and of itself won't be enough to get the team back into playoff contention). Sabonis is a solution, just not to the problem that must be solved for this team to compete again. As long as the defense remains this poor, offensive firepower won't save us. We're bottom 3 in defensive rating after last night. Literally no team has ever contended with defense like that (which makes sense--if you're giving up more points on average than 27 other teams, no amount of scoring will be enough to win 60% of games). The one thing a Sabonis trade might do is shake the team up enough to get some fire back in their belly, which *could* solve the defensive issues. Right now, the team and the coaching staff just seem to expect the problem to fix itself.

Just saw it in theaters and thought it was amazing. It's just incredible that it was directed by Steven freaking Spielberg, who had never directed a musical before. I'm convinced now there is literally nothing the guy can't do in terms of film projects. One guy directed Jaws, Raiders of the Lost Ark, ET, Schindler's List, Jurassic Park, Saving Private Ryan, Minority Report, Catch Me If You Can, Lincoln, and now West Side Story. Each of those was groundbreaking, historically great films in their respective genres (which span from horror to drama to sci-fi to historical epic to musical), or both. Even his "misses" were pretty much all good movies, just not "great" ones (The Terminal, the closest he's come to a comedy film in my lifetime, is actually low-key one of my favorite movies). The only one of his movies I really did not like at all was AI, and I have friends who swear that's his best movie. Anyway, see it in theaters while you can, because the sets, colors, and choreography just won't land the same on a small screen, and apparently no movie stays long in theaters anymore unless it's got lots of explosions.

The Skyhawks' schedule this week is insane! Memphis on Monday, Toronto on Tuesday, and then back to CP on Wednesday?? Those dudes are going to be Burned. The. Eff. Out.

I agree Capela stood out as a key reason we lost offensively. But defensively I don't think he was the issue. Defensively it was, as almost always, our perimeter guys that I thought were the problem. Ish Smith is quick, but he's small and has no business getting into the lane as often as he did. There were 1-2 ORebs where Clint just seemed to be caught out of position. But otherwise, I think the ORebs were where Clint was switched, out of position because he was forced to cheat, or outnumbered. Opposing teams have clearly figured out that our strategy when we have Trae and 1 or 2 other weak perimeter defenders at the same time is to try and funnel the driving player to Clint and then rely on rotations to recover. Because it seems like they are sending other guys at the basket as soon as our on-ball guy gets burned. There was at least 1 OReb I saw where Clint was literally the only Hawk within 10 feet of the basket and he was surrounded by 3-4 blue jerseys. In that situation, not even Dennis Rodman is coming away with the rebound unless it bounces right at him. The fact that their 4s are really 3s actually hurt us in a sense because it meant JC was often out on the perimeter and couldn't recover to have Clint's back in time, which has saved us on a LOT of possessions this year. Anyway, as long as our perimeter guys are getting consistently burned, leaving Clint alone near the basket to clean up the mess, opposing bigs are going to carve us up around the basket, both off passes and off rebounds. That's just what happens. I don't blame Clint for it. Yeah, he was more dominant as a help defender last year, and he's a step slower this year, and that means he can't make up for our other guys' flaws as easily. But I still feel like that's not "on" him, because I don't think any center in the league could do Clint's "job" well enough to make a meaningful difference in those situations.

I agree it makes sense for the Hawks. I don't see why it makes sense for the Blazers, which was my point.

Is there inside info at play here? If not, then as an adoptive Portland resident who has been forced to become something of a Rip City guy...I'd say hard pass from their perspective. Esp since Snell has proven to be a great locker room (and overall team culture) fit so far. Not sure where the benefit is for them.

Y'all downers do realize that the lineups we played in the second half tonight had like 2 total minutes on the floor together coming in? It was painfully obvious Solo/TLC/Lou had no rhythm with the starters (or the second unit, for that matter). Being forced to try new rotations featuring the end of your bench on the second night of a back to back is going to make any team look bad. Give them some reps in practice together--and hopefully have Nate realize that Delon can play alongside Trae--and I think they'll look better.

I just feel awful for Dre. Man just can't catch a break. Like everyone is saying, this is Cam's best (and possibly last) chance to establish himself as a consistent player. Maybe not having to worry about fighting for minutes as much will let him stop trying to force things so much. For those who think this might be a window for JJ...methinks Nate will want to know he can play like not-crap in G-League for a few games first. Solo and TLC will remain ahead of him on depth chart until then, since we're no longer in rebuilding mode.

In all seriousness, I agree. I think that, as a rule, Bogi/Kev works better than Hunter/Bogi as starters. Like I posted before, the Bogi/Kev lineup was fire when we ran it last season. For the Bogi/Kev lineup to work, Bogi really has to level back up on both ends to where he was last year. People remember his hot shooting, but he's also strong as an ox (if you've seen the dude shirtless, he's ripped) and has a crazy wingspan (6'11) for his height. He isn't the quickest player, but he is a physical, disruptive defender who can easily guard both 2s and 3s when he wants to. Problem is, it seems like he doesn't want to this year. The Euro foul seems like his only move. The other problem is that Cam/Hunter have been hot poo when on the floor together. Offensively, they are just a wreck when paired. One of them has to become a reliable catch-and-shoot player for the pairing to work, I think. Last thing: I do think the focus on who starts/comes off the bench is a false choice...or at least, it *should* be a false choice. In a perfect world, we could choose a "default" starting 5 and then have rotations dependent on opponent. If the other team has a tallish, high-usage perimeter player (looking at you, Randle and Doncic), we could sub out Kev and bring in Hunter early on. For the quicker wings, Cam could see more minutes with the starters. Etc. Problem is that Nate seems wedded to these idiotic shift-change substitution patterns. I thought he had broken out that a couple times (late in the Knicks series and then a couple games back when he did lots of rotation tinkering). But it's clearly his preferred default method. And it kills us because it forces us to deploy suboptimal pairings even when the matchups seem to scream for something different. I just don't get it.

Disappointed. Based on the title, I was expecting a thread about Zion.

Bogi was shooting 41.1% from deep this month before tonight, so...no. The issue is his edge and aggressiveness are missing on both ends of the floor this year.

I actually feel a bit better after tonight than I did two games ago. Tactically and in terms of effort/focus (especially not letting no-calls throw us off). We lost focus for about 4 minutes in the second half but recovered...just not enough to complete the comeback due to poor execution (like you said). Give us Bogi or Dre back and I like our chances. Also...let's try the Trae / Bogi / K'Von / JC / Cap lineup, which has only seen the floor 12 minutes this year after being the dominant lineup during our spring / summer run last season.

It seemed to me that Nate was trying out different rotations in the game to see how the pieces fit together, esp seeing what we could do without having either Clint or Gorgui on the floor (spoiler alert: play Gallo and JC together). I think that exercise was needed at some point because both of our centers have looked...not great...so far this year (though I still have hope that it's injury-related for Clint and that it'll resolve once OO is back and we can afford to rest him more). It shows he realizes the need to make adjustments. And we did "uncover" what I thought were a couple good rotations in the first half (Trae/Huerter/Cam/Gallo/JC and Delon/Huerter/Hill/Gallo/JC, along with the Trae/Bogi/Dre/Gallo/JC lineup that we also ran with some success against the Suns). Problem was, Curry was unconscious. Probably couldn't have won anyway given how hot he was. But winning definitely wasn't going to happen with Nate continuously fiddling with the rotations, which kept the team from getting on the same page defensively. Anyway, we'll see what happens next game. But I have a feeling that this was partially Nate just taking stock of some alternative lineups in light of how unexpectedly bad Clint and Gorgui have been--and doing that in a game is really the only option, since the team hasn't had 2 straight days off (giving the chance for a real practice) since the season started.

I agree with (1). (2) is a push (I'm assuming you meant Cam and Huerter, both of whom have been even less consistent than Bogi or Dre, but I'd be up for "promoting" Huerter and rolling with the starting 5 that dominated for us March through June). (3) is a hell no...Deuce Coop looked downright awful in his first two G League games.

And to make it even worse, in the post-game, watch Trae whine about how his problem is that he's not looking for his shot enough

That was a Bball IQ of 60 shot. He was DOUBLED 27 feet from the basket. Most predictable fast break in history off that miss. And then Bogi taking a fade away contested 3 on the next possession with plenty of time on the clock too. Awful.

Eh...there's a reason the 7-footers (and other bigs who park themselves on the low post) have largely died out of the NBA over the past 20 years, even before the Steph Curry/3-point boom: the illegal defense era ended in 2001. In Kemp's day, McMillan could dump the ball to Kemp and Kemp could largely go to work one-on-one because the other defenders either had to stay home or commit to a double...they couldn't cheat off the ball to constrain Kemp's movement while still staying close enough to their man to contest on a kick-out. So a big who could ISO in the low post was worth his weight in gold.* Now, if the ball goes to the low post, the other 4 defenders all cheat so far off the ball that a move into the lane will be double-teamed every time. So the choice is usually either a contested fadeaway (which John as great at), a contested hook shot or bank shot in traffic, or a kick-out. That's why passing bigs are usually the only ones who see a lot of low-post touches now. Trust me, I wish there were space for that strategy to work, because I agree JC has the touch to be deadly one-on-one down low. But although his dump-offs to Clint are crisp this year, he doesn't have the consistent passing skills to make defenders pay when they collapse on him. So unless we can turn back time, we'll have to make do with his occasional midrange fadeaways. (* As an aside, this was also the reason MJ was so dominant--the illegal defense rules meant that defenders couldn't cheat to the edge of the lane to cut off his paths to the basket. He wouldn't have gotten nearly as many lay-ups or dunks on ISO plays as he did if he were playing today.)

I can't possibly be the only one who thinks these new jerseys are ugly AF. Yellow was good as an accent color, but as the main color, with that big-azz red hawk splashed all the way across the front? Blech.

Huerter is shooting sub-30% from the floor. You don't get a promotion with that based on one game against one of the worst teams in the league. I'll trust Nate on mixing Cam in with the first unit. My gut tells me it's worth trying, but as of now, the three worst two-man combos for the Hawks thus far have featured Cam alongside one of the starters: Obviously, there's lots of overlap there because Capela, Bogi, and Dre are usually all on the floor together. But still.

Hawks lost tonight because they missed lots of shots they usually make. That actually was true against Dallas as well, but our defense was so good that it didn't matter. Trae will find his floater, he/Dre/Bogi/K'Von/JC will start knocking down open looks, and the team will get to the line more as the players find their rhythms. Gallo's return will help with that too. So yeah, I don't see this becoming the start of a trend. And unless it does, I'm not hitting the panic button.

Not miss so many wide-open looks. I'd love to see the advanced metrics on where the Hawks missed tonight. The eye test suggests to me that they had more than enough good looks to win. Relatedly, free throws--both not getting them and not making them. Not too many teams will win games with only 9 made free throws. Folks can blame the refs all they want, but we didn't attack the rim nearly enough, and if you remove Trae, we were only 2 for 8 from the line. Banking your offense on jump shots and then missing them is an easy way to lose.

Also...this is going back a bit further. But Kevin Willis strikes me as a player who deserved more Hall consideration than he got. He was top 20 all-time in rebounds when he hung em up. He's now #25. Of the guys ahead of him, only Buck Williams, Paul Silas, and Charles Oakley aren't in the Hall (and Buck will make it eventually...it's crazy he's not in there now). And Willis was a better offensive player than any of those three (though Buck and Oakley were both underrated offensively). He had a great low post repertoire (great hook shot and turnaround J) and solid midrange game (his jumper was ugly but it worked). He could have been a stretch big, except that wasn't a thing back then. He's the only player with at least 17,000 points and 11,000 rebounds who isn't in the Hall. And here's a list of guys who averaged 15.5rpg or more over a full season during the last 40 years: Dennis Rodman (x5) Andre Drummond (x2) Kevin Willis Unfortunately, Willis had the misfortune of playing in the era with Rodman (who overshadowed everyone on the boards), Barkley (another all-time great rebounder), plus the biggest glut of elite interior big men in the history of the league. His career was basically parallel with Olajuwon, Ewing, Rodman, Robinson, Barkley, and Daugherty (who was Hall-bound before his injuries), and early in his career, he had to bang with prime Malone and Parish in the East. And that's just the Hall of Famers. Laimbeer, Oakley, and Buck Williams were not shabby either. That makes his accomplishments all the more impressive. There is literally no one in league history who had worse luck in terms of just coming along in the wrong damn era. Shift his career 10 years earlier or later, and I honestly think he would have been in the Hall.