Discussion of The Conclusions One Can Draw from the Miami Series

[sturt]

14 minutes ago, Sothron said:

I have a feeling if we trade Collins and don't bring in a leader

Reading the Sgt Schultz article about Colonel Schlenk... hehe...

Sounds like that's at the top of the Colonel's mind.

[bleachkit]

12 hours ago, AHF said:

Nope.  Their injuries count as well.  But their injuries were less impactful because they had guys who came off the bench and either played better than the lost starter (Vincent over Lowry that series) or gave 90% of what you would expect from the starter (Dipo in that specific game).  

You give me your objective analysis and tell me what key elements of their offense and defense Miami was unable to run without Lowry and Butler.  Where I'd say it impacted Miami the most were in the minutes when Oladipo wasn't on the floor.  Dipo was Butler equivalent on offense and a step down but respectable substitute on defense.  

I would make the analogy to a scenario where Atlanta loses Bogi and Huerter steps in with a 15 point efficient shooting night.  Maybe that isn't everything a healthy Bogi could give you and now when Huerter is on the bench there is a dropoff in bench play, but the Hawks can run pretty much all the same stuff with Bogi or Huerter in the game.  So the loss is real but the impact is not the equivalent to what it was for the Hawks being unable to run their core schemes on both sides of the floor.

Now I do think you can make the case that this reveals a difference in quality depth between the rosters this season and therefore justifies a conclusion that Miami had the better team.  That is fair.  But it is not fair to say that what Atlanta did was representative of what it would have done had it been able to run its normal PnR offense and had its defensive anchor for the series.  I'm saying we don't know the outcome of that.

In the regular season, we have a small sample size issue.  The Hawks played Miami with JC and Cap once this season and beat them that game (Miami had Jimmy, Bam, etc. but was without Lowry for that one).  So the regular season doesn't actually give us any information on how the teams matched up when healthy since at least one team was missing a key regular whenever they played.  

So again, here are at least some of the conclusions that I think we can draw from the series:

1. We don't know how the healthy teams match up because we did not see a single game where either team had all their starters in the regular season or post-season.
2. We know the Hawks were crippled in terms of what they could do on the floor relative to their normal baseline game plan on both sides of the ball. 
3. We know that given those limitations, Miami was able to throttle the Hawks and even win without Butler (and Lowry although I don't think Lowry's absence was particularly significant given the level at which Vincent played and what we saw from Lowry before his loss). 

Don't see how anyone could argue that any of those conclusions are not accurate but welcome an analysis that goes deeper than a simple conclusion such as "they beat us without Butler and Lowry therefore we know our team can't compete with them when healthy."

You're taking the glass half full perspective on this. Of course injuries to our from court had in impact. But there are some things from the series that just can't be dismissed. Mainly, Trae being completely neutralized. How can Hawks fans watch that and not be a little concerned? And our inability to play sound defense, which was a problem all year. Oladipo wasn't the first ti light us up off the bench. What about game 4? Completely blown out at home. I honestly thought going in it could go 7. I don't support making moves just for the sake of making moves, but Id prefer significant roster moves over the status quo.

Edited June 17, 2022 by bleachkit

[Peoriabird]

4 minutes ago, bleachkit said:

 Trae being completely neutralized. How can Hawks fans watch that and not be a little concerned?

If Trae is the problem then no move will help.  You just hope Trae goes back to the lab and becomes a better player.  You don't pay someone $207 mil dollar contract for someone else to carry the team.

[Diesel]

50 minutes ago, bleachkit said:

You're taking the glass half full perspective on this. Of course injuries to our from court had in impact. But there are some things from the series that just can't be dismissed. Mainly, Trae being completely neutralized. How can Hawks fans watch that and not be a little concerned? And our inability to play sound defense, which was a problem all year. Oladipo wasn't the first ti light us up off the bench. What about game 4? Completely blown out at home. I honestly thought going in it could go 7. I don't support making moves just for the sake of making moves, but Id prefer significant roster moves over the status quo.

It  could have been MJ, Kobe, or Lebron out there... if a team is able to triple team one player... that player will be neutralized.  The problem is you want to make wholesale changes to the team based on the time we played Miami and we had missing starters and inexperienced front court player.   

MJ struggled with the Jordan Rules and he had a fully healthy team.

Bird was held to 8 points twice in the finals and he had 3 Hall of Famers playing with him.

You're making a big fuss about what happened to Trae when it was him with no Front Court people??  This isn't Xbox BK... Just because they suit up doesn't mean that they will always go for 40.

 

[RedDawg#8]

Here is a great breakdown of game 3. And despite the focus of the vid, my biggest takeaway was our slow reaction time to get the ball out to the corner, be shot ready, or go backdoor on the weakside corner defender whose eyes were completely locked in on Trae.

To me, this was the missed opportunity of the series. Trae, who I love, was the main culprit of over-dribbling and not taking advantage of their over extending the defense on the ball.

Look at these possessions. The corner is wide open, even with poor spacing half the time. We got hot enough that game to barely win, but we clearly did not gameplan for this weakness in their defensive strategy. That corner guy should be eating on backdoor cuts, offensive rebounds, and attacking closeouts.

We did not take advantage of Trae’s half court gravity. If anything it looked like Nate told Trae to just slow down and play “calm and cool”. The better decision would have been to have him get the ball out quicker to the open teammate.

This was a series that we could have won if the team bought in to the hockey assist and not the stand and wait for Trae strategy. That rock should be moving as soon as the help defender comes over to Trae.

Im ok with the misses, because those shots were wide open and the corner 3 is the best shot in basketball after a layup or FT.

If we had hit enough 3’s, Miami has to adjust their scheme. That loosens up the aggressive defense and gives Trae more room to work.

We tried too hard to keep it simple and did not play smart. Miami got away with a risky strategy.

 

[Diesel]

Streaky shooting from our SGs and SFs.  They gambled that we couldn't hit the corner shot and they kept the triple team on Trae...

[marco102]

@NBASupes told you the Warriors would win it!

[JayBirdHawk]

Finally - the real offseason begins now!!!

[marco102]

4 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

Finally - the real offseason begins now!!!

So ready.  I'm derailing this thread because of the derail in the other thread, but things about to really get moving. 

[JayBirdHawk]

2 minutes ago, marco102 said:

So ready.  I'm derailing this thread because of the derail in the other thread, but things about to really get moving. 

Posted in wrong thread, haaahaaa

[Diesel]

The series forces us to ask ourselves a much bigger question..

Did the series show the beginning of DeAndre Hunter becoming a "Star" player.. 

or

Was his performance a result of Miami just leaving him open to focus on Trae?

 

Hawks fans are excited about DeAndre's success in the series.. even finishing with 35 points and 11 rebounds in the final game.  But... was this because Hunter is evolving... or is this because Miami left him wide open because they felt as though he couldn't hurt them?  IF it's the latter, that suggests that Hunter is not evolving and it may be a mistake to label him as untouchable.  It would suggest that he has a Chris Crawford moment.

What do you think?

 

 

[AHF]

12 hours ago, bleachkit said:

You're taking the glass half full perspective on this. Of course injuries to our from court had in impact. But there are some things from the series that just can't be dismissed. Mainly, Trae being completely neutralized. How can Hawks fans watch that and not be a little concerned? And our inability to play sound defense, which was a problem all year. Oladipo wasn't the first ti light us up off the bench. What about game 4? Completely blown out at home. I honestly thought going in it could go 7. I don't support making moves just for the sake of making moves, but Id prefer significant roster moves over the status quo.

Trae's struggled in the series to even a greater degree than I would have projected even had I known we would not be able to run our normal offense and he would be routinely marked by 2-3 players with Miami selling out to stop him.  But I also recognize we could not run our normal offense and that our offense was built around the PnR.  Given the success of the Hawks' offense since Trae came aboard, including in the playoffs, I don't assume he would struggle like that if we had either a viable second option or a viable ability to run our normal offense.  I would be much more concerned if we had been able to run our normal offense and Trae had been neutralized like that.

To me, the concern is more about the inability of our wings to assert themselves when Trae gets that kind of attention.  Obviously, Hunter took some advantage of the lack of pressure but not enough to make Miami second guess their approach for a second.  

We clearly need to have our bigs ready to contribute in a Trae Young led team.  Whatever roster moves we make, we can't be in a position where a raw OO and a limited Gallo are our only offensive weapons in the frontcourt if we expect to have success against a team like Miami.

[RedDawg#8]

2 hours ago, Diesel said:

The series forces us to ask ourselves a much bigger question..

Did the series show the beginning of DeAndre Hunter becoming a "Star" player.. 

or

Was his performance a result of Miami just leaving him open to focus on Trae?

 

Hawks fans are excited about DeAndre's success in the series.. even finishing with 35 points and 11 rebounds in the final game.  But... was this because Hunter is evolving... or is this because Miami left him wide open because they felt as though he couldn't hurt them?  IF it's the latter, that suggests that Hunter is not evolving and it may be a mistake to label him as untouchable.  It would suggest that he has a Chris Crawford moment.

What do you think?

 

 

It’s neither, or just a combination of both if you ask me.

For instance. One of the golden rules of basketball, when your star gets doubled someone else has to step up.

For the majority of the series that did not happen. Dre, Bogi, Gallo, Wright would all hit a few open shots due to being left open. That’s it. In game 5, that helped Dre get in to a shooting rhythm, but it wasn’t going to be enough on it’s own.

Dre flipped a switch and started playing with aggression. That’s the “star” mentality we started to see. He began creating offense for himself to take advantage of the switches and late close outs by Miami. He did not just shoot open shots. He started getting in to lane and attacking, something Miami didn’t expect, and due to his size and length, Miami couldn’t just knock him around like they did Trae. Once Dre realized this, everyone in the building did too. With Jimmy/Lowry out and PJ focusing on Trae, it was obvious that Dre could eat against their defense.

Eventually, Miami started adjusting to account for Dre. They put PJ on him, they even started to double him more. None of it mattered. Dre’s confidence was on another level. He was now hitting everything, even when tightly contested. And he was doing it on both ends, which is another reason I can’t give Trae all the credit. Dre was a defensive playmaker as well. 

To me, a true “star” can get theirs no matter what. I do not know that Dre is there yet. Not consistently anyway. But what he learned was how to play off of Trae and attack a physical, aggressive defense in multiple ways using his full bag of tricks.

That’s what guys like Middleton do. They keep you honest to where you have to respect someone other than the star. 

None of us fear Middleton. But he will be the reason you lose if you do not account for him. That’s what Dre can be right now. Especially if we start game-planning to get him going.

If we can get him to make a quick 3-4 shots out the gate each game, Trae’s nights would be so much easier. It will keep defenses honest and on their heels. 

[AHF]

3 minutes ago, RedDawg#8 said:

It’s neither, or just a combination of both if you ask me.

For instance. One of the golden rules of basketball, when your star gets doubled someone else has to step up.

For the majority of the series that did not happen. Dre, Bogi, Gallo, Wright would all hit a few open shots due to being left open. That’s it. In game 5, that helped Dre get in to a shooting rhythm, but it wasn’t going to be enough on it’s own.

Dre flipped a switch and started playing with aggression. That’s the “star” mentality we started to see. He began creating offense for himself to take advantage of the switches and late close outs by Miami. He did not just shoot open shots. He started getting in to lane and attacking, something Miami didn’t expect, and due to his size and length, Miami couldn’t just knock him around like they did Trae. Once Dre realized this, everyone in the building did too. With Jimmy/Lowry out and PJ focusing on Trae, it was obvious that Dre could eat against their defense.

Eventually, Miami started adjusting to account for Dre. They put PJ on him, they even started to double him more. None of it mattered. Dre’s confidence was on another level. He was now hitting everything, even when tightly contested. And he was doing it on both ends, which is another reason I can’t give Trae all the credit. Dre was a defensive playmaker as well. 

To me, a true “star” can get theirs no matter what. I do not know that Dre is there yet. Not consistently anyway. But what he learned was how to play off of Trae and attack a physical, aggressive defense in multiple ways using his full bag of tricks.

That’s what guys like Middleton do. They keep you honest to where you have to respect someone other than the star. 

None of us fear Middleton. But he will be the reason you lose if you do not account for him. That’s what Dre can be right now. Especially if we start game-planning to get him going.

If we can get him to make a quick 3-4 shots out the gate each game, Trae’s nights would be so much easier. It will keep defenses honest and on their heels. 

Very fair take.  I don't think they ever fully adjusted to Dre or game-planned around him but they did start to take more notice of him.  If he takes the next step forward, he won't see a defense like that again since he will be a focal point of what they do.

Definitely hope that Hunter's increasing aggression over the course of the series is something that will carryover to next season and that he will actually get a full offseason to work on his game for once.  

Rooting hard for a healthy 2022-23 for Hunter!

[Diesel]

1 hour ago, RedDawg#8 said:

It’s neither, or just a combination of both if you ask me.

For instance. One of the golden rules of basketball, when your star gets doubled someone else has to step up.

For the majority of the series that did not happen. Dre, Bogi, Gallo, Wright would all hit a few open shots due to being left open. That’s it. In game 5, that helped Dre get in to a shooting rhythm, but it wasn’t going to be enough on it’s own.

Dre flipped a switch and started playing with aggression. That’s the “star” mentality we started to see. He began creating offense for himself to take advantage of the switches and late close outs by Miami. He did not just shoot open shots. He started getting in to lane and attacking, something Miami didn’t expect, and due to his size and length, Miami couldn’t just knock him around like they did Trae. Once Dre realized this, everyone in the building did too. With Jimmy/Lowry out and PJ focusing on Trae, it was obvious that Dre could eat against their defense.

Eventually, Miami started adjusting to account for Dre. They put PJ on him, they even started to double him more. None of it mattered. Dre’s confidence was on another level. He was now hitting everything, even when tightly contested. And he was doing it on both ends, which is another reason I can’t give Trae all the credit. Dre was a defensive playmaker as well. 

To me, a true “star” can get theirs no matter what. I do not know that Dre is there yet. Not consistently anyway. But what he learned was how to play off of Trae and attack a physical, aggressive defense in multiple ways using his full bag of tricks.

That’s what guys like Middleton do. They keep you honest to where you have to respect someone other than the star. 

None of us fear Middleton. But he will be the reason you lose if you do not account for him. That’s what Dre can be right now. Especially if we start game-planning to get him going.

If we can get him to make a quick 3-4 shots out the gate each game, Trae’s nights would be so much easier. It will keep defenses honest and on their heels. 

Was it that he flipped the switch or did he do what he was supposed to do.

If your corner three isn't falling... Drive.  That's what Dre did.  Bogi does it sometimes and Kev stopped doing it after his injury.  I don't think  Miami ever stopped it's approach to Trae though.  Whenever Trae was on the floor, whether he had the ball or not, all eyes were on him.  This sort of selling out can't take place if Trae can pass to somebody that can consistently score.  That's why we missed the real JC and the real CC.  We also missed Gallo who picked a bad time to be terrible.

 

 

[JayBirdHawk]

We've been begging for one of our Wings to be the 'Consistent Guy' next to Trae....it's great for one game...will it be repeated? Consistency is key.

[AHF]

13 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

We've been begging for one of our Wings to be the 'Consistent Guy' next to Trae....it's great for one game...will it be repeated? Consistency is key.

Can't be one game (Tony Delk).  Can't be one series (DeAndre Hunter).  Can't be a month or two (Bogi).  Has to be a baseline status.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

On 6/15/2022 at 4:27 PM, bleachkit said:

Did I mention they beat us in a close out game with no Jimmy Butler? 

Can we also mention that the refs called one of the worst offensive fouls to foul out a player, in NBA history?

A charge drawn .. 30 ft away from the basket ... by 245 lb PJ Tucker ... who literally bullies people all over the court?  But on that play, he flops and gets the call.

And our coach didn't even challenge the play, because, that's what stubborn Nate does?

[Final_quest]

The other thing about this series was it felt like the refs were making a statement.  No one plays tough D like the Heat when Atlanta is the opponent.

[Peoriabird]

On 6/17/2022 at 7:20 AM, Diesel said:

The series forces us to ask ourselves a much bigger question..

Did the series show the beginning of DeAndre Hunter becoming a "Star" player.. 

or

Was his performance a result of Miami just leaving him open to focus on Trae?

 

Hawks fans are excited about DeAndre's success in the series.. even finishing with 35 points and 11 rebounds in the final game.  But... was this because Hunter is evolving... or is this because Miami left him wide open because they felt as though he couldn't hurt them?  IF it's the latter, that suggests that Hunter is not evolving and it may be a mistake to label him as untouchable.  It would suggest that he has a Chris Crawford moment.

What do you think?

 

 

So you are trying to tell me that once Miami figured out that Hunter was the only one making shots, they decided to tighten their coverage on all the other players not making shot so that he could continue to destroy them.  That make a lot of sense