What can happen.

[Diesel]

About yesterday's firing.

1. It came from the top.

Kasten would never fire Babcock. He doesn't have the heart.

2. It was a precursor to a new regime.

I think there are people who the Hawks want but they realized that it would mean cleaning house to get them. Losing out on Jerry West and Isiah Thomas has triggered the Babcock must go if we are to succeed postulate.

THE FUTURE...

1. We are probably courting someone right now for Owner ship and someone to be GM/Coach.

Notice that Knight was not made GM yesterday. He is just interim. Had Knight been in the long range plans, then he would have been made GM so that we could move forward with thoughts about drafting.

so that tells me that there are some people that we are looking at that we possibly can't bring on til Summer. Firing Babcock was a message about our seriousness.

I think Ownership is close to being changed too. So here are the candidates..

1. Van Gundy. It would make sense that Van Gundy is up for GM/Coach. Reason being... I told you before about the NY South theory. Checkettes was rumored as being one guy who wanted to buy the Hawks. He would love to get out of NY. Van Gundy also is not able to talk to anyone until summer. He said about a coaching position in Atlanta something to the effect that our front office needs to be replace. Well, this would be good faith right here.

2. Doc Rivers.

http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/sports/co...oore/index.html

Hate to agree with Moore but He's right. Doc is the perfect fit. Coach of the Year... Returns home to right his old franchise. Doc has always been one who pushed his players but in Orlando he didn't have any control over personnell. He has also talked about wanting to be in Atlanta. In Orlando, I think they wouldn't miss him, they'd just get the next best thing....

3. Nique.

Could NIque be a GM? Maybe. However, I don't think that's the way that the Hawks will go.

4. Smitty.

See Nique. I think Smitty will be like Doc. I think however, that he will try to come back and play 1 yr at the minimum and maybe join the coaching staff.

5. Grunfeld (Toronto).

There are murmurings that Toronto is about to clean house as well. Grunfeld who had the foresight to get Vinsanity now could be a target for GM of the Hawks? I think it's a long shot.

6. Nellie.

His Coaching Contract needs to be redone. His GMing Contract is still good. Question is, has he grown bored in Dallas. I doubt it. The second question is would a second round loss send Cuban to the coaching pool... That's a possibility.

7. Isiah Thomas.

Do you think Isiah would leave Indy and his prominent coaching job there to be GM/Coach of the Hawks and work closely with his next door neighbor and good friend Kasten.... Do you think Zeke is ready to leave what he built in Indy (similar to Toronto) and start over with a Hawks team that's good. I think if Zeke could get out of his deal he would. Donnie Walsh is going NOWHERE. Zeke wants a position of Power. IN fact, if Zeke had the money, I can see hm vying for all three... Owner/GM/Coach... Let's see if He asks Dominique and Magic to help him come up with 200 million?!

SO if I had to rank them...

1. Van Gundy

2. Doc

3. Zeke.

Those are your top three.

[jaywalker72]

...he does not want a Coach/GM.

http://hawks.realgm.com/showarticle.php?artid=302

I would rather have Doc as the GM, and have HIM choose the coach. You would think he would pick someone with similar values as himself, right?

If we want to think outside the box, why not bring Doc in as GM and Smitty in to coach? We might have to worry about Smitty putting himself in at the last moment, but hey...

The real gem of your post is the ownership piece. Why not have all the ex-NBA allstars buy the Hawks?

Talk about a party.

[KB21]

First of all, I disagree with Diesel. This did not come from higher up. The higher up people in the organization rarely even pay attention to what goes on with the professional sports franchises. Stan Kasten is pretty much the de facto owner of the three teams, because he's where the proverbial buck stops.

Secondly, He doesn't necessarily have to give Doc the GM and head coaching job. He could name Doc Rivers the Executive Vice President/Head Coach of the Hawks while naming Billy Knight the General Manager, but in the process, he gives Doc Rivers final say on all basketball moves. It would be similar situation to Philadelphia and Milwaukee, where the two coaches aren't the GM, but they do have final say on all moves and the "GMs" basically work as their right hand man and allows them to concentrate on the coaching aspect during the season.

I think the Hawks have a very good opportunity to bridge a gap that was created when the Mike Fratello team was dismantled, ultimately culminating in the Dominique trade. I think there are a lot of die hard Hawks fans out there that hold a grudge and won't fully commit to following this team because of that gap. By bringin in Doc and giving Dominique a more prominent role in the organization, this franchise can go a long way towards bridging that gap.

Say what you want about the Lenny Wilkens years, but the late 80s was when the Hawks fielded their best and most exciting teams.

[Diesel]

When was the last time Kasten fired a GM?

He has three sports teams to his credit. Schurlhortz and Bobby Cox manages the braves and will manage them until the wheels come off.

The Thrashers.... who is the GM? Harvey Schilling? I don't keep up.

The Hawks have had the same manager through 13 seasons.

Kasten has never had the heart to fire. That's why he left the GM position of the Hawks and leaves the power in the hands of the GM.

This time, Babcock's arrogance got in the way. The bill just came in for the guarantee and the luxury tax. AOL is trying to sale the Hawks. The first place they look is the money. Seeing that Babcock made promises he couldn't keep... Babcock is the one to go.

[KB21]

When has he had a reason to fire a GM up until now?

But you know what, Kasten does typically give a person every chance in the world to prove whether or not he can do the job. Look at his record as the GM of the Hawks though. He fired Hubie Brown. He fired Kevin Loughery. He fired Mike Fratello.

AOL hardly even know the Atlanta Braves, Atlanta Hawks, and Atlanta Thrashers even exist. All they see is the accounting records of TBS, which is the scope that the three franchises come under. This move came from Stan, who almost made the move last year before the guarantee ever came out.

[Diesel]

Babcock should have been fired with Wilkens.

Babcock actually set the team up to fail by trading Both PGs.

That should have been the season we gracefully reloaded. We brought in Lo, We traded Mookie for JT/Coles. Our team was good enough and didn't need to make the Smitty trade.

What we got out of that draft was:

JT/Glover/Lo/Cal.

That's some sorry stuff. Especially considering it was not known if Glover would ever be the same.

We could have easily had:

JT/Coles

Smitty/Gray

Romac/Glover

Lo/Hendu

Deke/

I don't remember all of the elements, but I do know that Smitty would have been a big help to JT and less destructive than JJ/JR.