When the playoffs ended last season, Josh Smith was ready to say goodbye to Atlanta. The excitement he felt by the Hawks’ postseason success (beating Orlando, throwing a scare into Chicago) was tempered by the anger of once again being the lightning rod for criticism, seemingly every time something went wrong. The extreme ups and downs of his career with the Hawks had worn on him, just as it had worn on so many who watched him. As Smith put it, “When you’ve been in one place for a while, it crosses your mind: Maybe I want to get lost. Punch the GPS a few times. “I’ve been here a long time. I’ve never lashed out at the organization. All I ask for sometimes is, when I raise my hand, maybe somebody can help me up, so I’m not always the person who’s trying to [defend me from criticism]. It would be nice if somebody else said, ‘This guy’s a pretty good player.’” Smith said he never asked to be traded. But he would not have screamed if it had happened. Yet, when the Hawks opened the gym following the NBA lockout, guess who was the first player to show up? Guess who lost 25 pounds this summer, changing his workouts, changing his diet, running in the Hollywood hills? Guess who worked on his mid-range jumper — from 16 feet, not Neptune — and was determined to get faster and quicker so he could excel against the league’s small forwards, after seeing a lot of time at the 3-spot in the playoffs? Josh Smith showed up to training camp a different guy. He weighs 225, the lightest he has been since turning pro in 2004. After only a few days of drills, coach Larry Drew said, “He’s getting off his feet a lot quicker, getting to the rim and exploding, even more than he has in the past. “I’m seeing and hearing a passion I haven’t seen before.” Read more: http://blogs.ajc.com/jeff-schultz-blog/2011/12/13/can-this-really-be-a-new-josh-smith-for-hawks/
