Best Trade/Worst Trade in Hawks History.

[Thomas]

On 5/6/2021 at 9:14 AM, tomac said:

The Utah trade for 'Nique was the best.

Nothing else to say here other than that trade for Nique jumpstarted us into relevance. 

[TheBigETrain]

On 5/6/2021 at 11:14 PM, tomac said:

The Utah trade for 'Nique was the best.

Agree and the 'Nique trade for Danny Manning is the worst

[Diesel]

On 5/3/2021 at 3:01 PM, sturt said:

Nique was 34, in the likely twilight of his career. Manning was 27, in the likely prime of his career.

The offense w/ Nique completely revolved around him, even at 34... love him, of course, but he was about as ball dominant as they come.

Manning was more of a team player whose production came within the flow of the offense.

Both had suffered injuries before in their careers that were significant.

Both were on the cusp of free agency.

The draft pick was the #25 pick, and so we were effectively losing out on drafting 9 players we otherwise could have, since our next pick was #34.

 

To no one in particular... and remember it's not you, it's me, and that's why it's pointless to pursue a broader discussion with me here in the open-air forum...

Given the same factors/situation today, and not knowing hindsight as we do, I would still have made the same decision that Babcock did. True confession. I believe it made all the long-term sense in the world, though maybe not the short-term.

 

And, Nique, if you're reading this, my account was hacked, I swear.

We were leading the East at the time and Jordan was not in the East. 

[Diesel]

5 hours ago, Thomas said:

Nothing else to say here other than that trade for Nique jumpstarted us into relevance. 

John Drew, Fast Eddie Johnson, Tree Rollins, and Dan Roundfield wasn't doing it for you?  Our Cheerleaders were "the fastbreaks." 

[AHF]

14 hours ago, NBASupes said:

Kinda shocked people liked the Deke trade to Philly. Kukoc was wack in Atlanta and Theo was meh

It wasn't a good trade at all.  I think people tend to remember the great performance from Kukoc immediately after we traded for him over the lousy nothing he gave the next season even though the "wack" part of that was much longer than the good part.

[sturt]

  

20 hours ago, sturt said:

Happened upon this just now. This guy... not sure who he is, but he does seem to be an independent observer at first blush... captures a lot of my own sentiment albeit in different words than expressed in the PM conversation.

[Thomas]

10 hours ago, Diesel said:

John Drew, Fast Eddie Johnson, Tree Rollins, and Dan Roundfield wasn't doing it for you?  Our Cheerleaders were "the fastbreaks." 

Loved that Fast Eddie, Rounds and Drew team but am using hindsight here and the Nique vs Bird drama overshadows them. Don't remotely believe I am the only one seeing it that way and I am a big Drew fan when he was a Hawk. The Gresham Park Gangster. If we took out Boston with Nique we would definitely have found our way to facing the Lakers for the trophy and I truly thought that was going to happen after game five. Believe most Hawk fans did.

[NBASupes]

3 hours ago, AHF said:

It wasn't a good trade at all.  I think people tend to remember the great performance from Kukoc immediately after we traded for him over the lousy nothing he gave the next season even though the "wack" part of that was much longer than the good part.

I think people maybe confused. Maybe they think we got Deke for those guys.

[AHF]

10 minutes ago, NBASupes said:

I think people maybe confused. Maybe they think we got Deke for those guys.

Very possible!  But Kukoc got a big uptick in minutes after we acquired him and produced approximately 20 points, 6 assists and 6 rebounds over his 17 games to finish the 2000-01 season.  A lot of Hawks fans were pretty excited with that.  Biiiig drop the next season to almost half of those figures.

[sturt]

Jason Walker happened to tweet this morning something about an interview he once did with Babcock, and among the topics broached as one might expect was the Nique/Manning trade. All but one of these considerations I think we all already understood (whether we agreed or not).

- "Free agent"

- "Skills were declining rapidly (see his stint in Boston)"

- "There were family issues"

- "Got a young AS caliber player to replace the production"

 

 

(EDIT: I certainly don't want to pry, being respectful of anyone's privacy as a rule, but one can't help but wonder about the gravity of that one that I'd never heard before.)

 

[AHF]

36 minutes ago, sturt said:

Jason Walker happened to tweet this morning something about an interview he once did with Babcock, and among the topics broached as one might expect was the Nique/Manning trade. All but one of these considerations I think we all already understood (whether we agreed or not).

- "Free agent"

- "Skills were declining rapidly (see his stint in Boston)"

- "There were family issues"

- "Got a young AS caliber player to replace the production"

 

Any discussion of the rare window in the East without the Pistons, Celtics and Bulls blocking the finals or just Babcock explaining why he did it?  Any discussion about how he viewed it given that the assumptions on which the rationale for the trade was based turned out to be unfounded (like having a good chance to resign Manning)?  Or the impact on the fanbase / franchise of not letting Nique run out his prime with the team (aka the value of having a true franchise player stick with the team for as long as possible)?

[sturt]

Jason's tweets:

 

[Dejay]

On 5/27/2021 at 12:19 AM, Diesel said:

John Drew, Fast Eddie Johnson, Tree Rollins, and Dan Roundfield wasn't doing it for you?  Our Cheerleaders were "the fastbreaks." 

I loved those guys but Drew and Eddie couldn't leave the drugs alone. They were so unreliable that it often left Roundfield having to hold the line by himself, which was a recipe for disaster and years of mediocrity (see the Loughery years)...

[Dejay]

7 minutes ago, AHF said:

Any discussion of the rare window in the East without the Pistons, Celtics and Bulls blocking the finals or just Babcock explaining why he did it?  Any discussion about how he viewed it given that the assumptions on which the rationale for the trade was based turned out to be unfounded (like having a good chance to resign Manning)?  Or the impact on the fanbase / franchise of not letting Nique run out his prime with the team (aka the value of having a true franchise player stick with the team for as long as possible)?

That's the part that I want to read about. It was bigger than just getting back a younger player while they still could (who mind you, got off the plane talking about how he didn't really see himself signing an extension here). I want to know why Babs and Kasten were so gung-ho against putting real players around Nique instead of role players (big difference); you know, the antithesis of what Schlenk did with Trae this past offseason? Why did Nique had to play so many years around has-beens like old Sidney Moncrief and old Maurice Cheeks? Why did he have to spend so much time carrying scrubs like Snoop Graham, Adam Keefe, Rumeal Robinson, and a host of others? Why did they sit on their hands and cried 'salary cap' whenever questioned while the rest of the East were making moves and passing them by?

That's what I'd like to hear Babcock talk about. I won't hold my breath waiting on an answer...

[AHF]

6 minutes ago, Dejay said:

That's the part that I want to read about. It was bigger than just getting back a younger player while they still could (who mind you, got off the plane talking about how he didn't really see himself signing an extension here). I want to know why Babs and Kasten were so gung-ho against putting real players around Nique instead of role players (big difference); you know, the antithesis of what Schlenk did with Trae this past offseason? Why did Nique had to play so many years around has-beens like old Sidney Moncrief and old Maurice Cheeks? Why did he have to spend so much time carrying scrubs like Snoop Graham, Adam Keefe, Rumeal Robinson, and a host of others? Why did they sit on their hands and cried 'salary cap' whenever questioned while the rest of the East were making moves and passing them by?

That's what I'd like to hear Babcock talk about. I won't hold my breath waiting on an answer...

This feels a bit like reading why Babcock decided to take any of the dozen or so first round busts that he took in the draft.  Like I hear your rationale but given that each and every one was a disaster....

[Spud2nique]

Nothing will ever justify the Nique trade for me. I understand the free agency and everything but gutted me as a fan. Ripped my teenage heart out. I had never felt like that about any girl in all those years as the Nique trade, it’s crazy.

[sturt]

For whatever reason, this background music suddenly started playing in my head as I finished reading this page of the thread... "that basketball was like a basketball to me"...

 

[Diesel]

On 6/5/2021 at 12:52 PM, Dejay said:

That's the part that I want to read about. It was bigger than just getting back a younger player while they still could (who mind you, got off the plane talking about how he didn't really see himself signing an extension here). I want to know why Babs and Kasten were so gung-ho against putting real players around Nique instead of role players (big difference); you know, the antithesis of what Schlenk did with Trae this past offseason? Why did Nique had to play so many years around has-beens like old Sidney Moncrief and old Maurice Cheeks? Why did he have to spend so much time carrying scrubs like Snoop Graham, Adam Keefe, Rumeal Robinson, and a host of others? Why did they sit on their hands and cried 'salary cap' whenever questioned while the rest of the East were making moves and passing them by?

That's what I'd like to hear Babcock talk about. I won't hold my breath waiting on an answer...

I can't speak for Babcock, but I can speak for the time.  FAcy was not what it is now.  IN that day, a player signed with a team and they normally stayed with the team until they had no more usefulness.   IN other words, the teams held all the cards and treated players like slaves.   Us getting Moses and Theus was an example of trying to bring somebody in to play with Nique.   The Chemistry didn't work.  I often wonder what it would have been like if Nique and Deke were on the same team?

[Spud2nique]

14 minutes ago, Diesel said:

I often wonder what it would have been like if Nique and Deke were on the same team?

This would have worked. Easily.

Pair Nique with either Deke or Trae and it works beautifully. Deke doesn’t demand the ball while Trae shares it.

[JayBirdHawk]

27 minutes ago, Diesel said:

I often wonder what it would have been like if Nique and Deke were on the same team?

That would have been nice. Think how Capela protects the middle for Trae.