Nineteen

In World War II the average age of the combat soldier was 26...
In Vietnam he was 19.

Ninininininininininin 19 nininininninin 19


For being followers of a team that has not done so tremendously well either in the draft lottery or in the actual draft itself, the HHB gets very excited for the NBA draft.

Recently, The Almighty Hawks Website, Hawks.com, asked a few of us for our thoughts on what the Hawks should do with the #19 pick in the draft. Our thoughts rained down as written below:

Being that for almost a decade now the key pieces to the basketball team, a point guard and a center, are still understaffed and continue to be the places that we wish the Hawks to focus for the long term.

Mike Bibby, while being a key part of a turnaround, has been and is a short term solution to the point guard solution. That the team has seen fit not to give Acie Law the backup minutes behind Mike this season that would be needed to evaluate whether he is the long term solution to the position (while Mike was in a contract year to boot) means to the HHB that the team must not be sold on Law at all---actions, as they say, speak louder than words.

As it is, there is quite a population of proven point guards available in this year’s draft, and as we are always a fan a drafting the best available talent regardless of position, this year the Hawks might have the best of both worlds, picking the best available while still addressing the need at the point.

About the big men: Rick Sund speaks certainly regarding Al Horford’s future in the league-and it’s at center-so while the Hawks need to beef up the frontcourt, using the draft when there may not be the type of talent at center that there might be at point guard, would lead the HHB to look at other avenues to beef up the frontcourt (including re-signing Zaza Pachulia) and leave the Hawks drafting their future floor general.

Nothing that has transpired since has altered this view---it still looks like some quality floor leaders are going to be the best value where the Hawks are selecting. Both Micah and Bret have been tracking the draft along with the usual national links like our old friend (and fellow Gator) Jonathan Givony at DraftExpress.

(Side Story--CAUTION!) We worked with Givony @ the old DraftCity and was covering the Hawks 2004 draft workouts when we were locked out of the workouts after having too-little nice to say about JR Smith (nothing mean or negative really--We just dared to say he was uneven and not the can't miss lottery candidate other outlets were predicting at the time).

Our fearless predicting (We love Kirk Snyder!) should have tipped the world off that we were (and still are) harmless, but we suppose enough people were reading to be dangerous--strange.

Anyway, we love the process and especially love when quality guys start to drop (i.e. Rajon Rando in '06) for no apparent reason. The position most likely to drop is the point guard and that's what we have been seeing, at least in the mock drafts, with such names as Teague, Lawson, and Collison coming on down. The Hawks are poised to, at least, get a point guard they can trust to play behind Bibby. (We really don't want to pretend the Hawks may not sign Mike, since they have done everything but carve an AH + MB heart in the Philips Arena court--but we guess we will have to wait and see.)

The HHB celebrates the changing family times in the Hawks blogosphere--As we welcome the fifth piece to our personal All-HHB team, we congratulate Drew @ Peachtree Hoops for their nuptials and safety on their travels.