Hey Woody!!! That Statement is a bunch of Bull!!!

[TheNorthCydeRises]

Thanks for proving my point sir.

So we're going to be the first team in NBA history, to consistently run without a good PG running the show? If we pulled that off, that would make Wody and BK total geniuses.

You and I both agree that we might turn the corner, once Acie can take full control of this thing. And Salim would also hae to get major minutes, seeing that he's one of the only guys we have that can play fast and stretch the defense with his shootng.

[Traceman]

You can run off made baskets when you can shoot it like those two teams can. Their PGs put so much pressure on the D that they can almost always get an open perimeter shot for one of their wing players, even early in the clock. AJ has been pretty good for us but he is not going to put any pressure on the D because they are afraid of him penetrating and scoring (or dishing). Give us Nash or B Diddy at PG and I think we could run just fine off made baskets. With AJ, not so much.

[exodus]

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Thanks for proving my point sir.

So we're going to be the first team in NBA history, to consistently run without a good PG running the show? If we pulled that off, that would make Wody and BK total geniuses.

You still aren't getting it.

The Hawks aren't going to be contenders with this roster no matter how they play. That is a given.

The question is what style of play will give them the best chance to win right now. Clearly that is an uptempo attack.

The Hawks are one of the better defensive teams in the league, ranking 7th in defensive efficiency last i check.

The Hawks are top 10 in offensive rebounding, fast break points scored and free throws made.

It is their halfcourt execution that is killing them right now. Playing at a fast pace will minimize this problem as much as possible. Slowing it down makes it worse.

[exodus]

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You can run off made baskets when you can shoot it like those two teams can. Their PGs put so much pressure on the D that they can almost always get an open perimeter shot for one of their wing players, even early in the clock. AJ has been pretty good for us but he is not going to put any pressure on the D because they are afraid of him penetrating and scoring (or dishing). Give us Nash or B Diddy at PG and I think we could run just fine off made baskets. With AJ, not so much.

You are missing something. There are two reasons to push after made baskets and you are only addressing one of them, and you aren't addressing it completely.

It is true we don't have shooters but we do have guys who can attack the rim, get to the line and make their free throws. It is easier to attack the basket before the defense gets set. The hawks have done this many times (mainly in the first half) recently.

The other reason to push the ball after made baskets is to have more time on the clock to run a half court offense. Given the hawks lack of execution they need all the time they can get.

[skyhawk]

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It is true we don't have shooters but we do have guys who can attack the rim, get to the line and make their free throws. It is easier to attack the basket before the defense gets set. The hawks have done this many times (mainly in the first half) recently.

The other reason to push the ball after made baskets is to have more time on the clock to run a half court offense. Given the hawks lack of execution they need all the time they can get.

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The reason why it's so difficult to run on a made basket is that the other team WILL have it's defense set no matter how fast/quickly we get up the floor. I do agree with you about maximizing the shot clock as this will definitely help ball movement and shot selection.

[exodus]

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The reason why it's so difficult to run on a made basket is that the other team WILL have it's defense set no matter how fast/quickly we get up the floor.

That isn't always true. Many times opposing bigs are slow to get back and can be outrun by Smith and Horford.

By pushing the ball we could force a defender to match up with someone that they really can't guard.

[Gray Mule]

Question: How did Atlanta get their lead? Not just in

their last game, but in all those recent games where

they had a nice, big lead?

Playing up-tempo. No question. How did the Hawks get

up there in the rankings on fast break points? By

doing exactly what this discussion is about.

It's not always about flying up the floor at a mad pace.

Sometimes it's just about quickly getting across mid

court, making those extra passes, finding the open man

who either shoots the open shot or quickly goes or

passes inside for the score.

When the Hawks offense goes BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!

they usually score and take the lead.

When they sleepwalk up the floor, kill the clock with

someone taking a last second, desperation shot, they

quickly loose the momentum, the lead and the game.

Oh yeah. Got to hit those free throws too. Hawks left

5 points on the line - lost by one. Do the math.

Move it! Move it!! Move it!!! And win.

Not, hurry, the shot clock is expiring - Too bad!

[Traceman]

You make it sound like we can just run down the court an attack the rim and we will get the bucket or get fouled. It is not that simple. If it were, more teams would do it.

More likely, what happens if we try to run off made baskets is that we will run into a packed lane and commit a charge or throw up a wild shot and then the other team rebounds and gets an easy bucket on the other end. Teams are going to pack the lane on us because of our poor perimeter shooting. They already do it now. Almost every team we have played lately has ran some kind of zone against us if we get going offensively to slow us down.

As for us getting the ball up the floor faster so that we can get into our half court offense sooner, I am all for that - of course that assumes that we actually have a half cout offense.

[thesheedera]

Ex isn't asking for breakneck speed all out crazy Nelly ball. Just asking that we continue to force the issue whether we're winning, tied or losing. We played to not lose last night in the final minutes of the game and we lost.

When you play uptempo you don't have to go for the early shot every time - if you get down the court and there's nothing there, you pull it out and set up the offense...but you lose nothing by trying for it.

Even after a made basket the other team will rarely be completely set. 4 out of 5 guys may be in position, but if just one guy isn't set in time you can exploit that and get the team scrambling to help out on other offensive players, and if you CONITINUE TO MOVE THE F-ING BALL AROUND ON OFFENSE you'll find an open man.

Northcyde, you're acting like the only thing in question here is fast breaking. Not only did our pace slow down as our lead dwindled, but our ball movement did as well.

In the final minutes we went to the iso every damn time. We didn't test the defense with passing AT ALL. We relied on our best player who's clearly not 100% to try and win it all without the help of his teammates. That's ridiculous!!!

JJ, AJ, Josh, Marvin, Al, Chilldress and Acie are all good passers and generally smart players (though Smith tests the limits too often for some). With any combination of them on the floor we could surely find better shots than fade away thress at the end of the shot clock with a ahnd in your face.

Completely unacceptable excuse for a game plan in the final minutes of the game. I've never seen anything that looked that sloppy. Even after a timeout we looked clueless.

Something is VERY wrong there.

[thesheedera]

My bad for bringing baggage from other threads into this one, which on further review is more about "running" than I thought when I scanned through it.

One thought that is on topic:

Aj doesn't have much speed and he's got old legs, but he makes excellent decisions when he pushes the ball.

[exodus]

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You make it sound like we can just run down the court an attack the rim and we will get the bucket or get fouled. It is not that simple. If it were, more teams would do it.

First of all that isn't what i am saying. What i am saying is that when you push the ball up after makes you will at least have more shot clock to work with. And you will get easy scores here and there like the Hawks did last night.

This is from the play by play in the 1st quarter of last nights game.

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5:58

[POR 8-14] Webster Driving Dunk Shot: Made (2 PTS)

Assist: Blake (1 AST)

Johnson Jump Shot: Made (6 PTS)

Assist: Johnson (4 AST)

5:51

[ATL 16-8]

7 seconds elapsed

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5:04

[POR 11-16] Blake Jump Shot: Made (2 PTS)

Smith Slam Dunk Shot: Made (5 PTS)

Assist: Johnson (5 AST)

4:59

[ATL 18-11]

Smith dunked 5 seconds after Blake made a jumper. They couldn't do that unless they were pushing the ball after makes. Guess which quarter was their best.

The hawks pattern is clear. In the first half they have been pushing the pace successfully and in the second half they start getting conservative. In the two Portland games they scored 106 pts in the first half and 87 in the second.

The most obvious illustration was back to back games against Chicago and Denver. in the first half the Hawks scored 69 against chicago, but in the second half they scored only 36. Then against Denver they scored 65 in the first half, 39 in the second.

[DrReality]

If we had an offensive scheme that would be a choice between it and running that would be one thing. But we lack a clear offensive plan . . . . . thus running is a great idea.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

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Northcyde, you're acting like the only thing in question here is fast breaking. Not only did our pace slow down as our lead dwindled, but our ball movement did as well.

In the final minutes we went to the iso every damn time. We didn't test the defense with passing AT ALL. We relied on our best player who's clearly not 100% to try and win it all without the help of his teammates. That's ridiculous!!!

JJ, AJ, Josh, Marvin, Al, Chilldress and Acie are all good passers and generally smart players (though Smith tests the limits too often for some). With any combination of them on the floor we could surely find better shots than fade away thress at the end of the shot clock with a ahnd in your face.

Completely unacceptable excuse for a game plan in the final minutes of the game. I've never seen anything that looked that sloppy. Even after a timeout we looked clueless.

Something is VERY wrong there.

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The problem Sheed, is that you guys are equatng our great ball movement with playing fast. That has nothing to do with playing fast. Most good hafcourt offesive teams will move the ball. San Antonio and Detroit move the ball well, but there's no way we would confuse them with playing fast.

When we play fast, one of our guards has the ball maybe 30% of the time. The other times, you have people like Smoove or Horford racing the ball into the frontcourt, then gettng stuck in no man's land, looking to give the ball to AJ or JJ anyway. Then they run the halfcourt offense.

No other team in the history of basketball does it like that. Even the teams that people want us to be ( G State & Phoenix ) don't do it like that. You'll never see Amare or Biendrins racing the ball into the frontcourt after a made shot or a short rebound. Imagine Nash having to run down Marion, to get the ball frm him to set up the halfcourt offese?

If you play defense, it's a totally different story. When we play good defense and force turnovers or long missed jumpers, we can definatey create quick and easy scoring opportunities within 10 seconds. When we rack up the fast break points and/or get quick open shots, it's because of the defense on the other end givng us that opportunity. We rarely get those looks off of pushing the ball after made shots.

If you got that game on tape, re-watch the entire 4th qtr. First off, let me give you a few tidbits:

- Hawks shot 7 - 13 FG in that quarter.

- Hawks also committed 6 TOs ( 7, if you count JJ's foul away from the ball when he ran over James Jones . . . all in the final 9 minutes of the quarter)

- Blazers shot 12 - 18 FG ( they made 12 of their last 16 )

- Blazers made 4 - 6 3FG

- Blazers outscore us 16 - 5 to close the game.

- JJ hit his 19th and final point midway through the period. He didn't attempt another shot until the Blazers cut it to 4 with under 3 to go. He missed his last 2 ( should've been last 3, but there was a shot clock violation on one of them. )

- Hawks went stricty to the JJ isolation, I think, to limit the amount of possessions Portland could possibly get. It had got to the point where we couldn't execute on offense, and couldn't stop them on defense.

The ball movement didn't stop before the Blazers cut it to 4, while in the halfcourt offense. But we didn't execute nearly as well during that quarter, unlike in the first 3 quarters.

[hussamga]

i think some of you guys forget we dont have people who can consistently hit the jumper to run...unlike those west coast teams that are 6-8 deep in shooters... We'd need acie and salim to at least shoot 45% + on jumpers at least..add marvin and joe..maybe..but our roster has too many issues imo.

[thesheedera]

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The problem Sheed, is that you guys are equatng our great ball movement with playing fast. That has nothing to do with playing fast.

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I agree - two separate items - but we abandon both when the game gets down to the wire.

[JackB1]

This is why we have so much trouble holding leads in the 4th.

We try and use the clock more and go into a half court/standing around offense and that inevitably leads to bad shots and our lead slowly whittling away. We should play an uptempo game WHENEVER POSSIBLE and stop milking the clock in the 4th qtr. We have won almost every game where we played uptempo for 4 quarters. Why Woody doesn't take advantage of this I don't know. Again........or present coach doesn't know how best to use this team. He has one plan and that's it.