GT charlotte vs atlanta 12/17 7-30 est

[fatlever]

Xmas comes early for the Hornets. They get two days of rest for first time in a month. No game until Tuesday.

[fatlever]

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[Mystical Apples]

Am I the only one that thinks starting Lamb over MKG wouldn't be too bad?

Nope. I'm on board.


"BBMF'ers"

I'm good with that move. I'm so over MKG right now. I can't even figure out if he's still an elite defender. He's still an amazing on the ball defender, especially guys who are his size or smaller. And he's so aware of everything on the court that he is always there for help defense, dig, rotating to correct spots. However, he's been seemingly overhelping so much this year that he's giving up a ton of wide open 3s. I don't know if that's by design from Cliff, or MKG just trying to do too much at a detriment to the overall defense. He just doesn't seem to have the overall impact on defense that he did two years ago. Combine that with a slight regression on offense, and we're talking about a player who should no longer be guaranteed a starting spot. We've already seen Cliff cut his minutes by about 25% recently. I don't see that trend changing as long as we are healthy.

2 separate points here: should MKG start? Yes. If he isn't starting does Lamb solve the perceived issue? No it gets worse. MKG starts for a reason and Lamb starts 2nd quarters for a reason...both are about matching skills and needs.

If anything start MKG, replace him earlier with Marco, and keep Cody in through entire Q1 next to Marco, Nic and Frank. Then start Q2 with MKG at 4 and Frank at 5.

[BigSlam]

Xmas comes early for the Hornets. They get two days of rest for first time in a month. No game until Tuesday.

Did you see Cody post game? Said how spent he is and how happy he is that tomorrow is a rest day.

Going to be good for the guys to only have 2 games next week (2 games in 9 days in fact). They need it.


"BBMF'ers"

[yosemiteben]

Holy Marco. Rocking a 63.2% TS in the month of December.

Love games where we can score without relying on Kemba for every bucket. Let's all collectively ignore the fact that Kemba and Nic combined to go 8-27, because damn Marco and Marvin got the job done. Also pretty big fan of the fact that we shot 44% from three.

This is a weird game to say this after, but I don't love when our offense goes into find Marco a shot mode. It feels like we get so one dimensional when that happens and it doesn't normally result in him getting a good shot. I feel like sometimes we do the same thing with Nic and more often that not we end up with terrible fader midrange jumpers that don't fall. With that said, if it takes that to make him feel involved and engaged and to open up the sort of outside shooting he's doing right now, guess it's worth it.

I really liked Lamb's game tonight except for the end of his 4th quarter minutes where he missed the open three and twice tried to finish floaters right over Dwight. His D was really, really good in the first half, loved the intensity.

I normally don't complain about our rotation, but ATL went WAY too long with Korver at PF. That cannot happen. Either Frank has to destroy Korver or we have to go small or bring Marv in to exploit the matchup. We did that one play where Frank curled around and got the dunk, but felt like we spent a couple possessions trying to figure out how to take advantage of the matchup, which was a couple possessions more than it should take. We also had Frank cross matched on Bazemore, which I was really surprised ATL didn't try to take advantage of. Would have been a perfect opportunity to get MKG PF minutes. I know it would've broken the rotation, but I would've put Marvin in and let him go to work on Korver.

Was really surprised that Cliff stuck with Cody so much (is 36 minutes a record for Cody in a non-OT game?). With Dwight controlling the boards I thought Hibbert might get more minutes.

[fatlever]

This is a weird game to say this after, but I don't love when our offense goes into find Marco a shot mode. It feels like we get so one dimensional when that happens and it doesn't normally result in him getting a good shot. I feel like sometimes we do the same thing with Nic and more often that not we end up with terrible fader midrange jumpers that don't fall. With that said, if it takes that to make him feel involved and engaged and to open up the sort of outside shooting he's doing right now, guess it's worth it.

I'm with you 100%. We've fallen into this trap in the 4th Q far too often recently. PGs wait for Marco to run thru 15 seconds worth of screens, hit Marco for a jumper. Everyone knows its coming. It's usually a really tough shot. He's hit a lot of really tough shots to his credit. It's just not good offense from my perspective. If that play falls and Marco doesn't have a shot, its often too late to run much else. It's too one-dimensional. Not too different from the old throw it in to Al and watch him take a shot, regardless of how the play is defended. Thankfully Marco is a helluva a shooter off the curls, shooting on the move.

[fatlever]

I normally don't complain about our rotation, but ATL went WAY too long with Korver at PF. That cannot happen. Either Frank has to destroy Korver or we have to go small or bring Marv in to exploit the matchup. We did that one play where Frank curled around and got the dunk, but felt like we spent a couple possessions trying to figure out how to take advantage of the matchup, which was a couple possessions more than it should take. We also had Frank cross matched on Bazemore, which I was really surprised ATL didn't try to take advantage of. Would have been a perfect opportunity to get MKG PF minutes. I know it would've broken the rotation, but I would've put Marvin in and let him go to work on Korver.

Seems more and more teams lately are following the strategy of putting a smaller player on Frank and gambling that we can't/won't be able to exploit the matchup in our favor.

Not too different than last few years when teams would try to hide a PG on MKG. At least MKG has done a better job of scoring in those situations this year. In previous years, he'd just hot potato the ball back to Kemba.

[Diop]

Need Frank to post up guards constantly in training and learn to patiently find an easy shot. He has a decent shooting touch, he should be able to find a way

[Mystical Apples]

I wouldn't post Kaminsky with Hibbert in the game. Exploiting matchups with post ups is about getting a better shot, or at least the threat of one, and that means punishing help with shooters. If anything I would've subbed Hawes for Hibbert.

After getting caught napping Howard wasn't buying what Hibbert was selling.




Hibbert's flash was actually kinda funny. 9 players waiting...waiting....




Big difference with Cody's mobility in the PnR. Korver was exploited by forcing him to "protect" the rim by himself instead of defending the post where help is easier. CHA put Korver in a bunch of these situations on an island....paint help, the curl, the post, throwing over the top, and the open 3 he was hesitant to closeout.

[Braggins]

Nope. I'm on board.


"BBMF'ers"

I'm good with that move. I'm so over MKG right now. I can't even figure out if he's still an elite defender. He's still an amazing on the ball defender, especially guys who are his size or smaller. And he's so aware of everything on the court that he is always there for help defense, dig, rotating to correct spots. However, he's been seemingly overhelping so much this year that he's giving up a ton of wide open 3s. I don't know if that's by design from Cliff, or MKG just trying to do too much at a detriment to the overall defense. He just doesn't seem to have the overall impact on defense that he did two years ago. Combine that with a slight regression on offense, and we're talking about a player who should no longer be guaranteed a starting spot. We've already seen Cliff cut his minutes by about 25% recently. I don't see that trend changing as long as we are healthy.

If anything start MKG, replace him earlier with Marco, and keep Cody in through entire Q1 next to Marco, Nic and Frank. Then start Q2 with MKG at 4 and Frank at 5.

I like this.

[Joest2003]

Am I the only one that thinks starting Lamb over MKG wouldn't be too bad?

I would like to see this because I think playing with Batum would bring the best out of Lamb. We seen what it did for Kemba.

[yosemiteben]

Am I the only one that thinks starting Lamb over MKG wouldn't be too bad?

I would like to see this because I think playing with Batum would bring the best out of Lamb. We seen what it did for Kemba.

What's the logic in starting Lamb? Feels like we have enough offense in our starting unit and a bigger need for offense in the second unit.

[HornetJail]

Am I the only one that thinks starting Lamb over MKG wouldn't be too bad?

I would like to see this because I think playing with Batum would bring the best out of Lamb. We seen what it did for Kemba.

What's the logic in starting Lamb? Feels like we have enough offense in our starting unit and a bigger need for offense in the second unit.

Agreed. I'd rather start the unit we currently start, but make Lamb the first sub off the bench... for Batum, not MKG, then have Batum run the second unit with Lamb, Bellinelli, and whoever else. Nic needs to split time with both units, as they would both benefit from his playmaking.

[Joest2003]

Am I the only one that thinks starting Lamb over MKG wouldn't be too bad?

I would like to see this because I think playing with Batum would bring the best out of Lamb. We seen what it did for Kemba.

What's the logic in starting Lamb? Feels like we have enough offense in our starting unit and a bigger need for offense in the second unit.

It's not so much that I want lamb to start I just wish he could play more minutes with batum. Call me biased but I honestly think Lamb has the most potential out of our young guys (MKG, Cody, Frank) we should be putting him in position to shine but i understand the second unit needs offense more then the starting unit so I get why cliff has the lineups he has. Maybe try subbing in lamb for MKG a few games and see how it goes