Childress Should Be Starting

[clrumph]

Childress should be starting and playing at least 30 minutes a night. Not that he deserves to start at this point, but I believe he needs to play in order to gain experience for the future. Look, realistically the Hawks are probably the worst team in the league right now, so since we are losing big playing Diaw at the 2 (and we all know he is not a shooting guard because shooting guards are supposed to SHOOT the ball more than a couple of times a game) why not play Childress instead?

As bad a pick and I thought Childress was, I would like to see him get as many minutes as the other rookies drafted in the top 10 that are currently starting (Okafor, Howard, Deng, Iggy, etc.) so that we can see what we've got at that position for the future. He may (and probably will) suck during the first half of the year, but maybe with the increased playing time the light bulb will go off in his head during the second half and he will get the confidence he needs to start playing like he did in college.

Diaw, Barry and Delk for that matter are not the answer at SG on a long-term basis. Play Childress, let him sink or swim this year, and if he doesn't show enough potential we will know whether will need to address that position again like we have for the last two years (yes, that was a dig at BK).

Oh well, I'll guess I'll get ready to watch this Lakers game tonight. Hopefully we won't get our heads bashed in again like we did in Phoenix and Seattle.

[NvHawksFan]

I think all of the young players should be getting 30+ minutes a night.

Who are we kidding? We're not gonna make the playoffs. I don't even want to make the playoffs.

What I do want is to watch the kids develop.

Ivey-Diaw-Smith-Childress-Smith-Harrington

the other guys are irrelevant.

[pathway23]

Looks like the young guys will help us win...

Look, We have a sore spot at Center, but KA is not getting it done at PG. That is a huge liability. Royal Ivey is going to be the solution at starting PG for us soon, mark my words, and he is going to help us win and get the experience at the same time. Guy is a gamer.

Don't get used to the blowouts guys, this team is coming around. I like what I'm seeing here.

Childress is already good.

[jezmund]

Yeah I like the energy from the young fellas myself. Even Peja was knocking down every shot that came his way. Our obvious weakness is keeping people from driving to the basket. I think Diaw has great form on his shot he just passes up shots that he should always take.

[OGRat]

Wow! Someone actually said that Childress is good! I too think he is coming around and discovering his role on the team.

A little more practice will go a long way for this team. I see Childress as the perfect slasher/cutter to feed off of Walker's presence in the post.

[macdaddy]

Why not is the question. KA and Barry are doing nothing. We have 2 veteran guards who are supposed to be carrying a load for the young guys and they go scoreless? Both guards? I know they had some assists, but they need to score some.

Why not start Diaw at point and Childress at 2. They can switch the defensive assignment.

[Diesel]

I agree whole heartedly that we need not wait to put Childress/Smith in the game for some substantial minutes...

I suggest a lineup of:

Anderson/Childress/Harrington/Walker/Collier...

with J-Smooth backing up both forward positions until we work out a trade of Walker.

Right now, a lot of the guys we are seeing playing are BU quality...

Anderson/Diaw/Willis... all BU quality.

[macdaddy]

I agree about backup quality. I'm surprised how bad KA looks out there. He may come around though.

We aren't going to run with anybody. I'd rather see our guys over-playing on defense. Maybe pick up some bad fouls, but at least we'd slow the scoring down and maybe not go down by 20 so quick.

If we don't get some scoring out of the guards then we may never win. Right now Childress is the only one looking decent at guard.

[Diesel]

I think Childress should be out there simply because he has good Basketball smarts and he's a cutter by nature. I think that would work with Harrington/Walker. I think we should have J-Smooth shooting 500 shots a day.

I don't think wins and losses are that important right now... Right Now, improvement is job 1.