Does Stotts deserve credit?

[OGRat]

If this success continues, then I think Terry Stotts deserves a little of the credit for last nights improvements.

To me it seemed that everyone had a better understanding of what they were expected to do on offense. JT's suspension probably led to everyone being more focused, but if they continue last nights performance on the road......

How much of this was JV vs. Team Growth?

Will the team fair well on the road trip?

Would the team have done as well with JT? JT can't take full responsibility for the offense stalling in prior games.

[JTFan31]

Guys we have to remember last year after January how well JT ran the point for the Hawks with Stotts as coach, I recall every one was amazed how well the offense moved with Big Dog out of the lineup and the lineup being JT, Dion, Ira, Reef and Theo. You guys remember that. We also have to remember that JT kicks it 4th gear come December and from there on out he stays on 4th gear. Jt has always been a slow starter, we know that.

[OGRat]

I am actually high on JT. I believe that last night was a result of team progression. I think this progression will continue with JT.

[Diesel]

Well, you have a very gray area.... Here's why.

The difference in my opinion is less turnovers and better offensive flow and better defense.

The Hornets tried all night to do the same things they did to us that disrupted us in game one. Mainly that's press and cause turnovers. Remember we made Davis, Wesley, and Armstrong look like defensive demigods. However, last night, we had a different PG bringing the ball up. No matter how they tried to press Vaughn, he made them pay. He dribbled past their trivial pressure and found the open man.

In game one, I think we were pretty focused. IN the first half, I think we had totally dominated the Hornets... So I don' t know if it was a lack of focus...per se. But more they caught us off guard with the pressure.

I think Stott's coaching is good. He makes adjustments game by game. His playbook must be fabulous for instance, there were a couple of times that Vaughn Called plays and everybody MOVED. In the first half I believe, Vaughn called a play, Through the ball to Glover, pressure came, Glover out to Jackson, Jackson over to Nazr (I think) for the lay in. You can tell by the movement, that this was a set play. There were others... On the break, Vaughn is years ahead of JT because on the break JT is thinking about what he wants to do and 7 times out of 8 he will just keep the ball and try to score. INDECISIVE. However, Vaughn has the ball and he's looking up.

One of the things that I think cut down on turnovers is the fact that Vaughn would go to the ball. With JT in the game, we make some wild passes, pass into crowded passing lanes, and this is the kind of thing that N.O. feeds on.

Maturity is a good question. Are we maturing?? Developing?

I think we saw some development in the INdy game, So I won't doubt that... BUT when it comes to N.O. We just executed a lot better.

[swolehawk2]

The play we ran to pop Jax out for the 3 when we were up by one was flawless.

I think JV has a better handle on slowing things down when things go bad. JT tends to try to use his speed to correct things...thats what gets us in trouble. JT has to be a little more patient and I think he will.

[Diesel]

The truth is that JT can't controll the tempo. If you watched the first game, whenever JT was pressured, he rush and either made a bad pass, turned over, or got the offense out of sync. However, JV was not phased. That's not to say that JV doesn't make mistakes... Becuase he does. He made a bad decision with the ball before the half, but immediately redeemed himself by making that halfcourt pass to Nazr for the last 2 of the half.

[emeans]

Stotts is a temporary solution at Coach. I don't think he makes very good adjustments in the 2nd Half of games. The Hawks consistently give up HUGE leads and I never see him light a fire under their fannies when they start making dumb decisions with the Ball.

If it wasn't for the heroics of Stephan Jackson they would have blown the NO game.

You can see these game lapses coming from miles away and he seems to have no answers for them so far.

They had an 18 point lead late in the 3rd quarter that was trimmed to 1 point. They blew the Indy game after having a big lead. They blew the 1st NO game....a game they should have won.

We have some talent. I don't think we have a good coach. We should be 3 and 1 or 4 and 0 right now.

[swolehawk2]

So you are saying that Tim Floyd is a better motivator than Stotts.

At some point the players have to be sick of losing and play hard enough to win. It is really that simple. Do you think Floyd has to fire up BD PJ Lynch and those vet cats they have....we have to come evry night and compete .....we have so far......Stotts is not Larry Brown...but he is very capable.

[swolehawk2]

That's what I mean... JT uses his speed at times when he should not. He has to be more patient and calm when teams make runs. Its like when things go bad JT says I have to hurry up and fix things....JV says I have to slow this down and fix things. There is nothing wrong with walking the ball up the floor sometimes or when Dion or Jax bring it up.. JT needs to call for it at the top of the key hold it and make sure people go where they need to be....he needs to calm down...he is just a kid trying to play as hard as can to try and help us win...he needs to be patient.

[chillzatl]

First off, let me say, I am completely behind Stotts. I agree with the decision to keep him and I think he can be a good coach for us.

But I don't think he deserves a lot of credit for the teams only win so far. Simply because all of the things that went right for the Hawks in that one game, were completely non-existant in the previous three games.

He had an entire camp to work with his players and they came out looking like they had learned nothing since last year. If this had been a mostly new group of players, I could understand that. But most of our starting lineup was here last year. They should have been better prepared and obviously, they were not.

If the improvement continues, YES he deserves credit. But I have to see it before I'm going to pass out awards to anyone in this organization.

[emeans]

First of all who said anything about Tim Floyd?? Where did his name come up in this conversation?? We are talking about Terry Stotts not Tim Floyd!!! I know nothing about Tim Floyd...never have and probably never will until he coaches the Hawks. I can't comment on Tim Floyd. I am telling you what I see with Terry Stotts.

And you are basing Stotts capability on what?? Stotts hasn't proven anything as a head coach in the NBA yet and so far he is doing a poor job this year.

If the players are not playing hard enough to win in the 2nd half that has everything to do with COACHING!!!

Players efforts are direct reflections of their Coach and his expectations.

If you can consistently get up by 18 or 15 points at the half you certainly have the talent to continue to stay up in the 2nd half. Right now they are not doing that.

[pathway23]

Stotts has done a heck of a job on defense. I think he is a great coach. I think the best indicator of a good coach is how well the play is set up out of a time out. He does a good job at that. The problem Stotts has is he doesn't have a true PG. When he does, he wins. No matter how prepared he is.

[TROUBLEMAN69]

A lot of you guys are forgetting that Jacque Vaughn looked like crap against New Orleans in the first meeting. He was also shaky against the press. He was starting the offense well past the 3 point line, heck almost near half court in the first game. Jacque played a great game last night, but let's not go overboard with increasing his minutes at the expense of JT's. And please stop with the Boris Diaw at pg nonsense. He is not ready to run the offense yet.

TROUBLEMAN

[swolehawk2]

My point was ...you are talking about lighting fire under fannies....and I said players have to be accountable for their effort....I used Floyd as an example as when he sends PJ and BD and Lynch on the floor they know they have to play hard...they might not be effective but they will compete...I don't think Floyd brings FIRE to the Hornets, the players do!

If you can't see the improvement in team D that Stotts has made then u r blind.

As far as I see the Hawks have been playing with FIRE...execution hasn't always been there but they have been hustling.

Not many teams in this league get up by double digits in the first half and cruise to victory...every team in the NBA is more than likely to make runs on the best teams....but I guess when these teams make runs ....the opposing coach needs to light some fannies on fire.

[Diesel]

Why not increase JV's minutes??

You have to be blind if you don't notice that the team's offense runs better with JV as the PG than with JT as PG. This was noticed during the Chicago and the Indy games... It just took this outting to see it first hand.

I think we stand in the same place as GS last year. Arenas is an impact player, however, the offense runs alot better under Boykins' direction. What do you do? You play Arenas, but you play Boykins when the game is important.

I'm not suggesting that we take the same approach. I'm saying that we play JV more minutes alongside the starters (at the expense of JT). WHy? #1, because the offense runs better with JV as the PG. #2, because JT doesn't play defense well enough to stop any 2 guard in the game so playing JV and JT at the same time is a no no. #3, this could also be used to motivate JT to do the same things he see JV doing. We learned last year that JT is motivated by money. Last season, JT worked tireless on getting his assist numbers up. Not for the sake of making the team better, but for his own personal stats. However, I think the competition for PG could be healthy. They definitely compliment each other but they can't be played together.

So here's what I suggest.

1st lineup: JT, Dion, Jack, SAR, Theo.

2nd Linuep: JT, Diaw, Jack, SAR, Nazr.

3rd Linup: JV, Dion, Jack, Theo, Nazr

4th Lineup: JV, Dion, Nailon, SAR, Theo.

5th Linup: JT, Dion, Nailon, SAR, Theo..

6th Linuep: JV, Dion, Jack, SAR, Theo...

Then we rotate through these lineups as we figure out which are more effective and give us the best matchups.

[Weez]

"A lot of you guys are forgetting that Jacque Vaughn looked like crap against New Orleans in the first meeting"

~yep. a lot of people on this board have very short memories...

I think a lot of the win last night probably had to do with Stotts making adjustments in his gameplan after having seen what NO was going to do/knowing their team.

Reef played much better last night.

3rd Q meltdowns ~ whoever suggested that the starters not start the third if they weren't responsible for the turnaround in the second is going against all coaching standards. Maybe one player replaced, but even that's iffy a lot of times. Anyone consider that Stotts was using a little Phil and trying to let the players play through their errors in the 3rd, knowing that if it worked they'd learn something from it? Immediately pulling a guy for a mistake isn't the answer...it leads to too much looking over his shoulder and worrying on the court.

I actually think a lot of our W last night had to do with our being pissed that they stole the first game from us, our being at home (where we do play better, regardless of fan support), and simply playing well.

[emeans]

Fair or unfair.....The evaluation of a coaches true value always and will continue to be based on WINS.

Yes the defense is better. Yes the offense looks better in the 1st half of games. Yes opposing teams will always make runs during games. These things are true and I agree with them. However, if over an evaluative period of time (I am willing to give him this entire year) you are not WINNING and closing out games after these runs then something is wrong.

Now the jury is still out on this PG situation and whether this is why we are losing games. There are either 2 things that are keeping this team from being successful and 1 of them has to be the problem. Either Stotts is a decent coach that can't close out the games with WINS or we have some serious problems at the PG position that need to be address.

Unfortunately....Both of these problems go back to the Coach. He has to make the decision to pull JT when he is screwing up. He along with General Management have to evaluate what will be best for this team.

[Gray Mule]

We lost almost the entire 18 point lead --They didn't

catch the Hawks, but they came mighty close, within one,

if I am not mistaken.

They scored. We didn't. Our defense wasn't THAT bad

when they were scoring those points. They missed shots

and the Hawks got rebounds, blocked shots, etc.

Hawks got the ball back each time after a score. So, what

happened? Why were they able to gain 17 points on us?

one 3 + 7 twos = 17 points. Don't know if that is what it

was, but, any way, that adds up to 17. While they were

making that run, the Hawks missed shot after shot. They

shot it short. They shot it long. It clanged off the rim.

They created the shot, then missed

Hawks couldn't buy a point, not even a foul shot. Why did

this happen? If we can solve that mystery, it will go a

long ways toward total recovery. It must be a mental

thing, because these guys are professionals. They can

and do shoot and hit their shots, over and over again.

But, then they hit a dry spell, usually to begin the 3rd

quarter, when they couldn't hit a bull in the backsides

with a basketball, and the bull standing still. This is not

something new. They were doing this when Lennie W.

was the coach and have done it all the time since.

Considering that we have different players now and we

are still doing it, it can't be the coach, it can't be the

players, so, I ask you, whose fault is it ?????

[emeans]

To be totally honest it is really too early to point fingers at anyone right now..... even Stotts and JT. We can only have our suspicions as to the problem but we can't say for sure because it is just too early in the season.

Lets see a few more games and then make more definative conclusions on the problems.

I hope everyone see the game tonight and come back with their opinions.

[Inside_Man]

hustle and defense are coaching related - players won't hustle for a coach they don't like, and playing D together means they're listening to the coach.

Monday's win had nothing to do with JT being out. Jt will be fine this year. We got SjAX cheap, and the Glovster is maturing nicely - I like these Hawks - they can run with anybody - they hustle - they'll win a bunch more games than last year. Obviously, we got a ways to go, but if anything at least win or lose they'll be FUN TO WATCH, which should put some fannies in the seats, including my expanding middle-aged butt.