Si ranks Hawks 9

[oiatlhawksfan]

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/writ...tml?eref=si_nba

9. Hawks: After snapping an NBA-long eight-year playoff drought and taking the Celtics to seven games in the first round, they looked to be on the rise last spring. But the loss of Josh Childress (via free agency to Greece) and the drawn-out negotiations with restricted free agent Josh Smith (who signed an offer sheet with Memphis, only to have it matched by the Hawks) have raised concerns about chemistry heading into next season. At least Evans, who comes over from the Magic, will help take some of the sting out of Childress' departure.

[Vesper]

http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2008/writ...tml?eref=si_nba

Not a bad ranking!

A lot of teams ranked below us!

[thefloydian]

I'm surprised they have the Pacers ahead, but then again I'm no expert.

[Frenzy]

Pacers????? We'll see

[HawksBalla]

Pacers????? We'll see

The Pacers will not be better then us.

That said it will be tough to get out of the eight seed.

[EazyRoc]

I don't understand SI or ESPN. So, the Bucks aren't going to be better than us, but the Pacers will ?

[DrReality]

there must be something in their koolaide to rank us that high.

[Mr. C]

I believe that 1-7 on that list is about right. But not necessarily in that order. I think that during this upcoming season that those spots will be interchangeable all season like the West was this past season. They're probably not all 50 win teams though, but it'll be competitive. I wanna put us at that 8th seed as of right now, but something tells me that the Pacers, Bobcats and Bucks (in no particular order) will be in the thick of things come April (not saying that they're better than the Hawks, btw...)based off of some moves that they've made in the offseason...thoughts???

[WraithSentinel]

Top-5 seeds are a lock. They are Celts,Magic,Cavs,Pistons, and 76ers. The 6-8 seeds are up for grabs. I would expect a battle between the Wiz,Raps,Hawks,Pacers,Bucks,Heat,Bulls for those final 3 seeds. Wildcards in all of this are Nets and Bobcats. Knicks are well the Knicks.

[Dexmethylphenidate]

there must be something in their koolaide to rank us that high.

All these rankings usually take a similar stance to last season's final standings.

[High5]

If anything 9 may be too generous. I think it's about fair. I wouldn't have the Pacers ahead of us, but I could definitely see at least one of Miami, Chicago and Milwaukee ahead of us.

[thefloydian]

If anything 9 may be too generous. I think it's about fair. I wouldn't have the Pacers ahead of us, but I could definitely see at least one of Miami, Chicago and Milwaukee ahead of us.

Yeah, that's what I was thinking.

[crimedog]

Miami's tough. I think Beas is gonna be an animal right out the gate and a healthy Wade might very well be the best wing player in the league. On the other hand, it looks like they will starting either Chalmers or Banks at pg and either Haslem or Blount at C. Its gonna be hard for them even if Wade has a historic season.

Milwaukee, still don't like'm. They'll be better than they were last season. I actually like Ridnour for them better than Mo Williams because they have enough scorers on the team, the pg should be passing. I think that they'll be too bad on D to really push past .500.

Indy is the toughest to call. At times they overachieved last season. Another team who might be limited by their defense. I wanna see how Dunleavy looks with Ford, he did well last season with the ball in his hands a lot.

I don't see Chi doing much just yet unless Ty Thomas and Noah can grow up fast. Granted, that was a 49 win team a couple of years ago but they got career years from their top 4 scorers (Deng, Kirk, Gordon, Noc) and only one of those guys seems to have real upside left to explore (Deng). Also important is that that team was the top defensive team in the league, largely owing to a still motivated BWallace patrolling the paint and the always psychotic Skiles drilling it into them to hustle every play. Last season their D slipped down to middle of the pack even though their personnel was largely the same which leads me to believe that the Skiles era was one of overachieving. They could be solid but I'd take our top two players over any of theirs. They'll need to develop Chemistry FAST.

The Team I see pushing for that spot is Indy - the questions are: how fast will the gel with Ford pushing the pace and a whole bunch of new role players? Has Granger peaked (he's going to be 25 so he'll at least be levelling)? Can Dunleavy recreate his career year (upped his previous scoring high by 6 at age 27) and adapt to playing off the ball even more? And who is going to play defense?

I think that Atlanta is the most talented of all these teams but its an issue of chemistry, discipline, and depth. Last season I think we were just KILLED by a lack of depth after the Bibby trade and a lack of chemistry before it. Depth hurt the most on D so we are going to need Morris/Za to be a servicable defensive rebounder or Hunter to be a poor man's Josh Smith in the paint if we want that shored up.

[BusBoyIsBack]

Wouldn't expect anything higher than that. Most "experts" thought we'd be in the cellar of the East last year

[Vol4ever]

Top-5 seeds are a lock. They are Celts,Magic,Cavs,Pistons, and 76ers. The 6-8 seeds are up for grabs. I would expect a battle between the Wiz,Raps,Hawks,Pacers,Bucks,Heat,Bulls for those final 3 seeds. Wildcards in all of this are Nets and Bobcats. Knicks are well the Knicks.

I agree. It will be really interesting on the top 5, those guys are stocked now that the cavs have picked up Mo Williams. I still think the Cavs need frontcourt help. But these 5 are a long ways ahead of us at this point.

[BusBoyIsBack]

8. Pacers: Last year they finished just one game out of the playoffs -- even with O'Neal sidelined for most of the season. Ford, if he stays healthy, is an upgrade at the point over Jamaal Tinsley. The Pacers also added a quality combo guard in Jarrett Jack and a reliable true center in the 7-foot Nesterovic, who averaged 12.4 points and 6.1 rebounds in the second half of last season. With Danny Granger, Mike Dunleavy and Troy Murphy, the pieces are there for coach Jim O'Brien to run his type of fast-breaking, three-point-shooting system.

Doesn't even sound like a playoff team.

[crimedog]

I also wonder about the Raps and the Wiz.

Jermaine hasn't played 70 games since Shaq was in LA. If he goes down, they are really thin up front.

I don't think the Wiz will be worse than last season. I just question how much better they'll be. The pieces just don't seem to fit together very well and they certainly have never exceeded expectations in the Arenas era (45 wins with Larry Hughes was their peak) and they don't have many young guys who they can count on to improve... I wouldn't be suprised if some teams surpassed them.

[frosgrim]

Its going to be about injuries in the East this year.

The deepest teams are going to gain the playoff spots. The teams that have to rely on development league talent are going to suffer.

The Hawks are slowly building depth. The backcourt now has the depth to survive a big injury to Bibby. No one can really replace JJ, but if JJ is out Evans can be a better bandaid then what we had last year.

The place that the Hawks are dangerously thin at is big men. Sund is obsessed with big men, so I expect that the Hawks will add another one or two. If they do get Elson, then I think we have a very good roster in Atlanta.

In terms of playoff positioning, this team had better win aournd 41 games. That should get the team a lower birth 8 or 7. 45 wins might get the 6 seed.

One thing that people are overlooking is that with almost every team in the East getting better, every team is going to beat up on each other. There are going to be a lot of records around 39-43 wins just due to parity.

[Hatertots]

Barring injuries, I'd be very surprised if Miami misses out on the playoffs this year. Wade looks to have returned to his old form and if Shawn Marion can play at the same level as last year (a down year for him) or better, then the Heat are almost a lock to make it in the East, IMO.

Unfortunately, I can't say I feel the same sense of optimism for our Hawks. Unless one of the youngsters makes the leap to superstardom (possible but not something I'd want to count on), the Hawks won't win too many games in 2008-09. This squad's bench is just too weak with Childress gone.

I could easily see Indy missing the playoffs and Toronto, too. Tinsley and Ford almost make Claxton look durable and Jermaine O'Neal's best days are already in his NBA scrapbook.

[thefloydian]

This squad's bench is just too weak with Childress gone.

I think people are undervaluing Evans. But even if you see that as a fairly large drop off, this bench has a lot more usable players than it did at the end of the season last year.