The Amare for Smith rumors seem to be heating up according to ESPN!

[High5]

Well as long as it improves our swagger...

[mrhonline]

Well as long as it improves our swagger...

Ha ha. Thought of this:

[Joker]

For me, making the huge assumption of health not being a concern, what the discussion seems to boil down to is a question of whether Smith's defensive presence is of greater value than Amare's offensive prowess. I don't think there's any question that what Stoudemire brings to the team is more sorely needed than what Smith does. We were not a very good defensive team last year with Josh anyway, and especially in the playoffs, we were exposed as being soft inside. So you're not going to get a great offensive and defensive big man out there. There's no KG on the market right now. If you can get him, get Amare. He's not going to stop people defensively, but he sure as hell can get the opposing big man in foul trouble, which is more than Smith can do shooting long jumpers at a 25% clip.

Stoudemire makes you a dominant offensive team in the East. That's enough to get you over 50 wins and a shot at winning the conference.

I don't think we will win the conference but we will be a lot closer and are built for along time to be contenders.

Edited June 29, 2009 by nbasuperstar40

[Joker]

The only thing left is an offensive coordinator for Woody.

[Crank]

Well as long as it improves our swagger...

lol :) By that I meant that since its a superstar league you need someone who can get us those calls that superstars gets . The respect level around the league and with the refs would go up bigtime if we got Amare.

[realsquawk]

ESPN is conjuring this up. they have been doing this for awhile.

[AtLaS]

I don't see how anyone can think that Amare can do everything so fundamentally soundly (shooting, rebounding, etc.) and then be fundamentally poor defensively. That just doesn't add up and it's not what I've seen when I've watched him.

Just because it doesn't seem to add up, doesn't mean it isn't true. I have watched Amare for years, and I seriously question his defensive effort. Like I said, he has the ability but he just doesn't play it at all. He is widely known as one of the worst big men defenders in the NBA. PHX fans have bashed his defense for years. Maybe Woodson could get him to play better on that end since he preaches defense, but Amare has not shown that ability up to this point in his career.

His fundamentals are just bad, he plays with his hands down and is not physical. He always gives up great low post position. This is why he commits less fouls per minute than almost any big in the NBA.

And, I don't claim Smith is a great or fundamental man defender by any means, but you'll be surprised when you see Amare getting torched on a regular basis. The thing that makes up for it and sort of hides it is his ability to score. Many times he'll be scoring on the opposing team worse than he's getting lit up so it can go unnoticed or overlooked.

[drzachary]

This is one of those classic anecdote vs statistical arguments. Amare looks like an awful defender (and Josh Smith like a good one), but there's little to no difference in the on-court defensive product of these two players, in any way that we can measure it (Defensive Rating.) You CAN say that Josh Smith's defense has helped the Hawks to more wins than Amare's has helped the Suns to wins, but that's more a statement of the Suns and the Hawks than comparing the two players. (And the comparison of win shares is even more glaring in Amare's favor when you take offense into account.)

[vdunkndunk]

I would trade Smoove for Amare in about half a second, as long as we had assurances from our medical staff that Amare is healthy.

Amare would give us the kind of post offense we need - he's a dominant offensive player and would also make JJ much, much more effective. JJ destroys single coverage but has a lot of trouble when the entire defense is focused on him; with Amare the defensive focus would be on Amare, and JJ could make teams pay.

[AtLaS]

This is one of those classic anecdote vs statistical arguments. Amare looks like an awful defender (and Josh Smith like a good one), but there's little to no difference in the on-court defensive product of these two players, in any way that we can measure it (Defensive Rating.) You CAN say that Josh Smith's defense has helped the Hawks to more wins than Amare's has helped the Suns to wins, but that's more a statement of the Suns and the Hawks than comparing the two players. (And the comparison of win shares is even more glaring in Amare's favor when you take offense into account.)

Like I said, I would do the trade. And Amare's offense is unbelievably better than Smith's so much that the defensive difference doesn't matter IMO.

But, this discussion about defense has absolutely nothing to do with blocks. Amare makes highlight blocks as well. But, we know Smith is the better help defender. I'm talking about man defense, and Amare is just bad. I'd say Smith is average, he's not great. He's good against certain matchups like Dirk/KG/etc smaller more finesse PFs and struggles versus the bigger ones.

If you take into account DEFENSIVE win shares, Smith has been on par or better than Amare every year and Amare was on ~60 win teams. For example, in 07-08 Smith had 4.6 defensive win shares on a 37 win team, while Amare had only 3.9 on a 55 win team. The only time Amare had more DWS was 06-07 when he had 4.2 on a 61 team, while Smith had 3.9 on a 30 win team. Not to mention Amare played all 82 games that season and Smith played only 73. Clearly Smith outperformed Amare in that season.

Defensive +/- reflects similar results. Smith has had the better defensive +/- in every season except last year which was really an abberation. Amare missed the second half of the season as well which always skews the results, but we have already talked about how Smith's defense dropped after the big ankle injury and he clearly was hesitant to jump and wasn't himself for at least 2 months.

In fact, Amare has only had ONE season in which he had a negative defensive +/-, which was this year, and he only played 53 games. Smith has had a negative defensive +/- in EVERY season in the league except one. A negative defensive +/- means the defense is better with the player on the floor as opposed to off it.

Regardless, I don't even like using those statistics. I've watched them both a LOT and Amare is just bad. Plus to constantly hear from PHX and general NBA fans how bad he is adds more fuel to the fire. I honestly think it's just a general lack of effort, combined with poor fundamentals and lack of preaching defense by D'Antoni. But, he's usually killing the other team on the offensive end so many times it will go unnoticed.

Edited June 29, 2009 by AtLaS

[Dejay]

If these rumors come to fruition and Amare's eye is okay, I'd drive to Hartsfield-Jackson to drop off Smith and pick Stoudamire up from the South Terminal. Talk about an arms race in the East; after watching Shaq go to Cleveland and Vince Carter get traded to Orlando, we respond with Crawford and Amare? Talk about a public service message being sent to Miami, Washington, Philly, et al...

A move like that would change the 'Big 3' in the East to the 'Big 4' in the East really quick. I know health is all relative but if a squad with JJ/Bibby/Smith/Williams/Horford/Evans/Flip/Zaza won 47 games, how many would a team with JJ/Crawford/Williams/Amare/Horford/Evans (I won't include Zaza/Bibby since they're UFAs) win?

Edited June 29, 2009 by Dejay

[Dsinner]

Initially I was completely against this trade. But the more I think about it, how could we turn down a player who, outside of Nique, would be the best player to every put on a Hawks jersey? If his health is OK, his offense vs Smooves far outweighs his defense vs. Smooves. I wouldn't give up Teague but Smoove and some filler and I'd have to do it. Do we win the East? More than likely "no." Do we win the East if we don't make the trade? Absolutely not.

Even if Smoove peaks (which will NEVER happen under Woodson) he probably won't be the impact player Amare is. At best he'll be his equal. I think a lot of homers (myself initially included) are letting their hearts have too much of an impact on this idea.

[bird_dirt]

Regardless, I don't even like using those statistics. I've watched them both a LOT and Amare is just bad. Plus to constantly hear from PHX and general NBA fans how bad he is adds more fuel to the fire. I honestly think it's just a general lack of effort, combined with poor fundamentals and lack of preaching defense by D'Antoni. But, he's usually killing the other team on the offensive end so many times it will go unnoticed.

did you get to watch jj play under d'antoni a lot as well? they didn't play d in phx then, but jj is a good defender here. not saying that amare will become a great or even above average defender here, but couldn't it be concievable that he would at least attempt to play a little more defense when that is what the coach and team has put so much stress on?

[AHF]

did you get to watch jj play under d'antoni a lot as well? they didn't play d in phx then, but jj is a good defender here. not saying that amare will become a great or even above average defender here, but couldn't it be concievable that he would at least attempt to play a little more defense when that is what the coach and team has put so much stress on?

When JJ played in Phoenix, he was a good defender there too even though the team was a poor defensive unit.

[AtLaS]

did you get to watch jj play under d'antoni a lot as well? they didn't play d in phx then, but jj is a good defender here. not saying that amare will become a great or even above average defender here, but couldn't it be concievable that he would at least attempt to play a little more defense when that is what the coach and team has put so much stress on?

I actually thought JJ was a better defender in PHX. He guarded Parker extremely well in the playoffs that time.

I think JJ still has the ability to play defense but we ask him to do so much on offense and play him so many minutes that it's tough to give 100% effort and still be effective on offense. In PHX, he was a defender and a spot up shooter. They only went to him for ISOs when they really needed a bucket.

I don't think JJ is a great defender here, for the reasons I stated earlier. He's average to above average IMO because we wear him down so much on offense..