NBASupes

No coach works with Trae Young. His defense shatters your defensive integrity. Most players like him never sniff the NBA but he's so insanely good on offense, you almost just write it off as cost of having an once in a generation offensive engine. He makes old ass good coaches like Nate look good.

To marginalize him to chucker status especially in his prime is disingenuous. Especially as a Hawk fan who had the likes of Jordan Crawford, Kent Bazemore, J.R. Rider, Glenn Robinson, and Flip Murray. A.I. was much better on both ends than you are giving him a lack of credit for.

When that happens, you will see that player likely flourish unless it's Bogi. He's pretty much going to be the same no matter what.

That's great to hear.

Trae has the Reggie Miller assassin mindset and personality. Aka, the Joker. Both are capable of elevating their games to levels unseen in regular situations. This is why Reggie is an elite playoff player but in the RS, he made the All Star team less than Iso Joe. Trae's defense was at the same level in last year's playoff as Bogi. We didn't have to protect him anywhere close to what we did during the RS and this year, we have to protect him to an extreme degree. When Trae said, the RS is boring. That was the same mindset Reggie had. Assassins are showman. They want the spotlight. They live for it. Because of this, RS Trae might as well be a completely different player than playoff Trae. He has time to download you like Reggie did. He sees you often. He knows everything you like. When he's focus, he's deadeye. Because of this, our ceiling raises with Trae the same way Philly drops with Simmons in the playoffs. But yeah, you are right to a degree. If this was Trae in the playoffs, we would have ZERO shot of winning a title ever. Trae is made with the right stuff, sadly, we need it for the RS as well. I honestly think TS had a great plan how to build around Trae but as time goes, you learn more and more about your players. As do your opponents.

His defense has been ass all year. Not just yesterday. Yesterday was the point of no return. Fans finally could see, this is Trae's fault. He might not be OU bad anymore but OU is college Basketball and their schemes can protect bad defenders. This is the NBA, you will get expose somehow, some way.

Iverson won defensive player of the year in the Big East. He was miles better than Trae on that end. Iverson is an isolation engine. Because he doesn't make others better and he struggled to share the offensive load with others, they had to commit to an all defense squad and landing the best defensive player in the NBA at that time which was Deke. They tried to get so many guys to play with A.I. too. Even in his trade to Denver, Denver got worse because of the deal. Trae doesn't have that issue. His offensive impact is just a lot more massive than even A.I. this year. He doesn't have issues sharing, especially with bigs throughout his career. See the Parker/Jones era with Trae. Also was miles better defensively. He had a plus +5 wingspan. He played the passing lanes at an elite level. His off ball defense was million times better than Trae. He died on screens like Trae did, just not to the extreme as Trae. 1v1 and POA, he wasn't much of a defender as the effort wasn't there for it on most nights. What I am saying is, you can do that with A.I. and it works. You can't with Trae. Doesn't work for him on offense and it doesn't work on defense. I seen him play with Iwundu. Probably one of the best wing defenders we had since Augmon eye test wise and he was covering for Trae left and right. His defense got killed for us even though he was impressive eye test wise. Trae been average on defense and maybe better in the playoffs. His defense was on the same level with Bogi in the playoffs but he doesn't play defense in the regular season. His commitment just isn't there on that end. He puts his teammates in compromising positions possession after possession. I honestly don't believe putting nothing but defense is the answer unless they have very good offense as well. Ability to score all three levels. Can make plays on for themselves and others on the ball. Can score in the post and stretch the floor as a big. We played with a lot of defensive players with the G-leagers and our offense looked poorus and we still had a bad defense. I don't see what worked for Billy King and Philadelphia as the best option for us.

The data is there when Trae doesn't play. When Trae plays, of course the data isn't there because they have to account for him. I watch this too much. When I was calling Josh Smith out for his lack of offensive decision making skills on the ball as well as thinking he's more skilled than he is causing his offensive inconsistency, I got nothing but negative feedback (He's just young, look at this game, etc). Years later, you couldn't find a single Hawk fan that didn't share that opinion of Josh Smith. Sometimes fans don't want to accept the truth till it's near the end of his time. The offense falls off a cliff whenever Trae is off the court and whenever we play without Trae, our offense barely looks NBA level. That's actually proven by data. I can post stats all day but what's the point, someone will make excuses. Well, just don't have a PG when Trae's not in instead of just admitting, offensively, this team is trash. Trae is so freaking good, he's like a LeBron. By himself, he turns your offense into the shit. Trae is Basketball's Maradona. Nate sees Cam's potential. Not sure everyone his staff does and wasn't sure before yesterday, I am even stronger in that opinion now. They play the same style as Indiana. We kinda played like it last year but we had a lot of LP system details. We stopped spanming some of LP's favorite plays this year but truth is. We still run a lot of LP's plays. Just blended some of Nate's. This system is less about generating corner 3s and more about all around offense. We use the mid range more than anyone with Chicago and we are good at it. We are elite at 3% percentage but we don't take a lot compared to LP where we spammed threes and LP valued that. Trae added some elements as well and he's developed under Nate to become the best offensive weapon in the NBA. The regression of others isn't really a regression. This is what Bogi been every year other than the 2nd half of last year. Kev made a jump last year in the 2nd half and really hasn't fallen outside of the early games this year where him and Cam came off the bench. Cam has improved production wise this year on the offensive end. Regardless of what some think on here, I still believe energy bigs plus Jokic benefitted from the late COVID season last year and their production maybe disingenuous. Like all of these bigs had a year that nearly doubled in production from their norm. I find that odd. Even we are seeing teams handle these players with ease this year in contrast to last year. The defense isn't much different. It's pretty much the same. They gave up way too many open 3s last year, especially the post Reddish/Hunter pairings. The ball rolled right for us. It's like the Grizzlies in the last 26 games. I don't believe this is a testament to how good we were. Last year, the playoffs were real. We see a lot of the issues we had in the playoffs, in the RS with the exception of chemistry was just clicking, it hasn't clicked all year for us. That's probably the biggest difference. When LP got fired, chemistry came instantly. Before that, we had chemistry issues as well. Remember the JC doesn't like playing with Trae rumors which were farce.

He worked on his conditioning before the COVID year. Remember the LA trip with Kev and the boys.

Why do you think they played him like that? It's because in the sped up season, teams bearly had time to gameplan for teams. Bigs who weren't energy barely could move. Wings who tend to be one dimensional are decent at their one dimension again. I don't see how you don't notice this. Even Trae is benefiting as he's not as tired this year and you see him just killing teams in areas he was struggling last year.

Randle was All NBA last year. It wasn't just us who he played extremely well against last year. I heard several on here say, they don't recall Capela on the perimeter much last year. It's true, he wasn't, teams wasn't bringing in wings to play 5 against him like they are doing this year. I clearly think there is a massive difference between the sped up season defense of last year and this year's back to normal style. Lesser players was bricking their ass off this year, now I see them making threes again in general.

I was looking at the top 3 offensive teams of the last 15 years. We are the only team in that with a losing record with Portland 2019-20. That team had Nurk for only the last 8 games (Bubble), had severe defensive personnel issues and still made the playoffs. It doesn't look good for us. What we are doing is rare air. COVID hurt that as Nate mentioned before the road trip started.

Do they really stink? They only give up 102 ppg without Trae playing. If they stink, they would be similar with or without Trae. I really think we underestimate how bad his defense is as Hawk fans. The idea that any player is going to come in here and have elite impact with Trae might be a massive reach. We go through lulls. Especially without Trae on the court when he's playing that game. With him, when teams say Trae is not going to beat us. We fall apart. At times, Trae is just so good, they still can't do anything about it but teams like LA who do have the personnel, are usually successful at it. The coach last night was trash. That's neither here or there but this season, our offense has been special till they go to shutdown Trae as an engine and our offense falls apart. That's not typical of top 10 offensive teams much less top 3 offensive teams like us. Trae is a gem. Offensively, he has a chance to be GOAT but defensively, he's clearly WOAT.

The effort of late, not last night of course, looks similar to last year when we were winning. Teams just aren't missing shots like they did last year against us and maybe the sped up season boosted bigs like Gobert, Capela, and Jokic so much that it created an unrealistic expectation for all of these players. Hell, I think it boosted Randle as well. I think energy bigs with size vastly benefited from the sped up NBA and this year, we are seeing the real them.

Capela is not Draymond. He's not the QB of the defense. JC is. Capela is the last line of defense. What do you want JC to do? Trae isn't the best at taking criticism. JC loves his touches too. At some point, we gotta understand, Trae is Steve Jobs, a genius but damned if you do, damned if you don't.

He's always had a below average defensive rating. He generally gives up too many open 3s. He did last year as well. Teams did a lot of bricking in the 2nd half of the season but in the 1st half when he was playing in those games before he got hurt, he was getting roasted. Marcus Smart will fight Trae before the season is over if he was a Hawk. Those two will be at it from the jump. Ya'll really underestimate how trash Trae is defensively in the RS. When I say he's the worst to ever do it, that's significant. That's not RealGM trolling or hating.

Metrics say the Hawks are a top 3 offense with a bottom 5 defense. I've watched nearly every game over the last 3 years as have most of us on here and I am here to say, we are a solid defensive team who's terrible offensively. Now the metrics read the way they do because there is one player with massive impact in both areas who's are superstar in Trae Young but I have to judge without him because with him, you get blinded. Our defense is solid. In fact, I would say actually good. We have Wright who's a good defensive PG. Cam and Hunter are very talented defenders and even if Cam has his issues impact wise on that end, it's hard to find guys as talented on that end as him. Bogi and Kevin are average defenders. Maybe not to be consider two-way players but most definitely can be considered guys who can play on both ends and hold their own. TLC is TLC, smart heady defender who knows where he needs to be and is aggressive on that end. Lou is awful and washed and shouldn't play. Coop is raw. Mays is decent on that end. Our bigs with the exception of Gallo are very good and some of the best in the NBA. JC one of the best defensive PFs in the NBA. He's no Green or close that but he's smart, active, communicates, is generally in good spots, and works hard on that end. Capela is a defensive star and our anchor Okongwu is our most talented defender on the roster. Has a chance to be really special on that end while being solid offensively. Dieng is solid defensively. JC has turned himself into a Paul Millsap level player. There is a reason why without Trae, we only are giving up 101ppg. Offensively, we are awful. Do we have talent? Yes but let's break it down. At PG, we are a heliocentric offense at our core, of course Wright has no heliocentric abilities. He cannot operate as the ball handler in this system. Not possible. He needs to be in a player movement system. That's his game. Coop is raw but talented, needs seasoning for now. The wings are talented, and the more talented, the further away from impact. Kev and Bogi are typical 4th, 5th, and 6th options offensively on teams around the league. Which is solid to be honest but no team is using any of these two as anything more. Both provide solid offense impact wise. Hunter and Reddish are the most talented offensive players on the roster outside of Trae but both impact wise are depressing. It's fair to say both have been below average offensive players but Cam has produced at a solid level overall on this end, just very inconsistent. Both need to bloom but they show flashes whereas Bogi and Kev give you consistent production at a solid level. The bigs are below average at this stage outside of JC on average. JC is our best player on the team outside of Trae and best offensive player as well outside of Trae. He's a very good offensive player. I will say, he can produce at a very good level offensively with or without Trae but with Trae, it's a lot easier for him. A LOT easier. Capela is an average offensive center. He does somethings at an elite level. Screening, offensive rebounding, rolling, activity, and playing with high BBIQ. On the other end, can't shoot, FT's are awful, passing is tragic, bad hands, post skills is tragic, not a reliable offensive option unless you got a PG who can spoon feed him. Okongwu is below average offensively but he's talented enough to be solid and maybe even good in the future. He doesn't have any offensive flaws but he doesn't do anything outside of finishing alleys at a high clip at this stage. The talent is there, just needs more seasoning. Dieng is also below average offensively. He does something very well but for the most part, he doesn't have any impact offensively on the game. Gallo is a shell of himself. He can still shoot and can still post up but he takes a lot of time with the ball in his hands and more times than not, nothing good happens. Just a wasted possession. When you look at this team, is this really a playoff team without Trae. No, but this is a good defensive team. Trae is so good on offense and so bad on team, he has a tendency to positively and negatively impact a team. I think it's clear, we have offensive issues. When teams sell out to take away Trae, this above is what you gotta take into account. We need to upgrade the team offensively. It's not good. We shouldn't let Trae's ATG offensive game delude us. That said, we gotta take into account how Trae plays. Wings don't get touches like that with Trae. That's been the case every year for Trae. Bogi damn near had to be added in to run the offense just to get him the min touches he needed which was 40-45 per36. Bigs get touches from Trae. Even Damian Jones and Bruno had their share of touches with Trae. We just need to think about these things. I don't like following data when my eyes are telling me a different story. My eyes are telling me this offense is trash and it's Trae that's otherworldly. My eyes are also saying Trae is 100% the issue on defense and I don't think you can blame our defenders. I actually think we got a good defensive squad, Trae aside. When he doesn't play and we are giving up 101ppg. That's notable. TS talks about changing expectations but he should have been realistic. The offense in the playoffs was garbage. This team is what that are but the data isn't accurate at all. It doesn't tell you what this team is. This team is unlike the Woody/LD era Hawks were the data said Atlanta is exactly what they are. This team is nothing like what the data reads. This team is ass-backwards.

That Blazers offense was legit. Atlanta offense is fugazi. Blazers offense shined when the game mattered most. To start and the 4th quarter. Our offense is merely average in those moments. Teams knew when you played the Blazers, make sure you dont have it close in the 4th. When teams play us, they look forward to the 4th quarter.

I want TS to get KAT, Embiid, Jokic, or Sabonis. We need someone that's a big that can make teams pay for selling out on Trae. Our offense literally goes from elite to merely average when it matters most. That has to change

We have been a horrendous transition defense since Buds last year in Atlanta. This is normal for us when we have so many live ball turnovers.

Trae is better and worse defensively. He's a capable defender. The issue is, Trae rarely puts energy defensively in the regular season. His off ball defense was actually solid in the playoffs and he avoided getting screened like he had the holy ghost in the playoffs as well. Nash on the other hand was always the same. Terrible POA defender. Terrible man defender. Suprising decent PnR defender. Very good help side defender. A positive team defender. It's fair to say Nash has always been a superior RS defender to Trae and even younger, he was superior. Nash knew the fundamentals of defense. He lacked the ability to guard anyone due to his lack of lateral quickness and physical attributes. Nash defense was about to less is more. The old man defense against the young bucks. Trae is like, defense takes too much energy and i don't have a lot and I dont really care for it or good at it so i will focus on what i do and have the others help just in case. He also doesn't have good defense awareness during the RS and ball watches a lot. Nash really wasn't a ball watcher at all.

There always was a sense of urgency from the coaches last year. Nate would bench Trae if he felt Trae was playing too wild as he did yesterday. Now he's limit that greatly this year but defensively. It's been WOAT shit from Trae and it hurts his wings more than anyone No one is fixing the problem which is defense until Trae gives a shit about defense. He's like Zion last year for the Pels. He causes his defense to rotate so much to protect him that the integrity of the defense is shattered. The difference is, Zion could play some help self and use his athleticism to get some occasional positive plays. Defense is just the worst I've seen. His man defense isn't bad on average but his PnR defense is the worst in the NBA and during the RS, his off ball defense is trash outside of the first three games each season and the playoffs where he gives a shit on that end. It's not a shock, in the games without Trae playing, we were keeping teams at 101 ppg. With Trae, the last time a team didn't score 130+ points was our Orlando win. I been saying this for years. I don't believe Trae has tremendous stamina. I believe he puts so much energy in offensively, that he just doesn't have much for anything else. Watching him and John Wall when I was a WAS season ticket holder is so similar. Trae is obviously better than Wall but some of their issues are similar. Makes me wonder how well Trae game is going to age once he passes his prime. I disagree about the points. I think with Sabonis, he completely opens up our offense. I actually believe he can unlock Cam and Hunter as well where they can get them AD to Melo passes that they just never get from our bigs who dont demand coverage when they have the rock from the defense outside of their man in particular.

Now the bench is: Wright/Bogi/Kev/Open/Capela Let's say is Craig from Indy. Wright/Bogi/Kev/Craig/Capela That 2nd unit now has a lot of defense, shooting, guys who can handle the rock, and Capela to split with Sabonis. I like this trade idea. I think it helps. Capela and Sabonis are carbon copies but vice versa. Capela is an average offensive player with severe flaws while being a defensive star. Sabonis is an average defensive player with physical limitations while being an offensive star. I like it.

The more I think about it, I think Sabonis would help us more than I even though at first. The biggest issue we have is our defensive unit: Trae/Cam/Dre/JC/Capela Dre gets the ball, he analyzes. Ball movement basically stops. We already don't have much player movement outside of JC. Trae standing at the top of the key and Cam is in his rightful position in the corner. Facts: Trae is a win for the D in this spot. The D wins. Cam is always win when there is no movement in this spot for the D. JC cannot create his own shot and Clint clearly cannot create his own shot. At this point, we are at a stalemate. One of the reasons this grouping never worked too well for us even if it looked good on paper. Change Capela with Sabonis. Same thing. Difference is, now we got Sabonis who not only can fight for position, but he can create his own shot in the post but he also draw double teams. So now, even Hunter's man doesn't want the ball in the post. He's playing loose, Hunter kills that coverage and next play, he plays Hunt tight, Hunt goes to Sabonis. Sabonis goes to work 1v1 and easily scores. Now the D is sunked in, this is when Trae can go even more nuts. This actually makes our defensive unit work. The big issue with that unit is the offense stalls out way more than the offense with Kev/Bogi. Sabonis is also one of the best passsing bigs in the NBA. Okongwu has potential to be as good overall and he's a defensive big which by NBA standards of today's game, is WAY more valuable than offensive bigs. That said, with Trae offensive impact and strengths, I think going with an offensive star over defensive star or potential defensive star is better.

My expectation is lower and it's been that way for weeks. I just don't see a path if our offense stalls with the bigs. So much of what we do is Trae+bigs. Like I've said, Trae has little temperament for wings.