The actual on ball defense wasn’t the reason why we lost imo.
Hawks got out to an early lead they never gave up because Dame coughed it up like 4 times in a quarter. They had 19 points off of live ball turn overs before the starters were pulled and they were up 20 by most of the game.
Dame averages 30 and tonight he gave us 3 points. Not even gonna count the last 3 he hit in mega garbage time.
Love dame, but he sunk the team in the first half and gave none of it return with his offense. This was easily the worst game I’ve ever seen him play.
The defensive rotations need tightening up. Giannis leaves the roller too often, but a lot of that is because we aren’t as switchable without Middleton. Brook also only played 20 minutes.
Obviously, it’s just game 2 so whatever, but I think the knee jerk “our perimeter defense is sooo bad” is missing the mark.
So many of their buckets were transition and turn overs and a lot of it is just that ATL is a really good offensive team and they came out tonight way sharper and more focused than the bucks did.