Official Game Thread: Hawks at Cavaliers

[Atlantaholic]

28 minutes ago, Spud2nique said:

Sidenote: Why on earth does squawk think I’m a big bellied individual who needs intermittent fasting and is looking to wifey a Ukrainian lady? 
 

The Ukrainian lady ads I don’t mind but the big belly ads are startin to piss me off.

It's not Hawksquawk it's a third party automated ad service that tracks your cookies... In other words. You tell us. 

[macdaddy]

35 minutes ago, Spud2nique said:

Ahhhh not quite. I don’t remember having a Hawks rookie this capable. I don’t care if he’s shooting 20%, dude knows when to get timely buckets and has one of the best FEELS I’ve seen from a rook.

Yeah all i was saying was that he's shooting right where you'd expect a 50% college shooter to shoot.  So this feeling that we're going to be raining threes on people soon is wrong i think.  Other than Trae, what we are getting from 3 isn't that far off expectation.  

[benhillboy]

43 minutes ago, Spud2nique said:

Ahhhh not quite. I don’t remember having a Hawks rookie this capable. I don’t care if he’s shooting 20%, dude knows when to get timely buckets and has one of the best FEELS I’ve seen from a rook.

Jalen Williams (12th pick) and Shaedon Sharpe (7th pick) are the only other rookie guards who’ve played over 200 minutes and are shooting over 50%.  AJ and Kessler (22nd pick) still separating themselves as the best values of the draft:

 

AJ’s defense can be debated but I think he’s been a neutral at worst, box score says he’s been pretty good at +.7 and I agree.

Banchero’s minutes and production is monstrous no doubt but Okeke, Carter, Bol, and Bamba are all having more impact on Orlando’s bottom line than he as Bigs as far as I can tell.

Edited November 22, 2022 by benhillboy

[benhillboy]

3 minutes ago, Atlantaholic said:

It's not Hawksquawk it's a third party automated ad service that tracks your cookies... In other words. You tell us. 

I got an extremely weird ad a few weeks back but I didn’t say anything for this very reason lol

[Alf]

12 hours ago, Peoriabird said:

You really believe this?

Haha. Well let's just say when he is on his A game, he comes across as so. I promise I don't do any illicit drugs on the side friend.

[Spud2nique]

7 minutes ago, Atlantaholic said:

It's not Hawksquawk it's a third party automated ad service that tracks your cookies... In other words. You tell us. 

Ok… 

Hi my name is Spud. I’m a big belly Hawks fan who watches the Hawks every move on the couch . 
 

Ok that explains my dad belly. The Ukrainian ladies is still a mystery though.. I mean, what does cute foot fetishes gotta do with strictly Ukrainian women, it should be all women… 

G’bye  

[Spud2nique]

13 minutes ago, benhillboy said:

Jalen Williams (12th pick) and Shaedon Sharpe (7th pick) are the only other rookie guards who’ve played over 200 minutes and are shooting over 50%.  AJ and Kessler (22nd pick) still separating themselves as the best values of the draft:

 

AJ’s defense can be debated but I think he’s been a neutral at worst, box score says he’s been pretty good at +.7 and I agree.

Banchero’s minutes and production is monstrous no doubt but Okeke, Carter, Bol, and Bamba are all having more impact on Orlando’s bottom line than he as Bigs as far as I can tell.

We need you on the CageySpudnik podcast. This illustration is immaculate! I love this charts. 
 

Ya, the Kramer kid is a rare breed. He doesn’t look as good as he is… he kinda surprises you with his quickness and athleticism and smarts. He’s gonna be a good one too. Utah finally got the big white man they wanted after losing Eaton aka Mountain man. Ostertag stunk, and the 40 clones after…

This guy is good though.

You and @kg01 though.. you can’t beef about the Heat that’s my only concern. Well, that and you two fighting over the last piece of fruit.

Edited November 22, 2022 by Spud2nique

[Alf]

1 minute ago, Spud2nique said:

Ok… 

Hi my name is Spud. I’m a big belly Hawks fan who watches the Hawks every move on the couch . 
 

Ok that explains my dad belly. The Ukrainian ladies is still a mystery though.. I mean, what does cute foot fetishes gotta do with strictly Ukrainian women, it should be all women… 

G’bye  

Or that 5 bucks a month you spend on OnlyFans, can get a premium membership here instead and see no ads...

[macdaddy]

4 minutes ago, Spud2nique said:

Ok… 

Hi my name is Spud. I’m a big belly Hawks fan who watches the Hawks every move on the couch . 
 

Ok that explains my dad belly. The Ukrainian ladies is still a mystery though.. I mean, what does cute foot fetishes gotta do with strictly Ukrainian women, it should be all women… 

G’bye  

Spud waiting at the airport for his fiancée. 

[Spud2nique]

3 minutes ago, Alf said:

Or that 5 bucks a month you spend on OnlyFans, can get a premium membership here instead and see no ads...

Yes I was a member for life. Then, well, I wasn’t here for a while, and I came back and wasn’t a member. I do love it.

[benhillboy]

8 minutes ago, Spud2nique said:

We need you on the CageySpudnik podcast. This illustration is immaculate! I love this charts. 

I can’t take credit for them, it’s NBA Math Twitter.  It is a fantastic way to show a quick box snapshot of every player tho.  Look at where that boy Dre is:

 

Side note you can rejoice, Klay is looking cooked.  I just looked at his contract and literally almost had a heart episode my God.

Edited November 22, 2022 by benhillboy

[Spud2nique]

@kg01 come back and claim your prize ! The Cavs were as good as you predicted.  

[Spud2nique]

2 minutes ago, benhillboy said:

Look at where that boy Dre is:

Ya on top of Klay!  HECK YA! Luka and Trae are all by themselves  A league of their own.

[macdaddy]

1 minute ago, Spud2nique said:

Ya on top of Klay!  HECK YA! Luka and Trae are all by themselves  A league of their own.

What's up with Luka this year?  does this chart just give outweighted credit to steals or something because i have a hard time believing Luka is suddenly the best defender in the league after being real crummy his whole career. 

[Wretch]

3 hours ago, bleachkit said:

Bad call, but to put that as the reason we lost is a cop-out. It was clearly a foul, so he would have had free throws regardless. It did give them an extra possession, but we we were bricking our threes as usual. 

So, I don't just say stuff to be saying it...  I just make observations usually fueled by overthinking and over-analysis.  It doesn't always translate into the right context, but it's never a simple "X" is the problem for me.  Let's talk about the play first.

This is maybe a second before the "foul."  There is no contact.  John is straight up and if you watch it live, as I have about 20 times now, Cedi is leaning back to create the contact and he's about to use his forearm to shield himself from the defender:

Spoiler

In the next still, John is going for the ball while Osman is raising his arm.  There is no lower body contact.

Spoiler

In the final frame, Collins has ALL BALL in his left hand.  Bob suggests the same immediately after the play.

Spoiler

It's difficult to tell if Collins knocks the ball out before they come together, chest to forearm.  It's really close from a different angle, but I've seen much more contact on blocked shots.  This is a good play by both Collins and Cedi.  They are step for step and it's incidental contact right at the basket.  Cleveland is not in the bonus and Cedi knows it so he starts lobbying for continuation.  There is contact, so the fair call is probably 2 shots for Cedi.  The better call is side out to Cleveland.

As far as the impact on the game...

This was a hard fought 4th quarter and we battled back from double digits with six minutes to go.  We had cut this to 6 with 2:15 on the clock.  The ensuing 5 point swing makes it a double-digit deficit with 2:05 left.  Barring precision execution and a complete Cleveland meltdown, the game is pretty much over on that play. 

I did not say this one play is the singular reason why we lost.  It was, however, anyone's game with manageable time on the clock.  A lot of times, analysts will say "this is anybody's game right now" for a reason.  The deciding factor tilting the odds for Cleveland in the closing moments was this play.  Or, as I actually said... despite the debacle (or IOW other major issue) in the first quarter, the game boiled down to that key play.

Other factors IMO, were DJM's off night, untimely shots by Trae, and Hunter being out.  All of these things obviously affected the outcome, but we had a legit shot at stealing a win up until that play.  Consequently, I am not bitter about the loss.

Not a cop out, just a key observation.

[macdaddy]

Once Hunter's back i'd like to go back to a 9 man rotation and sit Aaron Holiday.  I know that Justin has been awful but forcing Murray to play with Trae or Aaron at all times doesn't give him the chance to really operate as the sole ball handler.   Put Murray out there with AJ, Justin, JJ, OO and they have a team that can switch a lot and get some open 3s with some hope of making them.   Wouldn't mind giving DJ/AJ,Justin/OO/Cap a little run honestly and see if the mid range opens up for OO and we can abuse people inside out.  

When Bogi gets back we can send Justin to the end of the bench if he's still not producing. 

[kg01]

50 minutes ago, Spud2nique said:

We need you on the CageySpudnik podcast. This illustration is immaculate! I love this charts. 
 

Ya, the Kramer kid is a rare breed. He doesn’t look as good as he is… he kinda surprises you with his quickness and athleticism and smarts. He’s gonna be a good one too. Utah finally got the big white man they wanted after losing Eaton aka Mountain man. Ostertag stunk, and the 40 clones after…

This guy is good though.

You and @kg01 though.. you can’t beef about the Heat that’s my only concern. Well, that and you two fighting over the last piece of fruit.

If you bring benhillbilly to the studio, I'm bringing stu.  

[benhillboy]

40 minutes ago, macdaddy said:

What's up with Luka this year?  does this chart just give outweighted credit to steals or something because i have a hard time believing Luka is suddenly the best defender in the league after being real crummy his whole career. 

He’s always been making incremental improvements as far as defending smaller players in space with his huge size but he certainly isn’t a league-best defender.  I just take it as Powell, Finney Smith, Kleber, and Bullock fit around him very well on that end as a greater sum of the parts because I don’t view any of them as elite, let alone Dinwiddie.  
 

Luka does pull down a lot of timely late contested boards too.  And I’m sure a deep dive into his defensive stats show a low fg% allowed in the paint: he does a very good job of staying vertical.  Kidd does some weird cross-matching that’s apparently working, going from 6th last season to 4th this year in defensive rating.  I think Luka benefits are overstated from that because he plays 37 damn minutes.

Edited November 22, 2022 by benhillboy

[kg01]

44 minutes ago, Spud2nique said:

@kg01 come back and claim your prize ! The Cavs were as good as you predicted.  

*harrumph*

Listen, I did my part last nite.  I fully committed to poetry nite but, sadly, it wasn't enough.

I look forward to playing them again with Hunter and Bogd.

Hopefully they can unlock Mary as he's on the struggle-copter.

[terrell]

2 hours ago, macdaddy said:

This is what i've been saying is that once we start hitting 3s we will be fine.   But i think I might be wrong actually.   Trae will improve but who else are we expecting a 'bounce back' from.  JC will improve a little but he's a low volume 3 point shooter.   Hunter, Holidays, Murray are all not that far off their career numbers.  AJ is shooting about what you'd expect from a rookie and who knows what to expect from Jalen.  

I think, without bogi, we're just a bad 3 point shooting team as a whole.   And that's a big problem.  Bad 3 point shooting teams don't contend in this league.  

Agreed...