TheNorthCydeRises

"We're the Lakers" has worked as a selling point for the past 40 years. Going into the 2014 - 15 season, the only guy under contract is Steve Nash. That means that they can completely reconstruct that franchise around Dwight in about 2 years. Also, Kobe may just sign for less money in 2014 ( if he decides to keep playing ), so that the Lakers could rebuild the franchise. "We're the Lakers" is a great selling point. - 16 NBA Titles - National exposure on a weekly basis, even if they're halfway good - The prestige of being a Laker itself - Located in the entertainment capitol of the world. No way the Hawks can compete with that, along with a lot of other things the Lakers have going for them. But the question that no one can seem to answer is WHY would Dwight or Paul even want to come here? Dwight has said in the past that he didn't want to come here because "they don't act right". People assume that he was talking about management, but I would bet $20 that he's also talking about the people IN Atlanta, and how they support ( or don't support ) the team. He has NEVER at no time in his career say . . . "I want to come home and bring a championship to ATL." And the only time Paul ever talked about coming to ATL was right before his rookie draft. Seriously. Give me a real good reason WHY either of those two would want to leave their current situation, to play for the Hawks?

Exactly. People just need to let it go. I mean, it would be one thing if either of those guys had said that they wanted to play in ATL. But I haven't seen that anywhere. The other thing is this. We CAN'T bring both of them here without doing one of two things: 1) trading Al Horford + fillers for one of them, so that we'd own their Bird Rights this summer 2) renouncing ALL free agents, including Josh Smith, just to create enough cap room to sign the 2 Believing that we could get either Howard or Paul is like believing that the world was going to end on Dec 21st 2012.

So Dwight is going to give up playing with Kobe and Nash. . . and Paul is going to give up playing with Blake Griffin. . . AND give up 25 million extra dollars. . . to play with Smith and Horford?Would YOU do that?

Funny how the ESPN trade checker says that a trade of Carter + Marion for Smith doesn't change our outlook one bit ( which means that we're not going to collapse without Josh here ) http://espn.go.com/nba/tradeMachine?tradeId=ajh7cby But if you don't want to trade him for Marion + Carter . . Marion + Mayo would be a better look PG - Teague G - Mayo F - Marion PF - Horford C - Zaza 6th - Lou 7th - Harris 8th - Korver 9th - Ivan I'd have no problem whatsoever with that 9 man rotation, with one of the rookies ( Jenkins/Scott ) being that 10th guy off the bench. And we'd still keep our flexibility at the end of the season to sign a big time free agent.

I would too, just to have Bynum's Bird Rights, and the ability to pay him more than anybody else if it came to that. But that would be the same reason why Philly probably wouldn't trade him to us.

Unfortunately, that ship may have past us by. There isn't a bad team out there who is going to give us an All-Star caliber player for Josh Smith. So from my perspective, the only teams we can deal with, are playoff level type teams who may want to change up things a bit. I actually like the Boston suggestion of trying to bring in an Avery Bradley and one of their young guys like Melo or Sullinger. But even that deal isn't bringing us some potential all-star talent. Unless we can talk a team who is kind of upset with their star player, to swap him for Josh, we're going to be holding the bag on a deal that brings in less. At least trading for a Marion and Mayo/Carter for Smith, gives us 2 rotation players that we can immediately put in the lineup, with one of those expiring at season's end. No one wants to overpay for Rudy Gay ( and Memphis probably doesn't want Josh in the first place, seeing that they need another shooter, not another frontcourt player ). Very few people wanted to trade for Pau Gasol last year. So what do we do? Because the alternative is to hold onto him for the hope that we can get a decent young player to replace him, but possibly miss out on trading him altogether. At that point, we're dead in the water once the summer hits. We'll lose him for a trade exception ( that we may not even use ). It is what it is folks.

Or better yet, work out a package involving OJ Mayo, with us having to deal with him being an unrestricted free agent at the end of the season. I'd take a Mayo/Marion for Smith as well. Cuban may go for that, because it takes Marion's 9.3 million for next year off the books, and he can fully decide if he wants to try to re-sign Smith, or just let him go, to even have more cap space next summer. Yeah . . I like the Mayo/Marion package a little better. That way, Cuban can try to get Smith + Howard to play with each other in Dallas, along with Dirk in his final years.

If I'm Ferry, I'm talking to Dallas. And I'll state the two guys they could give us - Shawn Marion - Vince Carter Marion immediately gives us the SF that we all want here. A guy who can still get up and down the floor, and most important . . . play DEFENSE. Vince Carter gives us another shooter off the bench, with the exception that Vince can still create his own shot. Those two guys represent the #10 and #24 SFs in the league, in terms of NBA efficiency. And Marion can play PF in a smallish lineup. Marion still has a year left on his deal after this year. Carter has a team option once the summer hits. Marion represents a very nice trade chip in 2014, for a team that may want an expiring contract, but may want to get rid of a higher salaried or longer contract player, to shed payroll. Shawn Marion + Vince Carter for Josh Smith Pull the trigger Danny.

Smith is about to have a "bad contract" as well. I mean, unless you believe that he's going to accept getting paid less than what he's making right now? That's why he's expendable.

EASTERN CONFERENCE Northeast: New York, Brooklyn, Toronto, Philadelphia, Boston, Detroit, Cleveland, Indiana Southeast: Atlanta, Washington, Miami, Orlando, Charlotte, Memphis, New Orleans, VIRGINIA BEACH WESTERN CONFERENCE Northwest: Chicago, Golden State, SEATTLE, Minnesota, Denver, Portland, Utah, Milwaukee Southwest: LA Clippers, LA Lakers, Dallas, Houston, Phoenix, San Antonio, Oklahoma City, SACRAMENTO That's right. Add 2 expansion teams ( with Sacramento keeping the Kings and Seattle and Virginia Beach starting from scratch ) and make it a 32 team league. While I don't think Memphis, New Orleans, and Milwaukee would make a big stink over switching conferences, I think Chicago would definitely pitch a fit. 28 in-division games 24 opposite division in-conference games 32 games vs opposite conference ( home and away ) 84 game season.

Yes it can.He has a -0.7 Offensive Win Score and an Offensive Rating of 94. Both are Career Lows for Josh and just flat out horrible for a player of his stature.The intangibles that you talk about just make those other stats worse.Drew needs to limit his role in this offense as a guy who shoots from 15 feet and in at all times.If he played like Kenneth Faried, Josh would be a beloved Hawk, instead of this love/hate relationship he has with the fans.

Considering Wednesday night's results, I wonder if Drew will do that "drastic change" to the lineup that he was planning to do.I still say that part of that change was going to be the benching of Jeff Teague. The change now should be to start Zaza & Horford at C and PF, with Josh being the SF. Keep the Teague and Harris backcourt.

And your interpretation is correct.As for the fans at Philips, they should've clapped during the intros. But once the game started, I personally wouldn't have had a problem with them booing him like they did. That booing probably threw him off a little.I remember Phoenix fans booing him in that same fashion the first few times we played them. That situation was a little different in the fact that he actually did leave Phoenix, while he was traded from Atlanta.I wonder if the people at Philips will boo Josh Smith when he's on a different team next year? Probably not, since he's the favorite son of ATL, even if they don't like the way he plays.

Haha @ Dolfan and Mace. The Pookie reference is perfect.Josh on those addiction to jumpers is like:"I try to stop but it be calling me man, it be calling me. I just gotta keep shooting them. I need help man"Hahahaha @ Pookie.

LOL . .that movie actually ended Christopher Williams career. He was never the same popularity wise after that. I guess that was the point in which "lite skin brothas" went out of style, and the "dark skin brothas" came to the forefront, led by Wesley Snipes. Christopher Williams, Al B. Sure, all of those dudes disappeared after New Jack City. Even I got to admit that the script was funny. I usually don't laugh at my own stuff, but this is funny. NINO SMOOVE is Josh's new name

Well dang. It's official. Josh is just too valuable to give up. The hawks just can't survive without him. May as well re-sign him for 5 yes / 90 million. Nothing he does can be replaced, so we may as well lock him up long term.

Like Two Face in the Batman comics. This year, Josh Smith leads the team in Defensive Win Shares at 2.2 This year, Josh Smith is DEAD LAST in Offensive Win Shaes at -0.7 ( which is incredible for a guy with his usage ) Seeing that, either his offensive role needs to be dramatically reduced, or we need to trade him before his stock REALLY plummets.

PG - TeagueG - Harris / Lou / JenkinsF - Marion / Korver / CarterPF - Horford / IvanC - ZazaIf that is our new 10 man rotation, with the big men able to rotate at those frontcourt spots, and guards able to rotate at the guard spots, I'd take that all day in a Josh trade.Harris can play both PG and the 2. Which would leave Lou as strictly a 2. Jenkins plays a spot role.Korver and Carter can handle the SF spot behind Marion ( although Drew would probably still start Korver )Marion ( in a small lineup ) can play the PF spot. Ivan can play PF.And both Zaza and Horford can play C.We're going to have money at the end of the year anyway, with Horford, Marion, Lou, and Jenkins under contract. Make a decision on whether to lock up Teague, then go after one big free agent ( Al Jefferson ). If Harris wants to come back, consider bringing him back too.Just move on from the Josh-opera

Just because you're the best player on the team, doesn't mean that people can't replace you.The issue with Josh has ALWAYS been that if push came to shove, Al Horford CAN replace Josh at the PF spot. That means that Zaza has to hold his own at C . . and Ivan has to hold his own as a backup PF.Horford basically stepped up and had an above average game for him. But Zaza and Ivan had a combined 21 points - 14 rebs - 9 assts.I'll say this again . . . slowly.Ivan . . Johnson . . is . . a . . better . . offensive . . scorer . . than . . Josh . . SmithAnd because of that, Josh's offense will NOT be missed.Zaza played on the inside, and even hit some foul line type jumpers.Teague had much more control of the team with Josh out.Without Magic "Josh-son", the Hawks offense looked better . . . again.It's time folks. Stop defending the dude like we can't possibly survive without him. We're proving that we not only can survive without him. We're proving that we can THRIVE without him.Deal him for a good SF, and a pick, and move on.Call up Mark Cuban . . . see if he'd send Shawn Marion and Vince Carter for Smith. They need a shot in the arm to not only put them back in the playoff hunt, but to also satisfy Dirk in his final year. See if Cuban wants Josh.Shawn has another year left on his deal, and is a good defensive player. Vince is a shooter you can bring off the bench at SF, and has a team option at the end of the year. Just do the deal and move on.

Josh isn't going to play well offensively, but will hustle his butt off and may play well defensively. Whether that translates into a win or not, who knows.

Hawks practice re-enactment(( Jenkins shoots and misses . . . Josh gets the rebound and starts to dribble up court ))TEAGUE: (( clapping for Josh to give him the ball )) . . Josh . . . JOSH !!(( Josh ignores Teague, pushes the ball up the floor, and throws an alley-oop to Horford out of bounds ))DREW: (( blowing whistle )) . . . Come on Josh, what was that?JOSH: My bad coachTEAGUE: (( shaking his head . . . mumbling, along with the rest of the team ))JOSH: (( looking around )) What's up?(( team still mumbling ))JOSH: What's up? . . Huh? . . . Come on now, don't everybody speak at once (( in an agitated voice ))DREW: Josh . . calm down.JOSH: (( ignoring coach )) You mean out of all of you mutha (( bleepas )) in here, don't nobody wanna say jack (( bleep ))?DREW: Josh . . come on man. Not now.JOSH: Al? (( Al staying quiet )) . . . Lou? . . . (( Lou staying quiet ))JOSH: Well I be a mutha (( bleepa )) . . . (( talking real loud now )) Don't nobody wanna say nothing? . . What up with this?DREW: Josh, that's enough !!JOSH: (( still ignoring coach )) I mean somebody gotta want to say something . . . (( looking at Teague )) . . Ain't that right Jeff Teague . . . yeah, Jeff Teague wanna say something . . . Yeah Jeff Teague wanna talk.(( Teague head down, rubbing his hands together ))JOSH: "You (( bleeped )) up . . . You (( bleeped )) up BIG TIME . . . The reason why I bring the ball up the court all the time is because you are INCAPABLE OF HANDLING YOUR POINT GUARD DUTIES.(( Teague angrily looking up, about to say something to Josh ))JOSH: SHUT . . YOUR 5 DOLLAR AZZ UP BEFORE I MAKE CHANGE !!TEAGUE: Korver brought it to my attention . . (( getting angry )) I got 4 people AT ALL TIMES that I need to try to get the ball to . . . I can't get the ball to every single one of you . . . . If you would pass me the ball . . .JOSH: If I would what? . . If I would WHAT? . . SAY IT AGAIN!! . . WHAT YOU SAY??DREW: JOSH . . STOP THIS RIGHT NOW, OR YOU'RE SUSPENDED!!TEAGUE: (( in disgust )) . . nothing.JOSH: (( angry )) THAT'S WHAT I THOUGHT YOU SAID!! . . .CAUSE THAT'S WHAT I GOT RIGHT NOW, NOTHING!! . . (( yelling )) A 9 YEAR QUEST FOR AN ALL-STAR BERTH, REDUCED TO (( BLEEPING )) NOTHING(( Josh fires the ball at Kyle Korver, hitting him in the face , , then going over and choking him ))AL: JOSH !!!JOSH: (( still choking Korver and talking to Teague )) . . HUH?? . . . IT'S YOUR RESPONSIBILITY HUH?AL: JOOOSSHHHHHHHHHHH !!!DREW: JOSH, YOU'RE SUSPENDED!! GET OUT OF HERE !!!JOSH: (( releasing choke hold off of Korver )) . . I never liked you anyway. Pretty mutha (( bleepa ))

LOL . . . oh wow. Defend Josh Smith until the end I guess. So a guy that commits 3 turnovers a game, and takes about 5 to 7 shots a game that he shouldn't be taking ( and missing ), which means that he's not in position to get offensive rebounds, doesn't mess the flow of the offense? Haha . . . Atlanta sports talk radio could care less about what has happened today. 95% of the talk is about the Falcons.

Since when has Josh been great under pressure though?

Funny you typed this, because I was thinking just last night what could be worse than what we're experiencing right now.- lose a big lead to what is basically our arch rival in the Celtics ( even if they don't consider us an arch rival )- lose to Cleveland and Washington by double digits- score only 5 points in a quarter and 58 points in a game- now Josh gets suspendedI guess the only thing that could be worse, is for Teague or Horford to go out with a season ending injury or something.The world may not have ended on Dec 21st 2012, but we've been playing like crap since then.

This is trueDown by 1 when he picked up that 2nd foul and went outDown by 13 by the time he came back in for Lou ( who did nothing )Down by 27 before he went out the game right before the half.