Official Game Thread: Hawks at 76ers

[lethalweapon3]

“I’m The Biggest Bounce of the Summer… Whoops, sorry, wrong phone ad! Isn’t it November, anyway?”

 

Tidbits Time! Not the same Bat Place, but the same Bat Time and Bat Channel (7:30 PM Eastern, Bally Sports Southeast and 92.9 FM in ATL, NBC Sports Philadelphia) for the 76ers and Atlanta Hawks rematch.

• WHAT’S UP, DOC? MEEP MEEP! – In the first quarter of Thursday’s 104-95 win over Doc Rivers’ Sixers, Trae Young wasted little time zipping past former Atlanta point guard great Doc Rivers on the Hawks’ all-time scoring list. Doc got himself a prime seat across from Gucci Row to see Trae move up the charts to 16^th, with a bullet. Trae (franchise-best 9.1 career APG, which is bananas) still has around 1200 more dimes to go before he can sniff Rivers’ Hawks-career assist record, so, Doc can relax for a few more months.

 

• WASH, RISE UP, REPEAT – This unrepentant non-streamer thanks the Sixers and Hawks for helping me forget to check whether Amazon’s Thursday Night Pigskin shindig between what passes for football teams in Atlanta and Charlotte was airing on regular-degular VHF TV. Saved me some antacids. Good news, Matty Ice! Turns out, sometimes, you CAN throw the ball with your back on the ground after all.

 

• MAXEY-MUM OVERDRIVE – Thanks, also, to Tyrese Maxey (29.7 FG% in last three games, all without James Harden around), for making me look foolish once more for overselling a mid-tiered scorer as the new, worthy franchise face. Your Jerami Grant Trophy is in the mail. Harden’s absence is drawing the young Sixers guard undue defensive attention, perhaps. But Tyrese has been immensely unhelpful of late to Joel Embiid (26 points on 28 combined FGAs & FTAs, no O-Rebs, 2 assists, 5 personals and 8 TOs vs. ATL) in making Philly’s offense look more than one-dimensional. Hunting mismatches and attacking quicker seems a sensible idea for him, but that’s beyond my paygrade to figure out how.

(aside: the offensive/defensive mileage stats have Maxey and Dejounte Murray burnin’ major sneaker rubber at both ends of the floor)

• ATL SECURITY. IDENTIFY YOURSELF! – Home thefts are up! Atlanta’s 9.3 steals per-48, in State Farm Arena, ranks in the Top 5 among home teams. The Hawks haven’t duplicated that thievery away from their own comfy confines (5.6 road steals per-48 and 14.4 road points off TOs per 48, Bottom 5 in NBA). Gambling for steals isn’t everything, yet a more consistent defensive approach and production will be needed from everyone wearing Hawks gear (116.7 road D-Rating, 25^th in NBA), not just Murray (2.3 SPG, 3^rd among NBA actives), as Atlanta’s road schedule continues to toughen.

 

• DON’T YOU FUR-GET ABOUT ME – Remember when Doc had Furkan Korkmaz starting in an elimination game against the Hawks? Also had Matisse Thybulle out there in the clutch when he needed a stop? What has transpired over the season-plus that makes these guys part of the last-ditch cleanup crew? Former Sixer two-way Paul Reed (6 steals in 18 minutes the week before vs. NYK) has to be happy he gets to appear, the default first big off the bench to spell Embiid. But at Trezz Harrell’s expense? Also, has anyone seen Jaden Springer? Is there a Doc in the house?

 

• SWISS, DON’T MISS! – All Hail Clint Capela! He’s hovering near 15&15 territory nightly, and at least against Embiid and the Sixers, it wasn’t simply playing wallball with himself and the glass. Embiid got his buckets on Thursday while also slowing the Hawks’ rolls every time Rivers threw him back out on the court. But it was evident that an illness-slowed Joel didn’t want to mix it up too deeply around the rim on offense, and Capela took advantage of that reticence with impunity. It wasn’t *just* Clint clanking bunnies in the prior game, as Atlanta’s team-wide struggles with rim-competency (65.4 restricted-area FG%, 15^th in NBA, admittedly nowhere near as abysmal as PHI’s 59.7%) on non-dunks allowed Philly to keep the game close longer than necessary.

 

• NOBODY PUTS BOBI IN A CORNER – But Doc will plant Tobi there every other possession, and with good reason. Tobias Harris is connecting on 46.2% of his corner-three shots, fourth among active players lofting more than two per game (at 1.9 3FGAs per game, Atlanta’s De’Andre Hunter is a spiffy 47.8). Harris leads the charge for a Philly team shooting an NBA-best 47.3 corner 3FG%. The Hawks brought that percentage down a smidgen by allowing 3-for-8 at The Farm, including Harris firing off just two corner-pocket shots and missing both.

 

• #EVENTHEHAWKS – The servers at Elon’s Latest Playscape may hit the skids at any moment, leading folks online to reminisce over their favorite red-letter days on The Bird. One of my faves, birthed unwittingly by a stray from Marc Stein at ESPN back in 2014, was the #eventhehawks hashtag. It was funny enough, in hindsight, as the oft-ignored Hawks reportedly meddling with the big-boys (Lakers! Warriors! Rockets! Oh My!) in the summertime sweepstakes for Dwight Howard was what had Stein tweeting out “no team has been told they’ve been eliminated, even the Hawks.” The feeding frenzy of snarky hashtagged tweets, usually directed at a flummoxed Stein, began with the great Hawks fan Jason Walker’s clapbacks, and only ballooned during the joyous 60-win season that followed without the services of D12. We’d wind up getting Our Man in a couple years, anyway, and #eventhesixers, too, during his tumble out the league. I, for one, hope The Jolly Not-Green Giant balls outta control in Taiwan. If, for no other reason than he won’t be breaking up any more wedding proposals here in Piedmont Park (IYKYK).

 

• I CAN’T UNSEE IT. NOW YOU CAN’T EITHER – My #eventhehawks Spidey Sense tingles every gamenight, thanks to the General Counsel’s graphics department at NBA Inc. If you stick around any game on TV long enough, at some point in the second half, they’ll come back from a break and hit us with what’s known as the Copyright Warning, the “Expressed Written Consent” legal-ese ad that The Association feels obligated to visually update every season. They flick all 30 team logos at you in quick succession before the wink-what-no-that’s-not-Jerry-West-at-all logo at the end of the 10-second spot. What gets my goat is, they start out with the Boston Celtics’… then go all the way three-by-three to the Washington Wizards’… in precise alphabetical order… before Atlanta’s logo shows up at the far end of the back row. In my very best KRS-One impersonation, “Why Is That?!?” It’s giving, “We might have forgot about a team… which one? Oh, the Hawks. Just tack them on at the end and roll with it, no time for a redo.” I quit using Denorex shampoo months ago, so whenever I am feeling all tingly during fourth quarters, I’m pretty sure I know what’s to blame.

 

• MIC HEAT CHECK – Good on The Hardest Working Man in TV Broadcasting. Bob Rathbun put on his ACC hat and joined lethal weapon third Brian Oliver to call a UVA game in Charlottesville last night, before hopping on a redeye to Philly. Bawb is right that he may have just seen De’Andre Hunter Redux, in Cavs freshman Ryan Dunn.

 

• ONE RINGY DINGY – Google fooled me once when I was among the first to go all-in on the very first Google Phone gadget back in the day, only to have the world’s hottest tech company pull the plug, and the rug, on me faster than you could scream FTX. Now, they’re trying to convince me that after Giannis and Embiid went at it on blacktop this summer, in The Greatest Pick-Up Game of All-Time (their words, Dr. J, not mine), a presumably victorious Embiid shouts Who Got Next at the crowd, and THE MOUNTAIN, of all people, sneaks up on everybody in the hood in a crummy white tank top, needing Google Translate on Druski’s Pixel 7 to respond, talmbout some “ei æm néxt!” Sure, Jan. Not sure which team, Embiid’s or Björnsson’s, I’d rather be on. Can I have Ivan Johnson as a ringer for my squad, though?

 

Let’s Go Hawks!

~lw3

[JayBirdHawk]

#EvenTheHawks. 

[lethalweapon3]

"Tomorrow's News" Today.

Harden obviously remains sidelined, while Jaden Springer is with the G-League Blue Coats. Bogi's all we have on the Boo-Boo Report.

~lw3

[JayBirdHawk]

 

Tank Time!!!

[Diesel]

2 hours ago, lethalweapon3 said:

"Tomorrow's News" Today.

Harden obviously remains sidelined, while Jaden Springer is with the G-League Blue Coats. Bogi's all we have on the Boo-Boo Report.

~lw3

If I were Reed, I would want to miss the Hawks game too.

Trae loves that dude!!

[JayBirdHawk]

 

 

 

 

[MarylandHawk]

#eventhehawks   Bring it back!  

[terrell]

1 hour ago, JayBirdHawk said:

 

Tank Time!!!

Not sure I like that in terms of our hopes of containing Embiid tonight. 

Nate will probably stagger JC and Capela. And JC is about the worst guy to throw at Embiid on defense. 

Tank might get 15 min tonight..Hope hes hot from 3.. I miss the pick and pop.. Trae and Murray are both great at it....

Not sure if they can pull this off without Okongwu. And if Doc Rivers gives Montrez more than 3 minutes tonight(lol), the frontcourt battle will be even more challenging for CC with just JC+Kaminsky....

Hopefully tonight is Trae's break out performance of the season...

 

Edited November 12, 2022 by terrell

[sturt]

It's flat out amazing/frustrating/galling to me that we talk as often as we do about how thin we are in the low post.

But.

Seem to have zero interest in a remedy.

 

Guess Sheldon and I have something in common after all.

 

 

[terrell]

5 minutes ago, sturt said:

It's flat out amazing/frustrating/galling to me that we talk as often as we do about how thin we are in the low post.

But.

Seem to have zero interest in a remedy.

 

Guess Sheldon and I have something in common after all.

 

 

Mind boggling...Its like Schlenk has a fear of SIZE. Especially 7 ftrs.. lol

Edited November 12, 2022 by terrell

[Diesel]

I figure we will have to get JC going early.  He's a good jump start for the offense.

 

[AtLaS]

I hope Trae just shuts everyone up tonight and drops 45.  Remind everyone who he is, lets go!

[Gray Mule]

Oh, well.  0017 is missing.  Expect 2 fouls on Capela within the first half of the first quarter.  As opposed to last season, the injury bug has pretty much left us alone.  Since it's personal and not an injury, I expect 0017 back for the next one.

Here's hoping that Trae's shin is all better.  He needs to score some tonight.  Maybe hit a corner three!

[JayBirdHawk]

 

 

[JayBirdHawk]

 

 

[TheNorthCydeRises]

No Okongwu, but Collins potentially on Embiid?

Uh oh.

 

Let's see if Collins and Tank are up to the task.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

3 hours ago, AtLaS said:

I hope Trae just shuts everyone up tonight and drops 45.  Remind everyone who he is, lets go!

 

He doesn't need to drop 45.  Just make his normal shots and draw fouls.

He also has help now in the backcourt, so he doesn't have to get it all at once.

Just play your game Trae.

[JayBirdHawk]

How quickly will Collins or Capela have 2 fouls in the 1st quarter?

[TheNorthCydeRises]

Bob said something about substitution patterns.

I know he has to read some of the Hawks fan sites.  Might even be a member on here.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

Whoa . . 2 shooting fouls already down by the Hawks.