If one star would come to Atlanta then......

[tbhawksfan]

 

They didn't intentionally miss the playoffs though, they just weren't quite good enough to make them. It's hard to do that now with the east being so pitiful. I mean you've got to be just awful to miss the playoffs now in the east. It's also entirely possible they get the 14th or so pick and George would have still been there. He wasnt exactly thought of as the next big thing. We just need to do like them and draft smartly and hope some good players drop and we snatch them up.

 Maybe he's already started. Schröder has potential to be a quality starter. Bebe about the same and Muscala is tearing up his league. Scott is growing into a solid rotation guy and JJ should at least develop into a rotation specialist; Korver light, but younger.Add our #12-15 pick and we should be looking at 3 starting potential and 3-4 rotation guys. It seems that we have a good chance at building a home grown team with a bunch of firsts. All Ferry has to do is draft well. Got to be a George type talent in the bunch.

[Jody23]

The highest pick they could get while still making the playoffs was 15. Would George still have been on the board. Perhaps, but I highly doubt it.As far as the Hawks, we a currently 3.5 games ahead of the eighth seed team who just finished giving us the business in London. Admittedly, the East is awful. But we still have over half a season left to play, so we'll see how things shake out. We both agree we need to draft well regardless. I'd just feel more confident about our chances if we had a shot or two at drafting higher than the late teens.

[Makaveli96]

We're going to have to get one from the draft or hope one of our players like Jeff Teague blossoms into one. No star wants to play for a team where you have to earn support support from the fans.

[nathan2331]

No signs? So I guess drafting extremely raw and yet still extremely talented players at the 2 most important positions shows signs if wanting to be a treadmill team? I know you guys will gloss over this but the Pacers haven't picked in the top 10 since I believe the 80's and they're doing alright. I wonder if their fans botched about not having a high lottery pick or being a treadmill team as they picked in the teens year after year after year.

What we just did this off season was not a rebuilding effort. I'm not really sure what to call it. While I'm happy with the direction we're moving in I understand the sentiments of those who are not.And yes, I'm sure they were once complaining about the position they were in.

[nathan2331]

We're going to have to get one from the draft or hope one of our players like Jeff Teague blossoms into one. No star wants to play for a team where you have to earn support support from the fans.

If so, why did Melo go to New York?

[Vol4ever]

We are going to have to get "that" player in the draft. I still would love to figure out a way to get Asik because he is a "piece" imo. Horf to play the 4 and keep Millsap for a 3-4 type position player. We need a SG pretty bad, Korver and Carroll are really bench players.

[Admin]

The highest pick they could get while still making the playoffs was 15. Would George still have been on the board. Perhaps, but I highly doubt it.As far as the Hawks, we a currently 3.5 games ahead of the eighth seed team who just finished giving us the business in London. Admittedly, the East is awful. But we still have over half a season left to play, so we'll see how things shake out. We both agree we need to draft well regardless. I'd just feel more confident about our chances if we had a shot or two at drafting higher than the late teens.

I'd love to pick around 5-10 while developing our current talent. That's far more desirable to me than throwing away what we do have while praying the early picks realize their potential. I guess I'm gunshy after Marvin, Shelly and Chillz.

[Admin]

What we just did this off season was not a rebuilding effort. I'm not really sure what to call it. While I'm happy with the direction we're moving in I understand the sentiments of those who are not.And yes, I'm sure they were once complaining about the position they were in.

Where did you get the notion that we are REbuilding? We are simply building for the future as Ferry mentioned quite clearly.

[Admin]

We are going to have to get "that" player in the draft. I still would love to figure out a way to get Asik because he is a "piece" imo. Horf to play the 4 and keep Millsap for a 3-4 type position player. We need a SG pretty bad, Korver and Carroll are really bench players.

Asik is a first big off the bench type not really a piece but a quality player I'd like to have.

[Jody23]

I'd love to pick around 5-10 while developing our current talent. That's far more desirable to me than throwing away what we do have while praying the early picks realize their potential. I guess I'm gunshy after Marvin, Shelly and Chillz.

To this day I give Billy Knight credit for blowing up the Shareef, Ratliff team. His plan would have worked amazingly well had he not been foolish with his draft picks. And I do mean foolish. It seemed he was more interested in being "different" than getting things right. Edited January 20, 2014 by Jody23

[tbhawksfan]

 

I'd love to pick around 5-10 while developing our current talent. That's far more desirable to me than throwing away what we do have while praying the early picks realize their potential. I guess I'm gunshy after Marvin, Shelly and Chillz.

 I really want to add the best possible pick/s this season. I won't hold Knight's picks against Ferry. I hated most of Knight's picks, but it's in the past. 

I'd love to pick around 5-10 while developing our current talent. That's far more desirable to me than throwing away what we do have while praying the early picks realize their potential. I guess I'm gunshy after Marvin, Shelly and Chillz.

 I really want to add the best possible pick/s this season. I won't hold Knight's picks against Ferry. I hated most of Knight's picks, but it's in the past.

[Admin]

To this day I give Billy Knight credit for blowing up the Shareef, Ratliff team. His plan would have worked amazingly well had he not been foolish with his draft picks.

He didn't get enough for those guts then blew our picks, plus gave up too much for Joe as well. That just goes to show that tanking and blowing it up aren't a guarantee of success either. Heck outside of Horford our best players over the past ten years have been Joe (picked 10th?) Smoove and Teague (non lottery picks).

[Jody23]

He didn't get enough for those guts then blew our picks, plus gave up too much for Joe as well. That just goes to show that tanking and blowing it up aren't a guarantee of success either. Heck outside of Horford our best players over the past ten years have been Joe (picked 10th?) Smoove and Teague (non lottery picks).

There definitely are no guarantees either way. Anybody can blow a team up, but you've got to have the right people making the decisions on picks. Knight was busy chasing his fantasy of an all 6'8 team (remember that?) which is what screwed us. Had he not been doing that, we would have had guys like Paul, Deng, Iggy or Rondo to build with instead of Marvin, Chillz and Sheldon. Knight was picking players he thought would make his dream come true rather than the BEST players.Contrast that with Seattle who blew it up and then proceeded to spend their lottery picks on Durant, Westbrook and Harden. They picked the best players from a basketball standpoint. They didn't try to get cute like Billy Knight did. Edited January 20, 2014 by Jody23

[Admin]

There definitely are no guarantees either way. Anybody can blow a team up, but you've got to have the right people making the decisions on picks. Knight was busy chasing his fantasy of an all 6'8 team (remember that?) which is what screwed us. Had he not been doing that, we would have had guys like Paul, Deng, Iggy or Rondo to build with instead of Marvin, Chillz and Sheldon. Knight was picking players he thought would make his dream come true rather than the BEST players.Contrast that with Seattle who blew it up and then proceeded to spend their lottery picks on Durant, Westbrook and Harden. They picked the best players from a basketball standpoint. They didn't try to get cute like Billy Knight did.

I don't disagree with anything here other than to say neither the Hawks back then nor the Sonics had players like Horford, Millsap or Teague in their primes when they blew it up. That's my issue here is I cannot stand behind throwing those players away and praying that draft picks work out.

[TheNorthCydeRises]

Number 10 lottery pick. Let's not try and make it sound better than it was. But they most certainly were giving teams fits well before Hibbert, Stephenson and George became who they are now. Their maturation and development has led them to be the team that they are though and that's certainly a much better team with George as their stud.

To me, the Pacers caught a break when Danny Grainger got injured. Up until that point, everything flowed through him, with George simply being a solid role player that got his shots within the offense. But when Grainger went down, that forced others to step up. And George stepped up big time. Now . . he's a legit All-Star that is flirting with becoming a superstar.

And that's why I believed that our best bet for getting a star player, was to maximize the talent of Al Horford. Get a legit center and play Horford at PF. Then let's see if he can make a Lamarcus Aldridge type of jump. Give Horford the freedom in the offense to take 18+ shots a game, since he already shoots a high percentage.

If he can flourish in that role, that would be great. If he couldn't, at least we'd know that he's not the one to build around.

Edited January 20, 2014 by TheNorthCydeRises

[Admin]

To me, the Pacers caught a break when Danny Grainger got injured. Up until that point, everything flowed through him, with George simply being a solid role player that got his shots within the offense. But when Grainger went down, that forced others to step up. And George stepped up big time. Now . . he's a legit All-Star that is flirting with becoming a superstar. And that's why I believed that our best bet for getting a star player, was to maximize the talent of Al Horford. Get a legit center and play Horford at PF. Then let's see if he can make a Lamarcus Aldridge type of jump. Give Horford the freedom in the offense to take 18+ shots a game, since he already shoots a high percentage. If he can flourish in that role, that would be great. If he couldn't, at least we'd know that he's not the one to build around.

That's true about George, though I think he breaks out anyway as he's just that talented. I doubt Horford or any vet on our team is truly capable of making a leap to the level above where they're at now. Maybe if he had a legit C to play with things would be different for Horford but I'm not sure I honestly think we've seen him as good as he'll ever be, which I'm okay with as long as he comes back healthy and stays that way.

[tbhawksfan]

 

I don't disagree with anything here other than to say neither the Hawks back then nor the Sonics had players like Horford, Millsap or Teague in their primes when they blew it up. That's my issue here is I cannot stand behind throwing those players away and praying that draft picks work out.

 Yeah, but we only have Sap for next year and then lose him or re-sign him to a likely big deal that will begin when he's about 29. If he walks, we're back to a rebuild team. Do you see the Hawks turning out a winner next year with Horf and Sap as the best players; everyone else not so good?

[Jody23]

Question...Does anyone remember Ferry attaching a timeline as to when he wanted the Hawks to be contenders? For some reason I remember him saying within two years but I might be wrong.

[Admin]

  Yeah, but we only have Sap for next year and then lose him or re-sign him to a likely big deal that will begin when he's about 29. If he walks, we're back to a rebuild team. Do you see the Hawks turning out a winner next year with Horf and Sap as the best players; everyone else not so good?

Not sure what you mean as we still have Horford and Teague as well. Millsap, like David West, has a lot of good basketball left in him as well and I wouldn't mind giving him a new contract either. He's not going to get more than 9 million annually either and we can certainly afford that. All of our bigger contracts either are flat or decrease which is a great job by Ferry as it allows us to increase salaries to our own if we need to resign them.

Question...Does anyone remember Ferry attaching a timeline as to when he wanted the Hawks to be contenders? For some reason I remember him saying within two years but I might be wrong.

I doubt he ever gave a timeline as that's not his style.

[Guest]

Milsap will not command some pie in the sky 'big' deal. He will not get more than Al.I can see Ferry offering him for around the same 9 mil but a longer contract or more money on another 2 year deal.That is his market value.