TheNorthCydeRises

But even Pop only left those guys out for 3 minutes, as the lead expanded to double digits. That lost the game for them too, and his players questioned the move afterwards. They basically thought he overreacted. Sometimes even the "smart coaches" can outsmart themselves. As for the Dennis / Beverly example, I purposely brought up the opposite extreme to Dennis, because if Beverly were the Hawks PG, the opposite would be true. He'd be great defensively, but fans would be asking him to improve his offense to be more well rounded. But if he wasn't comfortable, or fully capable of doing it, we'd might just have to settle for what he is . . . a defensive PG. Same goes with Dennis. People talk about his "defensive potential", but he's never really shown that he can be more than an average defender. People forget that the guy is only 6 - 1, and is much smaller than most PGs in the league. Even Isaiah Taylor is 6 - 3. But it's safe to say that Dennis' offense is much better than what people thought he'd be. At best, maybe Dennis becomes a guy who can play the passing lanes well and get steals, ala Allen Iverson.

(( touching your head like Mr. Spock )) Remember . . . . Dwight is like a stripper at Magic City. As long as you show interest, and keep them engaged, they'll put on a good show for you. Ignore them, or don't tip right, and the performance will be lackluster.

But name a coach who deliberately sits down his best offensive player ( who is playing well offensively at the time ), just because he's not giving his all on defense, or missing defensive assignments? When you rewatch the highlight video of last night's game, Bud took Dennis out when he sagged off the French PG, and he pulled up and nailed a 3, to put the Knicks up 7. I guess that, combined with Dennis scoring 3 consecutive times down the floor without moving the ball, was too much for Bud. Everytime he "teaches a lesson", it (( bleeps )) up the team and leads to losses.

Pretty much summed up the last line in my post. Bud picks and chooses what is the "priority" for the team. The narrative used to be Korver's "spacing" was so important to the offense, that we had to play him major minutes. Bembry couldn't get consistent bench rotation minutes, despite everyone in the world seeing his defensive potential. THj got buried. Moose got major minutes, even after he started to fade. And Bud's favorite son, Malcolm Delaney, pretty much got the chance to play as much as he wanted. (( CONSPIRACY THEORY )) Maybe the thing that upset Bud the most last night, was the fact that Dennis couldn't slow down Jarrett Jack . , the very guy that the Hawks passed on . . to sign Delaney.

You would have to state your definition of what a "good PG" is. I'll say that Jeff Teague definitely was "made" into a good PG. When he first got his chance to prove something in this series, you could tell that he had the tools to be a good PG. In Teague's case, he just didn't have the drive and motivation to be this aggressive on a nightly basis. But now that we have a PG that is ultra aggressive and has the balls to take a game over, it's now a big problem. There are no other All-Stars on this team. Heck, there may not be any other starting caliber players on this team, if you were to try to place them in the starting lineup of other teams. Hawks fans want the perfect PG, instead of just looking at the strengths of what we have. And this offense is totally different, with Dedmon and Collins in the middle. Instead of a pick and pop . . or a high pick and roll at the 3 point line . . Dedmon and Collins will actually roll toward the basket, giving Dennis another player to pass the ball to. Yet, people want to rip Dennis like he's Acie Law or somebody. The facts are that in a season where we're supposedly tanking, and have very little starter quality talent across the board, it is unfair to judge Dennis on his lack of effort on a nightly basis. When you're the focal point of the offense, and no one else can consistently score the basketball, you're going to have good games and bad games. Had Bud left Dennis in that game, he could've very well won it for us. But Bud's ego won't let Dennis play through whatever issues he has on the court. This hasn't been the first time Bud has pulled these types of stunts, to justify players not playing.

Benhill likes defensive PGs. And the discussion is about Dennis' defense. So if the Hawks had a PG like Beverly, would we be better off?

Rondo was also playing alongside 3 Hall of Famers. So let me ask you, and everyone else a question. Would the Hawks be a better team if Patrick Beverly was at the point?

Ask and you shall receive.

Good PGs don't grow on trees. And with the trend these days seeing PGs scoring at a high clip, you better have a guy who can at least offset some of that production from the other side, with scoring of their own. When Dennis had Collins and Dedmon in the lineup, he routinely found those guys on the pick and roll. Dedmon with midrange jumpers. Collins with layups and alley-oops at the rim.

You can click the ignore button. But isn't the point of message boards to engage in discussion? Not everyone is going to agree on things. I definitely disagree with Diesel about Dennis. But I'll never ignore him, or anyone else, just because he has an opinion. But yeah, you can ignore posters on here. Put your arrow over the username you want to ignore, then click on Ignore User.

* 11 - 19 FG . . 11 - 24 FG . . and 9 - 17 FG in the 3 games before that. * Shot 50% FG or more in 12 games ( out of 24 ) * Shot 40% FG or less in in 7 games * 3 - 2 in games in which Dennis has scored 26 or more points . . ( which means that we're a whopping 3 - 16 when Dennis scores 25 or less points ) . . 2 games he was inactive. * 14 games with 7 or more assists * And when he posts a positive +/- number, we're 5 - 3. One of those losses came last night, when Bud shut him down, despite being +5 for the game.

The coach himself has bad habits, with some of those lineups he throws out on the floor at times. The team is a reflection of the coach.

100% agree.

I had a feeling at the beginning of the season that this was coming. Joe Johnson was the recioient. Then Marvin. Then Smoove. Then Teague. Then Horford. And Dwight was an easy target. And now, Dennis is the target. Even with 90% of the fan base wanting the Hawks to lose 60 - 65 games, he's the target. It took us literally 13 years to find a PG close to the level of Mookie Blaylock, once Jeff Teague matured enough to be a top 15 PG. Run Dennis off, and it may be another 10 - 15 years before we find a good PG.

9 - 14 FG ... 21 pts ... +5 for the game ... In just 22 minutes of play. Empty stats I guess.

The true irony in all of this, is that the fan base expects Dennis to play All-Star level basketball on both ends of the floor, but want the team to lose as many games as possible. Kind of a conflict of interest. If he improves defensively and scores efficiently, that'll lead to more wins.

The problem with this, is that Dennis knows that the team needs his offense. So anytime Bud calls himself "punishing" Dennis for his lack of defense, he's actually punishing the team as a whole because they can't consistently score. Dennis isn't being phased by this. He's probably laughing at Bud for not playing him. When Bud "punished" Dennis last year after the All-Star break, it started the downward spiral to the 2nd half of the season. And it was made worse when Millsap went down. But better be careful with his little games. If the team doesn't rapidly improve after we get our "superstar" in the draft, he's the one that will be out of a job in a year or two. Dennis may be here, or somewhere else. But Bud will be sippin on some sizzurp in a Buckhead bar.

Well, when your best closer is on the bench due to a "coaching decision", it's hard for people who are normally not in that situation, to be the closer. Bud purposely tanked this game, I guess, to prove a point to Dennis. If he wanted to reward Taylor for playing defense, he could've played both he and Dennis together in the 4th quarter.

“Isaiah gave us a big lift,” Budenholzer said. “Malcolm (Delaney) came in, in the first half, gave us a big lift. Just a coach’s decision.” LOL @ Bud. Why lie man? Isaiah was negative double digits +/- for most of the game, until the Hawks made that final push at the end. Combined, Taylor and Delaney were 1 - 7 FG, for 2 points and 4 assists. . . . and -4 for the game.

Repeating . . 9 - 14 FG for 21 pts tonight. . . . in 22 minutes. Had scored 7 in a row in 3 minutes in the 4th, when Bud abruptly pulled him for the rest of the game. And was +5 for the game. And as soon as Bud pulls him, NiaKita ( sp ) goes on a little run of his own, to push the lead to double digits. Dennis is in the same boat that Joe Johnson was in, during his first 4 - 5 years as a Hawk. No one can create their own shot with any effectiveness, so they always throw it to Dennis with like 8 seconds left, for him to turn milk into moonshine.

Maybe if Dennis didn't have to carry the entire offense, his defense would pick up. Dennis didn't seem too upset with being out of the game. He was constantly encouraging the guys from the bench. Maybe Bud told him before the game that he was only going to play 20 or so minutes, and that he was going to give the other guys a look, seeing this was a back to back. I didn't see Bud's after game press conference, so I don't know if anyone asked him why Dennis didn't play the final 8 minutes of the game. LOL @ coming in at the beginning of the 4th, after sitting out half of the 3rd quarter . . scoring a quick 7 points . . then get pulled again after 3 minutes of play. Good job Dennis. Keep doing what you're doing man.

LOL @ Baze. Makes the 40 footer that didn't count . . almost gets fouled on a 4 point play, but his foot was on the 3 point line . . . but can't hit the rim on an intentional missed FT? That's Baze being Baze. I've always wondered why guys just never shot the ball higher than normal, and let it hit the rim that way. Trying to throw a hard ball at the rim is always harder to do.

Taylor playing tough defense. Fighting through screens the right way.

Leave him out the entire quarter now Bud. Don't put Dennis back in the game with 4 minutes to go and down 8. May as well tank all of the way if you're going to blatantly do things like this. No Bob . . what frustrates fans is when the coach won't put the best player on the team back in the game, because he's playing too well.