Initial feedback: A completely subjective and immediate response to the events of tonight's game, featuring a comment and rating, the latter on a scale of 1 to 10, on every player who saw the floor and the head coach, along with ephemera and miscellany as the author deems necessary.
Your ratings and commentary, dear reader, are welcomed in the comments to this post.
Boxscore
A thought regarding the opposition
The Detroit Pistons helped render any discussion of tonight's basketball game meaningless. Therefore, player and coach ratings in tonight's initial feedback post are indicative of season-to-date performance. The playoffs can't arrive fast enough.
Players
Jeff Teague: Provide an offensive alternative as an intermittent one-man fast break and by running the pick-and-roll adequately when Jason Collins isn't on the floor creating a man disadvantage. Passing up many open three-point shots. Steals and blocks to make up for points allowed when beaten. 6/10
Kirk Hinrich: Keep his man in front of him the majority of the time. Needs to make more than one open, spot-up jumper a game. 3/10
Joe Johnson: Make a high percentage of open shots. Make a relatively high percentage of difficult shots late in the shot clock. Keep his man in front of him some of the time. Make quicker move when on the block so his post ups don't always turn into 20-foot Josh Smith jumpers. 7/10
Josh Smith: Remain a tremendously productive player while exercising terrible shot selection and never, ever blocking someone out before going after defensive rebounds. The fascinating favorite. 8/10
Jason Collins: Obstruct the path to the basket. Keep Erick Dampier on the bench. 1/10
Marvin Williams: Rebound 18-20% of opponent misses while on the floor. Keep toes behind the three-point line. Attack the basket three times a game. 5/10
Ivan Johnson: See the ball, get the ball, put the ball in the basket. Don't even think about getting in foul trouble until either Zaza or Horford returns. 5/10
Willie Green: Continue to focus solely on scoring. Remain efficient enough in doing so to earn 15 minutes a night when you've got it. Be able to put it behind you following the nights when you play seven minutes because you've got nothing. 4/10
Tracy McGrady: I have no expectations for Tracy McGrady and have no idea if consecutive productive, out-of-nowhere performances in blowouts against bad teams portend playoff contributions or are just indicative of the occasional night when McGrady feels good. ?/10
Jannero Pargo: Take shots, make shots. If not, get off the court before the turnovers start to hurt. 3/10
Vladimir Radmanovic: When the back abides: spread the floor, shoot on sight, help on the defensive glass. 2/10
Jerry Stackhouse: Intangibles and nothing but. 1/10
Erick Dampier: Not applicable. 0/10
The head coach
Consistently put effective defensive lineups on the floor. Ride his top six or seven players until they collapse once the playoffs begin. Live or die on the basis of making jump shots. Never forget that's why you need to put effective defensive lineups on the floor. 6/10
2 comments:
I would have to disagree about McGrady, saving him for the playoffs, ideally, is a stroke of genius. This also differs with your "Run on pessimism and truth" slogan. At this point it may be more befitting to change it to "Run on optimism and hope". Getting the bench in shape to contribute down the stretch is also good timing.
Thinking about this team I would agree with the numbers above. Josh is an arguable all star, Joe is an above average starter, Teague is a decent starter, Marvin is a quality rotation player, etc.
However being the engineer that I am, I have been tracking all the games in a spreadsheet and the highest average is Joe & Josh at 6 (Horford was 6 as well). Teague, Marvin, and Zaza come in at 5. Hinrich, McGrady, and Ivan are at 4. Pargo, Green, and Vlad are 3.
These numbers indicate we have 3 decent starters and a bunch of rotation guys. Which makes me wonder again if the Hawks put forth the same effort on a consistent basis. This also supports the fact that the Hawks are not a threat for a deep playoff run.
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