TAKE A BOW BILLY KNIGHT

[Antmillennium]

I'm stating that the margin of error is large when drafting. There's some accountability there, sure. But, to call Billy a complete failure based on what he did in the draft isn't fair.

I never said that Knight was a complete failure. I understood his philosophy and I was actually fine with it. However, he had a change to bring all of those pieces together by selecting a good PG, and he absolutely blew it. If you're building a car, you can use the best parts known to man, but if you neglect to put a good engine in that car and put in a bad engine instead, then the car will suck because the engine is unreliable. It doesn't matter that you have the best leather seats, best windows, best woodgrain and etc... The car is not going to be nearly as good or enjoyable as it could be because the engine is unreliable. Billy Knight was on his way to building a top-notch car, but he skimped on the engine. Billy Knight had a chance to bring it all together and complete the car with a nice engine, but he failed to do that in order to throw in an expensive spare tire. Therefore, Billy has to be held responsible for that huge blunder.

[Sothron]

I love how we credit Knight for "getting rid" of our "slop"... Like it's difficult to give away players to other teams for virtually nothing. We traded a 21 ppg scorer for an expiring contract, JT who has been far better than any pg we have had since the trade, for Antoine Walker, who we later traded for scraps, and we traded Shareef who was then averaging 19 - 9 for Rasheed who we later traded for freaking Bob Sura and a pick.

Out of his "amazing" moves the only thing we got out of it that turned into anything good was a 17th first round pick, and a ton of cap-space that we used to sign such stars as... Al harrington, Speedy Claxton, and Lorenzen Wright.

From his seven years as GM, there are basically only three moves BK made that were good: snagging Josh Smith and Horf, and the Joe Johnson trade. People who mention the Bibby trade are insane. We traded Shelden, our FIFTH PICK in the draft for a 30 yo PG... That trade should never have happened because we should have drafted Brandon Roy. The Shelden pick stands as one of the all time worst picks in basketball... Not only was Shelden not projected to be a lottery pick by most experts, but Brandon Roy was the consensus BPA at the time. Those who argue that Brandon Roy played the same position as Joe, ignore that Shelden played the same position as our second best player, Smoove. Not to mention that just the year before BK passed on two studs at a position in need to draft a player that played a position we had already spent a first round pick the year before in. All in all, I don't see how you grade BKs tenure in Atlanta anything above a D+.

Thank you. I loathe how people forget the past so easily. Babcock's "mess" was very talented players that we sold for a nickel to the dollar. ANY idiot of a GM could have traded them for the scraps we got back in return.

[buckeye242424]

Really? News to me.

The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in conjunction with The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. (NYSE: HIG) announced today Dee Brown of Illinois is the winner of the 2006 Bob Cousy Award presented by The Hartford, an honor presented annually to the nation's top collegiate point guard. Mr. Brown was honored at a press conference today in Indianapolis, IN, site of the 2006 NCAA Men's Final Four.

My fault. Wrong year. Derron already left. Dee Brown was first team All American, Conference Player of the year when Williams was there.

[gsuteke]

Praising Billy Knight is a joke

[buckeye242424]

Praising Billy Knight is a joke

Bashing him is as well. There's no use crying over spilled milk. Here we are now heading into 09-10 with a capable roster due in large part to him. Do I wish the times with him would have been different? Of course! But here we are, with many of the players he brought here. He doesn't deserve a ton of praise, no, nor does he need to be degraded.

[AHF]

Bashing him is as well. There's no use crying over spilled milk. Here we are now heading into 09-10 with a capable roster due in large part to him. Do I wish the times with him would have been different? Of course! But here we are, with many of the players he brought here. He doesn't deserve a ton of praise, no, nor does he need to be degraded.

That is my view. He was a subpar GM but not a disaster. Last year's team was built around his blueprint with minor tweaks and that is a credit to his view - there is plenty to legitimately criticize but looking at his performance relative to other GMs you can certainly pick out worse failures and can certainly see even model GMs who have made big mistakes.

[AtLaS]

Many here are also forgetting BK offered Kenyon Martin a max contract, the same one that Denver gave him. Lucky for us K-mart didn't want to come here.

BK was a disaster IMO, no other way to describe it.

[gsuteke]

Bashing him is as well. There's no use crying over spilled milk. Here we are now heading into 09-10 with a capable roster due in large part to him. Do I wish the times with him would have been different? Of course! But here we are, with many of the players he brought here. He doesn't deserve a ton of praise, no, nor does he need to be degraded.

I didn't start the thread

The person that did had to expect a considerable amount of push back

[BusBoyIsBack]

Some people only focus on the bad, but conveniently ignore the good.

Joe JOhnson was a great decision

Wheeling and Dealing to get Josh Smith was a great decision

Al Horford was a great decision (although it took luck to get him, of course it took luck for teams to get Dwight Howard, Duncan, Lebron, etc)

Mike Bibby was a great decision

Our entire starting lineup was constructed by Billy Knight.

Now there have been a few tweaks here and there to hopefully complete it with Crawford and Teague for the future. But Knight at least deserves some credit for what he got right if people are so willing to talk about what he did wrong.

[Packfill]

Really? News to me.

The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in conjunction with The Hartford Financial Services Group, Inc. (NYSE: HIG) announced today Dee Brown of Illinois is the winner of the 2006 Bob Cousy Award presented by The Hartford, an honor presented annually to the nation's top collegiate point guard. Mr. Brown was honored at a press conference today in Indianapolis, IN, site of the 2006 NCAA Men's Final Four.

Dee Brown received that award the year after Deron left - meaning he returned to the point guard when vacated by the superior Williams.

[Atlantaholic]

Some people only focus on the bad, but conveniently ignore the good.

Joe JOhnson was a great decision

Wheeling and Dealing to get Josh Smith was a great decision

Al Horford was a great decision (although it took luck to get him, of course it took luck for teams to get Dwight Howard, Duncan, Lebron, etc)

Mike Bibby was a great decision

Our entire starting lineup was constructed by Billy Knight.

Now there have been a few tweaks here and there to hopefully complete it with Crawford and Teague for the future. But Knight at least deserves some credit for what he got right if people are so willing to talk about what he did wrong.

The ones in bold can't be good moves by Knight... Trading Shareef for the 17th pick a good move? That is crazy. It's not like BK KNEW that Josh Smith would be available at 17, and made moves to acquire him... Bk basically gave away an All star player for the 17th pick in the draft... We could have easily ended up with freaking Dorell Wright or Sebastian Telfair, or Kirk Snyder... The fact that Josh Smith was available at 17 is a blessing... I'll give Knight Kudos for picking him, but the fact his moves before netted us Josh is nothing but plain dumb luck... Trading a star for a 17th pick is ridiculous. It won't turn out good 99 out of 100 times... Mike Bibby is little to no consolation considering we traded Shelden Williams, the worlds worst draft pick to acquire him. Essentially we traded our 5th pick of 2006 for a 30 year old with a bloated contract... Think about that. That is HORRIBLE. I'll definitely give him some credit from somewhat salvaging the Shelden Williams catastrophe, but in my mind that only makes him marginally less horrific of a GM.

[Atlantaholic]

Many here are also forgetting BK offered Kenyon Martin a max contract, the same one that Denver gave him. Lucky for us K-mart didn't want to come here.

BK was a disaster IMO, no other way to describe it.

Speedy

JJ

Marvin

Kenyon/Smoove

Pachulia/Horford

That is BK's dream team.

[Atlantaholic]

Thank you. I loathe how people forget the past so easily. Babcock's "mess" was very talented players that we sold for a nickel to the dollar. ANY idiot of a GM could have traded them for the scraps we got back in return.

My worst years as a Hawk fan were watching Billy get raped in every trade that year... JT for Walker? Shareef for Bob Sura and the 17th pick, Glenn Robinson for no one?... I especially liked how he handled JT... Letting his value plummet to its absolute lowest before dealing him, even though we traded all our other players a year earlier.

At least acquire a lottery pick for christs sake... Or an average young player... Blowing up the team for cap space is fine in theory, but having a ton of cap space doesn't matter if your team is horrible... No one will want to sign with your crap team... All we could get with that cap space we had was Al Harrington, Speedy, and JJ. (through a trade, giving away two picks and a decent player). I mean, just think about were we would be if any of the teams ahead of us had drafted Josh? We'd be screwed.

[High5]

You can argue that BK wasn't terrible, but there is not one legitimate argument that can be made saying he was good.

[buckeye242424]

You can argue that BK wasn't terrible, but there is not one legitimate argument that can be made saying he was good.

I don't know about that. He did bring us an all-star. I'd say that's legit.

[exodus]

I don't know about that. He did bring us an all-star. I'd say that's legit.

McHale drafted KG. I guess that makes him a good GM.

[buckeye242424]

McHale drafted KG. I guess that makes him a good GM.

Depends on who you ask.

I've expressed my thoughts about Billy earlier in this thread. I'm just stating one could argue the point with bringing in an all-star.

[Atlantaholic]

McHale drafted KG. I guess that makes him a good GM.

Babcock gave us more than one All-Star

[Guest Walter]

The man made some bad picks but give me a GM that hasn't. He's not the GOAT but he's not as bad as the local media makes him out to be.

Hard to defend the Shelly Shell pick but I can understand to a degree. The Hawks already had JJ and really needed something down low. Good lord the man is known as "The Landlord"! How do you get the nickname "The Landlord" and not be a powerful beast?

At the time I would venture to say that %70 of fans (me included) were on board with taking Marv over CP3 so I can't kill him too much for that.

No GM has ever picked the worst (at best) of any three remotely considered picks in 3 consecutive years EXCEPT Billy Knight.

It's one thing to pick bad players. Only SW was one such player (and that is bad enough considering where we were picking). But with the #2, #6, and the #5 pick, to pick the worst possible player EVERY TIME is beyond bad. It's horrendous.

Let's not attempt to revise history here. We were a team building through the draft. BK got the worst possible players he could in the draft up until Horford. 'nuff said.

W

[Diesel]

Let's give it three more years before we call drafting Marvin a mistake.

:computer8: