Hollinger: Are Hawks better than Lakers?

[Plainview1981]

This is one of the few things you and I agree on. Shoot, even in the last game we played against Indy, the bench was horrible. They single-handedly lost that 17 point lead that the starting unit had built up in the first quarter . . and they lost it almost instantly.

The PER of the bench is due to Woody ONLY playing them extensive minutes when we're up in games. Fortunately for us, we've blown out a lot of teams this season, allowing the bench to get extended minutes against the other team's 2nd unit.

The only people I trust off the bench this year, is Joe Smith and Crawford. And at times, I don't trust those two either. Woody already knows all of this though.

Having said that . . . the Lakers are currently down by 12 going into the 4th quarter at Phoenix.

No Artest . . Kobe has played the ENTIRE GAME so far ( and scored 32 points in 32 minutes ) . . and Adam Morrison has 5 of the bench's 11 points.

The bench seems to have spurts to play well. It usually involves Mo Evans contributing, but he's proven that you can't count on that on a consistent basis. But the bench will look good when he is making his shots.

[Joker]

The bench seems to have spurts to play well. It usually involves Mo Evans contributing, but he's proven that you can't count on that on a consistent basis. But the bench will look good when he is making his shots.

Agreed

[Buzzard]

Agreed. As for Howard being the new Mourning/Shaq/etc, I agree, but it's a team game, it they cannot figure that out in the regular season, then they most definitely have issues. This is not the usual East of the 2000's. Teams like Atlanta, Cleveland, and Boston are too talented overall to have major issues coming into the playoffs. The Celtics are older but I when your older you understand the nuisances of the season, in other words, they are fine. The Cavs maybe a one man show on offense but that show is Lebron and no one in the NBA can stop that. You have four elite NBA teams in the East. Three of them have a MAJOR issue. The Celtics issue is minor to be honest. They also have a great bench.

No, because the players that play those positions have define roles whereas Nelson doesn't especially since the VC trade. The Magic could win without Nelson, he doesn't make them go. Only Dwight does. Cavs need Mo Williams and the Hawks need Mike Bibby. But if you took Marvin or Verejao in the regular season and it's the same results as usual.

Exactly what is Orlandos issue? They lost their starting PG for 15 plus games and are still good enough to stay tied for best record in the east. I think there is some serious Orlando bias going on within this board because of how they badly they own us on a regular basis.

Is it possible you are just hoping the Celtics or Cavs take out the Magic for us, so we can face either Cleveland or Boston? Just does not make sense to rule out the team with the most dominating big man in the game. Very similar to ruling out Duncan back in the day, just because all he had was Parker, Ginobli, and role players...

Edited December 29, 2009 by Buzzard

[bird_dirt]

The bench seems to have spurts to play well. It usually involves Mo Evans contributing, but he's proven that you can't count on that on a consistent basis. But the bench will look good when he is making his shots.

i think that is what you would expect from nearly any bench, which is why they are bench players and not starters. if they consistently put up major contributions on the court, they'd be starters. mo has been big in a number of games, but you can't forget about crawford. he's a major addition to our bench/team as a whole and effectively gives us a "6th starter".

you can't count on our bench 100% of the time, but i think you can count on them to performing at a higher level more consistently then most other benches across the league.

as for hollinger's article and how the benches relate to the playoffs, i have to agree on some level, but not completely. it's true that in the playoffs teams run their starters into the ground, leaving only minuscule minutes for benches, so the theory would seem to indicate that the team with the best starters will win. furthermore, i do believe that the hawks would lose to the lakers in a seven game series, especially if the playoffs started this week. HOWEVER, the hawks bench could give them an advantage over the lakers for two reasons.

reason one: one major injury to a starter would be more devastating to the lakers than the hawks. i think the hawks would lose much less subbing zaza, joe smith, mo or crawford in for an injured starter (not to mention being able to shuffle around players like jj, marv, smoove, and horf between sf-c). the lakers would struggle without gasol or utterly collapse without kobe. it's the whole putting all your eggs in one basket--it's a great basket, but you're screwed if it gets dropped.

reason two: with the deeper bench, the hawks starters look to be less worn out come playoff time than the lakers. (this will also translate into having an overall healthier starting unit come playoff time). we all know how well jj has played at the end of the year when woody only played a short player rotation all season long. hopefully this year he will have the legs to more consistently put up big numbers in the playoffs. i know kobe is kobe, and he is head and shoulders above jj as a player, but i don't think that difference would be quite as big were he to average 40+ min/game over the course of a season like jj has in the past, and jj averaging 32-35 min./game.

i've always mantained that how far the top teams in the league will go during the season and playoffs will be determined by health. starting fresh, boston, orlando, and prolly the cavs are better teams than the hawks, but the hawks still have a chance due to their depth that they've been missing in past seasons. we can now rest players more and overcome injuries more easily than we have ever been able to do in the past. honestly, i think having jj worn out and injured is the biggest factor in him disappearing in the postseason, and couple that with injuries to marv and horf, that is what has held us back the most in the playoffs. of course, having stern and the nba a little more nervous about the whole ref scandle and allowing the games to be called a little more evenly will only benefit us even more when we play queen james or baby wade. we aren't the top team in the east, but it wouldn't take too much good luck to swing our way, along with a little bad luck to hit other teams to open the door for the hawks to make it to the ec finals or even THE finals. i'm not betting on it, but it's not outside the realm of possibility, which we can honestly say the hawks haven't had in in this century.

[Plainview1981]

i think that is what you would expect from nearly any bench, which is why they are bench players and not starters. if they consistently put up major contributions on the court, they'd be starters. mo has been big in a number of games, but you can't forget about crawford. he's a major addition to our bench/team as a whole and effectively gives us a "6th starter".

you can't count on our bench 100% of the time, but i think you can count on them to performing at a higher level more consistently then most other benches across the league.

as for hollinger's article and how the benches relate to the playoffs, i have to agree on some level, but not completely. it's true that in the playoffs teams run their starters into the ground, leaving only minuscule minutes for benches, so the theory would seem to indicate that the team with the best starters will win. furthermore, i do believe that the hawks would lose to the lakers in a seven game series, especially if the playoffs started this week. HOWEVER, the hawks bench could give them an advantage over the lakers for two reasons.

reason one: one major injury to a starter would be more devastating to the lakers than the hawks. i think the hawks would lose much less subbing zaza, joe smith, mo or crawford in for an injured starter (not to mention being able to shuffle around players like jj, marv, smoove, and horf between sf-c). the lakers would struggle without gasol or utterly collapse without kobe. it's the whole putting all your eggs in one basket--it's a great basket, but you're screwed if it gets dropped.

reason two: with the deeper bench, the hawks starters look to be less worn out come playoff time than the lakers. (this will also translate into having an overall healthier starting unit come playoff time). we all know how well jj has played at the end of the year when woody only played a short player rotation all season long. hopefully this year he will have the legs to more consistently put up big numbers in the playoffs. i know kobe is kobe, and he is head and shoulders above jj as a player, but i don't think that difference would be quite as big were he to average 40+ min/game over the course of a season like jj has in the past, and jj averaging 32-35 min./game.

i've always mantained that how far the top teams in the league will go during the season and playoffs will be determined by health. starting fresh, boston, orlando, and prolly the cavs are better teams than the hawks, but the hawks still have a chance due to their depth that they've been missing in past seasons. we can now rest players more and overcome injuries more easily than we have ever been able to do in the past. honestly, i think having jj worn out and injured is the biggest factor in him disappearing in the postseason, and couple that with injuries to marv and horf, that is what has held us back the most in the playoffs. of course, having stern and the nba a little more nervous about the whole ref scandle and allowing the games to be called a little more evenly will only benefit us even more when we play queen james or baby wade. we aren't the top team in the east, but it wouldn't take too much good luck to swing our way, along with a little bad luck to hit other teams to open the door for the hawks to make it to the ec finals or even THE finals. i'm not betting on it, but it's not outside the realm of possibility, which we can honestly say the hawks haven't had in in this century.

The last 5 game Mo Evans is playing 19MPG and is averaging 2PPG 2RPG and is shooting 4-12. That doesn't get it done even for a 8th man. That's not up to snuff at all. Outside of about 7 games he has been terrible this year.

[macdaddy]

I don't see how Artest and Marvin are comparable beyond this season's stats. Artest is a really good defender and if you had to put the ball in someone's hands for the game winner would you pick Marvin or Artest?

I think Hollinger's system (like any) is going to get seriously whacked by a few things. Two of them are when a team blows out a lot of lesser teams and when you have a bench player who plays starters minutes and scores like a starter.

We are better than fans around the league give us credit for though.

IMO, Orlando lacks one thing: toughness. Despite Howard being a beast they don't seem to want to play physically. They really should be top of the heap if they get that figured out.

[TruJerz]

http://insider.espn....=PERDiem-091228

Kobe may be the better player, but are Joe Johnson and the Hawks more likely to taste the title?

Of all the questions I've received about the Power Rankings and Playoff Odds this season, one dwarfs all the others: How can the Hawks be ahead of the Lakers? Atlanta is first in the Power Rankings, while L.A. ranks only fourth. And in the Playoff Odds, the gap between the two teams grows larger: As of Monday, the Hawks have a league-high 23.1 percent chance of winning the championship, while the Lakers are at only 9.4 percent.

At first glance, this doesn't add up. The Lakers are the defending world champions and have superstar power in the form of Kobe Bryant and Pau Gasol, not to mention a coach who owns 10 championship rings. The Hawks, meanwhile, have won one playoff series this decade. Their most decorated performer, Joe Johnson, has made multiple All-Star teams, but nobody considers him to be anywhere near Bryant's stratosphere in the star hierarchy.

Dig a little deeper, however, and there's some method to the madness. And for Lakers fans, there's something of a silver lining.

First, the basics. Both the Power Rankings and Playoff Odds are based on performances from only this season, so nothing L.A. did last season matters to those tools. And this season, the Hawks have been better -- they've posted a superior scoring margin despite playing a tougher schedule. Although the Lakers prevailed in their one regular-season meeting to date (118-110 in L.A. on Nov. 1), Atlanta has been stronger throughout the first third of the season; L.A.'s superior win-loss record at the moment is mostly a result of playing 19 of its first 29 games at home. And for the record, the two clubs' standing in both these tools has nothing to do with my residing in Atlanta, either, nor with any bias I might have toward Adandeville -- both tools are automated and don't account for any subjective factors.

Now, for the digging. How, exactly, could Atlanta's crew outrank L.A.'s star-studded cast? Bryant, as I mentioned, is a far better player than Johnson, and the Lakers' front line of Gasol and Andrew Bynum inspires a lot more fear than the Hawks' pair of Al Horford and Josh Smith.

Inspiring fear, however, is not what I measure. Performance is. And based on performance, Smith has been every bit Gasol's equal this season, and Horford's production has matched that of Bynum. Throw in that Mike Bibby has been more productive than Derek Fisher and Marvin Williams has almost exactly matched Ron Artest (13.30 versus 13.32, respectively, in the player efficiency rating department), and suddenly the starting lineup comparison doesn't seem so lopsided. In fact, Atlanta's starting five has a better PER than L.A.'s more heralded bunch, even with Bryant's near five-point advantage over Johnson.

And then there's the bench. If you're a Lakers fan wondering why your team is "only" fourth in the Power Rankings, look at the chart below. That's what your second unit is giving you this season, and it's pathetic.

Second units: Hawks versus Lakers

Pos. Hawks player PER Lakers player PER Difference

PG Jeff Teague 13.11 Jordan Farmar 12.03 +1.08

SG Jamal Crawford 17.85 Shannon Brown 11.35 +6.53

SF Maurice Evans 14.59 Sasha Vujacic 9.63 +4.96

PF Joe Smith 14.06 Lamar Odom 12.54 +1.52

C Zaza Pachulia 13.69 Josh Powell 9.29 +4.40

With Lamar Odom having an off season (8.7 points, 8.5 rebounds per game) and nobody else on the second unit stepping forward, L.A. takes a giant leap backward once the bench checks in. Further proof comes from the shockingly awful on-the-court versus off-the-court differentials of the Lakers' subs: According to 82games.com, L.A. is 21.6 points per 100 possessions worse with Josh Powell on the court, 21.5 worse with Shannon Brown and 19.2 worse with Sasha Vujacic. Yikes.

Atlanta, meanwhile, has had the league's most productive bench thus far this season; the disparity between its second unit and L.A's couldn't be more glaring. Atlanta's worst sub in terms of PER, Jeff Teague, would be the Lakers' best, while Jamal Crawford, Maurice Evans and Zaza Pachulia all enjoy massive advantages over their L.A. counterparts.

Boil it down, and L.A.'s advantages over the Hawks basically come down to this: The Lakers have Kobe Bryant, and the Hawks don't. At every other position, Atlanta's players are performing either just as well or, in some cases, dramatically better.

Now, on to the silver lining. Despite the depressing performance by L.A.'s bench thus far, there's some good news if you're a Lakers fan: You'd much rather be the team with the uber-star and the limited bench than the other way around, for two reasons.

First and more obvious, the latter problem is the easier of the two to fix. A cheap trade or waiver pickup could improve the bench enough to make a real difference, as it did for the Celtics two seasons ago when P.J. Brown and Sam Cassell landed on the roster for the stretch run. But nobody will trade the Hawks a talent to match Bryant.

Less obvious, however, is that when we talk about playoff contenders based on regular-season results, we're somewhat comparing apples to oranges. Not because of clutch ability or character or any of the other popular clichés, but because the way that teams use their rosters fundamentally changes. One characteristic that has been proved time and again to be of immensely greater value in a playoff series than in the regular season is superstar power … or more specifically, the power of a great starting unit, even if it contains no superstars. (The Pistons would be a good example here.) The bench, meanwhile, proves less of a factor, as the subs' minutes are usually cut down when the games matter most.

At this point, I would consider the Hawks a better regular-season team than the Lakers despite their lack of star power, simply because they're so much deeper. That depth is incredibly important in an 82-game grind through the regular season, and it's the reason the Hawks are likely to shrug off any calamity thrown their way without too much distress. Right now, Atlanta projects to win 59 games to L.A.'s 57, and based on the info above, that forecast doesn't seem like a big stretch.

But in a playoff series against L.A.? That's a different story. In a seven-game series you can play Gasol and Bryant 42 minutes a game -- as the Lakers did when tested by Denver in the 2009 Western Conference finals. Once they do that, there are only six minutes left for Powell and Vujacic to mess up. Conversely, it would mean fewer minutes for Atlanta's bench aces like Evans, Pachulia and Teague … the players who provide the Hawks with their best advantages over the Lakers (and the Cavs and Celtics, for that matter).

As a result, the Hawks' postseason odds are likely overstated, while the Lakers' are likely understated. As Lakers fans keep noting to me, it would take a wild-eyed optimist to conclude that Atlanta is more than twice as likely to win the title as L.A. There's a valid reason for the Playoff Odds tool to reach this conclusion, but teams with extremely bad (or good) benches tend to perform better (or worse) in the playoffs than the regular season because the bench becomes less of a factor. In this case it creates an artificial disparity between the two clubs' likely postseason success.

That said, there's some important information to be learned. Beyond its top four players, L.A.'s roster is a real problem; comparing its bench to the Hawks' serves to put a magnifying glass on the supporting cast's inadequacy. We still presume the Lakers will address the problem and present a much stronger case for themselves come May. However, whether by trade or internal improvement, the bench does need addressing, and if the Lakers don't, they'll have a much smaller shot at repeating than the general public believes.

good article. I still dont think we can beat Lakers in 7 but i think that we can make it to the finals. Lakers record is a bit suspect tho because they've played most of their games at home..like 75%(just guessing). We would have only 5 loses too if if we played at home as much as they did. Hawks are better than any other team in the West though..no doubt about it

[Atlantaholic]

Jameer Nelson has not been playing well at all this year, and his entire career aside from one half of a season has been pretty lackluster so far... the main reason Orlando doesn't miss a beat without Jameer isn't so much because their backups are so good more like Jameer isn't that good. Rashard Lewis is not anything special either, and Vince Carter is showing his age. Despite the fact we don't match-up well against them, objectively, Orlando has not been all that impressive this year.

[Atlantaholic]

I don't see how Artest and Marvin are comparable beyond this season's stats. Artest is a really good defender and if you had to put the ball in someone's hands for the game winner would you pick Marvin or Artest?

I think Hollinger's system (like any) is going to get seriously whacked by a few things. Two of them are when a team blows out a lot of lesser teams and when you have a bench player who plays starters minutes and scores like a starter.

We are better than fans around the league give us credit for though.

IMO, Orlando lacks one thing: toughness. Despite Howard being a beast they don't seem to want to play physically. They really should be top of the heap if they get that figured out.

Actually, blowing out teams often IS a sign of being a great team. Point differential is always a pretty Decent indicator on how many wins a team should get. For example, Just looking back at the last few seasons, a point differential over one point a game pretty much guarantees a winning season, while a point differential of 5, pretty much guarantees a 50 win season.

[Plainview1981]

Actually, blowing out teams often IS a sign of being a great team. Point differential is always a pretty Decent indicator on how many wins a team should get. For example, Just looking back at the last few seasons, a point differential over one point a game pretty much guarantees a winning season, while a point differential of 5, pretty much guarantees a 50 win season.

Blowing out crap teams is not a sign of greatness. Winning against top teams and winning playoff series is. This team does little of either one.

[spotatl]

Historically the teams that are able to blow the doors off bad teams tend to do better in the playoffs than the ones that win close games against good competition. Margin of victory is a much better predictor of playoff success than record is but many fans don't at all realize it. When you beat a team by 2 it was a coinflip. You didn't prove you were better- you proved that you were pretty much equal to that team and it could have gone either way.

Edited December 30, 2009 by spotatl