Zach Lowe was not a fan of the Hawks summer moves

[Bankingitbig]

4 hours ago, MaceCase said:

Careful now, you might be accused of being surly, certainly will say that you are being purposefully obtuse.  Let me do a similar dumb argument I'm sure that you're sure that the Hawks made "Oh if Horford is so concerned about the 5th year then just give him 5 years $50 million hyuk hyuk".  You are tap dancing on your argument now by bringing up option years, because I'm sure you're going to say that the Hawks refused those too because they lack lawyers, accountants, and cap-analysts with any reasoning skills.

Millsap at 32 is, yet again, taking advantage of the last cap spike from the TV deal much like Horford did last summer but this is it, the cap smooths out from here.  You want to get "complex"?  Sure.

-The cap in 2015-2016 was $70 million

-The cap in 2016-2017 is $94 million

that's a $24 million increase in case the math escapes you.

-The cap projection for 2017-2018 is predicted to be $102 million

that's only a $8 million increase, certainly more conservative than the jump from 2015-2016 to 2016-2017 but combined, the league's salary cap increased $32 million in only two seasons which created a windfall for many players lucky enough to be free agents during these two summers as compared to players signed 2015 and before.  However:

-The cap projection for 2018-2019 is $108 million

-The cap projection for 2019-2020 is $109 million

-The cap projection for 2020-2021 is $114 million

So in only two seasons the cap jumps $32 million but in the 3 seasons following is only expected to rise $12 million.  Given that contracts of course do have limits on their length, by 2019 you are going to start to see the last of players signed underneath the "value" of the old $70 million and below cap expiring and their new contracts becoming comparative with others in the new cap era with teams no longer magically lucking their way into maximum amounts of cap space.  These guys will be Horford's competition come his option year with 90% of the league no longer having the free availability of cap and having to manage their salaries like the good ole days.  I'd say that's a gamble.  

Huh? I was literally using the exact same argument that you provided to show that just because the Hawks provided the most $ in a deal, doesn't necessarily mean it was the best deal. I have heard many Hawks' fans say this "We offered him the most and he chose to leave." While technically true, it is without any context and doesn't mean that our deal was far superior. I am not tap dancing in my argument at all. My argument has remained the same throughout, which is that the Hawks front office doesn't have direction and lacks decisiveness. You are just hung up on this Horford thing for whatever reason. 

I agree with you about the cap spikes in how it allowed for players to get large contracts that otherwise wouldn't have. However, I think that applies more to the journeymen, such as Kent Bazemore, Evan Turner, Allen Crabbe, and Timofey Mozgov. Not the all-stars like Paul Millsap and Al Horford, but I do agree with you on it and think it is definitely valid. Will be interesting to see what happens.

4 hours ago, MaceCase said:

I have, you're just not satisfied with the answers.  You already painted your position for all to see with your "Contend or Rebuild" statement and everything else is just "mediocre" to you.  I already pointed out the folly in your reasoning.  I've already pointed out the front office's reasoning.  I don't need hyperbole, hypotheticals, or pure imagination I can just look at the facts with an unbiased eye and feel confident that the Hawks already have a number in their head and if both parties can't reach on that they have contingencies in place much like just last offseason where they managed to swap out Horford for Howard and maintain the same record with flexibility for the future.  

I wouldn't call swapping out Horford for Howard a contingency. Considering they were going to sign Howard regardless of whether or not Horford sign. So I am not entirely sure what contingency plan they had for Horford leaving. Was it the Humphries signing? I guess you could say having "flexibilty" was the contingency? I went back and read some of your posts to see what you said about the direction the Hawks are going and the plan going forward and honestly could only find you saying that the Hawks didn't commit to an aging core and have flexibility, while maintaining the same level of success. Maintaining the same level of success is valid, but I hope that's not the direction you necessarily want. I think we both can agree that we want to see improvement and a championship. Sometimes you just have to retool given your current roster construction, age of players and contract situations.

I do have a hard time saying we have flexibility going into this offseason since our best player, who is aging, is going to get a huge contract and we are quite a bit aways from being a contender. Sure - if he leaves we will have flexibility, but we will be a much more inferior team without any assets to show for it. But to each his own. If the goal is not to commit to an aging core of players, then what do we do with the aging Millsap? I can get behind the point of having a number in your head for him and hope you can compromise on it, but let's be serious here... Remember Millsap will get offers of $154M/4years (avg. annual salary of $38.5M). Let's use a hypothetical (I know you love these...) and say Millsap loves Atlanta SO MUCH that he will take a MASSIVE 20% discount from that average annual salary for a 5-year deal. This makes it the same dollar amount, but an extra year at $154M/5years (again HIGHLY unlikely that Millsap signs anywhere close to that). Can we at least agree that paying Horford $141M/5years (remember Woj said we were $6M apart) would have provided us more flexibility? We would have had our "contingency" plan of swapping Millsap with Howard AND we could have gotten a lot more value in trading Millsap OR we could have kept him and had a much superior team this year. Though we would likely lose him this coming offseason, but hey at least we would have Howard and Horford on better deals and more flexibility. Now, I will say that Millsap is better than Horford, but I don't think the gap is that far. 

I am not the biggest fan of Horford. Definitely didn't think he put in the effort during the Cavs series. The game that I was most looking forward to this season was the Celtic's game last week and Isaiah Thomas managed to surpass my hate for Dellavedova in that game. That said, I still think Horford is a great player and I think we could have handled his free agency (and the past offseason) better and hopefully we handle Millsap's better, but that is looking like it is going to have a similar result.

Edited January 22, 2017 by Bankingitbig

[MaceCase]

2 hours ago, Bankingitbig said:

Huh? I was literally using the exact same argument that you provided to show that just because the Hawks provided the most $ in a deal, doesn't necessarily mean it was the best deal. I have heard many Hawks' fans say this "We offered him the most and he chose to leave." While technically true, it is without any context and doesn't mean that our deal was far superior. I am not tap dancing in my argument at all. My argument has remained the same throughout, which is that the Hawks front office doesn't have direction and lacks decisiveness. You are just hung up on this Horford thing for whatever reason. 

I agree with you about the cap spikes in how it allowed for players to get large contracts that otherwise wouldn't have. However, I think that applies more to the journeymen, such as Kent Bazemore, Evan Turner, Allen Crabbe, and Timofey Mozgov. Not the all-stars like Paul Millsap and Al Horford, but I do agree with you on it and think it is definitely valid. Will be interesting to see what happens.

 

No you didn't use the exact same argument, you used some churlish bastardized version of my argument.  I provided the greater dollar amount within the context of the likelihood of Horford recouping that money later.  That was my exact argument which you tried to refute with Millsap and then adding Horford's option year into the fray.  This is a tap dance and you can't claim me to be "hung up" on Horford when you are the one reaching for every possible scenario involving him in your crusade to attack the front office. 

It's very simple.  In a single free agency summer that saw 2/3rds of the league all have more than $20 million in cap space with half of those having $30 million or greater you couldn't argue some role player making $70 million and if you couldn't argue a role player making $70 million then you couldn't argue a 3rd or 2nd tier star making the Max.  This already will no longer be the case starting just this summer, the lower cap spike and the salaries inked the previous summer have already shrunk the market for a player like Millsap.  The number of teams that could possibly max him have shrunk to a handful to speak nothing of when you start to include other factors such as location, winning situation, or even just them having a desire to sign Millsap.  That's something that could help the Hawks and it's certainly something that could hurt Horford even further down the line.

2 hours ago, Bankingitbig said:

I wouldn't call swapping out Horford for Howard a contingency. Considering they were going to sign Howard regardless of whether or not Horford sign. So I am not entirely sure what contingency plan they had for Horford leaving. Was it the Humphries signing? I guess you could say having "flexibilty" was the contingency? I went back and read some of your posts to see what you said about the direction the Hawks are going and the plan going forward and honestly could only find you saying that the Hawks didn't commit to an aging core and have flexibility, while maintaining the same level of success. Maintaining the same level of success is valid, but I hope that's not the direction you necessarily want. I think we both can agree that we want to see improvement and a championship. Sometimes you just have to retool given your current roster construction, age of players and contract situations.

 

Aw, jeez.  If this is the type of logic you're going to be using then there really isn't any hope in trying to convince you otherwise on the front office.  It honestly is a merry go round but I will give it one last go and try to make this as simple as possible for you: 

 

The Hawks direction is remaining competitive. 

 

Very simple, this has been true in the days of Sund, through the days of Ferry and now for BudCox.  Perhaps because you're new here you don't know it but that point has been argued to death through numerous Hawks regimes on this board.  You're not the first person to bust out with the idea "why aren't they rebuilding if they can't win a championship?"

In terms of remaining competitive Howard and Millsap were the contingency for Horford leaving much the same way Howard and Horford would have been the contingency for Millsap being traded or leaving. *wooo saaa*  The entire offseason did not hinge on Horford to remain competitive, okay? 

I don't care about your opinion on the Hawks direction, I don't even care about folks like Lowe rating the Hawks offseasons.  All of those pundits didn't see anything special about the team the summer before they rolled off 60 wins and an ECF appearance, they even had more than a few insults about the team's direction.  The front office, of whom were a part of that successful season, however feel justified in their current plan.  They've had a recipe but they've allowed themselves the ability to tinker with the ingredients until they create a perfect sauce.  If you don't like sauce at all or prefer soup or stew isn't their problem, you don't have to eat it but don't call them bad cooks just because.  I hope that didn't go over your head.

[Bankingitbig]

56 minutes ago, MaceCase said:

It's very simple.  In a single free agency summer that saw 2/3rds of the league all have more than $20 million in cap space with half of those having $30 million or greater you couldn't argue some role player making $70 million and if you couldn't argue a role player making $70 million then you couldn't argue a 3rd or 2nd tier star making the Max.  This already will no longer be the case starting just this summer, the lower cap spike and the salaries inked the previous summer have already shrunk the market for a player like Millsap.  The number of teams that could possibly max him have shrunk to a handful to speak nothing of when you start to include other factors such as location, winning situation, or even just them having a desire to sign Millsap.  That's something that could help the Hawks and it's certainly something that could hurt Horford even further down the line.

You do realize Millsap received max offers when the salary cap was only $70M right? Are you seriously going to try and argue that he won't receive a max offer this summer? The teams most interested in him, such as Minnesota and Denver, have the cap space to max him this offseason. Houston can offer a max if they dump Ryan Anderson's salary. I would argue those three locations all have better winning situations than what we could offer (MIN might be a stretch, but definitely better future). But continue being naive and not actually thinking ahead or doing any research on this, while attacking me. Let's hope Millsap takes that massive discount to stay with us.

1 hour ago, MaceCase said:

Aw, jeez.  If this is the type of logic you're going to be using then there really isn't any hope in trying to convince you otherwise on the front office.  It honestly is a merry go round but I will give it one last go and try to make this as simple as possible for you: 

 

The Hawks direction is remaining competitive. 

 

Very simple, this has been true in the days of Sund, through the days of Ferry and now for BudCox.  Perhaps because you're new here you don't know it but that point has been argued to death through numerous Hawks regimes on this board.  You're not the first person to bust out with the idea "why aren't they rebuilding if they can't win a championship?"

In terms of remaining competitive Howard and Millsap were the contingency for Horford leaving much the same way Howard and Horford would have been the contingency for Millsap being traded or leaving. *wooo saaa*  The entire offseason did not hinge on Horford to remain competitive, okay? 

Sure.. continue to attack me while ignoring half my post. I'm beginning to think you're related with ole Wessy. I'll ask again and hopefully you answer this time... If the direction is remaining competitive (whatever that means.... is it making the playoffs? or is it at least a first round win? is it so far as to make it to the ECF? anyways that's for another discussion), then why not sign Horford to a $142M/5year deal and trade Paul Millsap this past offseason? You accomplish your goal of remaining competitive and having much more flexibility than what we have now considering Millsap's deal will likely be far above Horford's (given the salary cap increase and the fact that Horford was a 30% max player, while Millsap will be a 35%). Seems like a pretty easy decision to me... Take the younger Horford on a far superior contract, while adding the cherry on top by getting value from a Millsap trade.

1 hour ago, MaceCase said:

I don't care about your opinion on the Hawks direction, I don't even care about folks like Lowe rating the Hawks offseasons.  All of those pundits didn't see anything special about the team the summer before they rolled off 60 wins and an ECF appearance, they even had more than a few insults about the team's direction.  The front office, of whom were a part of that successful season, however feel justified in their current plan.  They've had a recipe but they've allowed themselves the ability to tinker with the ingredients until they create a perfect sauce.  If you don't like sauce at all or prefer soup or stew isn't their problem, you don't have to eat it but don't call them bad cooks just because.  I hope that didn't go over your head.

I think when a lot of people, whose job is literally only to follow the NBA, say that you had a poor offseason, then maybe you need to take a step back and think about why they might be saying that... Also, you're completely false about them throwing insults or not seeing anything in us. We just came off a season where we took the first seed to a 7 game series as an 8 seed without a key player in Horford. We were getting a lot of praise. Zach Lowe's renowned Kyle Korver article was literally written the offseason prior to our 60-win season and he continued to praise us heavily throughout that season. But sure... go attack them as well.

Nice analogy with the cooking... But I would argue that the 5-star, head chef (Ferry) left and now we are stuck with two sous chefs that have no experience running a 5-star restaurant. Actually maybe it's just a 4-star.. That's still competitive right?

[NBASupes]

On 1/20/2017 at 0:57 PM, AHF said:

Agree we don't know all the facts but I think a lot of people see several indicators that Al gave that he wanted to leave:

(1)  IT bragged about (and Horford confirmed in large part) how he was already working Horford and Horford was receptive to it as early as midway through last season.  

(2)  Al made no sign that he was committed to staying for a fair price other than a max deal.

(3)  He mailed it in the last year compared to prior years and you could see the safer, less energetic play and people commented on it way before he was a FA.  This led a lot of people to think he was already partially checked out.

As Horford's #1 fan on this site, I would be hard pressed to disagree. Part of the reason why even I am backing away from Al especially after that Boston game. The only reason I even talk about Al on here is due to clowns like Diesel talking stupid ish about him. Other then that, he's dead to me. We weren't even in his top 5. Basically, he wasn't resigning if he didn't get the max. That kinda sucks. Maybe Atlanta had to sign Dwight just to stay somewhat competitive but I wished they traded Sap over the summer honestly. I rather a rebuild if that's what we are going to do anyway. 

[bird_dirt]

OMG, these days I gotta make sure I'm all settled in and comfortable for the night before opening the Squawk because posters be writing novels up in here.

[MaceCase]

10 hours ago, Bankingitbig said:

You do realize Millsap received max offers when the salary cap was only $70M right?

You do realize the Hawks retained Millsap on a smaller contract, right?

10 hours ago, Bankingitbig said:

 

 If the direction is remaining competitive (whatever that means.... is it making the playoffs? or is it at least a first round win? is it so far as to make it to the ECF?

 

Please refer to the Hawks records over the last 9 seasons and the current season if you are confused as to their direction.

10 hours ago, Bankingitbig said:

 

I think when a lot of people, whose job is literally only to follow the NBA, say that you had a poor offseason, then maybe you need to take a step back and think about why they might be saying that.

 

in the summer of 2014 Lowe listed the Hawks amongst the "losers" that offseason.  ESPN predicted the Hawks at 42 wins, 7th seed in the East.  David Aldridge with NBA.com ranked the Hawks in his middle ten, 16th overall in the league.  Sports Illustrated gave them a C.  CBS gave them a C+.

 

Good day and goodbye, sir.

[hazer]

 

[Guest]

11 hours ago, Bankingitbig said:

I think when a lot of people, whose job is literally only to follow the NBA, say that you had a poor offseason, then maybe you need to take a step back and think about why they might be saying that.

Disagree, when it comes to the Hawks, MOST of these guys are often wrong. They have been predicting the demise of the Hawks since the Joe Johnson trade.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, JayBirdHawk said:

Disagree, when it comes to the Hawks, MOST of these guys are often wrong. They have been predicting the demise of the Hawks since the Dominique Wilkins trade.

Fixed

[AUhawksfan]

8 hours ago, bird_dirt said:

OMG, these days I gotta make sure I'm all settled in and comfortable for the night before opening the Squawk because posters be writing novels up in here.

I prefer to nuzzle up with a glass of wine in front of the fire on my bear skin rug with no pants on. 

Really gets me in the mood as I read these thesis statements on here. 

[AHF]

Yeah, the experts have been negative on this team for years and making predictions and reviews that have missed low year after year.

ESPN's projection for this year was 38 wins.  I guess we are going 12-26 the rest of the way?

You can't base too much on the reviews / predictions on the Hawks from the media.

[Guest]

16 hours ago, AUhawksfan said:

I prefer to nuzzle up with a glass of wine in front of the fire on my bear skin rug with no pants on. 

Really gets me in the mood as I read these thesis statements on here. 

But do you go with or without drawers on the bear skin?  Based on your post history, I'm guessing ... without? Be careful, there's a creeper at the window of your trailer ... 

(How do you have a fireplace in a trailer?  That's some trailer park ingenuity if I ever seent it.)

7 minutes ago, AHF said:

Yeah, the experts have been negative on this team for years and making predictions and reviews that have missed low year after year.

ESPN's projection for this year was 38 wins.  I guess we are going 12-26 the rest of the way?

You can't base too much on the reviews / predictions on the Hawks from the media.

Wait, eggsperts are/were wrong on the Hawks?  In other equally unexpected news, the sun came up yesterday.

[Sothron]

It is rather comical that the experts predict doom and gloom every season for the Hawks...and we continue to win 45+ games and make the playoffs. Every year. We may not be title contenders but we at least are a consistently good team.

[AUhawksfan]

46 minutes ago, kg01 said:

But do you go with or without drawers on the bear skin?  Based on your post history, I'm guessing ... without? Be careful, there's a creeper at the window of your trailer ... 

(How do you have a fireplace in a trailer?  That's some trailer park ingenuity if I ever seent it.)

Wait, eggsperts are/were wrong on the Hawks?  In other equally unexpected news, the sun came up yesterday.

Creeping me out with that Baze Gaze in my head now.  

By fireplace I mean trash can fire but meemaw doesn't like it when I start 'em.

[Guest]

6 minutes ago, AUhawksfan said:

Creeping me out with that Baze Gaze in my head now.  

By fireplace I mean trash can fire but meemaw doesn't like it when I start 'em.

Oh, it's allright, you ain't got nuthin' Skip ain't seent before.  He been peeking in your window for a few weeks now.

And don't worry 'bout ol' meemaw n' them.  She'll be out back tannin' in the sun room aka out behind the trailer where the porch -er- gravel-patch meets the grass.