I hate doing this but i think this is a trade idea the Hawks should consider.Deron Williams + MarShon Brooks ( maybe draft pick) for Joe Johnson and Teague. NOTE Obviously, Deron would have to sign a multi year deal ( even a max deal) with the Hawks.I am sure he would not mind playing with Josh and AL.

Why the Hawks should do it.

1. It gets Joes huge contract off our books therby giving us flexibility to sign additional players.

2. We will be able to re-sign Josh if he commands a bigger deal than maybe Horf.

3. We will have a legit big 3( Al Josh and Deron) of about the same age getting into their prime at the same time locked up for at least 4 years.

4. We would have one of the best point guards in the league.Good for putting people on the seats.Also, the stats of players like Marvin, AL and Josh will likely improve because of the upgrade in the PG position.

5. With the right bench players, we would have a legitimate shot at competing with Chicago and Miami.

6. Signing Deron to a max deal will be cheaper than Joe in the short run and will likely turn out to be money well spent.

Why the nets should do it.

1. i am making the assumption that Deron doesnt want to stay at NJ through the rebuilding process.

2. They become a instant playoff team with Joe, Lopez and Wallace .

3. They dont lose Deron for nothing

4. They have the cap room to take Joes contract and also sign other players. With the move to NY and a legitimate team, other players would not mind playing for the nets.

What do you think? Good idea?

Ok...go ahead and admit it. You were wrong when you criticized management. There is a reason those guys get paid a lot ot money to do what they do. So here you go.. things that the fans were wrong about and management was right about.Note I am looking at this season alone since no one can predict the future.

1.JOE JOHNSON SHOULD NOT HAVE BEEN RESIGNED FOR 123M. Well this is really a controversial point but you have got to say that he played pretty well this season i.e. He played up to his salary for the season. My way of judging the deal today is that can the hawks trade Joe? Ths answer is YES!. There are a lot of teams that will gladly take Joe today with his contract. New Jersey, Orlando,Golden State,Milwaukee,Washington,Sacramento etc. All these teams will gladly take Joe and his huge contract. So right now, the contract is worth it. Plus , you have to admit that not resigning joe would have made us a lottery team this season.

2. AL IS THE MOST IMPORTANT PLAYER ON THE HAWKS TEAM. Sorry guys as much as you would like to not admit it, the honor still goes to JOE!!!. Joe is still numero uno. Yes even ahead of Josh. He is the only Hawks player that can create his own shot and demands a double team.

3. RENT A BENCH WAS NOT THE BEST STRATEGY . Given the short season, the best strategy for the Hawks was the rent a bench strategy. Signing guys like Sy and Benson would have been a bad idea given the limited time that he would have had to learn the game and the limited contribution they would have had this season. The vets have done it for a long time and were more than able to hold their own.It really helped the Hawks the season. It turns out that the best strategy for a short and compressed season is using vets on the bench. No time to "groom" players.

4. THE KIRK DEAL FOR 2 PICKS WAS A BAD DEAL. Based on how kirk played this year and the fact that crawford is at best a backup and the pick from what is turning into a very weak 2011 draft, it is safe to say that the trade was not bad. There is no way either crawford or the pick would have been a rotation player, plus can you imagine the Hawks with the current Mike Bibby ?? ugghh

5.LARRY DREW WAS THE WRONG CHOICE. Larry Drew being on the short list of coach of the year already proves that he was obviously not the wrong choice.

So go ahead and admit it..>YOU WERE WRONG!!!

Based on an interview with Sund last season, he mentioned that the Hawks were elite and most people rediculed him. However, his definition of elite is

1.The elite teams are those that earn homecourt advantage in the first round and advance to the second round. 2.Your record at the end of the season( must be above 500 )against all the final four teams in your conference.Based on his definition, the Hawks were elite.

However, the media thinks only Miami and Chicago can be considered elite in the east.

What is an elite team in the NBA? What qualifies a team to be elite. Are the Hawks an elite team. Fellow bloggers, please help me in answering these questions.

I have been reading a lot of comments on this blog about how the Hawks should trade Henrich for a center ( or any center) and frankly i am shocked. Why on earth would the hawks want to trade Henrich for ANY BIG??.I keep hearing names like Nazr Mohammed, Thabeet!!!! Are you kidding me?? Unless the center is a legitimate starter who is better than Zaza, the hawks should keep Henrich and even look to extend him . Here's why:

1. Remember Orlando in the playoffs or better still remember Jameer Nelson??.

One of the major reasons why the Hawks got by Orlando last year was Henrich.His D on Jameer Nelson is what helped us win that series. How easily we Hawks fan forget. Infact, If he was not injured last season, I still think we would have gotten by Chicago as he would have made Rose work harded for his points.

2. He is the 2nd best guard we have today.

I am in favor of Jeff Teague starting because he needs the experience and he is the long term solution for us. But, as of today, Henrich is better than Jeff. Why trade your second best guard for a 7ft scrub.

3. Teams will give a lot to have him.

New York, Lakers, Miami are some of the teams that would LOVE to have a veteran guard like Kirk. why give him up for a center who is at best a backup.?

4. We need him.

Just because we have 5 guards does not mean that we should trade Henrich. If we have any hope of getting into the conference finals, we would need Henrich. Willie Green and Pargo are obviously not going to get us into the conference final.

5. He plays the 1 and 2 pretty well.

During the playoffs, where the rotation gets shortened, a guard combination of Kirk , Joe and Jeff is far better than any combination of Joe, Jeff,Pargo and Green.

6. We gave up a lot to get him

We traded 2 first round picks to get him.( The way the 2 picks are playing in Washington, I am grateful we made the deal).The least we can do is see what he can produce for a full season. We still dont know what would have happened had he not been injured in the playoffs.

No Matter what happens tonight, I think based on what we have seen so far this season, we can safely conclude on the following decisions over the last year. Note  this is not the future we are talking right now based on results....WHO’s RIGHT AND WHO’S WRONG…

1.       Signing Joe to the Max. ASG/SUND RIGHT and FANS WRONG: I can debate this to the ends of the earth. From what we have seen so far, signing Joe to the max was the right decision. There are 2 parts to this and probably the part that most people fail to realize is that by signing Joe, we kept him away from our competition. If you want to argue that signing Joe was the wrong move, just imagine a backcourt of Joe and Rose in Chicago..Ugghh. Chicago had the money and would have signed him to a max .Even  if he had gone to New York that would have automatically made New York a better team than the Hawks . Not signing Joe  would have ruled the Hawks out of from being a competitive team in the east for at least the next 5 years no matter who we signed as replacement.  

2.       Playing Jeff Teague DREW/WOODY WRONG and FANS RIGHT. This I am saying with a little hesitation. We can also argue that Jeff is playing well now because he is an unknown talent in the league and teams have not yet had enough information to scout him. We are yet to see what he can do in a full season. I remember his fellow draftee ( Collison) lighting it up in New Orleans with some  20-10 numbers  when CP3 was injured only to fall back to earth when he was sent to Indiana.

If Teague turns out to be the real deal, just imagine what the Hawks lost by not trusting him- 18 mil to Bibby( that money should have gone to a legit big), Jordan Crawford and a draft pick.

3.       Kirk Henrich Trade.. ASG/ SUND Right and FANS wrong: Unless Jordan Crawford turns into the next great thing; I think this was a very good trade. There is no doubt that the Hawks don’t get past Orlando without Henrich. His D on Jameer was super considering what Jameer did to Bibby last year. Henrich also makes Jamal expendable this off season. A back court of Teague, Joe and Henrich is good enough we don’t need to resign Jamal.

 Ok.let’s do it ESPN style..Here are the top 5 reasons why you can’t blame Drew for the game 2 loss.

Before we start here are some reasons that did not make the list.

1.       He has been doing this all season long- The HOF treatment. That is his philosophy and research has shown that players play much better when they don’t have to worry about fouls.

2.       We have won 4 straight against Orlando.  We had a loss  coming anyway.

3.       Comon…We were only down 6 points going into the 3rd .Would you not take that on a road game?

4.       The Hawks worse quarter was the 3rd quarter (12 points!) when HOF played not the second quarter.

 LETS Start with the top 5 reasons.

REASON 1.  CANT HAVE IT BOTH WAYS

Drew’s reason for benching Al? The hawks were still in the game late into the 2nd quarter. If it doesn’t make sense to you, then why do you like his Dwight treatment in game 1? The reason why Larry Drew did not change his strategy on doubling Dwight in game 1 despite Dwights ridiculous numbers and his players pleading  in the first half of game 1 was that the Hawks were still in the game despite Dwight’s numbers. So you can’t blame him for the result if you liked his strategy in game 1. If the Hawks had lost game 1 and Dwight had scored 70pts , we would have blamed Larry. So you can’t have it both ways.

 REASON 2. DWIGHT 48 MINS??

I must admit, I have never seen it before. I have seen guards play 48 mins but for a big man to play the whole 48 mins? That was ridiculous. I bet you at half the Hawks coaching staff  were feeling confident that at some point Orlando would have to rest Dwight and with our guys very fresh, we would inevitably make a run. Normal law says bigs get tired faster and cannot play 48 mins. Looks like Dwight is really superman.Cant blame Larry for not thinking that Dwight will play 48 mins.

REASON 3  COMON HOF.COLD IN THE 3RD QUARTER??

HOF said he was a little cold in the 3rd quarter. That is quite a lame excuse. He knew at some point he would come back into the game. He had the half time to get his groove back. He started the 3rd quarter. It wasn’t like he sat for like 15 mins and was just asked to come back into the game. Saying he was cold in the 3rd is worse than saying you were cold at the start of the game. You are suppose to know how to get your groove back especially after half time.

 REASON 4: WE HAD A CHANCE TO WIN IF THEY STUCK TO LARRY’s GAME PLAN .

Down 2 points with less than 2 minutes to go and Dwight playing 46 mins with 5 fouls and your best player well rested and not in foul trouble? The Hawks should have won that game if Joe had stuck to Larry’s  plan and NOT GIVEN UP THE  WIDE OPEN CORNER 3  to Jason Richardson.!!!!

 REASON 5. DON’T BE TOO GREEDY

Comon ..We went to Orlando to get 1 out of the 2 . WE GOT WHAT WE WANTED. ALL WE NEED TO DO RIGHT NOW IS HOLD SERVE AT HOME. The series is in our favor. ! Dwight is not playing 48 mins every game. Phillips will be rocking come Friday and Sunday …Even if Al had played in the second quarter, the Magic were most likely not going to lose 2 straight at home knowing that the series would be pretty much over.

LETS GO HAWKS!!!!!!!!

Okay, I am feeling a little gippy after the Hawks latest win @ Utah. However, when I look at the next 10 games, I think the Hawks should go at least 9 wins.Except for the Miami Heat game, the Hawks should win all the games. What do you think? After Vanlentine's day it gets ugly for the Hawks as 12 of the next 14 games are against winning teams. TIme for the Hawks to feed on the Buttom feeders!!!!!

Its prediction Time !!

Next 10 games

Vs Pacers

Vs Milwaukee

@Toronto

Vs Houston

Vs Sacramento

@ Miami

Vs NOH

@ Charlotte

@ Milwaukee

Vs New York

@Milwaukee

Recently, I have seen a lot of comments especially from ajc.com insisting that Larry Drew is holding the Hawks and Teague's development by not playing Jeff Teague more minutes. Frankly, I would have to support Larry.From what I have seen so far, Jeff Teague is NOT READY for starters minutes.

For starters, he lacks confidence in his mid -range and 3 point shot. This is quite baffling...Coming out of college, one of his strong points was his mid range shot. Although he has a funky release, no one questioned his ability to make it. Except for the last game against the clippers, I have not seen him even take the mid range jumper when it is clear that teams are backing off him  and inviting him to take the shot. Time and time again, I have watched players sag off him only for him to hesitate when the ball gets to him. Criticize Bibby for all you want, Bibby will take and most likely make open shots.

Presidence has shown that a team can fall off the cliff if a veteran point guard makes way for a young PG that is not ready. Here is a list for you... Detriot fell off the cliff when they handed the team to Stuckey , Philaldelphia's misfortune and Portlands fortune seems to have coincided with the move of the "old" Andre Miller, the Bobcats horrific season and the Knicks rise seems to coincide with the trade of Felton ( Bobcats felt DJ Augustin was ready).

So everyone please be careful what you wish for. Bibby's true weakness which is defence can be mitigated by Joe Johnson guarding the quick point guards. Teague's weaknesses ( inexperience,lack of shooting touch,poor decision making, poor ball handling) cannot be easily overcome. In my opinion, Bibby deserves to and should start for the Hawks. His ability to run the offence and move the ball is second to none on the team. Hawks poor showing in the last 2 playoffs has been tied to poor offence and not defence. Starting Teague will not help

In the words of Mike Woodson(and i am paraphrasing)" It is not how many minutes that you play that concerns me. It is what you do with the minutes that is given to you". Right now, Jeff has not shown any indication ( except in flashes )that he can run this team. It is wrong to the team, players and fans to  give Jeff more minutes that he frankly has not earned at the expense of the team losing more games.

Oh, and remember the same calls were made for Salim and AC Law....Where are they now?.

I am not saying this out of fraustration. I am saying this out of reason.WHO OR WHAT IS JOSH SMITH?? One of the major reasons why the Hawks are struggling is the unbelieveable indisciplined play of Josh Smith.

Every team has defined roles. The problem with Josh is that he gets out of his team's defined role.. He wants to be the point guard, center, 2 guard ,small forward , six man etc. The problem with that is that he messes up the team psychology. When Marvin , Joe or Bibby takes a 3, that is within  their role. It doesnt really matter if they miss it because everyone on the team knows that they are suppose to take the 3 and are more likely to live with the result.

Imagine being a team mate of Josh. When he jacks up a 3 or decides to run the point instead of passing the ball to the point guard, what will be on your mind? I bet they are saying DAMN Josh! , I bet your energy level  will fall and your fraustration will rise. It has nothing to do with making the 3 or pass. It has to do with discipline and playing your role. 

He( Josh) is very immature and tends to be easily frustrated when the Hawks are losing thereby hurting the team  by his  plays and antics e.g..Did you see how many times he let Big Baby  and Kevin get the shots they wanted because of  his frustration?

Too many times, you can feel the other Hawks players drop their shoulder when Josh makes a bone head play. That affects the teams psychology. Trading Josh will let Al play the 4, move Collins to the 5.We have enough shooters in the starting line up and Collins doesn't hurt you defensively,he  is very disciplined and is a TRUE CENTER. If down the road this season, Teague is able to get the starting job, WE WILL HAVE A TRUE STARTING 5.I am sorry, but 2 undersized starters is a huge hole for this  team to overcome. 

Oh and he has great trade value right now!. We can get a solid guard, small forward or even center( or a combination) in return. Like the saying goes, the Hawks goes as Josh smith goes. If he plays well, the Hawks play well. If he doesn't, they lose. Unfortunately, the Hawks cannot go far with that kind of mentality.  Especially when Josh is not Kobe Bryant. 

You want more reasons?

1. He is not a small forward as noted by the career points of the opposing teams small forwards when he played the role early in the season.

2., He is not the teams best power forward. That prize goes to AL.

3. He is in his 7th or 8th  year. He SHOULD GET IT BY NOW.

4. Yeah we will lose some of his rebounding and block shots...I can live with that. Marvin, Collins and Al can make up most of it.- Collins is not a good rebounder, but he is very good at boxing out, Al can be a good shot blocker as noted by his stats last year. 

5.His best role might be energy off the bench.Unfortunately, you risk him pouting and  losing it.!!!

6. A lot of teams will love to have him!!.HAWKS BEST  TRADE ASSET

7. Contrary to popular opinion, the Hawks will be better defensively without Josh in the starting line up. Why? Al playing the 4, no undersized center, limited bone head and risky plays and most importantly- EVERYONE PLAYING WITHIN THE GAME PLAN.

8., Woody was getting some success in limiting Josh's bone head plays.Larry unfortunately, has done a very bad job and lacks the reputation to make Josh rein in his antics. 

9.Forget stats , you can only win consistently when everyone plays within the roles defined by the coach and game plan. That is against Josh's basketball  philosophy of doing it all.

10. The Hawks can win with Marvin, Al,Bibby or even Joe playing badly sometimes. WE CANNOT WIN WITH JOSH PLAYING BADLY BECAUSE HE HURTS THE TEAM IN SO MANY WAYS.

You think otherwise ?let me know.

I love this signing. Despite all the negative comments from Hawks fans, I think this is a very good signing and here is why.

1. Coach- This is probably the most important reason. THE COACHING STAFF WANTED HIM. The coaches saw him play with other players during the summer league and were clearly impressed with him. They could have taken any other player in the summer league  for much cheaper.

2.Tools.- He has all the natural tools you would like for a raw talent. Height  6-7, Strength, Ball handling ( he plays point for his team), quick feet and hands, good shooting stroke.

2. 14th Player: The Hawks had zero motivation to do this deal besides total belief in this guy. They could have just signed 13 players like last season but they chose not to and went ahead to spend money to not only pay his club in France to release him, but also guaranteed him a 3  year contract and the 1st year guaranteed !!!. For a club- Hawks  that is notorious for pinching pennies, this is a big deal. The Hawks won't do this unless they really really  liked what they saw.

3. Character: Imagine if you put Mario West's character into Marvin Williams? You would have an All Star player. That is how important character is in sports. When I saw Pape play at summer league, I liked what I saw. Here are a few things I saw.

- He listened 100% to the coaches in the dug out during the time out. Believe me, for someone that watches a lot of Basketball games, this is a rare occurrence.

- He is active on the court. The guy was very active when he was playing. He was talking, getting other guys into their positions( even when he was not with the ball). This clearly shows leadership qualities. He also has a very calm demeanor  like Al that makes other players listen to what he has to say.

- He moves very well on defense and offence. Considering how raw he is, after the few jitters he had in the first few minutes of his first game, he moved very well on defense and offence using his hands and feet. He was hardly caught in the wrong position and was ALWAYS TALKING to his team mates during the game.

In summary, I think Pape Sy is Mario West with an offensive game. Given what we saw from Mario, Papee should be a very good utility player in a year or 2. I would not be surprised if he makes the final 13 player  roster this season.

After watching a whole lot of Hawks games over the years, I believe that one of the hawks major problems is that they have 3 Power Forwards as starters. lets look at each of the 3 players.

Marvin Williams: Criticize him all you want, but he is a very good defender. I have yet to see a player that has abused Marvin on the offensive side besides maybe Durant( and he abuses everyone). Marvin's key weakness is his ball handling and inability to drive to the basket without  turning the ball over. This I believe is because although he can guard 3's very well because of his quick feet, the weaknesses noted above  limits his  offense.

If Marvin was to play the 4, he would not have to go by quick players at the 3 but rather slower and stronger players at the 4. He has the lower and upper body strength to bang with the big boys down low both on the offense and defense. Also, because of his rather clumsy ball handling skills, he would not have to do a lot of ball handling at the perimeter. All he would need to work on, will be his low post moves. With his naturally soft hands , this should not be a big problem. 

Josh Smith: Josh has better vision  and ball handling skills for the 3 position than Marvin . However, his poor jump shot and lack of lateral quickness limits his ability to play the 3. He has greatly improved his low post moves so if he would stick in the low post, he would be a very good 4. 

Al Horford: Would Al be a better 4 than 5? Would Al make the all star team if he was a 4. How would he fare against 4 's that play outside the post e.g. Lewis, Garnett, Bosh etc.? I really don't know. i think Al would make a good 4 . However, one area I think he would struggle would be on the offense. Al is kind of mechanical when trying to get by players. This might not limit him against centers, but I think he would struggle against 4's on offence.  Besides that, i think he would make a very good power forward. Not sure if he would be an All Star at this time of his career. For Al to be an All Star at the 4 this season, he would have to beat out one of the following players- Bosh,Boozer and Garnett. I dont think he is better than any of them.

In terms of height and weight, all 3 players are almost the same  and they all have stats stats that are closer to the average Power Forward. 

Josh Smith  6-9 240

Al Horford   6-9 245

Marvin Williams 6-9 240 

What do you think ? Who would be the best Power Forward? 

Yahoo just did a top 30 point guards and Mike Bibby was not on the list. I find it hard to believe that he did not make the list even at this stage of his career. If the list is looking at just 1 season, then he should be better than at least half the pg's in the league. He has and definitely will  made a difference on a 50 win team. If you had a team for the coming season, who would you rather have as your starting PG? Derek Fisher( did not make it), Bibby or Jrue Holiday( made the list)?

To make matters worse, they even had 6 teams with 2 point guards. Yeah he is old and slow, but his playmaking skills is top class. I just find it hard to believe that you can win 50 games without a legit  point guard.

What do you think ?

My Hawks are once again projected to finish in the bottom half of the playoffs teams. For the 3rd straight year, all the analyst are dissing on the Hawks. Remember last year? who predicted the Hawks to finish 3rd in the East? No one...Remember 2 years ago? Who predicted the Hawks to get a playoff spot? No one..

How on earth can they predict the  Boston Celtics and Chicago Bulls to finish ahead of the Hawks?. Comon, We beat Boston 4 times last year and also finished ahead of them. The Big 3 are going to get 1 year older on the wrong side of 30 and still everyone thinks they will finish ahead of us? Lets look at Chicago. how on earth do they have a better team than the Hawks? Look at their bench. There is NOBODY there. Okay, so they got Boozer. Please tell me how their starting 5 is better than out starting 5.

Here are some key points that is missed by everyone.

1. Continuity: This is probably the most underrated quality of the Hawks. For 4 year now, the Hawks have been playing together. That in no small way counts. When other teams are working their new players into their system, the Hawks would have jumped off with a good start in the season. I would not be surprised if the Hawks are in the top 2 or 3 by December. Remember last year when the Hawks had the best record in the NBA early in the season? All this is as a result of playing together for so long.

2. BIG 3:  The Hawks Big3( Josh, Al and Joe) are probably  the most underrated Big3 in the NBA. These are 3 legit All Stars( Yes Josh definitely had All Star numbers last year). How can a team that has 3 legit All Stars and a top NBA bench guy in Jamal be so underrated?

3. Youth: Youth in your team means that all things being equal, the players will improve. The Hawks have 3 starters under 25! Which means that organic growth is guaranteed for next season. I marvel how everyone talks about the Thunder and Bulls going to improve due to the age of their top stars, but no one talks about the Hawks improving.

4. Change: Why do most people think that change means the team will get better? Yes I like change. But ONLY IF it makes the team better. Yes, there was no changes in the team but comon, if the team  is getting better, why make changes and risk messing up the chemistry. Funny how everyone is drooling over the Thunder for keeping their core together with limited changes and criticizing the Hawks for doing the same thing. Everyone says the Magic beat the Hawks and we should make changes. Does anyone remember how prior to last year, the Hawks lost to the Celtics like 8 straight times in the regular season and last year we beat them with the SAME TEAM 4 straight times? Remember the usual 3 heavy losses in the Texas triangle every year turned to 2 wins and 1 loss last year with the same team? Despite what people think, the gap between the Hawks and Magic is not that much. Oh, FYI besides Dwight, all the big stars in Orlando are looking at the wrong side of 30  so we should expect them to drop a little this year and the Hawks to get better.

5. We can (Still) Beat Anyone. The Hawks beat every team in the NBA last season except the Thunder  and we played them 2 very close games. If you compare our win - loss between the Hawks are all the top tier team for the last 2 seasons, you will see remarkable improvements. All this was done by limited changes to the roster.When the core of the team is still together and they have been improving, why not let it ride one more season?

6. Coach Change: The Hawks have a new coach that has been with the team for the last 6 years. This naturally means that the new system going to be implemented will compliment what is already working. I don't see Drew changing what was working. Since he is very familiar with the team. This should make the team better.

7. Patience: The Hawks are still under the cap and still have the exception from Chills trade. Sooner or later, a very good trade is going to come along. It is only a matter of time. An old  team is going to start off badly and look to make a trade that will write off this season. The Hawks are in a very good position to take advantage of this. 

I am going to say that baring any major Injury, the Hawks will finish in the Top 3 in the East. 

Joe is 29 years old and if he signs a 6 year contract, he will be 35 by the end of the contract.  FYI…There are many players that are playing at the top level at 33 /34 .Case in point, the youngest of the Boston Celtics big 3 is 33 and they made it to the NBA final. That is 3 players are the stage Joe will be in 4 to 5 years and they were still able to compete for a championship.If we get  4 to 5 years of  very good basketball from Joe, the contract will be worth it.  

The Hawks need to think like a WINNING TEAM . If Joe was playing for the Lakers, will they sign him to a max deal …The answer is YES. If they feel that he will be important to them in their goals. Yes Joe is not Kobe but Kobe is about 32 years old and the Lakers just signed him to a 3 year max deal without any hesitation.

Oh and here is something that is not brought up…Joe can be traded if it does not work out. Heck, even Gilbert Arenas with his baggage can be traded today( there was a rumor of a Magic trade offer). Kobe Bryant/ Ray Allen and Vince Carter are  shooting guards over  32 and are still playing at the top level. Joe is less athletic and does not rely on athleticism as much as most 2 guards so it is fair to say he will still be playing at the top level in 4 or 5 years. Also, he is much taller, bigger  and versatile ( can score in multiple ways)  than most 2 guards and that will help him when he gets older.

We should quit looking too far into the future., NOW is the opportunity for the Hawks to win. We might never be in this situation again for a very long time. It took us over 10 years to win 50 games. Why mess with something that is working?. Here is something everyone is failing to understand. Letting Joe go to either Miami or Chicago will almost guarantee that they will be better teams than the Hawks for the next 5 years. Right now, the Magic and Cavs are the only teams better than the Hawks in the East. We must keep Joe and hope that the natural progression of Josh, Marvin and Al puts us over the Hump. If Teague turns out to be anything close to an elite guard, we can almost guarantee that in 2 years, the Hawks as presently constituted stands a chance of truly competing for a championship.  Contrary to popular belief, the Hawks are not too far off from those 2 teams. We are probably 1 big man away from truly competing.

Oh and here are some counter arguments to common myths.

1.      Signing Joe to a max deal will limit the Hawks flexibility. Jamal’s contract ends at the end of this season, Bibby will be in the very tradeable final year of his contract. That gives the Hawks flexibility to sign Al to a bigger, longer term contract and even add other pieces. Besides, we still have the MLE ,Childress’s contact, Mo’s final year  to use as tradeable assets this season. So even if we resign Joe, we can still make trades to get better.

2.      The Hawks management group cannot afford to sign Joe to a max deal. Look at the contracts signed last season. Marvin, Bibby and Zaza all had a dip in the 2nd year of their contract. This was all done to sign Joe Johnson. So Sund and co had been planning for this situation since last year. The whole reason why we traded  the 31st pick and stashing talent in Europe was to have the flexibility to sign  Joe.

3.      A max deal is too much money and he is not worth it.  A player is worth what the market can offer. If other teams are willing to offer him the max deal, then that means he is worth the max deal. It is that simple. Why should 3 or 4 teams feel that he is worth the money but the Hawks feel that he is not? .

4.     The Hawks can still be a very good team without Joe. Can anyone imagine a back court of Bibby and Jamal? We would get killed in the defensive end. (Think Golden State).  Has anyone thought about if Joah or Al can still be effective if they become the primary focus on offence and also receive constant double teams?  Has anyone thought about how the long term effect of the fickle Atlanta fans if the Hawks start losing games in the short team? Why throw away 5 years of work on the HOPE that we will be better without Joe in the long term

Please lets make every effort to keep Joe. Talent like that doesnt come every day. As my dad use to say “a bird in hand is worth 10 in the bush”. Why mess with a sure thing? 

(Editor's Note from THHB: This is an excellent counterpoint to critics of Avery Johnson which articulates many of the arguments fans have made for the hiring of Avery as head coach. Great counter-counterpoint by KB21 in the Comments Area...enjoy!)

Looks like from the poll put up by Kris, Avery appears to be the coach everyone wants. From all the analysis, it looks like the job will be going to one of the following 4 coaches- Avery, Dwane, Larry Drew or Mark Jackson.Here are my top 10 reasons why Avery should be the next coach of the Hawks.

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Looks like Dwane is the leading candidate. Well from this article, it looks like he is a carbon copy of Woody. Please read the article and put in Woody's name anywhere you see Dwane's name and you will get the same criticism we "so called experts" here in ATL have of Woody.

http://sixers4guidos.wordpress.com/2009/05/21/shocking-insight-dwane-casey-sucks/

Oh and just for fun, he was 20 -20 and even though his replacement was 12-30, the writer still did not have anything good to say about Dwane.Even 3 years after he left, the writer still does not have anything nice to say about Dwane despite the fact that he has been their best coach in terms of record in quite a while.

BUYER BEWARE: If you are looking for a coach that will play basketball that is pleasing to the eye, you have got the wrong man and if you are looking for a coach that is more concerned with winning than anything else, then we just mighty have a Woody clone.

See my favourite quote below. 

(S4G): Which were Casey’s strengths as a coach, and what was he missing?

(CW): I honestly cannot remember any “strengths” besides the fact that he was a nice guy. Also, I think he did a decent job getting our players to play defense during his 20-20 second season, although the stats might say otherwise (I didn’t check). 

He was missing everything. Namely: experience, presentation, advanced game knowledge/strategy, good assistants, and good players.

One of the most common complaints I have heard about Woody is that the team does not have an offensive philosophy. Well here is the offensive philosophy of the team in the shortest sentence possible ... WE MILK EACH POSSESION.

What do i mean by that? Well, for each possession, the Hawks maximizes the possession by

1. Not turning the ball over

2. Getting a good shot and

3. Doing a very good job of going for the offensive rebound if it is a miss.

The Hawks are middle of the pack in 2 and 3 point FG %( 11 and 13) .However, when you consider that they are 3rd in offensive rating . which indicates that points scored per  possessions, it shows that they improve their ability to score by  not turning the ball over and doing a good job on the offensive glass.

Here are some of the stats to support my theory.

Turnover rate 1st . The Hawks lead the NBA with the least turnover. One of the main reasons I think Teague doesn't play much is his lack of ability to protect the ball. Protect the ball and you get at least a chance to get 2 points and even an offensive rebound. Turn the ball over and the opponent is more likely to score off the turnover. Thus a turnover can result in a 4 point swing....a +2 in turnover advantage can theoretically result in an 8 point swing.

Offensive rebound rate 6th. This shows that the team despite its lack of size at the 5, does a very good job crashing the boards for rebounds. I also notice that the Hawks do a very good job of tapping the ball to another player even when they are not in a good offensive rebounding position or when they are rebounding against bigger players. This is a definite strategy by the coaches because all the player do it.

Pace 27th. The Hawks take their time in getting their shots off. This can be attributed to the isolation game .The ISO, on most possessions, may not get us the best shot possible . . . but it does guarantee on most possessions that we’re going to at least get a shot up. Taking a shot and missing is better than turning the ball over, because with a missed shot, you do at least have an opportunity to rebound the basketball and get another shot up.

Fast break points 4th The hawks run a  low-risk offense  that is enhanced tremendously by our ability to get out on the break and score in transition. This is  because of the ability of our frontcourt people to get out and fill the lane .

Points in the paint 5th  in the league The points in the paint is obviously a high % shot. The Hawks makes shots based on  transition buckets, post-ups, and JJ’s floater in the lane . In the half court, our offense is definitely dependent on guys making shots when being guarded one on one.

It may not be the prettiest offense in the world, but it is VERY EFFICIENT.

And for those that criticize Woody for his offence, the HAWKS are winning because of their offence and not the DEFENCE where the Hawks are middle of the pack.

Its funny, I have now resorted to go to the oppositions website to get any good news about the Hawks. So any time the Hawks are playing any team and i want to get an objective assessment of our team, I have to go to the other teams website. 

I am not saying we should not be critical of the Hawks. All I am saying is that once in a while I would like to see an article about how good the Hawks are this season. 

THIS IS FROM THE LAKERS WEBSITE!!!   Wow efficient offence ??? With all the criticism of Woody offence, you would think that the Hawks have the worst offence in the league. 

http://www.silverscreenandroll.com/2010/3/31/1398283/bynum-delayed-is-bynum-denied

Right now they're tussling with the Celtics for the third seed in the East and the theoretical pleasure of avoiding Cleveland until the Conference Finals. They've come this far on the strength of an excellent offense. After placing 10th in the league in offensive efficiency in 2008-09, they've jumped to third this year. The Hawks turn the ball over less than anyone in the NBA, and they've become a strong offensive rebounding team. Their possessions seem to last forever.

Before you laugh. i have found the best best deal for the Hawks.Yes ..Joe Johnson for Chris Paul.I think the Hawks should do a sign and trade with the Hornets this summer. Darren Collison  is averaging an amazing Chris Paul like number of  18pts and 8 rebounds in March.The guy is lightning quick and is playing close to 40 mins a game . This makes him a cheaper replacement for Paul. With 1 year under his belt, look for him -Darren to explode next season.

With the trade, this makes the Hornets an elite team in the West. They fix their problem of a 2 guard and now have one of  the best backcourts in the West.

For the Hawks, this will be a dream come true. Josh and Chris pick and roll will be a thing of beauty!!.  What do you think? Ofcourse there will be other players in the deal to make the numbers  work. 

Hawks fans will now be able to turn their nightmare of the 05 draft into a sweet dream ..

For the love of God what is it about Woody that everybody does not like. Fine! He does not run 'sophisticated" plays. Fine! He runs a lot of Isolation. He even gets a lot of criticism when the Hawks WIN!!. The Hawks lose to Golden State and  all hell breaks lose. They go and beat Utah and no one gives him credit  . Heck he is even being criticized for winning against Milwaukee . Yes, the Bucks that had just won 6 straight ROAD GAMES!!!

For all the criticism, here are somethings you cannot deny

1. He plays to WIN THE GAME: If all the Hawks players play hard every night they will be in EVERY GAME !! What more can a coach do.

2. He has exceeded everyones expectations...At the beginning of the season, Hawksdawgs put out a post on the season predictions.( Please go back and look at your prediction) I guarantee you, the Hawks are on par to exceed everyone's expectations. For  the 3rd consecutive year , the Hawks have exceeded every analyst prediction yet the coach GETS NO CREDIT...AMAZING!!. 

3. The Hawks are 1 loss away from being the second best team in the East ! They are even 1 loss away from being the 3rd best team in the NBA!! Heck Woody must be doing something right .. I struggle to see another coach having a better record with the same squad.  Dallas, Denver, Boston,San Antonio, Utah, Orlando . All these teams are obviously better than the Hawks in terms of talent  and experience level yet the Hawks are within striking distance or better than all of them. 

4. Stats dont lie. Look at every stat, and the hawks are very impressive. Wins, Off efficiency ( currently 5th), what ever stat you look at, the Hawks are a very good team. 

Please Woody ...Just keep giving me the W. Iso Joe, Switch all , however you do it, I dont care .JUST GIVE ME THE W!!! 

Criticize Woody for all you want , you cannot deny that what the Hawks are doing this season is amazing. Playing with obvious deficiencies in the team especially at arguably the 2 most important positions( PG and Center) for the Hawks to be within 1 loss of being the 3rd best team in the league is damn right amazing and however you put it, some credit has to go to the coach. 

Saw this online and it is very interesting. A recent poll of NBA players show that Joe Johnson is the most under-rated player.

He may be a four-time All-Star, but according to Johnson's colleagues, he's vastly underappreciated. The Hawks' shooting guard, who leads his team in scoring and assists this season, garnered 8.9 percent in a recent SI poll of the most underrated players in the league (the survey of 190 players was conducted in late 2009).

Read More: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/multimedia/photo_gallery/1002/nba.underrated.players/content.1.html#ixzz0ex2l5Jh6 
What do you think? Do you think even the ATL fans are underrating him?

I have a feeling that the problem the Hawks are having with the magic is not tactical but psychology. Dwight Howard dominates 90% of the centers in the league but the Magic does not blowout 90% of the teams in the league on a consistent basis. 

The Magic have lost to Detroit, Miami( multiple times),Phoenix,Utah and Oklahoma. All these teams have "small" centers that Dwight can dominate easily so Dwight dominating Horford is not the problem. 

The problem is :

1. After multiple blowouts, the Hawks play tight against the magic.

2. When magic makes 3's, you can feel the Hawks players getting deflated.

3. When Dwight blocks a shot, the player do not take it to the basket but settle or adjust their shot to avoid being blocked. The best way to play a shot blocker is to take it to him .

4. The 2 games in Orlando were back to backs after emotional wins over the Celtics. 

The Hawks have the same problem with Boston over the last 2 years( the Hawks were swept by the Celtics over the last 2 years in the regular season). The Hawks beat the Magic last year in Orlando so we can do it again. We just need to be more focused and loose.Despite the blowouts, I would prefer to see the Magic in the second round of the  playoffs instead of the Cavaliers.

Time for me to dream. If there was one player i think that would put the Hawks over the top and even make them contest against Cleveland for the best record in the league, it would be Billups. I know right now Denver would not deal him but just imagine if we had gotten him when he was being shopped by the Pistons for expiring contracts?

He would be Woody's dream point guard. On offense , he can do all the things that Bibby does and more  i.e pass, score,run the offense and also  be effective without dominating the ball. Joe needs to dominate  the ball to be effective so a point guard like Chris Paul that needs  the ball to be effective might not be a good pair with Joe.Heck he can even score by backing down his defender ( which Bibby cannot do due to his size).

Oh and he is a 6ft 4 point guard !! Woody can "Switch ALL "on D with minimal mismatches.!I Hawks would have no clear weakness on offense or defense. With a 6ft4 and 6ft8 guard, our backcourt would be a mismatch for 90% of the teams in the league.

When you have his intangibles like leadership and clutch play, this would be a match made in heaven..

Oh ..time for me to wake up!!! What do y'all think? 

Brent Barry- He is the kind of player you do not appreciate until he is gone.If you don't believe that,  ASK PHOENIX.

Brent  Barry- He is going to be happy this summer regardless of who he signs with.

Rick Kamla-  He cannot be had for less than max money. He turned down 60mil because it is not max money and he is a max player.

Eric Snow- He will get it ( Max Money). It is just a matter of whether he is going to take it in Atlanta or not. It is not a matter of how much but where.

SEE Link Below for my initial analysis on why Joe is getting a max and the disagreement by a lot of my fellow bloggers.

http://www.peachtreehoops.com/2009/12/4/1186223/joe-to-the-max

I recently read the link below  in ajc  and I would love to hear the comments of the bloggers here. Note the assumption is that Woody does not want to fail obviously so can you all answer the following questions,. To quote the author, Instead of asking folk to judge or criticize, lets challenge ourselves  to think of why? Maybe that might improve our understanding of basketball.

Some more additional questions I would like us to look at are:

1. Why doesnt Woody not give Jeff teague more minutes?

The guys at hoopinionblog did an analysis. Based on prior year picks, only Mario Chalmers has been a mid first round point guard that started for his team.So it is an anomaly for a non lottery pick/point guard  to play heavy minutes in his first year. When you add the fact that the Hawks are a winning team, that even makes it harder to justify.  There is a reason Jeff was passed over by over 20 teams. I am guessing his flaws  will probably take more than a year to fix. 

2. Why does Woody not call more plays for Al Horford?

My guess is that unlike Joe and  Jamal,Horford does not take tough shots.  He usually plays within himself.This i think is part of his nature. So the reason he is one of the leaders in FG% is not only that he doesnt get enough touches. Maybe it is because he only takes shots that have a high % of going in, he only calls for the ball on offence where he has his man in an advantageous position or he passes the ball if he does not have a good shot. Should Woody tell him to be more agressive on offense? I dont think so. He is in his 3rd year and still working on his post moves so right now, it might be more advisable for him to play within himself and continue to improve. 

3. Why does Woody switch on defense? 

From the 2 to the 5th position, the hawks have players that are between 6ft7 and 6ft9. They all weight between 240 to 250 pounds. That is a very little variation. Why bother fighting through screens and risking missing assignments. You don't have to worry about going under screens and getting burnt.  Usually switching happens at the top of th key and the worse case scenerio is Bibby in a mismatch with a big or Al with a pg. With Josh and Al good shot blockers and help defenders, the Hawks are not really at a disadvantage when they switch. Also,  by switching all the defense.

http://blogs.ajc.com/atlanta-hawks-blog/2010/01/07/nets-shredded-celtics-next/?cxntfid=blogs_atlanta_hawks_blog

With the trade deadline coming up, should the Hawks make a move? What do you think is the best move for the Hawks ? If Tracy is released from Houston, should the Hawks go after him? I think he might be a difference maker .. What do you guys/gals think.

I doubt the Hawks will trade any of their major pieces so I guess any addition has to be a minor addition.  Baring any major injury, what position do we need additional help to improve our chances in the post season?

Apparently the analyst in nba.com think so.. As a big Woody fan, I think it might be better for him to wait till the offseason. If the Hawks get to the conference final, he will be up for a BIG PAY DAY.

Check this excerpt from the article.

As coaching free agents go, he could be the LeBron James of the market, especially if the Hawks reach the NBA Finals, which isn't a silly notion.

http://www.nba.com/2009/news/features/shaun_powell/12/22/coaches.doing.well/index.html?ls=iref:nbahpt1

Last season, the Hawks offered Joe 60 m for 4 years and he declined. I was rather unhappy that he did not re-sign. However, based on the comments on the blogs, Joe should play out his contract.  That can only mean one thing to the Hawks. The Hawks will have to pay more to keep Joe Johnson.

Before we go ahead, let me make one thing clear.  A players value is based on not only his skill level, but the demand for his skill. Rashad Lewis did not get a max contract becos he is the best power forward. He got a max contract becos at that point in time, there was a high demand for his skill and Orlando needed a strong complement to Dwight Howard from the perimeter. For that, they were willing to over pay. Gilbert Arenas did not get a max deal from Washington until he started flirting with other teams and someone else was willing to offer him a max deal. Timing is also very important. If Joes contract had ended this season, he might not have commanded a max deal. But he is fortunate to be in the golden year of 2010.

Is Joe worth a max deal? Well, I don’t know and frankly, that is not really important. But one thing is for sure . He will get a max deal from either the Hawks or someone else. Why? Becos , next season , there will be a high demand for a second fiddle for teams like Cleveland, Chicago  and Miami or from teams like New York if they fail to sign LeBron or Wade. Price has always been and will always be a convergence of demand and supply and next year, Joe will be in the lovely place of being in high demand with a limited supply of players with his skills. And for those who say that the Hawks should not offer Joe a Max deal. The reality is that the Hawks will find it very difficult to find a player near his skill level to replace him. This can only mean not resigning Joe will mean that the Hawks progress might be in Jeopardy. After 6 years of progress, why risk not resigning Joe?

So my fellow blogger, the question is not is Joe worth a max deal? The question is will Joe get a max deal. The answer my friend is YES.

Note: all these teams mentioned above have the cap space to sign Joe even if they keep their star player.