Bradley's Take On The ASG Debacle

[Lacsho]

ajc.com

Losing Childress an astonishing mistake by Hawks

By Mark Bradley | Wednesday, July 23, 2008, 07:47 PM

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

This summer was the test. The Hawks flunked. Are we surprised?

They couldn’t persuade the lesser of their two prized free agents to stay. They got outspent and outhustled by a team from Greece. Think about that.

An NBA-caliber player in the flower of his youth has chosen to play somewhere other than the NBA. It’s unprecedented, yes, but it’s also fitting. After this ham-handed non-negotiation, the Hawks should forfeit all claim to being big-league. They allowed something to happen that simply cannot happen.

Josh Childress isn’t a star — Rick Sund, the Hawks general manager, characterized him Wednesday as “a utility player” — but he’s precisely the sort of multi-tasker found on great teams. He’s a quick and clever sub who changes games. Having nurtured him for four seasons, the Hawks should have had some sense of his value. Alas, they wound up being penny-wise and pound-foolish. They dared Childress to leave. He took the dare.

This was Childress, speaking via conference call from Athens: “I wanted to get it done early … I was disappointed by the initial Hawks offer. They said, ‘Go out and find another offer’ … There was no urgency, no desire to get anything done.”

How could that be? The Hawks had no picks in the June draft. Sund and co-owner Michael Gearon Jr. had claimed the entire offseason focus was on keeping Messrs. Childress and Smith, but this disconcerted effort drove one Josh across the Atlantic.

Working a sign-and-trade wouldn’t have been the preferred course — Childress needed to stay here, period — but at least it would have yielded a return in personnel. This way the Hawks get nothing, and to twist the knife they must take a hit against their salary cap if they choose to retain his NBA rights. (Lon Babby, who represents Childress, was only happy to share that nugget with his media audience.)

This astonishing whiff comes not three months after the Hawks took the Celtics to Game 7 and this woebegone franchise began to buy back the good will lost over a decade of incompetence and indifference. This summer was going to be the time to consolidate precious gains, to prove to a suddenly rapt audience that happy days were here again. Instead we see that, in the serious-about-basketball department, the Hawks weren’t even a match for Greeks bearing gifts.

“After the Boston series, we thought things would get done,” said Childress, speaking of himself and Smith. “But I don’t think there was any commitment shown … We had a good run, we’d done everything we were expected to do, and we were put on hold.”

Sund noted that the Hawks offered Childress “more than market value,” but there comes a time when an organization that would win big has to spend what it takes to win big, even if it’s above market value. Sund wasn’t willing to do budge upward, not even after Olympiakos raised the stakes. Said Sund: “Going above the luxury tax with a team under .500 is probably premature.”

That’s the kind of small-minded thinking that has, over time, reduced the Hawks to irrelevance. After the pain and suffering of making all those lottery picks and watching them flail, the organization had cause to think this group might well win if kept intact. And now the Hawks’ fourth-best player is gone, and the third-best could follow.

For a few dizzying spring days, we dared to believe the Hawks were no longer the Hawks, that they were something better and brighter. Fooled us again.

I'm not a Bradley fan, but he was on point like a sniper. This is for my ASG lovers!!!!!!

[AtLaS]

If Bradley considers Smith to be our 3rd best player, than I really don't give a damn what he says.

[crimedog]

Bradley is, and always has been, a moron.

Sekou is the only guy whose articles I read in that (digital) rag.

[Lacsho]

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If Bradley considers Smith to be our 3rd best player, than I really don't give a damn what he says.

Trust me I'm not a Bradley fan at all; I think Smith is our second best player.

[TroyMcClure]

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If Bradley considers Smith to be our 3rd best player, than I really don't give a damn what he says.

Stop with the fatalistic, line in the sand decision making. Like Bradley is wrong about these tools being incompetent. Geez. He actually knows a few of them. So we've got Joe, Smoove, and Horf. So Childress is tied with Marvin for 4th. Or was.

[AtLaS]

When have I ever defended the ASG? Probably 1/2 of my last 200 posts are dedicated to my hatred of them. My point is, Bradley is an idiot if he thinks Smith is our 3rd best player.

[Swish]

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If Bradley considers Smith to be our 3rd best player, than I really don't give a damn what he says.

Trust me I'm not a Bradley fan at all; I think Smith is our second best player.

I don't like Bradley either but he was right on.

[Admin]

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Sund noted that the Hawks offered Childress “more than market value,” but there comes a time when an organization that would win big has to spend what it takes to win big, even if it’s above market value. Sund wasn’t willing to do budge upward, not even after Olympiakos raised the stakes. Said Sund:

“Going above the luxury tax with a team under .500 is probably premature.”

That’s the kind of small-minded thinking that has, over time, reduced the Hawks to irrelevance.

After the pain and suffering of making all those lottery picks and watching them flail, the organization had cause to think this group might well win if kept intact. And now the Hawks’ fourth-best player is gone, and the third-best could follow.

Yeah, let's ask the owners to spend double for every cent over the luxury tax so that we can keep a sub .500 team together. It's especially stupid when you can replace the production of a guy like Childress for half the cost, keep us under the luxury tax, and still have room to fill out the roster.

I like Childress as much as anyone here, I hate that he's gone, but for anything more than 6 million this season he's just not worth that and he would hamper our ability to keep the rest of the team together.

For all of those hating on the ASG the money that we save on Childress by replacing him with a guy like Evans for half the cost, that might just be the difference in money that we need to increase our offer to Smith to get him back. Just think if we had given Childress 7 million, or even 8. That's 4-5 million more than what Evans will cost and it might have cost us Smoove.

[Dsinner]

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Sund noted that the Hawks offered Childress “more than market value,” but there comes a time when an organization that would win big has to spend what it takes to win big, even if it’s above market value. Sund wasn’t willing to do budge upward, not even after Olympiakos raised the stakes. Said Sund:

“Going above the luxury tax with a team under .500 is probably premature.”

That’s the kind of small-minded thinking that has, over time, reduced the Hawks to irrelevance.

After the pain and suffering of making all those lottery picks and watching them flail, the organization had cause to think this group might well win if kept intact. And now the Hawks’ fourth-best player is gone, and the third-best could follow.

Yeah, let's ask the owners to spend double for every cent over the luxury tax so that we can keep a sub .500 team together. It's especially stupid when you can replace the production of a guy like Childress for half the cost, keep us under the luxury tax, and still have room to fill out the roster.

That's great and all IF that was the plan (or at least back-up for that matter) from the get-go but the fact is the ASG WANTED Childress back. If they didn't they would have already traded him (and others) if they honestly didn't want to keep a "

Fact is they blew it and now are saving face with comments like the ones highlighted above.

[Admin]

Sure, they wanted him back at slightly above the MLE. The FACT is that they DID NOT want him back at 7 or 8 million and they proved that by not increasing their offer once they learned of a possible offer from Olympiakos. Do you blame them for not paying him that much?

Sund (and Childress' agent Babby) both admitted that there were SnTs that were discussed but the Hawks felt like it would be a waste to spend what little we have on those players. Do you blame them for not wanting to take back undesirable players?

[coachx]

Bradley proves he no business writing about the NBA for a major maket's paper.

1. He has no clue about the salary cap and how it controls trades and/or resignings

2. He has no clue about the luxury tax

3. He has no clue how hard it is to do a sign and trade with a BYC player where you can only take back 1/2 the salary

4. He seems to have no clue about global economics either or he just forgot to mention that $1.00 US is $1.60 Euros or $10 mill US is $16 mill Euros making it easy for Greece to out nbid the US market. I think that is important to note for a "professional" sports journalists ?

Either he has no clue or he "forgot" to mention these very important things.

Atlanta fans are ignorant b/c they have ignorant writers like Bradley and 2 radio stations feeding bad info b/c the writers and DJ's don't know the slightest thing about the NBA's salary cap.

The average "fan" thinks these guys are "experts" or at least think the know what they're talking about. So they build their ideas of reality on bad informantion given out by the local press. So sad !

[jhay610]

I agree. WhoTF is Bradley to tell ASG to go into the luxury tax to keep a 37 win team together? It's not like that team was going to win a championship next year, we were still 1 or 2 pieces away from contending.

Let's blow up our payroll to keep our 6th man, so that we have zero ability to make any moves in the future, but we get to keep this 37 win team moving forward.

Now that, Mr. Bradley, is small-minded thinking.

[Lacsho]

Atlanta fans are ignorant b/c they have ignorant writers like Bradley and 2 radio stations feeding bad info b/c the writers and DJ's don't know the slightest thing about the NBA's salary cap. Just because people disagree, it doesn't mean they are ignorant. Anyone can do general research on the internet. Perhaps a lazy person depends on the local media outlets for their news, and then they let the media shape their views and opinions.

The average "fan" thinks these guys are "experts" or at least think the know what they're talking about. So they build their ideas of reality on bad informantion given out by the local press. So sad ! I agree with that part of the statement. It’s ok to use spell check.