CB Draft '09 Mock Press Conference: Atlantic Divison

[KCattheStripe]

also, Philly your team seems to have a real dearth of outside shooting.  I don't really think of any of you starters as being really efficient outside shooters.  does that concern you at all?

Mello shot 37% last year.

[Kwhit10]

I really like the look of the Philadelphia 76ers, but I have one question. Are you worried that neither Bynum and Okafor will be ineffective without a big who can space the floor ( Pau and Diaw). Bynum and Okafor are both good low post players and may get in one anothers way offensively. Also, are you worried this might hinder your excellent driving guard's ability to get to the basket?

Okafor can make a shot but he can't stray out too far.  We feel that having two strong post players won't clog the lane persay but actually open up more close rang opportunities for them.  With strong driving players on the team they can drive while the post players move out a foot or two.  This will be enough room for the driving player to finish, or it will draw at least one of the opposing big man defenders away from their man leaving Okafor or Bynum to clean up with close range buckets.  However, if this doesn't work out against certain teams we can always being in Joe Smith who has a 15footer to clear some space, or even Tim Thomas or at the very least Steve Novak to draw the defender all the way out to the 3point line. 

[Kwhit10]

also, Philly your team seems to have a real dearth of outside shooting.  I don't really think of any of you starters as being really efficient outside shooters.  does that concern you at all?

Melo can hit from three, and so can Davis.  Davis isn't as good a shooter off the dribble from 3, so it will be our coaches job to try and get him to stop that and have him be more of a spot up 3 point shooter. We feel he will be able to do this while playing some type of pick and roll to give to Melo and then him popping right out to the 3pt line.

Questions for Philly:

1) I've asked this before, but for the benefit of folks who haven't seen your response, how do you prevent teams from collapsing their defense on you when you have two close-to-the-basket bigs, and only one shooter from the outside who stretches the floor? 

2)  Many people are concerned about Bynum's health.  How do you answer those worries?

3)  How do you match up against the other teams in your division?

1) We can always bring Tim Thomas or Steve Novak off the bench to the PF spot and they both shoot over 40% from 3land.  Joe Smith even can hit from 15feet.

2) Concerning Bynum's Health we can't really say much as of now.  He came back last year and played strong at the end of the regular season.  Your judgments will have to wait until you effectively see him play.  We feel that he is young and will bounce back and he can only go up in his skill level.

3)I feel the only direct competition in this division is with Toronto and Boston, with that said I think we match up pretty well with both.  We have very skilled big men who are good post players, and as said before we can easily change our team strategy depending on how we play at that moment by bringing in some shooters to space out the floor more.  We feel our team is very strong defensively, we have great shot blockers, people who have a knack for getting steals and we think we can run a lot on some of these teams with our defense leading to a lot of fast breaks.  While Boston had Wade and Toronto at the time had Arenas at the 2, was one of the reasons why I drafted Ronnie Brewer and Anthony Parker.  Both these guys are stud defenders.  Baron Davis will be posting up Rafer Alston all day.

[Rondo2287]

Questions for Philly:

1) I've asked this before, but for the benefit of folks who haven't seen your response, how do you prevent teams from collapsing their defense on you when you have two close-to-the-basket bigs, and only one shooter from the outside who stretches the floor? 

2)  Many people are concerned about Bynum's health.  How do you answer those worries?

3)  How do you match up against the other teams in your division?

Questions for Toronto:

1) Can you address concerns that you don't have a "go to scorer"?

2) What was your pre-draft strategy?  At one point, you had the third pick in the draft.  You also held, at different points, the 16th, 19th, 25th, and 26th pick in the first round.  Do you think you're in a better position now than if you'd chosen CP3, while perhaps surrounding him with another star? 

3)   How do you match up against the other teams in your division? 

Obviously I believe that Kevin Garnett can be a go to scorer in this league.  His stats took a hit as soon as he came to Boston becuase he didnt need to score as much.  However as it is true that he was our leading 4th quarter scorer and leading playoff scorer the year that we won the championship I dont think you can argue that he wasnt a go to scorer on the celtics.  
At the same time I find it very hard to pick out a player on my team that you leave alone to double team Kevin Garnett.  Everybody on my team can score the ball and is an offensive threat.  

I knew that I did not want to hold onto the third pick and then not have another pick until the end of the second round, this was very clear to me.  I moved the third pick for a lower first round pick and from there kept making moves each time trying to get better pieces than I started with.  I really didnt care where those pieces were on the board as long as I thought they had more value than what I was sending out.  I was able to come up with a very competitive predraft board starting with the 7th overall a mid second, and two third rounders.  

I believe that I do match up favorably against the other teams in my division.  I believe that my defense is equipped to shut any team in my division down and as I said before on offense there isnt a single person that you can double off of, especially when big z and KG are in the game at the same time.  
Throughout Artests Career he has a winning record against the three best small forwards in the eastern conference, Paul Pierce, Carmello and Lebron.  This past year he held Melo to 18 points a game on 17/44 shooting and Ron's team went 2-1.  Against Lebron in his career Artest is 7-3 and Lebron is averaging 5.1 turnovers a game against Artest teams,(no wonder he recruited ron so hard.)  Then when you consider he has Camby and Garnett protecting the basket, this defense is going to be extremely tough against some of the best offensive players in the game.  

Also, Artest's Defensive PER was 12.2 which is better than Bowen, Battier, Ariza, and Lebron which are commonly thought of as the best defenders in the league
I truely think that Philly will give us the biggest run for our money, but with Artest playing tough D on Carmello and our superior big man rotation I think we should squeak out a victory

[wdleehi]

Posting this for the Knick.  He apologizes for not being online.  Between him getting sick of this Internet provider (and canceling them and waiting to move before he gets online again) and his work blocking the blog, he has had me do the posting of the picks.



Knicks

Starting lineup

PG.  Deron Williams
SG.  Vince Carter
SF.  Marvin Williams
PF.  Nenad Krstic  (his defensive PER has always been better at PF then C)
C .  Kendrick Perkins


Bench
PG.  Keyon Dooling
SG.  Thabo Sefolosha
SF.  Luke Walton
PF.  Jason Maxiell
C .  Rasho Nesterovic   

11th man:  Greg Buckner

12th man:  Up for grabs between the 4 rookies.

DeMarre Carroll, Rodrigue Beaubois, Victor Claver, Toney Douglas

[wdleehi]

Question for the 76ers, if Bynum does the injure for the playoffs for the third year in a row, how do you survive deep in the playoffs?  The big men off your bench are good for short stints, but not long stints. 

[Kwhit10]

Philly will be doubling KG with whomever is playing Artest.  With one of the worst 2pt shooting percentages we will let Artest make the decisions for your team and let him take his shots.

[Rondo2287]

ok, well he may have had a poor shooting percentage performance, but he still average 17 points a game and shot 40% from three point range, double at your own risk

[Kwhit10]

Question for the 76ers, if Bynum does the injure for the playoffs for the third year in a row, how do you survive deep in the playoffs?  The big men off your bench are good for short stints, but not long stints. 

Well if that happens we won't be as good, and neither would any other team that loses a starter.  We will hope that at his young age he will have recovered, and be a productive center.  Worst comes to worst we could always make an in season trade.

[Rondo2287]

And really, Artest shot 40 percent from the field this year, Carmello Shot 44% except for when Artest was covering him of course when he shot 38%

[wdleehi]

How do you plan to motivate Tim Thomas?  (I think if you do, you could have the best 6th man in the Atlantic)

[Roy Hobbs]

Question for the 76ers, if Bynum does the injure for the playoffs for the third year in a row, how do you survive deep in the playoffs?  The big men off your bench are good for short stints, but not long stints. 

Well if that happens we won't be as good, and neither would any other team that loses a starter.  We will hope that at his young age he will have recovered, and be a productive center.  Worst comes to worst we could always make an in season trade.

Toward such end:  what's your philosophy on voting when it comes to teams that have stars who have suffered past injuries?  Should teams vote you down because of any perceived question marks regarding Bynum?

[Kwhit10]

Question for the 76ers, if Bynum does the injure for the playoffs for the third year in a row, how do you survive deep in the playoffs?  The big men off your bench are good for short stints, but not long stints. 

Well if that happens we won't be as good, and neither would any other team that loses a starter.  We will hope that at his young age he will have recovered, and be a productive center.  Worst comes to worst we could always make an in season trade.

Toward such end:  what's your philosophy on voting when it comes to teams that have stars who have suffered past injuries?  Should teams vote you down because of any perceived question marks regarding Bynum?

It depends on each situation.  Bynum came back at the end of the regular seasons and I liked what I saw.  Other players were out the entire year and I haven't seen them do anything yet.  So I will hold my judgments til the second round of voting.  I will have different views on each individual case but, people can think what they want, I doubt I'm going to change anyone's mind, they have his stats from what he has done last season and that's all I can provide.  I will vote on other teams on an individual basis.  And I will be harsher for people who've been out for an extended period of time and haven't seen play since recovering.

[Kwhit10]

How do you plan to motivate Tim Thomas?  (I think if you do, you could have the best 6th man in the Atlantic)

Tim Thomas is 32 years old, he hasn't really played for a contender.  He did play for Phoenix in 2005 and put up 11 and 5.  I think when he sees how good this team is and what they are committed to doing, he will be on board.  Nothing helps people play better than being in a winning environment.

[Roy Hobbs]

Questions for New York:

1) Can Vince Carter be counted on, or will he wilt / lose interest?

2) Are you worried about the mobility of your bigs at all?  What about their shooting?  None of your big men seem to be a super-athlete or a great shooter.  (I do love the toughness of Perk and Maxiell, though).

2) How do you match up with the other teams in your division?