The Hawks played hardball this summer with restricted free agent Marvin Williams, just as the Hawks do with most restricted free agents. Last year, Atlanta GM Rick Sund allowed Josh Smith to hang in the RFA win, only bringing the electric forward back when Memphis got Smith to sign a reasonable offer sheet.
It didn't come to that this season -- Marvin apparently talked to no other team seriously -- but it still worked out for Atlanta. Marc Spears of Yahoo! reports Williams will stay in the ATL for $40 million over the next five seasons.
The Oregonian's Jason Quick reports the Blazers will sign 33-year-old point guard Andre Miller to a deal. The terms look like $22 million over three years, with only the first two guaranteed. By the numbers, it's a good deal for Portland and Miller -- the PG wasn't getting more elsewhere, and the Blazers get away with a good playmaker at a fair rate for a short time.
But the opportunity cost of signing Miller is quite high for the Blazers.
So, you may or may not have seen the feature we did for the NFL Draft in which we took every single team and decided who the worst draft pick in the history of that franchise was. And it was so awesome and fun to do (and totally not time consuming at all) that I decided to roll it out for the NBA as well.
So, for every NBA team, we give you a horrible draft pick -- either a straight bust, or player picked ahead of another player who was far better, etc. -- and then a snarky reason as to why said pick was the worst in franchise history. Your suggestions in the comments, please. And happy draft day!
Cherry Picking recaps the previous day's NBA playoff action.
Progress looks like this. Atlanta, long a laughingstock of the NBA, made the playoffs last season. This year, the Hawks advanced to the second round. Progress, right?
Well, from my seat it doesn't look like a whole lot of progress. More than offering new hope for tomorrow, the struggle against Miami followed by obliteration at the hands of Cleveland has pointed out Atlanta's specific deficiencies. The shortcomings are intrinsic to this roster, the problems part-and-parcel with the strengths. I fail to see how the Hawks can get much better from here.
It's been five months since the Hawks last beat the Cavaliers -- their lone win in four tries in the regular season was on Dec. 13, 2008 -- but after watching the Cavs absolutely destroy the visitors from Atlanta in the first two games of the second round, it may as well be five years.
Cleveland won Thursday's game 105-85, but that doesn't even begin to convey how much they dominated the Hawks. The Cavs had a 30-point lead entering the fourth quarter, at which point Mike Brown pulled all of his starters. The Cavs improved to 6-0 in the postseason, winning every game by double-digits while holding their opponent to 90 points or fewer each time.
Cavaliers 105, Hawks 85: Recap | Box Score Cavs Lead 2-0 | Next Game: Saturday @ Atlanta, 8 PM ET
MIAMI -- Center Jermaine O'Neal was replaced in the starting lineup for Miami Friday night because of concussion-like symptoms stemming from a hit Wednesday night from Atlanta's Zaza Pachulia.
Although O'Neal was on the 12-man active list, the Heat listed Joel Anthony as their starting center, hurting their chance to fight off elimination in this best-of-seven series.
While O'Neal was a surprise scratch, Hawks forward Marvin Williams must have had a good healthy lunch because his sprained right wrist suddenly healed enough so he could play.
Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.
Marvey Milk had 28 points on 11-of-15 shooting, hitting four of six threes and adding four boards and a couple steals. Who did he do it against? That, that's not important. What is important is that, thanks in part to Marvelous, the Hawks were able to escape an awful shooting night from Mike Bibby. (Someone's always gotta clean up after that guy.)
It hasn't been a great week for Atlanta sports fans. The dreams of the Falcons were ended by the now-NFC-Championship-Game-bound Cardinals, then the Hawks started to slide, culminating in Friday night's massacre against Orlando. In that game, Al Horford wound up a little banged up, and scheduled an MRI.
Well, it turns out that the MRI revealed a bone bruise on the knee, holding out Horford today against Philadelphia (a game that the Hawks promptly proceeded to lose, their third in a row). Now word has come out that Horford will miss up to four weeks games with the injury. That's quite a significant amount of time for a team in a pretty tough decision, with Orlando streaking off into vapor trails and the Heat hanging tight, not to mention the fact that the Bobcats might actually be getting their stuff together.
It doesn't seem that long ago that the Southeast was an afterthought. I'm aware that sounds stupid as this division attempts to rise to serious L-bound prominence, but it's true -- before Dwight Howard and before Dwyane Wade and before Josh Smith and before Jeff McInnis ... what was there?
It doesn't particularly matter now; the division is still only an erstwhile powerhouse; you would never see a prediction coming that any one of these teams can contend for the NBA title right now, and that's what matters in these sort of things.
Of course, Orlando is a different story of sorts. Maybe. At least we have to wonder: Does Hedo Turkoglu Still Have the Special Sauce?
A to Z.
The Hawks played hardball this summer with restricted free agent Marvin Williams, just as the Hawks do with most restricted free agents. Last year, Atlanta GM Rick Sund allowed Josh Smith to hang in the RFA win, only bringing the electric forward back when Memphis got Smith to sign a reasonable offer sheet.
The Oregonian's Jason Quick reports the Blazers will sign 33-year-old point guard Andre Miller to a deal. The terms look like $22 million over three years, with only the first two guaranteed. By the numbers, it's a good deal for Portland and Miller -- the PG wasn't getting more elsewhere, and the Blazers get away with a good playmaker at a fair rate for a short time.
So, you may or may not have seen the feature we did for the NFL Draft in which we took every single team and decided who the worst draft pick in the history of that franchise was. And it was so awesome and fun to do (and totally not time consuming at all) that I decided to roll it out for the NBA as well. 
Cherry Picking recaps the previous day's NBA playoff action.
It's been five months since the Hawks last beat the Cavaliers -- their lone win in four tries in the regular season was on Dec. 13, 2008 -- but after watching the Cavs absolutely destroy the visitors from Atlanta in the first two games of the second round, it may as well be five years.
MIAMI -- Center Jermaine O'Neal was replaced in the starting lineup for Miami Friday night because of concussion-like symptoms stemming from a hit Wednesday night from Atlanta's Zaza Pachulia.
Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the "lig." Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.
It hasn't been a great week for Atlanta sports fans. The dreams of the Falcons were ended by the now-NFC-Championship-Game-bound Cardinals, then the Hawks started to slide, culminating in Friday night's massacre against Orlando. In that game, Al Horford wound up a little banged up, and scheduled an MRI. 
