DBac

First off, the Nets and Knicks are not tanking. The Nets blew up their future when they traded away everything for old stars in a desperate attempt to win right away. The Knicks did something similar when they maxed out Joakim Noah and Derrick Rose. Hell even the Lakers f***ed up and signed Luol Deng and Timofey Mozgov(!) to big money contracts last year. The only teams in that list that I feel good about getting it right are the 76ers and TWolves. Sacramento, Orlando, NY, Brooklyn are all horribly managed and won't be good no matter what strategy they employ because they are simply badly run teams. Detroit is in a funky position, Jackson and Drummond seem to have personality issues that makes their future weird. I expect them to deal one or both of them. And everybody would love to be San Antonio. Their MVP level player gets hurt, suddenly their season is torpedo'd and they are right in striking distance to land the #1 pick and draft the best power forward of all time. On top of that, they have one of the best coaches ever and an amazing developmental staff. That's the amazing thing about the NBA, all you need is one pick to break right and suddenly you have a plan. Nobody ever envisioned Kawhi becoming this good, but now that he has he is suddenly the posterboy for the "anti-tanking" army. Look around the NBA man, it's not a secret that assets and flexibility are the common denominator in the top teams. What is the Hawks pathway to becoming a top team in your opinion? We have a PG on the rise in Dennis, a nice 3nD SF in Taurean and then a jumbled mess. Bazemore is overpaid with a bench player's skillset. Dwight is not a good fit with Dennis, who needs space to operate in the paint. But honestly, I don't mind Dwight's contract since he'll be gone in a couple of years anyway. He's actually tradable unlike Bazemore and Millsap (assuming he gets a max contract). THJ has to be resigned, I'm still not even entirely convinced that he's a good fit next to Dennis. I love him as a 6th man, but I'd prefer a guy in the Courtney Lee, Wesley Matthews mold next to Dennis. Ideally if I'm building around Dennis, I'd go Dennis / 3nD SG / Scoring SF / Defensive 4 / Stretch 5. @MaseCase You're missing the point. Tanking only exists to get straight to the point and eliminate as much luck as possible. Of course you don't have to go full Philadelphia, but you still have to be bad to get your shot at the top talents. And the top teams in the NBA are either built around those top talents (Cleveland, Golden State, San Antonio, Houston, Washington) or built around smart cost effective contracts (Golden State, Houston, Boston). You don't get to the top by overpaying FAs and drafting in the 20s every year. The 2015 Hawks succeeded on Kyle Korver, Demarre Carroll, and Paul Millsap outplaying their contracts to an amazing degree along with top 5 pick Al Horford being an amazing glue guy. The Hawks as they stand now are not bad enough to get to the top talents and not good enough to stand a chance in the playoffs. This year it wasn't even Lebron, it was the Wizards. It's not like they are an old team that we can outlast. The Hawks are one of the 5 oldest teams in the NBA. And for what? /rant

Kind of. It's much more important to collect and manage assets. Tanking clears the canvas and often times allows teams to quickly stockpile assets. Assets allow you to make a deal to get a guy like James Harden (Houston) or Kevin Love (Cleveland). Golden State's philosophy of building through the draft allowed them to have enough cap space to snake Kevin Durant away from OKC (who was also built through the draft). Boston has unbelievable flexibility right now. They have the #1 pick in a very strong draft while also being able to afford another max contract player, as well as yet another top 5 pick next year. If you're not in the lottery, you better get lucky like Milwaukee (Giannis + Middleton deal) or San Antonio (Kawhi). Compared to the Hawks, who are declining in a hurry and are backed against the salary cap wall. If the Hawks bring back Millsap on the max contract that he will demand, they are entirely dependent on Dennis Schröder, Tim Hardaway Jr (assuming we bring him back), or Taurean Prince being good enough to put them over the top in the next few years. And that is why people are fine with the idea of the Hawks blowing it up. Because the team is dangerously close to salary cap hell and not competing for a title at that. Right now, flexibility is king and the Hawks don't have much at all..

Obviously don't know much about this guy. It'd be a nice pick if he shows a good 3 pt shooting stroke in workouts.

I'm very open to "selling high" on Dennis. I love Dennis and his attitude. He's a killer on the court, he's not afraid to mix it up with the stars of this league. He's also by far the best trade chip on the roster. If you look at the recent drafts, Dennis would be a very nice outcome to drafting a young point guard. However, his play-style does not lend itself to winning. He's a zero on defense, doesn't do a good job of creating for others on offense, and doesn't get to the line (aka we are at the will of his somewhat inconsistent shooting ability). So if we moved him to collect some lottery assets, I would not be torn up one bit (Especially considering I prefer bigger point guards in the first place). That said, I still like his mentality and would not be mad if we moved forward with him. I would like to see him get stronger. That should make him better on both ends of the floor. Right now he's simply too weak to score through contact like an Isaiah Thomas, James Harden. And he can be bullied by bigger players on defense, negating his great wingspan. I have very little hope that he'll become a creator, though. Part of that mentality that I love is also a weakness, as he is overly concerned with his own scoring. His assist numbers are nice, but watching him play and then watching a guy like John Wall or Chris Paul or even Harden really reveals the difference in basketball IQ. Schröder's game doesn't lend itself well to having a non-PG initiator, so it's important that he takes leaps in that regard. Also disclaimer: I'm very open to rebuilding most of the damn roster. I like Taurean Prince a good bit, could definitely see him on a winning team. I like the idea of Deandre Bembry. Outside of that, I'm not super attached to most players on this team anymore.

Taurean might not be Kawhi but he's gonna be a fine player in his own right. Big time performance under a lot of pressure... showed the same guts he showed vs Brooklyn to get us back in it.

Listen to trade offers on the entire roster except guys on rookie deals.

Prince won't be Kawhi. The thing about Kawhi is Kawhi was the ball handler for SDSU, so while he was an elite defender he was also an underrated ball handler. Bembry is similar in that regard, he handled the ball for St Joseph and got really good at it. Bembry's shot is broken though. Prince has some 2 way potential and I think you can win a championship with him though.

Ehhh a lot of his game is based on being bigger than the guys he faces. He has some sneaky good passing and outside shooting, but I don't think he's a good enough offensive player to make up for his lack of athleticism on defense. At best he's Jokic lite.

That's so good for Sacramento and awful for us. Is this something that you made up yourself or what you're hearing?

this audio on foxsportsSE is terrible edit: As I say that it got better.

That would not be good at all. Our best 3 point shooter would be Al Horford lol.

Would need to be heavily protected.

Rudy Gay? You really want Bud fired huh.

Uhhh if Baze gets 20M, BudCox shouldn't be the execs getting fired...

I would consider a deal with Portland with McCollum as the main piece. Chicago with Butler or Milwaukee with Middleton too.

What do you guys think this means for Millsap if the rumors of pairing him and Horford are true? Could he be moved for a star wing player?

Can't see the team winning with a SG / SF duo of Korver / Baze or Baze / Thabo. The best teams in the league all have at least one stud at that position. And eventually they have to realize keeping the status quo isn't getting us anywhere.

Yeah all draft day we heard that Beasley and Luwawu were the guys. And we passed on both. Just gonna sit back and watch this unfold.

The more I look into Prince the more I like it. His numbers are very similar to the numbers that Jimmy Butler put up at Marquette and Prince has said that Butler is someone he's trying to model his game after. That is NOT to say that he will become Jimmy Butler (no one expected Jimmy Butler to become this good) but don't be so fast to mark him down as simply a Demarre clone. He has a very decent jumpshot right now and it will only get better under our player development staff. What will take him to that next level is improving his ball handling.

I remember being very impressed by his playoffs play. I would not mind this at all.

I want him on the team.. he's a very good player. It's just a matter of him being healthy. Would prefer him to Deng if it came down to those two. The max though? That's a little much and it sounds like most teams agree according to Supe's post.

Yeah my second guess was gonna be Thabo on the move and Darren Collison moving here to be our backup PG.

So Dennis is on the block.

He's already a better player than Hield was as a freshman / sophomore with more athletic upside.

If it wasn't for the second half of that Virginia game, we would not be talking Malachi Richardson right now. He would probably not even be in the draft and he would have very little hype going into next year. If a team takes him, it's because they believe they can harness those flashes from that Virginia game and turn him into a player. But just realize we're talking about a guy because of ~11 minutes. Outside of that he was a 20 year old freshman who shot 22% on his 2 point jumpshots and 37% from the field while having very poor assist, rebound, steal and block numbers. If we're taking a chance on an super athletic wing I'd rather it be Malik Beasley or if you like length Patrick McCaw / Wade Baldwin / Timothe Luwawu are all good athletic long wing types.