Spurs

To be fare, Wilbon is a Chicago writer and a Bulls fan. He does give credit to the Hawks, but it isn't gushing.

In all honesty, the Hawks must win two playoff series to get national respect. Frankly, that is the way it should be. The regular is about setting your dance card. The playoffs show your metal.

mettle

I agree with that , but I will say this , Bud will be the guy to take that title from Pop

I hope, when Bud comes back and leads the spurs after pop retires. lol

@Spurs

You do realize this is a HAWKS board?

You do right?

Pretty much. I'm just debating that in no shape or form can someone say Bud is better than Pop. Not even Bud can. 

I still think is a top 3 coach though. 

Injuries? Injuries, how dare you mention injuries here, we had our fill last year and nobody cared not even some of our own fans :-(.

During the offseason I said the hawks were a good team and losing Al was a huge setback and they had a good record with him and they kept saying the hawks were barely ahead of anyone and I cosigned all the moves and I'm not even a hawks fan. I do cheer for ya though. 

We've played and beaten almost all of those teams, many of them in their house, in December and January. In fact we have zero losses against any of those teams. 

I don't know if you understand 11 games in 16 days vs all great teams when we are heavily depleted with injuries is insane. 

I'm not talking about beaten those things with a healthy team in a reasonable amount of time. 

He's for sure better than overrated Thibs and Rivers. 

Thibs wears out his teams for regular season victories and then they fall apart in the playoffs. I'm not to big on that guy. 

I don't know if he's doing a better job than Bud especially knowing the Hawks history. It's the 2nd year of the system where the Spurs are already a well oiled machine even with missing parts. Al is still working his way back into shape and relearning to play with Millsap, have you seen Thabo shoot to start the season, we have a bench a no name bench, a 2nd year backup 21yr old PG. We are undersized. The East is weak, but we've traveled out West and beaten all comers except the Spurs :-(.

:D Both teams are doing great given their respective situations. 

I don't know where I read that strength of schedule bit but I can't find it anymore.

Anyways this was a small part of their december schedule.

12/14 - @ Denver
12/15 - @ Portland
12/17 - vs Memphis
12/19 - vs Portland
12/20 - @ Dallas
12/22 - vs LA Clippers
12/25 - vs OKC
12/26 - @ New Orleans
12/28 - vs Houston
12/30 - @ Memphis

12/31 - vs New Orleans 

Pretty tough in a small amount of time. 

Pop has a 23-15 record with kawhi out almost all the year, parker injured just as much, tiago out for a good portion, patty out until like 2 weeks ago, resting manu and tim as much as possible and on some B2Bs and playing a top 3 hardest schedule to date. I think Pop is doing a greater job than Bud but that's just me. 

I read where Pop said that seeing Tony's play for France at some international tourny where he was playing like we see now (think France win). Pop told him he needed him to be THAT guy. TP was lije what about Timmy? Pop was like no worries.

I guess it's similar to when he told Kawhi forget TD, TP and Manu in last years final.

Pop going to Pop. 

As I mentioned a couple posts ago, how would Pop have this current Hawks squad? Would they be better than we are now? I truly don't think so. 

Pop in the east? I'd say even better.The whole media and basketball pundits would be calling this team a championship team. 

Let's not act like Pop is some perfect God of a coach.  I'm sure every one remembers the epic meltdown he had in Game 6 of the Finals 2 years ago.  I just watched him cost the Spurs a game against the Pistons last week. 

 

Spurs had missed 5 of 7 FTs late in the game.  They were still up 3 with 9 seconds left and Detroit was inbounding the ball.  Pop inexplicably calls for an intentional foul on Jodie Meeks who is a 93% FT shooter.  He makes both of them and the Pistons are down by 1.  They steal the inbounds pass and Jennings takes it for a game winning layup. 

 

Why on earth would you ever intentionally foul an automatic FT shooter in that spot.  It would clearly turn the game in to a FT shooting contest and your team had missed 5 of their last 7.  Just a terrible decision and it cost the Spurs a game.

Who even put them there in the first place? Who won it all last year with the most loopsided series ever in history and for the whole playoffs too. Who has 5 rings as head coach in the modern era?

You're talking about regular season games where Pop experiments and has always won 50plus games including a lock out season and went 37 and 13 in another lockout in 99 and won a title? You talking to me about regular season games? As a spurs fan, regular season games aren't much to talk about unless you haven't had much playoff success. We could careless if Pop uses his 2 point guard line-ups in the regular season. He experiments with his rotations and play calling. Do you understand that?

I honestly wouldn't put any coach outside of Pop ahead of Bud. Rivers and Thibs are so insanely overrated it's not even funny. Of course Pop has been doing this a lot longer but you gotta remember that about halfway through Bud's time there they completely changed their style of play to this pace and space model and who's to say that wasn't Bud's influence? 

Until you actually bring some proof to the table, that's just homerism at best. 

Bud better than Pop? Are you serious? My god the over reaction. He is behind Pop and Carlisle no doubt though. Number 3 for me in the league. Multiple rings as head honcho and at least 20 years of 50plus winning seasons in a loaded conference and like 10 conference finals at least. Then we'll talk about his legacy. Pretty high up there though. 

Go back and check out the Thabo signing thread...ur right only about 10% of us thought he'd be a great addition ;-) while 90% hated....I just think many people didnt even know his game but just wanted to blindly comment.

Can I get an amen?

You have a championship coach. Listen to that guy. Not the one that wants to be entertained and have someone shoot tons of shots and move away from the ball movement and team basketball concept that got you here. He just said detroit is one of the most talented teams in the league. WTF? Seriously?

I told ya guys this guy is the real deal. No knuckheads allowed. Winning cures all. 

I believe it is:

 

Chicago

Cleveland

Indiana

Miami

Washington

Charlotte

Atlanta

Orlando

 

 

You might flip flop us and Charlotte, but I think they are better

People underestimate the powers of depth. You'll see that this coming season. 

Im dont think so, I believe the other teams have improved to the point we have fallen behind, that is why is was important to add a piece like a Deng on the wing and we did not do that.  Thabo may or may not come back as a decent player and Bazemore is just really young.  If we had signed Deng I could have seen a top 3 finish.

The other teams are all trash besides miami cleveland and maybe chicago. They aren't even that great either. All the other teams are pretenders though. If there was a year to make some noise, it's this year. 

I agree and I've seen some recent comments by Harden that were no team oriented, lol.  D12 is just a crybaby period.  Losing Parsons will hurt that team alot imo.  

 

Over the years I have noticed that the success of a team on the court is a steady handed veteran PG.  Not a lot of the teams around have that situation and I hope in the future that Dennis will grow into that.  Ultimately Bud has put a great system in for the Hawks that always makes the team competitive although we have less talent.  

Coach Bud changed the whole system in one year. Wow. People don't give him enough credit. He also lost his best player for most of the season. Having a healthy squad and 1 year under his belt, I see a top 3 finish. 

Lance is a scrub. 

The year they beat us in the 2nd round.  If you gave Bud or Thibs Indiana's talent, it would be all over!

Bud has tons of rings. He could make that Indiana team beat the heat. 

I put Bud second too. Has thibs even gone to an ECF?

Hawks ball movement is not gimmicky. They were just not the better team. That's fine. Keep working the system and the team will get better. Continuity is a thing the spurs rely on along with player development. The hawks will get better as long as everyone is healthy.