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Teague has struggled this year playing against backups and you want to see his role expanded. Evans has been TERRIBLE this season against backups and you want to see his role expanded. And the first time that Woodson sits Crawford, Bibby, and Joe too much then everyone here woudl crucify Woodson for it. If you are willing to lose games to get these guys more PT then thats great but I think you are nuts.

If the team wasn't too cheap to field a summer league team maybe Teague would be closer to being able to help at this point. If the team didn't waste money on Collins then maybe Woodson would have better options on the bench.

Saying nice things about players in the offseason is great- playing guys who will hurt the team is a whole different matter. The team screwed up by signing Collins- Woodson shouldn't make the mistake worse by actually playing him. The team screwed up by drafting Acie Law- Woodson shouldn't have made the problem worse by playing him. Evans Has struggled. Woodson has gotten what he can out of Zaza. Teague just doesn't look ready. I'm sorry but when the backups are already killing the Hawks then I don't see the rationale for giving them more minutes.

When Teague is off the floor the Hawks outscore the opposition by 7.4 points/100 possessions. When he is on the court the Hawks are outscored by 2.2.

When Evans is off the floor the hawks outscore the opposition by 12.4 points/100 possessions. When he is on the court the Hawks are outscored by 11.7!/b]

Last year the Hawks were significantly better with Murray on the court and Woodson gave him more minutes to reward the good play.

This is a serious question- how many games are you willing to lose to give Teague and Evans more minutes? Because maybe you do think that losing a couple extra games during the regular season will mean winning a couple extra games in the playoffs which would easily be worth it. But you shoudl at least say that now.

I'll say once again that I trust Woodson on his judgment of Rookies more than I would anyone else here. When people were bitching about Salim not playing enough people blamed woodson- it turned out Salim just wasn't good enough. The exact same thing happened with Acie. I do like Teague more than I ever did Acie but I am not ready at all to say that Woodson is making a mistake by not playing Teague. This is a team that intends to get home court advantage in the first round of the playoffs- you need to pick and choose the spots to play a rookie. And when the second unit is getting killed (unlike last year) then I think we just need to give it some time.

And if Teague is still not ready as the season goes on go out and trade for a backup PG from a team thats destined for the lottery. The Hawks don't ahve a ton of salary filler which is the biggest problem with that plan.

I'd LOVE the team to go after Mike Conley. The Grizzlies are an inept organization and I think that Conley has done good things when he has had the chance. Not quite sure what his value is at this point but I'd love to see the Hawks make a move.

I'm sorry... if you think that the Hawks SHOULD have (unless they get poor coaching) a better offense than a team with Carmelo, Billups, JR Smith, and Nene then I think you are just a blind homer.

Same with a team that has Nash, Amare, HIll, Barbosa, and Richardson

And a team with Duncan, Parker, Ginobili, and Jefferson

And a team with Howard, Carter, Nelson, and Lewis

And a team with Deron Williams, Boozer, Okur, and Millsap

And a team with Pierce, Rondo, KG, Allen, and Rasheed.

Given good coaching for every team I think the Hawks SHOULD finish with worse offenses than all of those teams. When Woodson has the Hawks in the top 5 in the league in offense I think he deserves a lot of credit.

Buzzard- do you really think that the Hawks have better players on offense than The Nuggets? Do you think they have better players on offense than the Magic? The Suns? The Spurs? I just don't think its realistic to expect the Hawks to be a top 5 offense when so many other teams have been willing to spend the luxury tax to create a better roster.

Buzzard- do you really think the Hawks have the talent where they SHOULD be a top 5 offense?

And I'll once again say that I love the switching defense late in the shotclock. But early in the shotclock its just betting for a smart team to be able to set the exact matchup they want. Watch when the Spurs play the Hawks. They will come down and set a screen to get Parker matched up on whoever they think he can most easily exploit and then they reset the offense and he just eats them alive. Switch late and fight through the screen early!

MacDaddy- you have to be kidding me. Its not guards who are killing the Hawks with offensive rebounds.

Against Detroit Wallace had 11 offensive rebounds, Jerebko had 5 and Maxiell had 4.

Against Orlando Howard had 6.

Against New Orleans West had 5 and Okafor had 3.

How on earth can you blame the offensive rebounds the Hawks are giving up on the guards?

The team was a top 10 offense last season and people were complaining just as much. I think that people simply have impossible expectations if they are complaining about the offense and the only teams who have been better this season are Toronto, Denver, and Phoenix.

Never have so many fans complained about their team having a top 4 offense in the league before.

I'll take a cold shooting Joe Johnson over Maurice Evans.

I'm not sure that the Hawks have a single player who is an above average rebounder for their position. Josh Smith hurts the team badly on the defensive boards because he gets out of position so much going for blocks. You need the SF to compensate and hit the boards harder and Marvin simply isn't getting the job done this season.

Zaza isn't the answer- he has always been strong on the offensive glass but not so much on the defensive side. Really its just that Smith needs to pick his spots better on when to go for the block and when he does Marvin and Horford need to work harder.

I don't think there is much explaining necessary- you only make $24,000 a year in the NBADL- in China he will make a ton more money. I'm pretty surprised he went to the nbadl at all.

And I think that if you want to be higher than the 4th seed then tell that to Sund and the ASG and have them make a move. The Celtics, Magic, and Cavs simply have better talent than the Hawks and coaching isn't going to matter no matter what offense the Hawks run. Over and over in the NBA we have seen that the players matter more than the coaches but people here act like Woodson is somehow holding the team back despite good results. If you want to say that we should fire woodson because he isn't a HOF coach thats great but I think its more likely the Hawks will end up with a coach that gets decidedly worse results. I simply think that having Horford run the PnR makes the Cavs job easier and if I am coaching against the Hawks thats 100% what I would like you to do.

Better teams have better plans C & D because better teams have better players. As I said as Orlando's coach if Howard is having a bad day I still have Vince Carter, Jameer Nelson, and Rashard Lewis who all give me good options on offense. In the half court of Joe and Crawford are not working then I think you have an entire roster of guys who need someone else to create chances for them. Its not Woodon's fault that the roster is built that way

If you want a better plan C then lets get an actual post threat on the roster. Lets get a PG that can take on more than a Jim Paxson role. Lets spend the luxury tax to actually compete with teams that are willing to spend the luxury tax. You are blaming Woodson when he is doing more with less on offense because of your preconceptions on what a good offense is supposed to look at. I simply care more about the results.

When it comes to pace adjusted stats- do you think the Hawks should be a top 10 offense? top 5? top 2? I think its critically important. To me there are at least 10 or 11 teams that simply have better personnel than the Hawks and if they have better offenses than the Hawks then I don't blame the coaching- I blame Sund and the ASG. But it seems that people here have a different baseline. So how good do you think the Hawks offense should be? The stat I like is offensive efficiency which is the number of points scored per 100 possessions. I don't see how thats biased at all. I don't care of the hawks score fast or slow so long as they score. last year I believe the Hawks were 10th and I think that was a good job by Woodson. Do you think that the Hawks are so good on offense that if they don't have a top 5 offense that its the coach's fault? Here's the link to this year's offensive efficiency for comparison.

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/hollinger/teamstats

I see Sacramento at #9 and I think the coach is doing a great job. I see Miami at 18 and think that the Coach is doing a poor job and needs to reassess the offense.

But seriously- if you really are complaining this much about woodson and you think the difference is half a point a game over the course of the season then I really think you are just missing the point.

buzzard- I think that while you would like the aethetics of the offense more if the Hawks were running more PnR and motion offenses- I think the hawks would rank lower ahon offense because of how much more time the ball would be in the hands of guys who are not good halfcourt offensive players. I don't want Horford to be part of a PnR where the team Jumps the screen and forces the ball to Horford outside- he just can't do much with the ball other than toss up a long jumper. I'd rather see Crawford and Joe take a guy 1 on 1 and pass to Horford streaking to the basket if his guy goes to help. I hope that Teague can develop into someone who can exploit a weak defender at PG. I wish that Marvin could develop into that kind of guy as well but I've given up hope. I honestly think that marvin woudl be better off playing as a stretch the floor PF where he could take bigger guys off the dribble and drag guys outside because of his outside shooting.

Clearly you just think that Horford is more ready to carry a heavy offensive load than I do. I think Horford is basically Kendrick Perkins on offense and trying to make him have more of a role is just likely to hurt the offense overall even as it makes people here feel warm and fuzzy about how the hawks are mixing it up.

Buzzard- with the offense you think the Hawks should have where do you think they would rank in the league in terms of offense?

AHF- I am not saying that Woodson is a better offensive coach than Sloan. I am saying that the players matter more than the coach does. And if the Jazz had a much better offense than the Hawks then maybe you can point to coaching being the reason why. But when you are saying that the Hawks should be emulating a team with a worse offense because its prettier I just think its ridiculous.

I think at the core all offense is built on creating a mismatch that the defense has to adjust to. A pick and roll is trying to get the ball in hte hands of someone where the defense has to rotate or adjust to stop it. I don't think that Josh Smith shoots well enough where I want him as part of a pick and roll- to me thats just dragging Josh Smith's Defender out to the ball where Josh Smith doesn't have to be covered at all. Horford I do not think has anywhere close to the offensive skill for me to want to involve him in a Pick and Roll. I don't want my 5th option on offense dragging his defender closer to my guy who is more of a threat to score. If Marvin becomes a PF then I'll be all about Marvin being part of a Pick and Roll but when he plays SF I don't think that creates a mismatch.

In the end I think with the current NBA rules the best way to create a mismatch is to just spread the floor and take someone 1 on 1 because the handchecking rules make 1 on 1 defense pretty much impossible. You guys are bitching about Isos even when the Hawks have a more effective offense than teams you want to emulate and I think its just disconnected from reality. I'll take results over what looks pretty.

I think we must be using different definitions of "post threat". You believe that against the Pistons Josh Smith was fed the ball in the post and he took a defender 1 on 1 to get his points?

I think that you would have a MUCH easier time finding games where the star player had an off shooting night and the team still won compared to games where the team gave up more offensive rebounds than they had defensive rebounds and still won.

You put someone like Shaq on the roster who has an actual postup game and then I'll complain that Woodson doesn't use them. The Hawks have zero post up threats on the team. The Hawks plan A is Joe. The Hawks plan B is Crawford. I don't really know what you want the Hawks plan C to be because they just don't have the talent on offense. Put the Ball in Josh's hands and let him try and draw a slow defender outside and take him off the dribble? Ha. Horford blowing past a slow center 1 on 1? Bibby taking guys off the dribble? Marvin?

The Roster was built to have forwards that excel in transition but who are not very strong halfcourt players. Thats just who the Hawks are and I don't see how thats Woodson's fault.

Orlando's plan A is Howard. Plan B is Howard Kicking out to a bunch of 3 point shooters. Plan C is Vince Carter. Plan D is Jameer Nelson. Plan E is Rashard Lewis exploiting a mismatch. The Magic simply have more weapons and more options on offense.

And I think Utah fans would have much more reason to complain about the Jazz having the 12th best offense in the league this season than the Hawk fans about having the 4th best offense yet you still think that Sloan is doing a better job. Absolutely ridiculous.

I mean its clear that some people here think that Horford could start abusing people in the post if the Hawks just let him do it. But thats just wishcasting a skill on someone where we have absolutely no reason to think the skill is there.

Miami won the championship with an iso offense. Of course Cleveland now runs an iso offense. I think that most teams without a post presence run what amounts to an iso offense. (this does show how much easier it is to build a championship contender with a post threat) And just FYI- the Hawks are middle of the pack in the NBA as far as what percentage of baskets are assisted.

If you have ever coached you know at the core of any offense is someone drawing a double team and then finding the open man against an unsettled offense. I would prefer the Hawks offense if they had more guys who could exploit a weak defender- but to me thats a personnel problem and not a coaching problem. If I am running the Hawks offense I look at it and I see 2 guys who can consistently draw a double team and find the open man- Crawford and Joe. past that everyone else is FAR better off faciing an unsettled defense where someone else is creating their chances for them.

IF you tell me you want to see Josh Smith getting fed the ball in the post I'll think you are crazy but at least its a plan. If you think that Bibby shoudl be initiating the offense "like a PG should" then I'll think its crazy but sure thats another way to go. But when I look at the Hawks I see a team with no post game and just 2 guys who can initiate the offense and I feel sympathy for the coach when he gets crucified at the same time the team is a top 4 offense.

Like I have said- if the Hawks were languishing with the 15th or 18th best offense in the league when they clearly had the talent to be higher then absolutely I'll be on board criticizing Woodson for his choices. But I'm a results based guy and don't care much about aesthetics. When the Hawks have a much better offense than a team like the Blazers who I think have more tools to work with on offense then hell yeah I'll give woodson some credit for that.

Put it this way- You would probably be much happier with Sloan's offensive system than what the Hawks run. But the Hawks have had the far better offense this year and I would have a hard time saying the Hawks have better personnel on offense.

I'll take Woodson over John Kuester, Tom Barisse, Eddie Jordan, jay Triano, Don Nelson, Vinny Del Negro, Erik Spoelestra, Jim O'brien, Flip Saudners, Kurt Rambis, Scott Brooks, Mike Dunleavy, Lionel Hollins, jeff Bower, and Scott Skiles. Go look at every team's message board and how much they complain about their coach. Go look at a Denver messageboard and see how much they complain about George Karl.

If the Hawks could get Adelman or someone like that in here I'll pack Woodson's bags myself. But I just don't think the Hawks are going to get an upgrade if they do make a move.