The Tank Thread

[Lurker]

17 minutes ago, AHF said:

NBA and MLB GMs have basically come to the point where they want their teams in one of 3 places - contending, on the path to contend or rebuilding.  Nobody wants to be in no man's land anymore.  Being in any one of those lane's means fully embracing that path without half measures.

Pretty much this except MLB is more forgiving in that even if you aren't really that good, it doesn't matter as much if you simply get hot. Not as forgiving in the NBA where there really are standards in most cases outside of the Houston case (that involved an injured superstar) that have to be followed to really have a shot at winning an NBA finals (top 4 seed, 50+ wins). It's why I want to see the NBA playoffs just get contracted. It'll shut most of this mess up.

Although I suppose with us just watching UMBC take down a #1 overall a couple weeks ago then you can argue that the standards that we've seen for years in the NBA can and will be broken sometime very soon and it's fine to chase being that team to do that. 

[deester11]

41 minutes ago, Peoriabird said:

Except a few hold outs that happen to be the most vocal on this message board!  But at least they are entertaining..Redundant but entertaining! LOL!

They aren't entertaining this board at all.  Most of the posters make great arguments FOR the reboot of this team,  but the holdouts think it's great to be in the playoffs to say.."Look at us...we lost in the first round, but we made i!" That seems to be dumb to me.  I'd rather do it right and challenge every year..

[KB21]

1 minute ago, deester11 said:

They aren't entertaining this board at all.  Most of the posters make great arguments FOR the reboot of this team,  but the holdouts think it's great to be in the playoffs to say.."Look at us...we lost in the first round, but we made i!" That seems to be dumb to me.  I'd rather do it right and challenge every year..

Yeah.  We are certainly challenging for a championship with our 21 wins this season.  Wow!   It’s just been exhilarating.  Little did I know that the team who wins the fewest games and doesn’t make the playoffs is the true championship team.  It’s going to be an exhilarating next 5 years with all these tanking championships the Hawks will be winning.  Houston must be the biggest fools ever, winning so many games this year without cutting the talent on the team to the point where they intentionally lose games.  

[Diesel]

Since nobody had the guts to take up my first offer Let's try it this way...

For all the tankers... Since everybody was scared of 4 years...

Again put your guts in your hands and give YOUR prediction on how long you believe the tanking strategy will take to get us into championship calibre... i.e. ECFs appearance. 

Save the cowardice and let's see who is willing to stand behind their convictions. 

 

[KB21]

2 minutes ago, Diesel said:

Since nobody had the guts to take up my first offer Let's try it this way...

For all the tankers... Since everybody was scared of 4 years...

Again put your guts in your hands and give YOUR prediction on how long you believe the tanking strategy will take to get us into championship calibre... i.e. ECFs appearance. 

Save the cowardice and let's see who is willing to stand behind their convictions. 

 

I’ll go first.  The Hawks will not make the playoffs for at least 5 years, and they will not become a championship caliber team.  

[High5]

1 hour ago, Diesel said:

Since nobody had the guts to take up my first offer Let's try it this way...

For all the tankers... Since everybody was scared of 4 years...

Again put your guts in your hands and give YOUR prediction on how long you believe the tanking strategy will take to get us into championship calibre... i.e. ECFs appearance. 

Save the cowardice and let's see who is willing to stand behind their convictions. 

 

That's a very silly question to ask before we even draft anyone. Until we see how our pick(s) play in the NBA it's a total shot in the dark. It could be 3-4 years or 13-14 years depending on how the lottery shakes out and the decisions we make on draft night. 

[MaceCase]

1 hour ago, High5 said:

That's a very silly question to ask before we even draft anyone. Until we see how our pick(s) play in the NBA it's a total shot in the dark. It could be 3-4 years or 13-14 years depending on how the lottery shakes out and the decisions we make on draft night. 

Don't fall for the straw man. 

-It's been proven without a doubt all of 130 pages ago that you need talent to win in the NBA. 

-You have 3 avenues available to you to acquire said talent: draft, trade, and/or free agency. 

-At the end of last season the Hawks recognized that in their current iteration they had little opportunity to effectively do either. 

-So they embarked on the path to opening said avenues by increasing draft assets, increasing trade assets, and increasing free agency assets.

 

That's it, that's all the current strategy is.  Creating the opportunity to acquire talent.  Morey focused on collecting enough assets for trade, Hinkie focused on increasing his chances in the draft, and Ferry focused on being a player in multiple free agencies until they all hit.  You can dip and dabble through any and all of those strategies...if they are available to you.

So pay no mind to those who would demand ultimatums when they themselves can't even offer one besides stay in limbo for at minimum 2 more years and then...... crickets.

If any feel the desire to actually engage the question, then whatever number you come up with add +2.  Because that's the best the alternative offers.

 

 

[CBAreject]

Predicting the next ECF isn’t about “guts”, it’s stupidity.  This is just baiting people into fulfilling the strawman KB created.  How’s this:  how many seasons of paying Howard, Bazemore, THJ, and Schröder $70 million to be barely above replacement level would it have taken to get us to the Finals?  How many if you add a declining and injured Millsap to make it a cool $100 million?

[Diesel]

5 hours ago, High5 said:

That's a very silly question to ask before we even draft anyone. Until we see how our pick(s) play in the NBA it's a total shot in the dark. It could be 3-4 years or 13-14 years depending on how the lottery shakes out and the decisions we make on draft night. 

If it's a silly question to ask... doesn't that make it a silly plan to follow?  I mean... isn't the purpose of tanking to make us a better team???    If our problem was that we couldn't get to the championship calibre... please tell me the logic in scrapping everything to not get to the championship calibre?

[Diesel]

3 hours ago, CBAreject said:

Predicting the next ECF isn’t about “guts”, it’s stupidity.  This is just baiting people into fulfilling the strawman KB created.  How’s this:  how many seasons of paying Howard, Bazemore, THJ, and Schröder $70 million to be barely above replacement level would it have taken to get us to the Finals?  How many if you add a declining and injured Millsap to make it a cool $100 million?

Wow... so you are saying that this is just a exercise in futility.   

Or is it.. that you have been program to criticize but have NO TRUE CONVICTIONS OF YOUR OWN?  DOES ANYBODY HERE BELIEVE THAT TANKING WILL LEAD US TO CHAMPIONSHIP CALIBRE?

[Peoriabird]

6 hours ago, Diesel said:

Since nobody had the guts to take up my first offer Let's try it this way...

For all the tankers... Since everybody was scared of 4 years...

Again put your guts in your hands and give YOUR prediction on how long you believe the tanking strategy will take to get us into championship calibre... i.e. ECFs appearance. 

Save the cowardice and let's see who is willing to stand behind their convictions. 

 

The one thing we know is that the current strategy has a 10 year cushion which is the number of year we were in the playoffs without contending.  And before you use the eastern conference finals year as proof of contending, stop right there.  You know and I know that we were Cleveland's doormat as we were swept away by an injured Cleveland team and never had a shot at wining that series.  Last year was the end of the road for that team with its parts becoming more and more dysfunctional and old...It was time to get some fresh blood in to infuse the franchise with new life.  Old wait, now I sound like a broken record.  Maybe this isn't as entertaining as I thought especially when you are directly involved in the food fight.  LOL!

[Diesel]

4 hours ago, MaceCase said:

Don't fall for the straw man. 

-It's been proven without a doubt all of 130 pages ago that you need talent to win in the NBA. 

-You have 3 avenues available to you to acquire said talent: draft, trade, and/or free agency. 

-At the end of last season the Hawks recognized that in their current iteration they had little opportunity to effectively do either. 

-So they embarked on the path to opening said avenues by increasing draft assets, increasing trade assets, and increasing free agency assets.

 

That's it, that's all the current strategy is.  Creating the opportunity to acquire talent.  Morey focused on collecting enough assets for trade, Hinkie focused on increasing his chances in the draft, and Ferry focused on being a player in multiple free agencies until they all hit.  You can dip and dabble through any and all of those strategies...if they are available to you.

So pay no mind to those who would demand ultimatums when they themselves can't even offer one besides stay in limbo for at minimum 2 more years and then...... crickets.

If any feel the desire to actually engage the question, then whatever number you come up with add +2.  Because that's the best the alternative offers.

 

 

No conviction...  So this is a strawman?? That's laughable. 

Do you work???  IF so.. When At work, whenever you propose something... do they ever ask you... What do you believe the outcome will be?  Do they ever ask you for a timeline?  And if they do...  IS your response:

I'M NOT FALLING FOR THE STRAWMAN!

Tanking is a proposal for being better than we were.   Since we were a perennial playoff team, that means that tanking should take us higher.   Your Strawman bullshit tells me that you don't believe in it and you have no convictions about it's ability to be successful.   You just are quick to criticize anybody who does not believe in it but has the voice to speak it. 

What good is acquiring talent, Mace, if you don't believe that the process of doing that will make you any better than you were before starting the process?

[MaceCase]

20 minutes ago, Diesel said:

No conviction...  So this is a strawman?? That's laughable. 

Do you work???  IF so.. When At work, whenever you propose something... do they ever ask you... What do you believe the outcome will be?  Do they ever ask you for a timeline?  And if they do...  IS your response:

I'M NOT FALLING FOR THE STRAWMAN!

Tanking is a proposal for being better than we were.   Since we were a perennial playoff team, that means that tanking should take us higher.   Your Strawman bullshit tells me that you don't believe in it and you have no convictions about it's ability to be successful.   You just are quick to criticize anybody who does not believe in it but has the voice to speak it. 

What good is acquiring talent, Mace, if you don't believe that the process of doing that will make you any better than you were before starting the process?

If I was working at a company with a failed business model that is hemorrhaging money, uncompetitive in the current market, and on the brink of completly folding and was asked for a solution?  I’d say sell off some assets to keep the lights on, restructure and probably completely rebrand.  If they asked me for a timetable on when the company would be profitable again?  I’d say worry about not taking on any more water first, you weren't profitable to begin with.

But hey, you rather continue to be Toys R Us than work at being the next Amazon.  Kudos to you and your “conviction”, that alone will see you to success.

+2

[CBAreject]

56 minutes ago, Diesel said:

Wow... so you are saying that this is just a exercise in futility.   

Or is it.. that you have been program to criticize but have NO TRUE CONVICTIONS OF YOUR OWN?  DOES ANYBODY HERE BELIEVE THAT TANKING WILL LEAD US TO CHAMPIONSHIP CALIBRE?

 

1) If squawkers read “so you’re saying,” they can bet whatever comes next is a strawman.  

2) What is with the escalating font sizes?

3) I do have convictions—I believe tanking was absolutely the right move and I stand by that.  I will stand by it even if we strike out in the draft.

[Buzzard]

8 hours ago, AHF said:

NBA and MLB GMs have basically come to the point where they want their teams in one of 3 places - contending, on the path to contend or rebuilding.  Nobody wants to be in no man's land anymore.  Being in any one of those lane's means fully embracing that path without half measures.

 I think until we lost Horford we were on the path to contending. Horford, Sap, Teague, Schröder put us in a spot to be one SG or SF away. We could not lose Horford, max out a near 30 year old SAP, and then wish upon a star for both a All Star Center and SG or SF to drop in or lap.

As much as I was on the D12 Bandwagon, it is painfully obvious he is not the player who carried Orlando for all those years. He was on a equal team with us, and is currently on  a equal or better team with Charlotte; and neither were or are going anywhere. Inadvertently swapping Howard for Horford was a huge step back.

Travis saw this, Bud did not.

 

[deester11]

8 hours ago, KB21 said:

Yeah.  We are certainly challenging for a championship with our 21 wins this season.  Wow!   It’s just been exhilarating.  Little did I know that the team who wins the fewest games and doesn’t make the playoffs is the true championship team.  It’s going to be an exhilarating next 5 years with all these tanking championships the Hawks will be winning.  Houston must be the biggest fools ever, winning so many games this year without cutting the talent on the team to the point where they intentionally lose games.  

You have to be insanely blind to think that what the team had was a few parts away from winning anything in the playoffs.  The old way wasn't working unless you wanted to continue to do the same old thing with the same results. Get over yourself or align yourself with the many teams in the playoffs.

[Buzzard]

8 hours ago, KB21 said:

I’ll go first.  The Hawks will not make the playoffs for at least 5 years, and they will not become a championship caliber team.  

You are really going out on a limb here. What happened to us being like Minny ( 14 years in the lottery ) or the Kings ( 12 years ) ? The bold part is even weaker. You could say that about any Atlanta Hawks team in history barring one ( Nique, Theus, Malone, Doc, Willis ) and be absolutely correct.

Your way is the best way but your way has not won us anything either. We have not been in the lottery since 2007 and still not won a championship. That is your strategy being used for 10 years. I would think a change in strategy would be welcome.

Edited March 31, 2018 by Buzzard

[Buzzard]

8 hours ago, Diesel said:

Since nobody had the guts to take up my first offer Let's try it this way...

For all the tankers... Since everybody was scared of 4 years...

Again put your guts in your hands and give YOUR prediction on how long you believe the tanking strategy will take to get us into championship calibre... i.e. ECFs appearance. 

Save the cowardice and let's see who is willing to stand behind their convictions. 

 

Maybe you missed this; but our All Star center from that ECF Team no longer plays for us.

It takes more than one ECF appearance Diesel. We are the weak conference; if you are not good enough to get there two, three, four years in a row; the West will own you.

There is a good reason Bron does not want a playoff realignment. If that happens, his championship finals run would end as fast as it started. Honestly, if that were to happen and he stays in Cleveland, he may never see a NBA Finals again.

Edited March 31, 2018 by Buzzard

[High5]

2 hours ago, Diesel said:

If it's a silly question to ask... doesn't that make it a silly plan to follow?  I mean... isn't the purpose of tanking to make us a better team???    If our problem was that we couldn't get to the championship calibre... please tell me the logic in scrapping everything to not get to the championship calibre?

We had no path to a championship if we re-signed Sap. We would just be waiting 2 years for his contract (and probably Dwight's) to come off of the books and then we'd be in basically the same position we were to start this season, except everyone would be 2 years older and closer to their next contract. So it would have been silly (being polite) NOT to rebuild now. Now we have better odds to build a contender and to build it sooner. 

Edited March 31, 2018 by High5

[Buzzard]

1 minute ago, High5 said:

We had no path to a championship if we re-signed Sap. We would just be waiting 2 years for his contract (and probably Dwight's) to come off of the books and then we'd be in basically the same position we were to start this season, except everyone would be 2 years older and closer to their next contract. So it would have been silly (to be polite) NOT to rebuild now. Now we have better odds to build a contender and to build it sooner. 

Exactly, waiting to go downhill is still the same result. Horford walked and he would have been our best player and trade chip. SAP is showing his age ( 33 ) this year with diminished overall numbers and injuries. Dwight is proving in Charlotte he is not a savior for any team.

We were not going any further once Horford walked; and the downhill decent started with him. Schlenk just decided to cut our losses and speed it up.