kg01

Sorry, IIUC, gifs are frowned upon. In this establishment!

Sorry, even the haters had to be smiling at that stretch. That was fun.

I sincerely hope you're doing and feeling well. I hope you accept my humblest apologies for making light of your injury on gif-form. There was no excuse for it. I am an embarrassment to my family and I will spend the rest of my days trying to make amends.

Oh dang, I didn't even read the OP. Why not just ask me to tone it down, @Vol4ever? Geebers, mayne.

Weird. All I do is copy/paste. Not usually on mobile but I have done it via mobile

I use reactiongifs. Giphy and most other sites don't work for me.

"What happened?" Shouldn't you be asking why he didn't just make a KB house-call? If he went to the hospital instead of just calling KBT, I think that's a slap in de face.

Here are the outtakes ... Trust exercise gone wrong? Skiing? An oldie but goodie ... too much science

Hey, Dennis. Keep yer options open. I'd love to get my hands on you again ... wait, that sounded weird.

How TF did you get a kidney laceration? You fightin' in the kumite or something? Were you jus' takin' a stroll ... 4th of July celebration .... maybe track and fail'd ... Did you finally start that modeling career? Just hangin' with the bros ... Seriously though, hope all is well.

I think that's where player development comes into play. Considering his apparent ability to see the floor/see the game (to the extent that we can see that at this point), it's not inconceivable to think that he could develop the ability to 'think the game' on a really high level. That's my take-away in the whole "play like Conley" thing. I think we all know the answer is 'yes'.

Would it be too low-brow to simply say that you are already mega-fats ...

CLP - Coach Lloyd Pierce Sounded really impressive.

The things that surprised me were: we want to play like MIA we want Rayf to play like Conley Fran's candid comments

And, even after that, they quickly realized he was unplayable. Not sure what folks still think is 'there' with this guy.

Right after the CLP sit-down, Fran Fraschila was next and he discussed Young a bit. Some of his comments were a little controversial IMHO but I agree with them. Synopsis: - Just talked to CLP and got to the Young/Conley comp he "stole" from you? Yeah, having watched Young 15 or so times, the biggest concern is people trying to get him to think he’s Curry. Instead of coming in hitting singles/doubles, they want him hitting grand slams. ‘Just be Mike Conley’. Mike hits his open shots, just run the team, keep it simple, find the open man, hit the open shot. "Don’t try to put on a show". - Is that hard for Young as it's clear he’s tried to duplicate Curry. "It’s obvious". You said he should "just be Conley". Is that gonna be hard for him? Yes. In HS he averaged over 40 pts/game, in college he avg’d almost 30. And I always felt there were ‘style points’ involved in the way he played and that concerned me. But CLP might be the right guy for him (since he coached both Curry and Conley). As an example, I saw him sit next to Trae during a game to offer guidance. – He (Fran) was big on that being a good sign. - How about Collins, good play I call guys like him (2nd year guys play SL) 'playground bullies' . They should be playing well. Should be dominating.

Not sure if y'all have discussed it but there was a tremendous interview with CLP on NBARadio yesterday afternoon. It was from summer league so they discussed a couple things in addition to Rayford. It was followed up by an interview with Fran Fraschilla who also had some thoughts on Rayf. The interview was conducted by a host and Eddie Johnson who's son had apparently been recruited by CLP back in the day. Long story short, it was apparent they had a good relationship. "Get my man Lloyd up in here." He said. Synopsis: Salient points from CLP: - What's the style gonna be in ATL Put young guys in position to succeed early. Need to defend, be efficient, understand pacing and movement. Be able to outwork teams. - On Trae's struggles. Depends on how you look at it. Shots not falling, that'll improve. We look at shot creation and, to me, he's been tremendous at that. Only had 3, 7 and whatever number of assists in Salt Lake but not for lack of clean passes/facilitating. With Prince, Huerter, etc. out there you'll see him have double-digit assists. Not worried about shooting. That'll come. - On playing fast, do players understand how hard that's gonna be on them? Do they understand what "playing fast" really means for them (work wise)? They all wanna run 'in theory' (ha, hah, heh) then the work starts ... "Pacing" refers to how we practice, not necessarily getting up/down the court fast. We give guys 0.5 seconds to make a decision. Everything we do is done with quick decision making in mind. That's what we mean by "pace". We'll see when we work with pace (i.e. high-level decision making), we'll see that we're always in the right spot, facilitating success. - Is there a team you try to emulate? Big fan of Spoelstra. You don't think of them as a "fast pace" team but that's not true. In the half court, they actually are a very fast-paced team. Everything they do is done with pace ... but in the half court. - Impressions of John Collins Always positive, walks with a bounce. Saw his highlights and was amazed since he hadn't seen him play much. Unbelievable athlete, can shoot 3. As excited about him as the other rookies. - Another guy we like because of the fire he showed in playoffs is Dennis, where does he fit in the mix? Oh, I just txted Dennis. He's over in Africa with his workout coaches, shooting coach, etc. Vowed to come back stronger/better. Adding he and Young, the concern is having 2 small guys .. I look at 'how are you gonna guard them'? Any time you have high IQ guys who can facilitate for others, you'll be tough to deal with. - And does he want to be there ... Yeah, there's been some stuff out there .. only thing I can control is what he and I talk about. He knows he's a Hawk right now and he knows we drafted a point guard and he knows 'from my voice' that they're gonna play together. We have to be patient with Young so he (Dennis) has got to grow up (yes, he said that) and show that he can be a mentor to a young guy and show the next step in his development (I presume he meant as a leader?). I'm excited for the opportunity and I think he can help Young. - Atlanta sports scene overall appears to be changing for the better ... My goal hasn't been to convince (people to be Hawks fans), it's been to learn the scene. See what's here. Been to soccer games, Dream games, etc. Hope we can capitalize on the excitement from the other teams. - Last thing on Trae, comparison to Curry. You said you want the team to play like MIA, is there a player you want Young to pattern his game after? Worked with Steph, played with Nash, coached Conley ... has abilities like Steve but I compare him to Mike (Conley). Left/right-hand floaters, gets into lane as a small guy. Slower set shot. If he can end up as a 'Mike Conley' type, we've hit a home run. People are looking for the 'splash' of Steph but I think you get a HR with a guy like Conley with vision, being able to facilitate. Cerebral, control pace of game, etc. Stole this comp from Fran Fraschila I'm posting a synopsis of Fran's interview next.

I've heard him speak a couple times and it seems clear to me that he's the real architect to that team. Folks that came after are accepting the credit he deserves. He definitely comes across as crazy but he knows his stuff.

I'll never understand the obsession with Okafor. He's a dinosaur. I'm not sure how much people need to see before they finally accept that. If he was willing to do or be the player that he needs to be in order to have an NBA career he wouldn't be on the outside-looking-in right now. "Bwah, but he can get better ..." No, not if he doesn't want to. If the light hasn't gone off by now, let some other schmuck team waste a spot/time on him.

I saw a great question posed on TOS ... how much is MIN kicking itself for giving Wiggins that extension to prevent him from being a rFA? Nobody's getting paid that kind of money this offseason. They vastly over-paid that dude.

Has it been confirmed that Rayford will miss time with his quad confusion ... I mean, contusion?

Heh, Jabari Parker offer comin' up?

Why you gotta hate on what I (could) have with Becki? None of us asked you to take down that shrine of Pit Stains aka Ashley Judd.

So ... you agree with me? And @Atlantaholic, I don't think we're underrating him. More like projecting what he is on a squad where he'd have more responsibility. IOW, not great. Certainly not $20mil-a-year great.

I agree on his defense, however, on our team that would have diminished value. He can get away with being so one-sided because of who he plays with. Again, the Biyombo comparison is apt here. Absent transcendent offensive talent to offset his deficiencies, the defense is just not enough to justify paying him $100mil+. Plus, at the dollar figure he's wanting, that's a player you expect to be a leader. He ain't that either. How's he gonna yell at Rayford for taking a bad shot when Rayf can just yell back at him, "Bruh, try hitting a shot outside 8-feet before you tell me anything. I gott jak up dees long-2's 'cause nobody guards your a**."