The Tank Thread

[Lurker]

Please, convince me how the 2017-2018 Atlanta Hawks are a playoff team this year if the move is to mostly stand pat outside of a few moves, despite a negative point differential last year (if you believe in Karma, what goes around comes around was going to mean the Hawks this year were likely going to be a below .500 team regardless due to it and likely a 33-35 win team because a correction is always HARSH with analytics) outside of ZOMG MIKE BUDENHOLZER IS AWESOME!!!

If all you're going to do is move your argument, then don't reply.

[KB21]

2 minutes ago, Lurker said:

It's sad at this point. You don't even consider keeping everyone on last year's roster, and I am not sure it's a team that makes the playoffs. 

Let's say you do go with a roster than doesn't have THJ but has a guy like Gerald Green instead and I'm unconvinced that's a playoff caliber team. More likely, it's a team that continues to go the Dallas Mavericks route of slowly, painfully declining into being bad which apparently is better than "suddenly being bad". 

Paul Millsap has shown that his magic is not as good when he plays with an inside big man or another guy that does both outside and inside. 

It's not accepting losing, really isn't. I'd be much softer if we'd accept that this is not just about last summer's actions and about multiple mistakes. Understand this, Bud is not a miracle worker, if the Hawks make minimal moves outside of letting THJ walk and signing filler guys like a Gerald Green (which idk if the Hawks even want that because of culture), I'm quite doubtful that 17/18 is a playoff team. 

There is never one extreme side that is correct in any argument. 

Well, there's no way of proving it either way now.  You can sit there and say that team isn't a playoff caliber team, but there is no way of proving it at this point.  I feel that team would still be a playoff team, and I feel they would have drafted their Kawhi Leonard and Giannis over the next two drafts.  

[davis171]

19 minutes ago, KB21 said:

Boston did not completely blitz their roster to bare nothing like Schlenk has done in Atlanta.  Boston did not field an expansion level team.   Boston also went out and brought in veteran players in the first off season they had. 

THEY WON 25 GAMES they didn't want to win! The hawks got rid of 3 starters because they were either overpaid or going to be over paid. Name 1 team that started their build around an overpaid old roster that had a negative plus minus last year.

[KB21]

1 minute ago, davis171 said:

THEY WON 25 GAMES they didn't want to win! The hawks got rid of 3 starters because they were either overpaid or going to be over paid. Name 1 team that started their build around an overpaid old roster that had a negative plus minus last year.

It would not have been a rebuild had they kept the roster relatively intact, so that question is irrelevant..

[lethalweapon3]

oooh oooh, and no T-Words, please! The verb or the nouns, s'il vous plait! Thank you all and Carry On!

~lw3

[davis171]

Just now, KB21 said:

It would not have been a rebuild had they kept the roster relatively intact, so that question is irrelevant..

What... Name a team from where the hawks were last year that won a championship by paying a 33 year old boarder line all star to a third of the cap and retaining a non all star center that is paid a fourth of the cap and THJ if you want him at 17 mil...

[JTB]

Looks like we have a chance at the 2nd pick now that we are tied record wise with the grizzlies.

phx is tanking harder and more obvious than other teams.... sheesh! They really want Ayton.

[deester11]

9 hours ago, davis171 said:

What... Name a team from where the hawks were last year that won a championship by paying a 33 year old boarder line all star to a third of the cap and retaining a non all star center that is paid a fourth of the cap and THJ if you want him at 17 mil...

But...but....we could have been an 8 seed, one and done and kept that treadmill going.  We could have done that for the same time frame KB tells the pro-tankers 3-5 years? 

Edited March 30, 2018 by deester11

[KB21]

55 minutes ago, deester11 said:

But...but....we could have been an 8 seed, one and done and kept that treadmill going.  We could have done that for the same time frame KB tells the pro-tankers 3-5 years? 

....and somehow, being on the lottery treadmill is better?

This will be Phoenix's 8th year on the lottery treadmill.  This will be Orlando's 6th year on the lottery treadmill.  This will be Sacramento's 12th year on the lottery treadmill.  This is Brooklyn's 3rd year on the lottery treadmill (sans picks).  This is New York's 5th year on the lottery treadmill.  This will be the LA Laker's 5th year on the lottery treadmill (sans pick).  Charlotte has been on the treadmill for 6 of the past 8 years.  Detroit has been on the treadmill for 8 of the past 9 years.  This will be Denver's 5th year on the treadmill.

So, please tell me if the lottery is such a sure fire way to make your team great, why do these teams continue to draft in the lottery?  The NBA Lottery is like Hotel California.  You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.

EDIT: I will also add that Minnesota is currently on a 13 year lottery treadmill streak, and it isn't guaranteed that they will actually make the playoffs yet.  

 

Edited March 30, 2018 by KB21

[deester11]

4 minutes ago, KB21 said:

....and somehow, being on the lottery treadmill is better?

This will be Phoenix's 8th year on the lottery treadmill.  This will be Orlando's 6th year on the lottery treadmill.  This will be Sacramento's 12th year on the lottery treadmill.  This is Brooklyn's 3rd year on the lottery treadmill (sans picks).  This is New York's 5th year on the lottery treadmill.  This will be the LA Laker's 5th year on the lottery treadmill (sans pick).  Charlotte has been on the treadmill for 6 of the past 8 years.  Detroit has been on the treadmill for 8 of the past 9 years.  This will be Denver's 5th year on the treadmill.

So, please tell me if the lottery is such a sure fire way to make your team great, why do these teams continue to draft in the lottery?  The NBA Lottery is like Hotel California.  You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.

I applaud your humor...not bad.  While I certainly don't think the lottery is the end all, I do think that making the right acquisitions along with the draft is the way to go.  The team you embraced that was old and a playoff team was never going to challenge for a championship and if you think they were you're fooling yourself.  But I do give you credit for recognizing they were a playoff team.  One and done does it for you? Nice.

While I understand the angst you have for this strategy, I feel it was needed.  No one likes to lose but isn't the object to win the championship, not just be happy you made the playoffs?  To reiterate, losing stinks, but knowing your team has no shot to win it all stinks as much.  

Anyway, I've seen it asked of you many times and your answers are...interestingly glossy.  What would you do NOW...not what you would have, could have done?

[AHF]

10 hours ago, KB21 said:

Well, there's no way of proving it either way now.  You can sit there and say that team isn't a playoff caliber team, but there is no way of proving it at this point.  I feel that team would still be a playoff team, and I feel they would have drafted their Kawhi Leonard and Giannis over the next two drafts.  

Where do you think the Hawks finish with your hypothetical playoff team?  Looking for seeding in the East.

[KB21]

4 minutes ago, deester11 said:

I applaud your humor...not bad.  While I certainly don't think the lottery is the end all, I do think that making the right acquisitions along with the draft is the way to go.  The team you embraced that was old and a playoff team was never going to challenge for a championship and if you think they were you're fooling yourself.  But I do give you credit for recognizing they were a playoff team.  One and done does it for you? Nice.

While I understand the angst you have for this strategy, I feel it was needed.  No one likes to lose but isn't the object to win the championship, not just be happy you made the playoffs?  To reiterate, losing stinks, but knowing your team has no shot to win it all stinks as much.  

Anyway, I've seen it asked of you many times and your answers are...interestingly glossy.  What would you do NOW...not what you would have, could have done?

In my view, you have no chance of being a championship team without being in the playoffs.  In my view, you build yourself as a playoff team.  You bring young players into a winning environment and develop them properly.  You have a winning culture.  Everything else will take care of itself.  

Building a winning culture and tanking are completely incompatible with one another.  You cannot build a winning culture when you want to intentionally lose games.  You can't build a true team oriented program where you emphasize hard work, dedication, intensity, and hustle when the ultimate goal is for you to lose games.  Those traits are completely incompatible with one another. 

What would I do?  Well for one, I would not attempt to build a team through the draft, as I don't think you can build a championship caliber team through the draft.  I'd target free agents veterans to bring in and get this team back into the playoffs within the next two years.  Sign Derrick Favors this off season.  Give Kentavious Caldwell-Pope a 2 year, prove it deal.  Maybe getting him back home will help the light come on for him.  Hell, Trey Burke would have been a great guy for the Hawks to pick up this off season, and he has not probably entrenched himself as the Knicks starting point guard going forward.  

 

[TheNorthCydeRises]

9 hours ago, Lurker said:

Please, convince me how the 2017-2018 Atlanta Hawks are a playoff team this year if the move is to mostly stand pat outside of a few moves, despite a negative point differential last year (if you believe in Karma, what goes around comes around was going to mean the Hawks this year were likely going to be a below .500 team regardless due to it and likely a 33-35 win team because a correction is always HARSH with analytics) outside of ZOMG MIKE BUDENHOLZER IS AWESOME!!!

If all you're going to do is move your argument, then don't reply.

There's no convincing you, because no matter what anyone says, you won't believe it.   This team was a 43 win team DESPITE the pitiful and inconsistent offense.  So you may want to stop reading now.

The negative point differential is directly attributed to the multiple blowout losses this team incurred, mainly because too many people had the "green light" to shoot the ball in this offense, if they're open.   If you're open, but you have a tendency to shoot bricks, it doesn't matter if you're open.  You're still going to miss.  Maybe if they threw the ball inside a little more often, or take a few dribbles and take an 18 footer that they could make, the offensive efficiency wouldn't have been as bad.

 

IF they brought everyone back ( Howard, Hardaway Jr, Millsap ), this is the squad.

black - returning

green - draft picks

red - free agent signings

 

 

Starters:  ( roughly 88.7 million in salary )

 

PG - Schröder  - 15.5 mill

G - Hardaway Jr - 16.5 mill

F - Prince -  2.4 mill

PF - Millsap - 30.8 mill

C - Howard - 23.5 mill

 

 

Bench:   ( 25.9 mill in salary )

 

PG - Frank Mason  - 0.8 mill - 2017 2nd Rd draft pick ( #31 ) . .  we retain this pick if we didn't trade Dwight

G - Sindarius Thornwell - 0.8 mill - 2017 2nd Rd draft pick ( #48 )

G/F - Bazemore - 16.9 mill

F/C - John Collins - 1.9 mill - 2017 1st Rd draft pick ( #19 )

 

G/F - Bembry - 1.6 mill

PG - Delaney - 2.5 mill

F - Cavanaugh - 0.075 mill - 2-way contract

C - Diamond Stone - 1.3 mill - minimum contract

 

Total:  114.6 mill + whatever exceptions or residual contracts I missed

Salary Cap:  99.1 mill

Luxury Tax:  119.3 mill

 

If the only financial constraint that we're worried about is going over the tax, this is the team that we could field.  As the season progressed, all 3 of those draft picks would be integral parts of the reserve unit, with Mason eventually overtaking Delaney as the backup PG. 

Thornwell, Baze, and Bembry are actually 3 above average defenders to throw at reserve wings.  Either Bembry or Thornwell may be a casualty in the rotation though, especially if Bembry couldn't show the ability to sometimes run the point.   Thornwell has more overall offensive scoring talent, and is just as good of a defender as Bembry.

 

Potential minutes rotation:

PG - Dennis ( 33 ) - Delaney/Mason ( 15 )

G - Hardaway Jr ( 28 ) - Baze ( 8 ) - Thornwell/Bembry ( 12 )

F - Prince ( 14 ) - Baze ( 20 )

PF - Millsap ( 32 ) - Prince ( 16 )

C - Howard ( 28 ) - Collins ( 20 )

 

• Dennis ( 33 )
• Millsap ( 32 )
• Prince ( 30 )
• Howard ( 28 )
• Baze ( 28 )
• Hardaway ( 28 )
• Collins ( 20 )
• Mason ( 15 )
• Thornwell ( 12 )

 

That would be my proposed 9-man rotation.  And that team, if healthy, DEFINITELY makes the playoffs.   

Defensively, we don't take a step back at all, and would still be a top 5 - 10 defense.   

You add 2 rookies ( Thornwell and Mason ) who are OLDER players that know how to play the game correctly.   You add the young stud in Collins, who would get his minutes and learn from two of the better frontline players in the league in Howard and Millsap.  And you'd have 1 more season in which the main core of the team could play with each other.

 

This is at minimum, a 45 - 50 win team that challenges for a 3 - 6 seed in the East.

[deester11]

7 minutes ago, KB21 said:

In my view, you have no chance of being a championship team without being in the playoffs.  In my view, you build yourself as a playoff team.  You bring young players into a winning environment and develop them properly.  You have a winning culture.  Everything else will take care of itself.  

Building a winning culture and tanking are completely incompatible with one another.  You cannot build a winning culture when you want to intentionally lose games.  You can't build a true team oriented program where you emphasize hard work, dedication, intensity, and hustle when the ultimate goal is for you to lose games.  Those traits are completely incompatible with one another. 

What would I do?  Well for one, I would not attempt to build a team through the draft, as I don't think you can build a championship caliber team through the draft.  I'd target free agents veterans to bring in and get this team back into the playoffs within the next two years.  Sign Derrick Favors this off season.  Give Kentavious Caldwell-Pope a 2 year, prove it deal.  Maybe getting him back home will help the light come on for him.  Hell, Trey Burke would have been a great guy for the Hawks to pick up this off season, and he has not probably entrenched himself as the Knicks starting point guard going forward.  

 

The last paragraph is at least an action plan.  Maybe they would have been good acquisitions, but I still don't think they move the needle enough.  We had playoff runs for 10 years and the hawk's are still searching for the missing ingredients...albeit a superstar.  I don't see one walking through the hawk's front offices begging for a chance to play in Atlanta.  So with that said, the hawk's have assets and they are lottery tickets (draft picks). I prefer to scratch and win for a change.  

[Peoriabird]

40 minutes ago, KB21 said:

....and somehow, being on the lottery treadmill is better?

This will be Phoenix's 8th year on the lottery treadmill.  This will be Orlando's 6th year on the lottery treadmill.  This will be Sacramento's 12th year on the lottery treadmill.  This is Brooklyn's 3rd year on the lottery treadmill (sans picks).  This is New York's 5th year on the lottery treadmill.  This will be the LA Laker's 5th year on the lottery treadmill (sans pick).  Charlotte has been on the treadmill for 6 of the past 8 years.  Detroit has been on the treadmill for 8 of the past 9 years.  This will be Denver's 5th year on the treadmill.

So, please tell me if the lottery is such a sure fire way to make your team great, why do these teams continue to draft in the lottery?  The NBA Lottery is like Hotel California.  You can check out anytime you like, but you can never leave.

EDIT: I will also add that Minnesota is currently on a 13 year lottery treadmill streak, and it isn't guaranteed that they will actually make the playoffs yet.  

 

I thought your argument was aimed at tanking teams and not nonplayoff teams.  The teams you mention weren't all tanking...they just missed the playoff similar to what our fate would have been had we just kept Howard and Millsap.  So I don't follow your argument please clarify!

[skimaskway23]

Favors, kcp, and trey burke lol. Thank god schlenk isnt stupid enough to do that

[Peoriabird]

18 minutes ago, KB21 said:

What would I do?  Well for one, I would not attempt to build a team through the draft, as I don't think you can build a championship caliber team through the draft.  I'd target free agents veterans to bring in and get this team back into the playoffs within the next two years.  Sign Derrick Favors this off season.  Give Kentavious Caldwell-Pope a 2 year, prove it deal.  Maybe getting him back home will help the light come on for him.  Hell, Trey Burke would have been a great guy for the Hawks to pick up this off season, and he has not probably entrenched himself as the Knicks starting point guard going forward.  

 

What would prevent the team from doing what you suggested above?

[KB21]

3 minutes ago, Peoriabird said:

What would prevent the team from doing what you suggested above?

An idiot for a GM who wants to build through the draft and have fans suffer through years upon years of losing.

[Peoriabird]

8 minutes ago, KB21 said:

An idiot for a GM who wants to build through the draft and have fans suffer through years upon years of losing.

SOOO Has he not signed free agents in the past??  I truly don't understand your assumptions.

[KB21]

9 minutes ago, deester11 said:

The last paragraph is at least an action plan.  Maybe they would have been good acquisitions, but I still don't think they move the needle enough.  We had playoff runs for 10 years and the hawk's are still searching for the missing ingredients...albeit a superstar.  I don't see one walking through the hawk's front offices begging for a chance to play in Atlanta.  So with that said, the hawk's have assets and they are lottery tickets (draft picks). I prefer to scratch and win for a change.  

So, we are back to you preferring to go the route that is a proven failure then.

Just now, Peoriabird said:

SOOO Has he not signed free agents in the past??

He's not going to.