Welcome back Vit Krejci!!

[NBASupes]

6 hours ago, AHF said:

The fact that an advantage in resigning Vit was weighed as being more valuable than an advantage for our playoff roster says everything to me about what the front office thinks of this team in the post-season.

They don't want this team to make the playoffs and neither do I 

[Carmine]

On 4/15/2024 at 9:01 AM, JeffS17 said:

Schlenk gave out a ton of really expensive contracts that handicapped this team, including Nate's coaching contract.  Also, the Murray trade happened on Schlenks watch, not Landrys.  Landry was the one who signed Murray to a team friendly deal.  Landry has actually been very good by any objective measurement -- the only reason to not be happy with him so far are things he hasn't done, i.e he has not landed some blockbuster trade.  Personally, that gives me comfort more than anything because he's not desperately making moves.

Trading for Murray is a desperate move and also short-sighted. I don't care if he was on the staff at the time of the trade, the reason he is gone is because he refused to give up assets (reasonably so) trade for Murray, that's not on Travis. Fields, Nick Ressler, Trae & all the other front office doofuses were pulling to reign him in from San Antonio. Schlenk refused to be a yes man and paid the price for it. He also did not treat Trae like a sacred cow and was willing to listen to inquiries from other teams. The team friendly deal is literally the only silver lining and not because of our cheap money grubbing owner. It is because we can now trade Murray & hopefully re-coup some of what we lost in acquiring Murray.

The only moves that give me comfort are the Quin hire + Kobe & Gueye. But there are many decisions a GM must make in a league year. We could have signed Vit and still kept him as an RFA. What's the difference? $100-200,000 and no Forrester or end of bench player? It is clear to me that in one year that Fields lacks nuance. He either needs to surround himself with a better front office or nut up and start making executive decisions. Whatever they doin' up there is not working.

[Carmine]

Via Hawks Twitter

 

[KB21]

10 hours ago, Carmine said:

Trading for Murray is a desperate move and also short-sighted. I don't care if he was on the staff at the time of the trade, the reason he is gone is because he refused to give up assets (reasonably so) trade for Murray, that's not on Travis. Fields, Nick Ressler, Trae & all the other front office doofuses were pulling to reign him in from San Antonio. Schlenk refused to be a yes man and paid the price for it. He also did not treat Trae like a sacred cow and was willing to listen to inquiries from other teams. The team friendly deal is literally the only silver lining and not because of our cheap money grubbing owner. It is because we can now trade Murray & hopefully re-coup some of what we lost in acquiring Murray.

The only moves that give me comfort are the Quin hire + Kobe & Gueye. But there are many decisions a GM must make in a league year. We could have signed Vit and still kept him as an RFA. What's the difference? $100-200,000 and no Forrester or end of bench player? It is clear to me that in one year that Fields lacks nuance. He either needs to surround himself with a better front office or nut up and start making executive decisions. Whatever they doin' up there is not working.

I think Landry has done a very good job considering the constraints ownership has put on the purse strings.  He didn't trade Murray for peanuts like many wanted done before the trade deadline.  No matter how you feel about the fit between Murray and Young, trading Murray for Deangelo Russell and picks is a complete nonstarter.  Landry was 100% correct in wanting players like Herb Jones and Trey Murphy in a deal for Murray.  

[macdaddy]

34 minutes ago, KB21 said:

I think Landry has done a very good job considering the constraints ownership has put on the purse strings.  He didn't trade Murray for peanuts like many wanted done before the trade deadline.  No matter how you feel about the fit between Murray and Young, trading Murray for Deangelo Russell and picks is a complete nonstarter.  Landry was 100% correct in wanting players like Herb Jones and Trey Murphy in a deal for Murray.  

Agree but time has come to actually make something happen.  I only have so much kudos for them 'wanting' the right the players but not getting them. 

[KB21]

1 minute ago, macdaddy said:

Agree but time has come to actually make something happen.  I only have so much kudos for them 'wanting' the right the players but not getting them. 

Well, you have to have two to tango, and if they go through with the rumored trade of Murray and OO for Ingram, Lakers pick, and another NO player that may or may not be Dyson Daniels, then that feels like a trade that is being pushed by ownership to get a name brand player (Ingram).  Giving up OO in that deal is simply too much.  

[JeffS17]

3 hours ago, macdaddy said:

Agree but time has come to actually make something happen.  I only have so much kudos for them 'wanting' the right the players but not getting them. 

How can you ask for anything more than working every deal as hard as possible?  It's unfair criticism and the type of results-only thinking that leads to front office and coaching carousels >>> endless mediocrity.  It's the exact type of thinking that leads to forced trades where we overpay (Murray).  We need less of that, not more.  Unless you're suggesting Landry had a reasonable deal on the table and for whatever reason did not pull the trigger?

[KB21]

17 minutes ago, JeffS17 said:

How can you ask for anything more than working every deal as hard as possible?  It's unfair criticism and the type of results-only thinking that leads to front office and coaching carousels >>> endless mediocrity.  It's the exact type of thinking that leads to forced trades where we overpay (Murray).  We need less of that, not more.  Unless you're suggesting Landry had a reasonable deal on the table and for whatever reason did not pull the trigger?

I really like Landry, and I'm really high on his ability as a GM.  He's a part of the new breed of NBA GM, IMO.  I'm really high on guys like Landry Fields in Atlanta, Brian Wright in San Antonio, and now Jeff Peterson in Charlotte.  These guys seem to know the game well from their playing days, but they are also very in tune with alternative methods of scouting and thinking outside the box.  Someone needs to hire Bryson Graham, because I think he's the next guy to get.  

[AHF]

6 hours ago, KB21 said:

I think Landry has done a very good job considering the constraints ownership has put on the purse strings.  He didn't trade Murray for peanuts like many wanted done before the trade deadline.  No matter how you feel about the fit between Murray and Young, trading Murray for Deangelo Russell and picks is a complete nonstarter.  Landry was 100% correct in wanting players like Herb Jones and Trey Murphy in a deal for Murray.  

What do you see as the good things he has done?

I'd say the Murray trade has ended up being bad.  The Murray resigning was good.

He ditched JC which is bad but not his fault.  That is a purse string issue.

The lack of a backup PF after JC's ejection was bad.  Even a cheap one is better than starting Mathews and Bey or something like that when we had injuries.  This became a crisis anytime JJ was hurt.

Same for our players who could defend big guards.  We had one player:  Hunter.  When he was out, we were SOL.  We got a bunch of marginal guards and wings who can't do this but not much in the way of people who can -- especially when injuries hit Hunter.  And injuries were 100% predictable coming into the season for Hunter, OO, Bogi, and JJ.  

Wes Matthews was bad.  Waste of a roster spot this year.  Plenty of better ways to fill that spot.  

Garrison Mathews has ended up being fine - great shooter but that is the entirety of his value.

Patty Mills was bad.  Waste of a roster spot.  Plenty of better ways to spend $6.8M on a team that DESPERATELY needed a big wing and/or a backup PF instead of yet another point guard.

Vit was a nice late rotation player that no one else wanted who showed he may have a brighter future ahead of him but wasn't enough for Landry to actually put on the post-season roster.

I think the rest of the vets were inherited players.

As for draft picks:

Kobe is TBD.  Didn't get enough run but looks like he should be a member of the rotation next year.  A pity it didn't happen this year.

Gueye is TBD.  He looked promising from the moment the pick was announced and had a few nice minutes in the NBA but didn't get enough run to really do anything.  Big question whether he can join the rotation next year.  A mostly lost season due to injury.

Landry looks like another career G-League guy which I don't hold against Landry since that is most 2nd round picks.

All in all, our draft picks had perhaps the smallest impact of any group across the NBA:  Gueye 0.2 WS, Kobe -0.1 WS, Lundry -0.1 WS.  Net 0.0 WS.  Total minutes:  321.  This is similar in total combination to guys like #24 pick Olivier-Maxence Prosper (336 minutes, +0.2 WS) and #35 pick Julian Phillips (323 minutes, 0.0 WS) and if you are asking who they are that is my point.  TBD.

 

I'm just not seeing much of anything significant that Landry did other than one big thing:  he hired Quin Snyder.  Granted that is a very good thing (IMO) but I'm not seeing a well rounded bunch of accomplishments to date.

I'm still in wait and see mode on Landry because I just don't think he has shown enough to get accolades and don't think he has had long enough in the GM chair to get ripped.

 

What am I certain of, however, is that he is in the position to do make some highly consequential decisions this offseason that will define his tenure (or at least its first few years).  And that is whether changes are coming which will bring one type of analysis and if he doesn't make changes which will bring another.  My own view is that changes are needed but it is so important to get them right as SA sits there owning our picks for the next few years.

[JayBirdHawk]

We kept Vit ineligible for the play-in and then Forrest didn't even see a minute to try and play his POA defense vs Coby or Ayo.  Make it make sense! 

[AHF]

31 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

We kept Vit ineligible for the play-in and then Forrest didn't even see a minute to try and play his POA defense vs Coby or Ayo.  Make it make sense! 

The front office didn't want to win this game.  They submarined the team by making Vit unavailable and forcing us to play even smaller than we were already playing in JJ's absence.