niremetal

My thoughts exactly.

Yup. Atlanta is an city of transplants and expatriates. It's probably the biggest reason why there aren't the deeply-embedded sports loyalties in Atlanta like there are in cities in the northeast and midwest. You don't see father-to-son passing on of pro sports loyalties in Atlanta even close to the extent you do in most other cities. My mom was born in Miami, my dad in Arizona, and my grandparents in New Jersey and Alabama. I was the first in my family to actually grow up in Atlanta, and I became a Hawks fan in spite of my family's loyalty to their hometown teams...and then I moved away for college and never returned. I had 5 close friends in HS who were also big-time Hawks fans. But only 2 of them live in Atlanta today; the others are in San Francisco, Connecticut, and DC. We should start city Hawks clubs like university alumni clubs. It would be funny (and sad) to see if we could get more club members than there are Hawks season ticket holders.

A veteran guy would cost exactly the same as Rio, dude. Brush up your CBA.

Bibby/Flip/JJ/Josh/Al was more effective than Bibby/JJ/Marvin/Josh/Al. But do you know what was even more effective than either? Bibby/JJ/Marvin/Al/Zaza. I guess that means Josh is even more expendable than Marvin, huh? Please. Sunk cost applies perfectly in Marvin's case. He is our best on-ball defender outside the post and our most versatile on-ball defender overall. We pay him a click above the league average, and you are increasingly alone in not recognizing that he's an above-average player. You have zip, zero, nada, zilch besides BS and your personal opinions (sorry, I repeat myself) to back up your assertion that Marvin's draft position is the reason he got re-signed and the reason he keeps starting. In your warped mind, Sund was so loyal to BK's decision to draft Marvin that he handed him a 5-year extension (nevermind that he previously had traded one BK lottery pick as scrap metal) 4 years after that draft, and Woody keeps starting him for the same reason (nevermind that he shoved other lottery picks like Shelden and Acie to the end of the bench, and consistently played #17 pick Smoove more than #6 Chill starting in their second year). And the fact that we paid $20M more to a 17th pick just 1 year before Marvin's contract? Pish-tosh. Irrelevant. The fact that we signed Marvin at all proves your point, right?

Dude, you posted this like an hour ago. Chill out.

His agent knows the NBA is looking at this trade with a warier eye than most. If he pretends that Z is hurt and considering Atlanta, it gives a veneer of suspense to his decision on where to play. I think that's all that's happening here.

We get drivel and hating on Joe from you and that's it, nothing else.

Second round is luck of the draw for every team besides San Antonio. The other 5 recent Philly 2nd round picks were Kyrylo Fesenko, Paccelis Morlende, Sam Clancy, Jr., Damone Brown, and Alvin Jones. For the Warriors, it's Richard Hendrix, Jermareo Davidson, Stephane Lasme, Kosta Perovic, and Chris Taft. Ivey, Salim, and Solo all were far more "productive" than any of those. Not incidentally, Akyol and Gladyr have had pretty decent seasons over in Europe. Gladyr hurt his hand recently and will miss 1 month, but he was having a good rookie year over in the Spanish league before that. Akyol is having a great year in Italy; he’s getting lots of burn in a top-tier overseas league after spending several years stuck at the end of a bench in the lower-quality Turkish league. UPDATE: I remembered that the Spurs had picked Blair, Dragic, Scola, and Manu in the second round. I didn't notice that in between, they picked Corey Hightower, Chris Carrawell, Bryan Bracey, Robertas Javtokas, Randy Holcomb, Sergei Karaulov, Romain Sato, Damir Markota, Giorgos Printezis, Marcus Williams, and James Gist.

Post of the year.

The fact that you think there's a GM in the league who would rather have Yaroslav Korolev for the minimum instead of Marvin for $7.5M pretty much confirms that you have zero perspective on Marvin. Considering that Marvin is a better and more versatile defender than any of the guys on that list and also a better offensive player, that's an easy question - I would rather have Marvin. You could do the same thing with Shane Battier or Tayshaun Prince. Like those guys, the advanced stats and simple observations indicate that Marvin brings more to the table than is shown in individual box score stats. I've done this before: Check out the 82games.com pages for the Hawks, Cavs, Celts, and Magic. If you click on each player’s name and scroll down, you see a row labeled “Defense: Pts per 100 Poss.” The two numeric columns show how many points per 100 possessions the team allows when the player is on the court versus when he is off the court. Marvin has the best net rating (-9.6) for that not just on the Hawks, and not just among the SFs on those teams, but amongst ALL rotation players on those 4 teams. But you will never acknowledge that Marvin has become an excellent defender. Instead, you'll dismiss all stats and facts that people REPEATEDLY bring to your attention and that are inconvenient to your obsession with bashing Marvin as "excuses." I still can't believe you think that Rick Sund and Mike Woodson are so wedded to Marvin's draft position 5 years ago that they re-signed him to a $37.5M year deal and keep starting him, respectively, solely to keep Billy Knight from looking bad. You have no evidence of that, no precedent you can cite that indicates that. I mean, Yaroslav Korolev and Linton Johnson. You've become a caricature of yourself, Diesel.

Marvin gets 8.3 shots per game right now. If everything else remains constant, Marvin would have to shoot somewhere between 67 and 75% from the floor, depending on whether his 3-point percentage was 30% or 50%, in order to average 15ppg. The league leader is shooting 61.4% from the floor. No one has shot higher than 65% since Artis Gilmore was in his prime. So yeah, it would be REAL easy for Marvin to average 15ppg. He'd just have to shatter NBA records for efficiency to do it. MVP's right. He's the 6th option. Expecting him to score more than the low double digits is kinda ridiculous. Whose shots would go down so his could go up?

Yeah, you're right. There's so much proof that Marvin is only playing and staying in the rotation because of his draft position 5 years ago. Because Woodson and the front office have really shown that they'll keep and play draft picks commensurate to where they were drafted rather than based on on-court performance. That's why Chills got more minutes than Smoove and why Shelden kept getting 20 minutes a game in his second season. And why Acie stayed in the rotation as long as he did. Wait, what's that? Smoove always had more minutes than Smoove starting in the second half of their rookie season? And Shelden and Acie's playing time got reduced dramatically in their second year and then they were traded after they had essentially been removed from the rotation? And wait, what? Second round pick Solomon Jones had more MPG last year than lottery pick Acie? Every time someone says something to "defend" Marvin, even if they back it up with stats, you go and say they are "making excuses." But your evidence that Marvin's contract and PT are a function of his extension rather than his on-court performance is based on the fact that you don't like Marvin. You do not have one shred of evidence to back it up. If anything, the Hawks' treatment of other draft picks indicates that your explanation is a load of crap based on nothing but your personal opinion on Marvin. And then you have the gonads to say sh!t like this: Give me an effing break.

What, head coach isn't an option?

It's not bandwagon-jumping if you've always watched, followed, and hoped for a player to play to his full potential, and then give him credit when he does it. February (18.6ppg, 10.0rpg) was the first time in Josh's career that he averaged a double-double for a full month in an NBA season. It marked the third-highest scoring average, highest rebounding average, and highest assist average of Josh's career. Tonight was the second-highest rebound total for a single game in Josh's career. Josh is playing better than he ever has in his career and people are recognizing it, but no one can pretend Josh has been playing like this all along unless they're blind or disingenuous. He's been playing out of his mind. For the past month, he's been the team's best player, which saying quite a bit because JJ (23.7 ppg, 4.3rpg, 4.2apg, 49.6% shooting including 44.1% on threes and what must have been a stratospheric TS%) was playing at an All-NBA level too. But hey, if you don't want people to point out that this is an improvement over the Josh we saw before...

No one can guard D-Howard one-on-one without running a serious risk of being railroaded. No one. There is no rhyme or reason to the games where D-12 has struggled, which is a strong indicator that the only person who holds him back is himself. Some of his worst games in the past year have come against such fearsome defensive big men as Dan Gadzuric, Al Harrington, and Hilton Armstrong. His single worst game of the past two years came against Emeka Okafor, who is perhaps the most comparable player to Horford in terms of physique and skill set in the whole NBA. It's a red herring to suggest that we should hold out for a type of player that doesn't exist. That being said, I could deal with Finley if Ilgauskas falls through and no other serviceable bigs hit the waiver wire.

Smoove has to start. No way you bench him the way he's playing this year, especially the past couple weeks. That being said, I don't think you'd see Josh at SF for too long after the first 5 minutes of the game. On offense, Josh is a gazillion times more effective within 10 feet than he is on the perimeter. We could get away with that, though, because we could simply have Z on the baseline corners instead of down low. But on defense, you don't the league's best help defender chasing his man around the perimeter any more than he already is. And that's the real issue - a lineup with Z at the 5 and Josh at the 3 is one that can just be shredded off screen rolls and dribble-drives.

Hate-to-hate, but there was a non-import thread too, and it also discussed the Blog-a-Bull bit ;) http://www.hawksquawk.net/community/index.php/topic/344139-a-troubling-article-about-joes-future/

It truly is a sad indicator of how common sense goes right out the door when it comes to discussing favored and disfavored players that some people think that we have been in the top 5 in fast break points both this year and last year in spite of having guards that hate running the fast break. Having Josh and Al is certainly one of the biggest reasons why we're so high, but it's beyond absurd to suggest that we made it to the top 5 in fast break points despite having guards who hate to run. And as far as him being the best passer on the team...um...ok. I guess that's why he has more turnovers and fewer assists than JJ and Bibby. Bibby is #3 in the league in Ast/TO ratio (3.68:1) and many-to-most of Josh's highlight reel dunks come off lobs from Bibby or JJ. Josh is an excellent passer for a big man, as is Al, but neither are as good passers as Bibby or JJ (or Teague or Craw, for that matter, when Craw decides to pass). Come ON. Complementing Josh and Al's ability to pass and run the floor does not necessitate hating on JJ and Bibby's.

Whoa, wait...Diesel doesn't like Marvin?

First, I think the page that's the topic of this post was posted a week or so ago. Second, yeah. Any post that projects Manu as being more productive during the next 3 years than Lee, Gay, Boozer, Amare, and JJ...well, I love Manu, but that should be a red flag.

You want Hughes as a backup PG and playing at the same time as Crawford? Oy...ok.

Marvin made a number of outstanding defensive stops during the game (his ability to contest shots without fouling kept us in the game and made it impossible for Salmons to get a clean look at the game-tying trey at the end of OT), and you made a post picking out a 28-foot pull up made by a backup PG that Marv had switched onto. Ridnour had taken it to the basket and killed us several times in the game. He had not yet attempted - much less made - a 3-pointer during the game, and he was a good 3-4 feet behind the line and was still moving at the time of the shot. Give me an effing break. Marvin has been a non-factor on offense all year, but he has been a great defender. The obsession that Diesel has at refusing to give him credit for the things he does well is truly a sight to behold, and you've made a number of posts that fit the same mold. So apparently, yes - you are missing something.

I still say I doubt he would get more than marginal PT here. I know people around here are down on Mo, but Stack is not an upgrade over him. He can still score a bit more, but Mo is more efficient and a significantly better defender.

Alfred E. Neuman. In all seriousness, though, my top pick would be Portland assistant Monty Williams. He basically head coached the team for a few weeks this year while McMillan was recovering from his torn achilles tendon, and he did damned well. If he isn't available for whatever reason, Ty Corbin in Utah might be worth considering too. Among vet head coaches who are currently jobless, I'm not optimistic. I'm not a big fan of Avery Johnson or Byron Scott, though both would be an improvement over what we have now. My guess is that guys like Fratello and Hubie Brown are thoroughly uninterested. Hell no to Jeff Van Gundy and Doug Collins. Former players who I'd take a look at would be Sam Cassell, Steve Smith, and Eric Snow (not necessarily in that order).

I think your analysis is spot on. The difference between him and Tayshaun is that Tayshaun never had his kind of confidence issues on offense.