RE: The Atkins Diet is Hunter

["Sean Giovanello" <sgiovanello@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Personally, I think Hunter will settle a little bit back to earth the
more games and minutes he logs.  I don't see that as a knock on his
game.  If you peg him in at 12 points and 10 rebounds he is a ENORMOUS
SUCCESS.  I think he should be able to perform around those levels so
its not like I am dissing him in anyway.  Is it possible for him to pull
a u-e?  I guess so.  It might mean that we he plays some better teams
and when the book gets out on him the more he plays that some flaw will
be seen and exploited.  However, I don't think that is likely.  The only
possible thing I can think of is that he will have trouble defending
people 1 on 1 - he looks pretty quick and strong, but I don't think we
will really know until he plays against some good quick power forwards
and some good strong power forwards that are taller than him.  I think
he will be better than any of us ever imagined and be a key cog for this
team now and in the future.  

As for Atkins, I am far less sure of what he will bring.  On the court
he is an improvement over Mike James.  In the realm of salary and
rebuilding a team in an environment where each dollar is precious, I am
not so sure how wise an investment he is for more than this year.  I am
pretty certain he is a stopgap pointguard to stabilize the team and
maybe be here for next year and some of the next before he is wheeled
out as a cap space deal.  My biggest question with him (there are
actually 2) is whether he can consistently play well on both ends of the
court (when I think of him I can never escape the visions of Kenny
torching him) and if he can keep his shooting percentage up and his
turnovers down.  The second question is to whether he will prove just
good enough to hamper the development of Marcus Banks.  I hope that will
not be the case.  I am not a big fan of Banks learning totally by
watching and firmly believe that this team is best served by him logging
20 minutes every night.  If Atkins hampers that, I think its both
shortsighted and hurts the team more than it helps.

The last point I will address is Mihm.  I will firmly admit to being on
the Mihm bandwagon.  The one downside to Hunter getting more minutes is
that it seems that they are coming at the expense of Mihm.  Blount
should be the one losing minutes under this scenario.  Hunter glides
into the PF slot.  Mihm slides over to his natural position center-
where his fouls should go way down.  The problem is that Blount
continues to perform good enough to stay at center and the relationship
between coach and GM seems to make it difficult for the switch to occur.
I would love to see a lineup of Atkins and Banks splititng time, Davis
backed up by Jiri, Pierce backed up by Jiri, Hunter backed up by Walter
and Perkins and Mihm backed up by Blount and Perkins.  I think you need
to limit the minutes of Blount (cut them in half) and cut Walter down to
about 10 minutes a night.  Then this team might be able to do something
this year and improve for the future.

I don't think you can address anything from two games.  I think that
trading Toine makes sense, but taking Raef back didn't.  There are still
a lot of guys on this team with a lot left to prove - Pierce as to
whether he should remain a Celtic and elite player in the league, Davis
that this is the real Ricky and not the stuff he has pulled in the past,
Jiri that he can shoot consistently and be a starter or 6th or 7th man
in the NBA, Mihm that he can stay on the court and turn his rebounds per
48 into an impressive rpg, Banks that he can be an NBA starter, Atkins
that he is a player and should be this teams starter, Hunter that he is
a complete NBA player and possible star, etc etc etc.  This team has
lots to prove and its not a bad thing.  It makes the rest of the season
intriguing.  As to whether we would have been better this season with
Toine, I am sure our record would have been.  However, we need to look
towards building a little this year and taking a major step next year.
I am not down on this team - I have questions and even some concerns
(especially about Raef and Danny's ability to pull all this off) but I
will always be a Celtic fan and don't believe for a second that I spend
my time tuning into every game and devoting way to much time to this
list to search for something negative about a team I love...

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-celtics@xxxxxxxx [mailto:owner-celtics@xxxxxxxx] On Behalf
Of Dan Forant
Sent: Saturday, February 28, 2004 1:36 PM
To: Celtics@xxxxxxxx
Subject: Re: The Atkins Diet is Hunter

OK let's discuss it. What is it that seems to be misunderstood? Is
Atkins
going to do a u-e? Will Hunter not be able to rebound and score at least
a
few gimme's for us off of offensive rebounds alone? Pierce, Blount,
Yiri,
Davis and Mihm seem to be benefiting from their play. Just what could go
astray? Are we a better team today than the day Toine left since the
last 2
games?

DanF

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Sean Giovanello" <sgiovanello@xxxxxxxxxxxx>


> I don't think its fair to draw that conclusion after two games Dan.
Its
> not a desire to see the team do bad, but after how this season has
gone
> its more of a collective lets wait and see how things turn out.
>
cut