Official Game Thread: Knicks at Hawks

[bleachkit]

4 minutes ago, terrell said:

Hunter is the only consistent player right now..

Capela is a close 2nd. But we cant really play him late..

Everyone else needs to step it up..

 

Capela's free throw shooting is such a liability. Teams can just foul him late in the game.

[RedDawg#8]

I watched every Falcons game this season, and I did so because almost every game was competitive and winnable. We know how that played out.

I personally do not have the stomach anymore for blowing leads and self destructing. It's honestly probably bad for my health at this point.

Nobody expects to win every game. And we havent yet seen this squad at full strength. But that's also the frustrating part. You have to win games like this. The season only gets longer, things only get harder.

We wanted to be taken seriously, well, teams aren't going to just lay down because we got some shiny toys. We have to be prepared to play a full 48 every night, no excuses.

Hawks, you are the 2021 to the Falcons 2020. You do not have to do anything extra special, just for the love of God be better than the predecessor. Please, we need good news in this city.

[Sothron]

When you are up by 15 at home against the Knicks in the 3rd quarter you win the game. Not interested in any excuses in this game. We clearly took the foot off the pedal in the mid 3rd and let them come right back in the game. You can't do that. We need those hurt guys to get back into the games to teach our guys about closing out games.

[terrell]

14 minutes ago, bleachkit said:

Capela's free throw shooting is such a liability. Teams can just foul him late in the game.

Capelas free throw shooting..

Trae and Collins' defense..

Liabilities...

[Peoriabird]

Well I guess posters are finally seeing what I've been talking about.  Trae has been good at times and absolutely terrible at times.  He shoots so many terrible shots and has so many terrible turnovers which the team can't recover from all of the time.  LP is hell bent on playing small even with a lead. For some reason unknown to me, he does not value defensive rebounding which is the key to winning consistently.  He talks about it plenty but he constantly puts in line ups that are at a clear disadvantage when it comes to rebounding.  It should be quite clear to everyone now that LP is not a defensive minded coach.  John playing more center than he should was one of my most confident predictions in the predictions thread.  And even when Okungwu is healthy, he won't play much because of LP's obsession with playing John at center.  Solo is now last year's version of Vince Carter and Bogi is who I though he was.  Despite the obvious roster flaws, this team should still make the playoffs but the head coach might make that goal quite difficult to achieve.

[bleachkit]

7 games in and Trae's numbers are pretty much identical to last years. A lot of points, a lot of assists, but turnovers and so-so efficiency.

[hawkzlova123]

Im still so pissed

[HawkingAwesome]

well this was a hot mess

[HawkingAwesome]

hawks need to try and trade for something

[BrazilianHawk]

Bullshit game from Trae. He's great and all, sure, but a lot of times I wish he would have made the simple play. We went up big when he did it. A lot of horrible turnovers and those ridiculous deep threes... and his D.  Honestly. He's WAY BETTER than that. LP has to have the balls to sit him late in games like this. I wish Rondo would play some last night.

 

 

[macdaddy]

We got beat.  Pretty simple.   Knicks were much more physical than we were which is going to be a problem for this team.

But let's not overreact.   The starters plus Heurter scored every basket but 1.   That's insane.   Thibs, who runs his starters into the ground usually, got 30 points from his bench.  Hawks got 12.  9 from Heurter. 

[Gray Mule]

NEW HAWKS - 2021

We've added two great three point shooters - Bogdan and Danilo - Both missing - injured.

We've added a great new defensive guard - Out, injured. (surgery on ankle) - unseen.

We've a great rim protector center - #6 draft pick.  Agent 0017 - Still unseen - injured.

We've added a great, experienced PG to lead our bench - Rondo out - injured.

We've added a great assistant coach who breathes defense - Yet, we have poor defense.

And, we all wonder why our beloved Hawks can't win.  Gee - I wonder.  Blame the coach.  Blame the tired starters who play too many minutes.  Blame the refs.  Blame the GM for adding these players who are injured?  Maybe we're not really as good as we thought we were.

Most of us thought that we were a .500 team for the season.  To do this, we would have to win more in the second half of the season as these players became a team.  Hawks are one win better than the .500 target for the season.  With everything that is wrong, we are still 'right there.'

Relax.  Breathe in and out.  Some of our friendly other teams have been better than we expected.  We will learn from all our errors we have been making.  They are mostly things that can be fixed.  (Note: Capela had an arch on his free throws last night - and - they went in!  Ya!!)

Onward and upward - GO ATL HAWKS !!

 

 

[nathan2331]

A lot of y'all need to find some patience. Obviously there is valid criticism with us blowing 3rd quarter leads, but we're not in a bad position at all right now. 8th place in the East and one of 6 teams with 3 losses is not the worst place we could be right now. Especially considering the injuries we're dealing with. Losing like this sucks, but we're not getting blown out so just let it go.

[REHawksFan]

Didn't have a chance to post during the game and it was probably just as well.  What a frustrating game to watch. Hawks had double digit leads in the 3rd qtr of both the last 2 games and lost both.  Just ridiculous.  

Some thoughts:

1. I love Trae. No, I LOVE Trae. He's avg 28.6 / 9.1 on the season. Top 5 in both. Yippee. And yet the eye test tells me he's largely playing like crap. Too many turnovers. Too many passive, I don't give a $*** type plays.  The Hawks had the ball down 4 or 5 on at least 2 straight possessions late in the game and I'm not sure Trae even touched the ball.  IF he's your Alpha, your leader, that just can't happen.  It was the same thing I complained about after the Nets loss.  He HAS to be better.  (I'll also just add that his efficiency has gone down seemingly every game, which sucks).
2. Unless Trae goes ballistic, the Hawks aren't going to win many games when your bench production is 14 pts on 17 shots.  Just not going to happen.
3. The wings outside of Hunter really hurt the Hawks last night.  Cam, Kev, and Bogie combined for 22 pts on 9-26 shooting. Yuck.  
4. Stating the obvious I know, but the Hawks REALLY REALLY miss Gallo.  Even more than his consistent shot is the seemingly calming influence he brings to the team. 
5. Why we paying Rondo $7.5M to watch a combination of Goodwin, Bogie, and Kev run the 2nd team?  If he's available he should be playing. Goodwin played 8 min. You tellin me Rondo is available but can't manage 8 min? 
6. I'm still not sure how Clint and JC are going to fit together and I wonder if them being on the floor together makes the offense harder. I was looking at the two so far, and they avg 28/19 between the two of them. For comparison, JC and the starting C last year avg 30/17.  Obviously Clint is a HUGE upgrade over anyone the Hawks ran out there last year at C, but is the combo of JC and Clint a net positive?  Not yet offensively.  
7. It's only been 7 games so it's not time to draw any definitive conclusions, but I do think it's safe to say the Hawks will only go as far as their 3pt shooting takes them. Live by the 3. Die by the 3 as they say.  In their 4 wins, they shot 41.5% from 3 which would rank 3rd in the NBA. In their 3 losses, they shot 35.8% which would be 17th in the NBA.  And that number is inflated due to the Nets game. In the last 2 losses, they shot 33.3% which would rank 26th in the NBA.  Ugly. 
8. Finally, the defense.  Hawks gave up 1.33 pps against the Knicks. Not quite as bad as the Nets 1.45 pps in that loss, but still really bad.  The knicks are good but not great. Same with the Cavs. Should have won both games even with the poor shooting if they only played a modicum of defense.  

 

 

[macdaddy]

Thibs waited until the 4th quarter and then started trying to deny Trae the ball.  It worked great.   We had no answer.   You deny Trae, that neutralizes Collins to an extent and the other guys stumble and brick their way to the finish line.  

[REHawksFan]

1 minute ago, macdaddy said:

Thibs waited until the 4th quarter and then started trying to deny Trae the ball.  It worked great.   We had no answer.   You deny Trae, that neutralizes Collins to an extent and the other guys stumble and brick their way to the finish line.  

You're probably right, but my pushback is this.: teams have been trying to deny Trae the ball for 2 years.  It's LP's damn job to figure it out and have a plan in place to get him the ball late in the game. Either as a facilitator or (my preference) as the primary scoring option. I'm just a firm believer that you ride or die with the ball in your superstar's hands at the end of an NBA game.  

I'll also just say that Trae looks to me like he's got all these new shiny weapons to play with and he's going out of his way to try and get those assists to them when sometimes the smarter play is for him to take that jumper or floater in the lane.  Case in point, one of his turnovers last night was him trying to force the ball to Clint inside when he was point blank in front of the rim on a broken play. Just shoot the floater. 

[Peoriabird]

The Hawks don't have a Super star player on their team

[macdaddy]

2 minutes ago, REHawksFan said:

You're probably right, but my pushback is this.: teams have been trying to deny Trae the ball for 2 years.  It's LP's damn job to figure it out and have a plan in place to get him the ball late in the game. Either as a facilitator or (my preference) as the primary scoring option. I'm just a firm believer that you ride or die with the ball in your superstar's hands at the end of an NBA game.  

I'll also just say that Trae looks to me like he's got all these new shiny weapons to play with and he's going out of his way to try and get those assists to them when sometimes the smarter play is for him to take that jumper or floater in the lane.  Case in point, one of his turnovers last night was him trying to force the ball to Clint inside when he was point blank in front of the rim on a broken play. Just shoot the floater. 

Absolutely.  There has to be an answer.  Unfortunately there is still this belief that Heurter and Cam can be facilitators.   They can to an extent but they fail often in crunch time.   But yeah we should have made some kind of adjustment.   It was horrible. 

[JeffS17]

17 minutes ago, macdaddy said:

Absolutely.  There has to be an answer.  Unfortunately there is still this belief that Heurter and Cam can be facilitators.   They can to an extent but they fail often in crunch time.   But yeah we should have made some kind of adjustment.   It was horrible. 

Heurter has actually looked better handling the ball in the last couple of games.  His shot wasn't falling last night but he's getting a little better at play making.  I'm not opposed to letting other guys run sets and manage the offense for short spurts -- as I think it's necessary for guys like Heurter/Cam to develop -- but in crunch time, I want Trae with the ball.

[hawkzlova123]

Gotta love yahoo 

 

       The point guard scored his final points on a lay-up with 2:26 left, cutting the deficit to three and setting up a nervy finish. About 40 seconds later, Mitchell Robinson blocked another layup attempt from John Collins but DeAndre Bembry hit a trey on Atlanta’s ensuing possession to make the score, 107-106