TheNorthCydeRises

Josh Smith. He's the key to our defense and our running game. When this team is really clicking on all cylinders, he's usually playing very well. I think the other coaches around the league gameplan more for Smoove than they do Horford. You have to account for him on the defensive end and on the offensive end, especially in early offense. With Charlotte playing so well right now, I think Gerald Wallace may take one of those reserve Forward spots. That means that we won't get 3. Pierce? - G. Wallace? - Smoove? - Granger? I think 3 of the 4 will go. Someone will stay home.

I wanted Acie to succeed just like everybody else. And he, of all people, can't say that Woody didn't give him a chance. Acie played much more than Teague does now, in his rookie year. But when Acie got hurt not 10 games into his rookie year, it pretty much set the tone for the rest of his career so far in the NBA. The first injury allowed Anthony Johnson to prove his worth, and eventually become the undisputed starter. Add the fact that it was AJ who led us to be over .500 in late December for the first time in about 7 - 8 years, you knew that Acie would have to work to get his briefly held starting job back. He just didn't seize the moment. Then he gets hurt AGAIN. Then BK made the trade for Bibby, a guy who could play 35 min a night at PG, and Acie's opportunities becameless and less. In year 2, he was the undisputed backup PG. But look what happened. He let Flip, a guy who nobody wanted, come right in here and outshined him. Acie never elevated his game while he was a Hawk. And once again, he played a lot more than Teague does now. Acie couldn't finish at the rim ( got better in year 2 ) Acie couldn't shoot worth a damn ( his outside shootng seemed to get worse in year 2 ) Acie was a virtual no-show on defense ( he didn't get sreals, deflections, none of that ) Acie would commit untimely turnovers, especially offensive fouls going to the hole. So Acie leaves here, and goes to Golden St. He looked like he was getting better as a player. Then again, Nellie's crazy azz was playing him at SF on occasions during the preseason. And the backup PG ( CJ Watson, was hurt ). So when CJ comes back into the fold, it's Acie's job as a player to beat CJ out for that backup PG position. He didn't do it Then Acie gets traded to Charlotte. Same situation. If he wants to play, tell him to beat out the guy that was his arch rival in college, DJ Augustin ( who went to Texas ). He didn't do it. But if he could shoot and play a little defense, he and Augustin could possibly play in the same backcourt together. I guess Larry Brown and Jordan thought differently, seeing that they brought in Flip. Now look what Flip did. He took minutes from both DJ and Acie. Now look at Teague so far: - He shoots a little worse than Acie. - He finishes at the rim worse than Acie did. - He's athletic, which does enable him to get an occasional steal or a deflection - But he's in a worse situation than Acie playing time wise, because both Bibby and Crawford can play the point ( or lead guard ) position. So if Teague wants more PT, he either has to . . . 1) start making an immeadiate impact on a game, even in short stretches. ( Mario has proven that this can be done ) . . . or 2) simply start outworking Bibby in practice. All of this excuse making on why he should be playing, when the kid shoots poorly and isn't impacting games, should simply stop. Somebody needs to tell that kid to start outworking people, and producing on the court. Near the end of Shelden's Hawk career, who was woring harder and making more of an impact on games . . . . Shelden or Solomon Jones? So instead of wondering why Teague doesn't play, someone needs to tell Teague to start making layups, start making midrange jumpers, start playing his azz off on defense ( even if it's just for 3 - 5 minutes ) . . . and maybe . . . just maybe . . . he'll get more playing time.

Jamal has missed a ton of game winners or game tying shots in his career. Only Kobe has missed more I think in the last 5 years. In that OKC game, you had JJ, who was 0 - 4 from three . . . and Jamal, who was 0 - 5 for the 4th quarter. So given the situation, I didn't care who took that shot, because both were probably going to miss. I actually thought they may have tried to free up Bibby for the 3, seeing he made a shot 4 seconds earlier.

I miss Midrange Marvin. Ever since he's tried to develop the 3 point shot, his midrange shot has gone downhill. Marvin, ditch the 3 ball and go back to being "money" from midrange.

OK . . . I see what you're saying. God knows I'm not a fan of Crawford at the point. Still, we're better off crossing that bridge when it comes, than reducing Bibby's minutes to prepare for that day. Bibby represents one of the only pure outside shooters. And even if Teague got increased minutes, the ball is still going to be in JJ's or Crawford's hands most of the time. Teague will have to be able to knock down shots if the ball is swung to him. If Bibby went down, you'd almost have to start Teague, to reduce the scorng burden off of him when in the game with the 2nd team. Playing him in a Royal Ivey role with the starters, may at least protect him from being overwhelmed a little. That way, you can keep Crawford in his lead guard role off the bench as a scorer. Then when JJ needed his rest, Woody would have to make the decision to either play Teague at the point and move Jamal to the 2 . . or keep Jamal at the point, and let Mario play the 2 while JJ is out. You guys need to understand a critical point. For us to play Teague more time, the 2nd unit as a whole has to be better. When they quickly lose leads, or have decifits expand on them, Woody can't have a lot of patience with them, or the game will get too far out of reach. If Crawford isn't scoring while JJ is out of the game, we all know what happens. He has to put JJ right back in the game after only a few minutes rest. That's when you'll see JJ rack up those 42+ minute games. We're not a developing team anymore. Woody doesn't have time to push and hold the circle button on the game pad, just so Teague can make his midrange jumpers. Woody right now is trying to work him in the 2nd quarter, to get him playing time. Yesterday, he played a very lacluster 4 minutes, so Woody pulled him.

Spot, I'll hae to admit that I was one of those guys. Especially wIth Salim. But as time went along, there's no way people could justify Salim playing over Tyronn Lue, when Salim wasn't a better scorer or passer than Lue. And when Woody would play Childress spot minutes at PG, you couldn't argue that Salim should play, because that big lineup worked. So now, people want Woody to play a PG that can't shoot, but on the flip side, is against him getting a extension right now ( so that he may have the job security to develop Teague ). Woody is like . .."forget that. I need to win games, so that I'll either get an extension here this year, or a job somewhere else next year". Personally, I don't blame him. Teague is starting to look like Mateen Cleaves on the pro level. ( the former great PG from Miochigan St who played with Charlie Bell and Morris Peterson ). Both Bell and Peterson are still in the league . . . barely . . but still in. Mateen is probably selling insurance somewhere.

And people talk about all he needs is playing time. Don't forget that this is the same dude that went 0 - 15 in a preseason game. Yes, it's preseason, and it didn't count. LOL . . but who goes 0 - 15 in a game? Here's the game. Pull up his shot chart, and look where he missed from. http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/shotchart?gameId=291023019

Truth . . which lineup is the best Hawk lineup on the year? And tell "the truth".

from http://www.nba.com/hotspots Bibby: 22 - 38 on shots close to the rim ( 58% ) Teague: 28 - 67 on shots close to the rim ( 41% ) What part of that is hard to understand? So you would have Teague going to the rim, and missing a layup, but expecting that to get us back into the game? You all keep talking about how the coach isn't this and the coach isn't that, but you want him to play a guy who can't make a close range shot 45% of the time, and can't make a midrange jumper? Meanwhile, you take your best 3 point shooter out of the game . . . or you don't play your combo guard who can score, at the point? Does that really make sense?

Doug Collins? ( talking like d*ck Vitale ) Are you serious? As for your assessment about dumping the ball down in the post, what you say is true . . ONLY . . if the guy who we dump it down to, is scoring on his man. If he's not scoring in the low post, then there's no need for a double team. Smoove and Horford almost never see a double team. This gives them the green light to take their man one on one. According to 82games.com . . JOSH SMITH sees 62% of his shots being assisted. He scores more points within the first 10 seconds of the shot clock elasping ( 6.6 pts ), than at any other time in the possession. He also sees less of his shots being assisted during this time, than at any other time in the possession ( 55% ). This is because he starts his own fast break off of defensive rebounds, he'll occasionally get a steal and take it all the way, or he'll receive an outlet pass in which he dribbles down for the dunk. During "crunch time" ( shots taken with 8 or less seconds on the clock ), Smoove shoots 38%. In other words, Josh Smith is an "early offense" type player, not a halfcourt type player. AL HORFORD sees 64% of his shots being assisted. Even though we run a lot more ISO plays for Al, he's even more dependent on someone feeding him a good pass, for him to make shots ( whether those shots be going to the basket, or the midrange jumper that he likes ). During "crunch time", Al shoots 50%, justifying him being more of a halfcourt player. But even during that time, 62% of his shots come via assists. Just for comparison sake, JJ and Crawford shoot 49% during "crunch time" in a possession. Jamal sees 44% of those crunch time shots coming via assists, while JJ only sees 28% of his shots being assisted during that time. That's why they're our ISO guys. They can create their own shot during this time, plus shoot a decent percentage during this time as well. But back to Spot's original point. Neither Smoove or Al are a potent enough of a threat down low to command double teams. So both are reliant on other people getting them the ball, to get them good looks in the half court offense. When they both had it going in the first half, both were looking for each other, getting easy shots. Having said that, should our main 3 guards have taken 18 shots in the quarter, when none of them really had it going? Probably not. That will probably be corrected in the Bobcats game, if Smoove and Al have it going again.

Nine . . . people freak out every time we lose a game. So if we lost games because Teague is playing a set 15 minutes a night, people would lose their minds. If we were 23 - 17, people would be calling to have Woody fired. No way Woody is going to develop a PG that can't shoot, when he himself doesn't even have a contract on the table as the future Hawks coach. He's going to try to win as many games as he can, in case the Hawks do fire him ( for whatever reason ) at the end of the year. If Bibby or Crawford goes down, he'll have no choice but to go with Teague. If Teague produces, great. If he doesn't, they'll have to go out and pick up somebody . . anybody, who can somewhat play the position. The Lakers have Ron Artest and Lamar Odom . . . both who can play SF. So who does that affect? It affects a guy who has actually contributed ( Luke Walton ) and a guy who was the 3rd pick in the 2006 draft ( Adam Morrison ). Phil Jackson could give a dang about those 2 guys and their development. Phil has his 2 SFs and his 8 guys that he rolls with on most nights, and he leaves it at that. Smart coaching if you ask me.

If Bibby gets injured, then Teague will play like Royal Ivey did. He may opt to start Teague in the first and third quarters, then go with Crawford at the point the rest of the way. This is the argument that I was making with Joe Smith at the beginning of the year, when a lot of you were saying that he should play 10 - 15 minutes a night at PF. No he shouldn't. Not when Al Horford can slide over to PF if he's teamed with Zaza. And not when Marvin can also play PF if need be. If you have better players who can play a position, you play the better player. But there's no way you give Teague 15 minutes a night right now, when he's shooting 36% FG and can't finish at the rim and can't hit a jumper. And you definitely don't do it when you have Crawford who can play the point. Like spotatl said, Jamal is our backup PG, no matter how much people want to deny it. It's not Teague. Teague is 3rd string and our 9th/10th man in the rotation. If Mario keeps playing defense and impacting games, Teague is going to be the 10th/11th man.

Now that the coach has officially stated where Teague stands, there's no sense in worrying about the guy's playing time the rest of the year. He's going to play when he plays. But Woody isn't going to put him out there in situations in which he can hurt the team. Teague needs to talk to Mario about how to maximize 3 - 5 minutes in a game.

Mike Woodson believes point guard Jeff Teague will run the Hawks one day. It’s just not going to happen on this team, at this time. “I don’t have to rush Teague,” Woodson said. “I’ve got confidence in Teague. But [Mike] Bibby and Jamal [Crawford] have carried the load at the [point]. “I feel good about Teague and what he brings to the table. Eventually Teague will run this team, I think. But I don’t have to throw him to the wolves like I did those other guys.” Read the rest of the article by clicking on the link. http://www.ajc.com/sports/atlanta-hawks/woodson-says-teague-must-277757.html

What you're seeing in this league this year, is that the only elite teams in the league, may only be the Cavs and the Lakers. Then you have a group of 7 - 10 teams that are right with each other, and will battle to the death every night. One of the things to keep in mind about the Hawks, is that we haven't played a lot of games against the so called "bottom feeders" of the league yet. No games vs Milwaukee yet. Only 1 game vs Philly. None vs Golden St yet. Only 1 game vs Detroit ( even though they beat us last time). Clippers aren't a "bottom feeder", but we haven't played them yet either. When it comes to the good and elite teams, they're going to knock each other off now and then. The key for us is to win at least 50 - 60% of those battles, which we have been doing, to keep up our current pace. So we'll see how the season turns out and if we can do that against the good teams, and can simply handle business against the lesser teams about 80% of the time.

The Thunder are a very good team. You can tell that they are when you watch them. Kristic killed us with those midrange jumpers. But that's something that Nenad has always done. Like Big Z, the midrange jumper is his shot. The Thunder could easily be on a 6 game win streak, seeing that they lost to San Antonio in OT by 1, and lost to Dallas by 1. Durant is the truth. He can make the long midrange jumper and put the ball on the floor and draw a ton of fouls. Then when he gets to the line, he's going to shoot in the high 80% range. If he can become a 40% 3 point shooter, or start to finish better around the rim, that team is going to become a squad to be reckoned with come playoff time. If I'm in the West, and I'm anybody outside of the Lakers, I wouuldn't want to face either OK City or Memphis in the playoffs. I think both of those teams are going to make the playoffs in the West and are going to be a NIGHTMARE for 2 of the top 4 teams.

LOL @ Woody's stepson. But he proved why he got more burn than Teague yesterday. When Teague was in the game, he didn't impact the game at all. When Mario got in, he instantly impacted the game by significantly slowing down Durant. That enabled us to get back into the game. Forget Teague's playing time, if Mario keeps playing like that, you may see him on the floor during crunch time, as a defensive specialist. Woody is crazy enough to put a Crawford - West - JJ - Smoove - Horford lineup in the game, to close out games.

I agree. I think at that point though, Crawford had missed 2 layups and a jumper. And was on his way to missing 3 more shots to go 0 - 6 FG for the 4th quarter. But you're right. JJ did take a tough shot with Crawford basically holding his hands up, signaling that he was wide open.

Bingo. But for the record, JJ was 3 - 8 FG in the 4th. Crawford 0 - 6 FG in the 4th ( after hitting two huge 3s to end the 3rd quarter ). Bibby 1 - 4 FG in the 4th ( missing wide open shots each time ) . . . . Total: 4 - 18 FG ( 22% ) Horford and Smith combined: 2 - 3 FG The strange thing about that OKC game, is that we missed a TON of shots in the paint. Add that to the fact that we couldn't make wide open jumpers, and you have the recipe for what happened yesterday. Hawks were 16 - 30 FG via shots at the rim. ( 53.4% ). That's below what we usually shoot at shots around the rim. That's probably due to the fact that we didn't get a lot of fast break points yesterday, especially in the 2nd half. From within 10 feet to the rim, the Hawks were 6 - 20 ( 30% ) . . . From 3 point range, we were 4 - 16 FG ( 25% ) . . . lol. . . eFG% of 37.5% ( and we were 3 - 15 before Bibby hit that 3 with four seconds left ). When you look at a major reason why we lose games, these are the two areas offensively that we usually are horrible at. If the shots in the lane aren't falling, and especially if the 3 ball isn't falling, that's a recipe for disaster for us. Strange stat of the day: Al Horford had a +/- rating of ( -16 ), by far the worst on the team. . . . . Zaza has a +/- rating of ( +13 ), by far the best on the team

LOL . . . Durant was the best freshman of ALL TIME. I think he was the only freshman to win POY in college. The guy would've been the #1 pick in just about every other draft in the last 15 years, if not for the overhyping of Greg Oden. Like Marvin, he shouldn't have picked #2. Marvin would've gone lower and Durant would've been #1. As an aside, the wrong pick is turning out to be this year's choice of Jeff Teague over Dejuan Blair. But we got burned once by an undersized rebounding machine in college, so I guess we couldn't take a chance on drafting another one. But we had to take Teague, because we didn't know if Bibby was going to return. Blair would be a godsend on this squad though. When our jumpshooters are missing a ton of shots, he'd be another guy that could possibly grab offensive rebounds to keep possessions alive.

Oh well. This is what happens when you let a good team have its way with you on your home floor. Thunder made the plays when they had to. That's a very nice young team. We missed a ton of shots from close range. Jamal had to have missed 6 of his last 7 shots. JJ would hit 3, then miss 4, then make 2, then miss 3. Just an up and down game from him. From a coaching standpoint, I guess the question for the next 48 hours will be . . . why didn't Mario play in the 2nd half. Tough loss. Hopefully this will get them focused for the Bobcat game. And good job by the kids. They were loud and into the game, especially at the end.

Damn . . Durant missed the 2nd FT. I say that Jamal will get the ball, but they'll make him pass to somebody else. If JJ gets it, he's jackin it regardless.

WOW . . .what a play by Jeff Green. People flying to the exits. LOL I guess no one saw Friday night's game. It'll take an even bigger collapse from the Thunder to win this game. We basically need a 3 . . . a steal . . . and another 3

Oh OK now. I see I have a jealous hater on the board, just arbitrarly giving me -1s on all my posts. LOL . . . keep it up then hater. The mods know who you are though. Smoove needs to hit these 2 FTs to tie the game. It's bee a struggle to get back into this game, but the defense has kept us in it. If we can take the lead, we'll win. Crawford want the ball, but JJ has overlooked him twice. Craw has missed his last 5 shots though, I think. Horford can't pick up foul #6. Just play defense guys and close this game out. Tie game . . good job Smoove.

LMAO . . now who game me a -1 for this post? And why? Woody has our best offensive group in the game now. Crawford and Bibby either must make shots, or hold up defensively.