BackForThe2ndTime

It would suck to see Teague go, but the timing may be right. Truthfully, the Hawks are kind of in a tough spot. The biggest need is definitely rebounding. We just aren't efficient as we used to be and can't get away with the poor rebounding. The issue is that there are so few guys we can realistically trade for that will get enough minutes to really improve our rebounding. In addition to that, it's hard to confidently build with 2 key cogs (Horford & Bazemore) possibly gone after this year and another who was abducted and may not be returned (Korver). We may not be rebuilding now, but we could easily be rebuilding this summer. All that being said, assuming we hold onto Horford and Baze, I say we ideally get a SF who can start and make Korver a 6th man. I think we can get away with an average or below average scorer, buy they have to be able to defend well, hit open shots and do it CONSISTENTLY. I'd be excited to see what Schröder could do with the full time starting job.

The Cavs are indeed stacked. It seems like both the Cavs and the Spurs are. Even more so than the Warriors.

Little bit of overreaction going on. We are still 2nd in our conference with a lot of games left. Hopefully we get Bud back tomorrow and bounce back against Utah.

The Korver opens up the offense even without shooting argument is getting old. We're past that. The fact of the matter is he's having a harder time getting open and less success hitting when he does, so he is MORE of a liability than before (all things equal). And I'm not even sure all things are equal. I would need to look at additional statistics to see a clearer picture of how the offense is playing with him on the court early last season and now. All that said, it's one reg season game. We'll see if the situation gets better, but at the end of the day, how much longer can we justify relying on a guy who can't create his own shot for a large chunk of the offense? Either we have to do things differently to get him open/play off him or consider relying more on someone else.

Watchin how Thabo's D changed this game is definitely bittersweet.

Hype!!

Like it. This roster the versatility to switch up their lineup based on the team we're facing. Baze's energy will be an asset early on.

No issue with the sentiment, but Bud has an issue with balancing this. It's tricky. Dennis might have a higher ceiling than Teague, but is he a better PG for this team this year? Don't think so. Next year? Maybe. This is good for the NBA. The Hawks have to commit or trade him to someone else who will naturally get him in his prime. Hard to get good value for that. And what would trading Teague do to the chemistry of this team?

http://grantland.com/the-triangle/2015-nba-free-agency-3-point-shooter-danny-green-demarre-carroll/ Sums it up pretty well

BODIES! BIG BODIES!

From 2017-2020. Did we ever hear what happens T'Wolves miss the playoffs every one of those years?

Little early to trade Dennis. His value will only go up IMO. And will Teague get more consistent? IDK

Agree. I'm assuming Splitter starts even with Milsap signing. If Milsap doesn't sign, this moving of chess pieces isn't even fun anymore. We'd have to make a serious move to be contenders.

Splitter has to start, right?

Congrats to DMC. He deserves it. Judging these deals relative to the norm makes no sense. Not saying we should have paid him, but that contract will not look nearly as bad with the new cap. I wasn't sure which one I preferred TBH, but I think we can afford to lose 1. Biggest thing for me is losing Carroll might make it hard to move Horford to C. I guess you can make the argument that Splitter at C provides better rim protection , but if Sap is at the 3, do we start Korver and sacrifice perimeter D or start Thabo and sacrifice O? It's gets murky.

Part of me feels like Korver can't start on this team if we are going to win it all. Not any team. This team. We don't have enough invested in guys who can create their own shot. Hell. Teague is great at it but, at times, just decides he just doesn't want to do it. For all the talk about team play on offense, sometimes you have to beat your guy 1 on 1. Our pass-heavy offense worked so much in the reg season, our play makers weren't prepared to be aggressive when it stalled in the playoffs. That being said, Bazemore will need to polish his offensive game a little more and put a little weight on if he is going to be fit for that spot over Korver next year. Call me crazy, but I don't mind a scenario where we let Carroll go, move Milsap to the 3 and for goodness sake, put Horford at the 4 if we can find a serviceable C. Or even just one who can provide some rebounding with a little range. I get the new small ball infusion, but I also think we need to get the most out our best players. About time we put Horford in a better position to succeed night in and night out.

I agree we may have to get creative but do we really want to put ourselves in the position for Lebron to guard one of our best offensive weapons in Sap? At least Bazemore could make him move around.

Plenty of blame to go around. Looks like opportunities are there and that we could make more of a deliberate effort to get Korver the ball if we wanted to. If Teague is being aggressive like he was last game, do we really need to though?

His D was pretty bad at times in the Wiz series. His better moments came toward the end of the series.

I remember all the hype before the Mayweather/Pacqauio fight. As more than a casual boxing fan, I had been anticipating it forever. Right before the bell was about to ring, I remember me and a guy I had just met simultaneously look at each other and say oh *#F#, as it just hit us that we were finally about to watch it. Starting to feel like that with this game/series. Hawks Baby!!

Pretty Interesting read!! I tried to copy pictures but the site kept kicking me back to the main forum page after submitting the thread. Not sure how this will turn out. http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/playoffs/2015/insider/story/_/id/12916333/why-kyle-korver-struggled-2015-playoffs-nba Pop quiz: Who's the best player not named LeBron James in the Eastern Conference finals? Tough call. But if you're consulting ESPN's real plus-minus metric (RPM) that estimates on-court impact on both ends of the floor, it's an easy pick: Kyle Korver. At plus-5.5 RPM, the sweet-shooting All-Star registered as the most valuable player on the Atlanta Hawks roster this season, even more valuable on balance than Kyrie Irving (plus-3.1), Kevin Love (plus-3.0) or any other Hawk. That's hard to believe if all you've watched is this season's playoffs. Korver has been rather pedestrian thus far, averaging 11.3 points, 5.2 rebounds and 35 percent shooting from downtown this postseason. Korver shooting 35 percent from deep is like Stephen Curry forgetting how to shoot free throws or James Harden losing his ability to draw contact. To wit, Korver shot 61 percent from 3-point range over a 12-game stretch earlier this season. So, what's up with Korver? Is it just a cold streak or is something deeper going on? For the Hawks to punch their first Finals ticket in more than 50 years, they need the All-Star to play like an All-Star. Here's why he hasn't yet in the playoffs. The gravity king Let's back up a bit. Korver's numbers are way down this postseason, but he is still a master at keeping the defense honest. That's why even though he's not smoking defenses with 25-foot haymakers, the Hawks' offense is 6.5 points per 100 possessions better this postseason while he's on the floor. Keeping defenses honest is an essential part of the job in today's NBA. This season, no one did it better than Korver, who possessed the highest respect rating in the NBA. What's respect rating? It's a composite metric that combines STATS LLC's gravity and distraction scores provided to ESPN Insider that quantifies how much a player pulls his defender toward him while he's off the ball. Using SportVU cameras in every arena, STATS LLC took a stab at figuring out who was the best at keeping defenses honest and Korver tops the list. This season, Korver registered a 99.8 score, just passing Golden State's splash brothers Curry and Klay Thompson. The others near the top of the list includes some sharpshooters (Kevin Martin) and some ball-dominant lone stars (Kobe Bryant and Carmelo Anthony). But no one stretched it quite like Korver. 'Respect Rating' Leaders, 2014-15 Regular Season PLAYER TEAM RATING K. Korver ATL 99.8 S. Curry GSW 99.6 K. Thompson GSW 99.4 J. Harden HOU 99.2 K. Martin MIN 98.8 K. Bryant LAL 98.6 Mo Williams CHA 98.3 D. Lillard POR 98.2 M. Ginobili SAS 98.0 C. Anthony NYK 97.7 This is where Korver makes his case for being one of the most impactful players in the game. But he's not camping out on the perimeter as much this postseason. Check out the activity heat maps provided to ESPN Insider from NBASavant.com. http://a.espncdn.com/combiner/i?img=%2Fgraphics%2F2015%2F0320%2Finsider_korverchart_md_576x324.jpg&w=570 The two maps look similar, but as you can see, Korver has spent more time on the elbows inside the arc rather than in the corners where he's most effective. This might be an indication that he's finding it more difficult to fight around screens in the postseason, but he should be behind the arc more. His average speed in the postseason (4.3 mph) is the same exact rate as in the regular season, so it's not true that he's idly standing around more these days. However, he can't just be a spacer if he wants to win a championship. He needs to produce, especially in this Cleveland series. And he hasn't done that when a certain player has joined him on the court. The Schröder effect Here's another game for you. Guess these two players: PLAYER PTS REB AST FG% 3FG% PER Player A 12.0 5.0 2.7 42.9 38.6 14.1 Player B 7.7 4.6 1.4 27.3 26.7 6.4 Pencils down. Any guesses? Trick question! It's the same player. Both lines come from Korver's per-36-minutes averages this postseason except Player A is Korver playing without point guard Dennis Schröder and Player B is Korver playing with Schröder. Look at that disparity. Korver has morphed from a sharpshooter into a D-League player when Schröder is the one running the offense. And it's hurt the team. This postseason, the Hawks are plus-104 when Korver plays without Schröder and a minus-25 when he plays with the young point guard. Why is that? The obvious: Schröder is young and inexperienced. The German point guard often tabbed as "Baby Rondo" is just 21 years old and toeing the playoff waters for essentially the first time. Nonetheless, Atlanta coach Mike Budenholzer has trusted Schröder with about 20 minutes per game in the postseason, including some key crunch-time opportunities as starter Jeff Teaguelooks on from the bench. A closer look shows how Schröder struggles to find Korver on the wing. Schröder is the most high-volume driver in the NBA, averaging 15.1 drives per 36 minutes here in the playoffs, per NBA.com player-tracking data. That can help suck the defense into the paint area, but he's often prone to putting his head down and forcing shots. Other times Schröder just loses his cool in the open court. Take a look at this play from Game 1 against Washington. Schröder pushes the ball in the open court and forces a pass to DeMarre Carroll with Korver in the corner. After the ball sails away, you can see Korver giving Schröder the "calm down" motion. And here's another. Instead of taking his time and handing the ball off to the trailing Korver for the transition 3, Schröder decides to make an almost impossible pass and throws the ball away. That transition 3 is Korver's bread-and-butter. To see this in the data, consider that Korver and Schröder have played together for 149 minutes this postseason and Korver has made just four baskets off of Schröder passes, all coming behind the arc where he's shooting 26.7 percent on Schröder feeds. Korver has found much better luck getting looks and knocking down shots from his other teammates. According to STATS LLC's tough shot score that factors in shot distance, defender distance, speed and other shot variables, the level of difficulty of Korver's shots has been higher when Schröder is his point guard (66.6 out of 100) compared to Teague (63.0 out of 100). Simply put, life is easier for Korver and the Hawks when Schröder is on the bench. But Budenholzer has curiously upped Schröder's playing time next to Korver this postseason from 30 percent of the sharpshooter's minutes in the regular season to 33 percent now. Cleveland hopes that continues. Cleveland kryptonite? Korver has struggled against Cleveland this season. He averaged just 7.8 points in four regular-season matchups, his worst output against an Eastern Conference team. The Hawks did just fine, however, winning three of the four games; the only loss came Nov. 15, way back when Anderson Varejao and Dion Waiters played big minutes for Cleveland. To illustrate how different the Cleveland roster is now, consider that the Cavs player who has defended the most Korver shots this season is rookie Joe Harris -- who has been glued to their bench in the playoffs. J.R. Smith will likely get the assignment in this series, but it takes an entire village to account for Korver. It's true that Korver hasn't gotten as many open looks this postseason. The average defender on his catch-and-shoots has stood just 4.4 feet away this postseason, compared to 5.5 feet in the regular season, per SportVU tracking. If he breaks free, the Hawks will have a much better shot at topping James and the Cavaliers. But Smith might not be the Korver stopper anyway. So far this postseason, it's been his own teammate Schröder, who has kept the All-Star in check.

How about this for a technicality?

When asked for a game 1 prediction last night on NBA Tonight, he said Hawks win because LeBron always loses the 1st game then turns it on. Believe he was talking about Conference finals, but I could be wrong. Either way, He already has his built in excuse. If the Cavs win, he can just turn around and say "Wow, Bron even won Game 1 against the Hawks". Pretty convenient.

Not sure if all the pics/GIFs will translate but if not, here is the link: http://grantland.com/the-triangle/2015-nba-conference-finals-preview/ Lowe actually watches all the NBA teams so his analysis is actually valuable IMO. Surprised he doesn't mention how important a reincarnated Korver could be more but still a good preview. WC preview is also included. He picks GSW in 5. SCOTT CUNNINGHAM/NBAE VIA GETTY IMAGE Atlanta-Cleveland The biggest question in a series between two wheezing teams with injury issues and thinned-out benches is simple: Which lineups do Cleveland’s co-coaches want to play? Timofey Mozgov and Tristan Thompson logged exactly zero minutes together in the one game Cleveland and Atlanta played after David Griffin, the Cavs GM, saved the team’s season by nabbing Mozgov, Iman Shumpert, and J.R. Smith in one mega-transaction.6 Those two bludgeoned Chicago with offensive rebounds, and they could do the same against a smallish Atlanta team that ranked just 22nd in defensive rebounding rate.7 Mozgov has never been better at protecting the rim, and Thompson has the speed to scamper around the perimeter with Paul Millsap. But the Cavs have zippo spacing on the pick-and-roll with Thompson and Mozgov crowding the paint. There are no lanes for driving or passing. Against Chicago, LeBron reverted to a kind of state-of-nature basketball: lazy one-on-one jumpers and bulldozing post-ups that made Jimmy Butler look overmatched. DeMarre Carroll can hound LeBron one-on-one as well as almost anyone outside San Antonio, but no wing player can deal with him in the post. That kind of bully-ball is just brutally difficult work for LeBron relative to conducting spread pick-and-rolls — another cost of going super-big, and a reminder of what the Cavs lost when Kelly Olynyk hit Kevin Love with his finishing move. No single event of the last three months had a greater impact on the championship picture. Atlanta defanged that pick-and-roll attack in their last meeting by blitzing James and Irving: Playing that way is a gamble with Kevin Love spotting up. The rotations get longer, and Love’s shooting makes defenders think twice about helping away from him. There is no time for such reflection against a LeBron James offense. Pause and you die. Everything is easier for Atlanta with Thompson in Love’s place amid a double-big lineup. The Hawks don’t have the size of a classic great defense, but they make up for it with speed, precision, and dogged effort. They’ll smother the ball with extra bodies, and when you swing it to the other side, they’ll meet you there on the catch. Shrink the distance they have to cover, and the Hawks can lock you in a vise grip. Going big also makes it hard for the Cavs to hide a gimpy Kyrie Irving from Jeff Teague. Irving might be able to survive against Carroll after guarding another canny shooter-cutter type (Mike Dunleavy Jr.) for parts of the Chicago series, but that would leave LeBron on either Korver or Teague. LeBron can handle both — duh — but they are the kinds of taxing assignments he typically absorbs for only a few crunch-time possessions. But Irving’s defense is going to be a problem. He has issues navigating picks when he’s healthy, and Atlanta can slice you apart if Teague gashes the paint and draws help. Teague has to amp up his score-first aggressiveness if the Cavs guard him with Irving or Matthew Dellavedova — just as he did in the last round when John Wall was out. Dellavedova battles, but Teague is just too quick and crafty for either of them, and the Hawks should let Teague attack one-on-one — without a screener to clutter things up: Going smaller, with LeBron at power forward, could juice the offense and make it a bit easier for Cleveland to rejigger the matchups on defense — though hiding Irving would require LeBron to suck it up and take Millsap for big minutes. Lineups featuring Irving, Shumpert, Smith, James, and one of Mozgov and Thompson have killed it in the playoffs on both sides of the ball, per NBA.com. Shumpert could guard Teague, Irving would slide to Carroll, and LeBron would battle one of the league’s most well-rounded big men. Some of those matchups are still dicey; Irving is a minus defender against anyone, and the notion of a spaced-out ball-watcher like J.R. Smith tracking Korver’s dragonfly flitting is enough to induce a panic attack.8 But a small lineup with Thompson at center opens the door to the kind of mass switching that can simplify defense for a rickety team. Mozgov and Thompson are good defenders, but scooting around the perimeter against Horford, Millsap, and Pero Antić stretches any traditional big man to his breaking point. Cleveland in March had Mozgov lunging out on pick-and-rolls involving Horford, and it went poorly: The point of defending like that is to make sure Mozgov stays close to Horford — to prevent an open pick-and-pop jumper. But Horford and Millsap are uncanny at reading those hard traps, slipping into open space, and sucking in extra defenders. The Hawks can get a decent midrange jumper whenever they want. Those kinds of cuts (and Teague splits) are how they start the machine moving toward something better. The peak Hawks, whom we haven’t really seen since the last time these two teams played, get you in rotation and whip the ball around until they find the juiciest open shot. It might be safer to drop down, wall off Teague’s drive, and scurry back toward Millsap and Horford before they can uncork jumpers. They can both pump-and-drive against that kind of defense, but if the Hawks beat you making a bunch of plays like this, you tip your cap: Getting switchy provides a simpler answer. It could also create some ugly mismatches, but a speedy lineup is better equipped to send emergency help — fast. It’s also the easiest way to blanket Korver without a single lockdown defender, other than LeBron, suited to the job. Going with Heat-style small ball would also force Atlanta into a dilemma on the other end: Do you match up position-by-position and let Millsap guard James, or keep Carroll on him — and hide Millsap on someone like Shumpert? Atlanta has preferred keeping Carroll on LeBron, but Shumpert has enough pep in his step to take bigger guys like Millsap off the bounce. Millsap isn’t the typical big guy, though; he’s fast, with genius tap-dancing footwork, and he could hang with Shump. But he can also slide around with LeBron, and Atlanta in the middle of the Brooklyn series decided to keep things basic and just have Millsap guard opposing small-ball 4s — first Joe Johnson, and then, against the Wizards, Paul Pierce. Millsap has been comfortable switching onto LeBron in the past, and he has even swiped the ball from the King with his cat-burglar hands. Taking Carroll away from LeBron would free him to guard Irving — a move Atlanta made in the one head-to-head game LeBron sat out. Teague’s defense comes and goes, and if Irving has his zip back, the Hawks would do well to spot Teague some time away from the ball. Putting Carroll on Irving also suffocates the dreaded LeBron-Irving pick-and-roll, since Carroll and Millsap could simply switch an action specifically designed to punish switches. Look, the Cavs are going to do a bit of everything, and all of these decisions get much easier once these teams dip into their sad benches. James Jones does no harm as a small-ball power forward if he has Antić or Mike Muscala9 to guard, and Kent Bazemore will defend Irving when LeBron rests. The NYPD made sure Bazemore would be a key figure in this series as Carroll’s deputy chief on LeBron, but Bazemore just isn’t big enough to deal with James in the post. The Hawks have missed Thabo Sefolosha since the night of his injury, but they’ll feel his absence most here. We’ll see Teague and Dennis Schröder play together; Dellavedova tailing Korver; and a ton of chess-playing with matchups. At the end of the day, you lean on your best lineups. We know what that is for Atlanta: one of the most polished starting fives in the league. We don’t know what it is for Cleveland, and the answer might change multiple times in this series. It is hard to trust either of these teams. Atlanta has been off for two months, and its bench has been a disaster. Cleveland is even shallower, Irving is hurt, and every basket against Chicago was such goddamned hard work. The Cavs have limped across the finish line in a lot of their playoff wins against broken and overmatched opponents. It feels like a toss-up, and Irving’s health is a huge unknown — and possibly the decisive factor in the series. But he says he’s a go in Game 1, and he finished strong against Chicago. I hovered fretfully between “Cavs in six” and “Hawks in seven,” but if Irving can rise to the occasion, then the league’s best overall player should have just enough weapons at his disposal to eke this out. Prediction: Cavs in six

The ball was clearly in his hand but the funniest thing is people who say "they JUST should have counted it". LMAO That's not how this works! Also, had a coworker tell me that we ALMOST lost game 6 on that shot. I remind him that he only would've tied it and he said well of course they would have come back to win. Mind you, he assured me the Wizards would win Game 6 by double digits after we got lucky in game 5. The truth is if not for Pierce's GW shot, we win this in 5. That's much more realistic than this narrative that we we "this close" to losing in 7.