Official Game Thread: Hunk-o'-Hawks at Lakers

[Carmine]

38 minutes ago, terrell said:

I'll just leave this hear....

Smdh.....

I'm not saying this just to say it. But Trae is legitimately the worst defender I have ever seen on teams that I am a fan of & follow. He needs to hear the smoke from his coaches & teammates.

[Sothron]

When I was going ballistic on the Hawks for trading Luka when I knew he was a superstar one of the things that really bothered me was how bad Trae Young was on defense in Oklahoma. He was literally the worst defensive player I have ever seen play the game of basketball at a serious level.

That was then, this is now. Trae has improved slightly on defense. Slightly. What I keep seeing is him showing and giving just no effort too many times on defense. People can get mad at @terrellfor posting that clip. Guess what? Tape don't lie. My coach yelled at us after games if we deserved it and would use game tape up on the monitors to show it if a player gave him lip about it. Tape don't lie. Look at those clips. That's not a guy making a tough shot on Trae running out to defend or Trae getting bullied in the post. I could live with that. 

But while the defense is certainly not all on Trae the lack of effort on his part is 100% on Trae's shoulders. He's literally just standing there or barely moving towards his man on every one of those clips. And that's just ONE GAME. Not a collection of the season so far...ONE GAME. 

[NBASupes]

1 hour ago, Sothron said:

When I was going ballistic on the Hawks for trading Luka when I knew he was a superstar one of the things that really bothered me was how bad Trae Young was on defense in Oklahoma. He was literally the worst defensive player I have ever seen play the game of basketball at a serious level.

That was then, this is now. Trae has improved slightly on defense. Slightly. What I keep seeing is him showing and giving just no effort too many times on defense. People can get mad at @terrellfor posting that clip. Guess what? Tape don't lie. My coach yelled at us after games if we deserved it and would use game tape up on the monitors to show it if a player gave him lip about it. Tape don't lie. Look at those clips. That's not a guy making a tough shot on Trae running out to defend or Trae getting bullied in the post. I could live with that. 

But while the defense is certainly not all on Trae the lack of effort on his part is 100% on Trae's shoulders. He's literally just standing there or barely moving towards his man on every one of those clips. And that's just ONE GAME. Not a collection of the season so far...ONE GAME. 

His defense has been ass all year. Not just yesterday. Yesterday was the point of no return. Fans finally could see, this is Trae's fault. He might not be OU bad anymore but OU is college Basketball and their schemes can protect bad defenders. This is the NBA, you will get expose somehow, some way. 

[niremetal]

9 hours ago, NBASupes said:

No one is fixing the problem which is defense until Trae gives a shit about defense. He's like Zion last year for the Pels. He causes his defense to rotate so much to protect him that the integrity of the defense is shattered. The difference is, Zion could play some help self and use his athleticism to get some occasional positive plays. Defense is just the worst I've seen. His man defense isn't bad on average but his PnR defense is the worst in the NBA and during the RS, his off ball defense is trash outside of the first three games each season and the playoffs where he gives a shit on that end.

It's not a shock, in the games without Trae playing, we were keeping teams at 101 ppg. With Trae, the last time a team didn't score 130+ points was our Orlando win. I been saying this for years. I don't believe Trae has tremendous stamina. I believe he puts so much energy in offensively, that he just doesn't have much for anything else.

 

9 hours ago, NBASupes said:

Trae is like, defense takes too much energy and i don't have a lot and I dont really care for it or good at it so i will focus on what i do and have the others help just in case. He also doesn't have good defense awareness during the RS and ball watches a lot.

Taken together, this says to me that as long as Trae is unwilling or unable to give more of an effort defensively, the Hawks are never going to be able to win a title. Because the reality is this: no team has won a title in this century without at least a top 20 defense (in terms of efficiency, i.e. DRtg). The only team that wasn't at least top 10 was the '01 Lakers--a team that finished #1 in DRtg the previous year and was so dominant with two all-time-top-10 offensive players that it was able to coast during the regular season. That was a team, in other words, that was literally the best team in the league defensively when it decided to be, and had already proven itself capable of cranking it up defensively when needed. That ain't us. 

What am I missing here?

 

[NBASupes]

6 minutes ago, niremetal said:

 

Taken together, this says to me that as long as Trae is unwilling or unable to give more of an effort defensively, the Hawks are never going to be able to win a title. Because the reality is this: no team has won a title in this century without at least a top 20 defense (in terms of efficiency, i.e. DRtg). The only team that wasn't at least top 10 was the '01 Lakers--a team that finished #1 in DRtg the previous year and was so dominant with two all-time-top-10 offensive players that it was able to coast during the regular season. That was a team, in other words, that was literally the best team in the league defensively when it decided to be, and had already proven itself capable of cranking it up defensively when needed. That ain't us. 

What am I missing here?

 

Trae has the Reggie Miller assassin mindset and personality. Aka, the Joker. Both are capable of elevating their games to levels unseen in regular situations. This is why Reggie is an elite playoff player but in the RS, he made the All Star team less than Iso Joe. Trae's defense was at the same level in last year's playoff as Bogi. We didn't have to protect him anywhere close to what we did during the RS and this year, we have to protect him to an extreme degree. When Trae said, the RS is boring. That was the same mindset Reggie had. Assassins are showman. They want the spotlight. They live for it. Because of this, RS Trae might as well be a completely different player than playoff Trae. He has time to download you like Reggie did. He sees you often. He knows everything you like. When he's focus, he's deadeye. Because of this, our ceiling raises with Trae the same way Philly drops with Simmons in the playoffs. 

But yeah, you are right to a degree. If this was Trae in the playoffs, we would have ZERO shot of winning a title ever. Trae is made with the right stuff, sadly, we need it for the RS as well. I honestly think TS had a great plan how to build around Trae but as time goes, you learn more and more about your players. As do your opponents. 

[Atlantaholic]

I've been willing to give Trae a pass on defense because of his incredible offensive season, but not anymore. Trae is a problem on defense. We can't win unless he at least starts to look interested on that end. He doesn't have to be good, but at least give some effort. That type of stuff rubs off on everyone.

[terrell]

2 minutes ago, Atlantaholic said:

I've been willing to give Trae a pass on defense because of his incredible offensive season, but not anymore. Trae is a problem on defense. We can't win unless he at least starts to look interested on that end. He doesn't have to be good, but at least give some effort. That type of stuff rubs off on everyone.

"That type of stuff rubs off on everyone"

How many times have I said this before? 

[Sothron]

What really chaps my ass is listening to Trae talk about the team needing to give more effort when the tape shows where the effort is really lacking. It stares back at Trae every time he looks in a mirror.

[NBASupes]

Sabonis responded to me saying we need to target him to dropping 42 on the Jazz. That said, Whiteside might be the worst big man defensive player in the NBA who, still an accomplishment and Lance who could barely score here is dropping points like crazy. My feeling is when Cam's traded, he will go nuts and Travis will be fired soon. 

 

 

[terrell]

48 minutes ago, NBASupes said:

Sabonis responded to me saying we need to target him to dropping 42 on the Jazz. That said, Whiteside might be the worst big man defensive player in the NBA who, still an accomplishment and Lance who could barely score here is dropping points like crazy. My feeling is when Cam's traded, he will go nuts and Travis will be fired soon. 

 

 

So are you saying our coaches suck?

[NBASupes]

5 minutes ago, terrell said:

So are you saying our coaches suck?

They don't suck. A part of this is when Lance was here, our offense was trash even by G-league standards. He played 6 games with us and barely touched the ball and when Trae came back, he barely played. His first game was his last game he got touches. The coaches don't suck but they do have a pecking order. 

[JeffS17]

These guys at half time v the Grizzlies:

2/16..... they were 19/31 v us and 11/19 from 3.  Why!!!

[benhillboy]

27 minutes ago, JeffS17 said:

These guys at half time v the Grizzlies:

2/16..... they were 19/31 v us and 11/19 from 3.  Why!!!

ESPN’s college analysts blow their NBA guys out of the water.  

Yesterday one of the guys said “dribble penetration is the most dangerous weapon in basketball.”  Taylor implores his guys to stay in front but a majority of those guys are self-starters on defense anyway.  With Trae, Bogi, and Kevin, that’s a real struggle.  Then the other guy (Former C from Florida) said “you can’t play good team defense if you don’t like each other.”  Both those comments resonated.  The Grizz are tight obviously.  
 

The Hawks seemed extremely close-knit for the late season run last year, I don’t know what has happened this year.  Poor rotations,Covid, injuries, and losses will do it I guess.  I’m just trying to be patient for Dre’s healthy return.  Everything Trae takes off the table Dre puts back on outside of constant communication.

Edited January 10, 2022 by benhillboy

[benhillboy]

OO is my man but we all knew struggles were afoot matching up with Zubac (one of his nicknames is supposedly Zupac lol)  On what planet is he only 240 lbs?  I could’ve sworn he was damn near 270 the way he plays.