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Player development, shmayler development


In recent days, both Bronn and I have examined where and how Mike Woodson has helped develop, failed to develop, or been vindicated of not developing certain players. We may be reaching overkill on this subject when the fact stands that if you have not made up your mind on Mike Woodson then you are not really watching the games. If five years with the same coach can get you anything, it is firm, stubborn opinions on the coaching.

Still, I came upon an excellent article by Tom Ziller over at Fanhouse looking at how teams respond to dreadful seasons. Ziller looked at teams with 19 or fewer wins (hello, 04-05 Hawks) and examined the rate at which these teams improve. It should be noted getting to 19 or fewer wins is not common with every rebuilding process. Only five percent of all seasons even qualify.

Also, a team on average wins almost 29 games following their low point season (the Hawks won 26), and Ziller adds a final point that matches the Hawks progress from the 13 win debacle.

As you can see, most teams do not stick around the deep cellar for long: the average win total for teams following a 19-wins-or-less season is 26.9 wins. If you consider teams with records that fall between 38-44 and 44-38 to be average, then it takes (on average) sub 20-win teams only four years to get to that level. One team -- the Mavericks -- took some eight seasons to get from awful (11 wins in 1993) to better than .500 (53 wins in 2001). Every other sub 20-win team got there more quickly.

All this is to say, the Hawks rebuilding process is normal at best and slow at worst. Should Mike Woodson take more credit for being able to whether questionable coaching ability and keep his job or for not coaching the team to worst results than average rebuilding process?

In the end, I think it means three  things. Mike Woodson has been adequate or average or whatever  word you want to use as the Hawks head coach. Coaches don't really matter that much when you have middle of the pack skill and depth. And the Hawks have much bigger decisions to make as to how far this talent and skill can take the team when Joe Johnson and possibly Marvin Williams are unrestricted free agents in 2010 than they do with Mike Woodson and his unrestricted status the same year.

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I’d put it this way. Woodson has probably cost the Hawks something like 5 or 6 wins each of the last 2 years, but it wouldn’t have made much difference in the final analysis. They still would have lost in the first round in ‘08 and in the second round in ’09. They didn’t have the talent to get home court in ‘08 with Bibby coming over late in the season, and they didn’t have the talent to move up to 2nd seed in ‘09 which they would have needed to make the conference finals. And since Sund has brought back close to the same team, it again won’t matter much in ’10. Unless Josh, Marvin, or Al makes a gigantic leap forward to become an All Star, this is still a team whose ceiling is the 2nd round. And if the Heat get Odom and Boozer, maybe not even that.

by redwards95 on Jul 23, 2009 9:55 AM EDT reply actions  

Only bright spot this off season...

Was acquiring another serviceable guard, since our whole offense runs through them. Getting a better rotation of guards helps a Mike Woodson coached team as much as anything. If Teague can provide at lease some quality minutes to add to Crawford, Bibby, JJ, and hopefully Flip, we can have fresh guys on the court, and have JJ ready for the emd of the game.

I have six locks on my door all in a row. When I go out, I only lock every other one. I figure no matter how long somebody stands there picking the locks, they are always locking three.

Elayne Boosler

by NaGaNole on Jul 23, 2009 1:34 PM EDT reply actions  

as long as woodson does not make a crazy

“lets play joe a lot of minutes no matter what because we need an all star” i agree with you.

the more quality guards you have in woodson’s system the better.

by hawksdawgs on Jul 23, 2009 1:36 PM EDT up reply actions  

It’s pretty much a lock that Woody will do the “let’s play joe a lot of minutes no matter what” strategy, and it’s not like Joe is unhappy about it either. He wants to play virtually every minute of every game.

by redwards95 on Jul 24, 2009 10:55 AM EDT up reply actions  

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