2023-24 Insider Information Thread

[JayBirdHawk]

1 minute ago, therealist said:

i'm not trying to be rude, i really do think you guys have big brains. that's why i've been reading here for years

Noted.

So what is your rebuild plan by trading Trae considering we do not have control of our picks in 2025, 2026 and 2027.

[therealist]

Just now, AHF said:

I don't think this is the right time to rebuild.  With SA controlling our pick for the next 3 years, there is really no short-term benefit to being bad.  We can't do a tank job like the Spurs or OKC where we give away our best players and try to compete with a depleted roster while building a stash of picks and gathering lottery picks in the meantime.

If we are going to rebuild, I think the right time is a few years from now when if we stink we will benefit from that.  I don't trust the FO to get great value back in trades so I see us likely losing value when we move Trae or DJM and moving both doubles down on that lost value.  IMO, we are close enough that we need to keep working towards putting together the best team we can.  I'm also pretty certain that this is what Snyder signed up for when he came here.

Retool.  Don't rebuild.

fair enough. i only think trading trae works if you can get a good haul in the short term. if that isn't possible like you're saying, then the idea completely deflates

 

3 minutes ago, kg01 said:

We were a 5-seed with him.  So ... 

it's not about the player, it's about the front office. the guy who built that roster was run out of town and all the players with great fit around trae were allowed to walk for nothing. i don't trust our front office to put the difficult to acquire pieces around a difficult to build around player

[JTB]

34 minutes ago, JeffS17 said:

Which is the rub for me.  Do anything you need to get the deal done for Herb except giving up the #1 pick in the process.  Ship Bogi out if necessary.  He's probably one of our best trade assets and a perfect "sell high" guy.

I’m ok with keeping number 1 pick but don’t ship out Bogi.

per the insiders the pelicans deal can get done without the draft picks being involved.

i like what @JayBirdHawk said in this situation “it cost to do business” and that’s exactly right.

it cost to get that much needed playmaker next to Zion. It cost to offload that player you’re scared to play in Ingram. It cost to not pay into the luxury tax.

i prefer we make the trade with the spurs and just give the pelicans that 8th pick if they want more back for herb jones.

 Trying not to put too much into this but I really love the talent coming in off this trade 

[therealist]

Just now, JayBirdHawk said:

Noted.

So what is your rebuild plan by trading Trae considering we do not have control of our picks in 2025, 2026 and 2027.

my idea was to recoup some of those picks by trading trae. but i'm inclined to agree with AHF here in saying our front office likely wouldn't be able to get a great haul for him. if that's the case, the idea holds no water whatsoever. which makes the offseason 100% about retooling around trae, which we all know is going to be extremely difficult to pull off.

[JayBirdHawk]

2 minutes ago, therealist said:

my idea was to recoup some of those picks by trading trae. 

I've said it a million times before - we need to get past recouping the picks. It's a mindless effort. 

[kg01]

7 minutes ago, therealist said:

it's not about the player, it's about the front office. the guy who built that roster was run out of town and all the players with great fit around trae were allowed to walk for nothing. i don't trust our front office to put the difficult to acquire pieces around a difficult to build around player

Fair.  I'd only say it's about the (cl)ownership, not the front office.  It's splitting hairs but I think Laundry is following orders w.r.t. cutting costs. Which is to the detriment of the team, as you alluded. 

[therealist]

10 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

I've said it a million times before - we need to get past recouping the picks. It's a mindless effort. 

i saw something somewhere that said no other NBA team values trae as much as the hawks. couple that with our desperation trades from the past few years, and teams are probably willing to wait til we get desperate again to trade trae. and without him being traded for real value, there is no route to acquiring picks. so yeah, i'm seeing your line of thinking there

[AHF]

16 minutes ago, therealist said:

fair enough. i only think trading trae works if you can get a good haul in the short term. if that isn't possible like you're saying, then the idea completely deflates

I think either Trae or DJM has to get moved this offseason.  DJM seems the more likely candidate.  Maybe the front office can surprise me and get a strong return on one or the other (or even both in a rebuild scenario).  I'm just fundamentally of the idea that we should be trying to compete for the next few years and trying to make it work with some retooling of the roster and not tearing down to acquire future assets in a rebuild.

[AHF]

Just now, therealist said:

i saw something somewhere that said no other NBA team values trae as much as the hawks. couple that with our desperation trades from the past few years, and teams are probably willing to wait til we get desperate again to trade trae. and without him being traded for real value, there is no route to acquiring picks. so yeah, i'm seeing your line of thinking there

I am sure you could get picks for Trae.  The real question is where you would get sufficient quantity and quality of picks to make trading him make sense.  If you are trading Trae to another team and getting their picks, they are almost certainly going to try to be good with Trae and so their picks are not likely to be of the "rebuilding" type (high lottery).  Teams that will be near the top of the lottery generally are in the business of hoarding picks rather than sending them out and if a team is that bad already then trading picks for Trae who is an UFA in two years probably doesn't line up.  This isn't to say that you can't pull off a trade and get a nice lottery pick in a trade but teams (other than the Hawks) tend to be very careful about including protections on picks they trade which obviously limits the upside that is the whole reason for the trade.  (The number of unprotected picks that go out anymore are so much smaller than the era where the Hawks gave up an eventual lottery pick and mid-round first for Lorenzen Wright or the Grizzlies eventually giving up the #2 pick in a trade for Otis Thorpe).

For example, we saw talk of a trade of DJM to the Knicks last year for a package of Grimes and a future first.  That first would be in the timeframe where NY would be expected to be a solid playoff team and so even if the pick is unprotected you should not expect a big payout from it.  Given Trae's popularity and impact on ticket sales, I struggle to see trades that make sense from either a basketball or a marketing standpoint for the team.

[therealist]

Just now, AHF said:

I think either Trae or DJM has to get moved this offseason.  DJM seems the more likely candidate.  Maybe the front office can surprise me and get a strong return on one or the other (or even both in a rebuild scenario).  I'm just fundamentally of the idea that we should be trying to compete for the next few years and trying to make it work with some retooling of the roster and not tearing down to acquire future assets in a rebuild.

for me, it's a really really tough choice between the two. i think our FO is bad and i think trae is difficult to build around. i don't see djm for herb being enough to put us anywhere close to contention in the next 2 years, and i dont trust the front office/ownership to make enough quality moves after that to get us there either.

but on the flip side, if we do go the rebuild route, we're depleted on picks, we'd lose a quality head coach, we'd lose a player that a lot of people really like watching, and most importantly, the hawks would be boring for fans. also, as others have pointed out, starting a rebuild earlier doesn't guarantee sooner results. we can rebuild at any time.

i was also especially wrong about the mavericks. i did not think they'd this quickly put fitting pieces around luka, and they've done exactly that. lots of little moves (plus the big kyrie swing) that ultimately moved the needle in aggregate. if they did it, why cant we?

so i think i'm coming around on the retool idea, thanks to discussion with you guys. sometimes i gotta write my ideas out before i can really digest them and come to a reasonable conclusion

 

[therealist]

1 minute ago, AHF said:

I am sure you could get picks for Trae.  The real question is where you would get sufficient quantity and quality of picks to make trading him make sense.  If you are trading Trae to another team and getting their picks, they are almost certainly going to try to be good with Trae and so their picks are not likely to be of the "rebuilding" type (high lottery).  Teams that will be near the top of the lottery generally are in the business of hoarding picks rather than sending them out and if a team is that bad already then trading picks for Trae who is an UFA in two years probably doesn't line up.  This isn't to say that you can't pull off a trade and get a nice lottery pick in a trade but teams (other than the Hawks) tend to be very careful about including protections on picks they trade which obviously limits the upside that is the whole reason for the trade.  (The number of unprotected picks that go out anymore are so much smaller than the era where the Hawks gave up an eventual lottery pick and mid-round first for Lorenzen Wright or the Grizzlies eventually giving up the #2 pick in a trade for Otis Thorpe).

For example, we saw talk of a trade of DJM to the Knicks last year for a package of Grimes and a future first.  That first would be in the timeframe where NY would be expected to be a solid playoff team and so even if the pick is unprotected you should not expect a big payout from it.  Given Trae's popularity and impact on ticket sales, I struggle to see trades that make sense from either a basketball or a marketing standpoint for the team.

yeah this is a really good point i hadn't considered.

 

[AHF]

Also, welcome to the site @therealist!  Glad to see longtime lurkers jump into the conversation.  People are passionate about their Hawks around here and that can make this a great place for all of us even when we don't necessarily agree on particular players, moves, strategies, etc.  

[therealist]

9 minutes ago, AHF said:

Also, welcome to the site @therealist!  Glad to see longtime lurkers jump into the conversation.  People are passionate about their Hawks around here and that can make this a great place for all of us even when we don't necessarily agree on particular players, moves, strategies, etc.  

i appreciate that!

[kg01]

38 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

I've said it a million times before - we need to get past recouping the picks. It's a mindless effort. 

Not sure why people are still so focused on that.  Never negotiate from a position of desperation.  Us going out to the market aimed at recovering those lost assets is the height of desperation. 

[JayBirdHawk]

36 minutes ago, therealist said:

i saw something somewhere that said no other NBA team values trae as much as the hawks. couple that with our desperation trades from the past few years, and teams are probably willing to wait til we get desperate again to trade trae. and without him being traded for real value, there is no route to acquiring picks. so yeah, i'm seeing your line of thinking there

What else are they supposed to say. It's an easy way to depress his value and get him cheaply.

I wouldn't say desperation trades, but more so cost cutting trades that significantly undermines the talent on the team, without a plan for replacement level talent.

If Hawks keep going into trades with rumored cost cutting at the forefront, we will always get less than stellar offers.

That narrative has to change.

[KB21]

2 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

What else are they supposed to say. It's an easy way to depress his value and get him cheaply.

I wouldn't say desperation trades, but more so cist cutting trades that's significantly undermines the talent on the team, without a plan for replacement level talent.

If Hawks keep going into trades with rumored cost cutting at the forefront, we will always get less than stellar offers.

That narrative has to change.

Trae is one of the three best shot creators in the NBA.  If he were legitimately on the market, teams would be falling over each other trying to get him.  The fact that he's not on the market is the reason you see the comments that other teams don't value him that much.  Bullshit!  Teams value elite shot creators no matter what their size is or how well they defend.  

[JayBirdHawk]

23 minutes ago, therealist said:

 

i was also especially wrong about the mavericks. i did not think they'd this quickly put fitting pieces around luka, and they've done exactly that. lots of little moves (plus the big kyrie swing) that ultimately moved the needle in aggregate. if they did it, why cant we?

 

The Mavs also went thru their own mistakes trading for KP and giving up unprotected picks and weren't a playoff team last year. So sometimes you need to take a step back and re-evaluate. You don't throw the baby out with the bathwater.

[Afro]

Idk how you can criticize the FO for not building the right team around Trae(this part is fair), BUT also think they can build a functioning team from complete scratch. 

Identifying the right guys to go around Trae should be relatively easy. Shit, we've(not this FO, though) done it before. If they failed at that, what makes you think they can do something woefully more difficult, like building an entire team from the ground up? 

[JeffS17]

1 minute ago, KB21 said:

Trae is one of the three best shot creators in the NBA.  If he were legitimately on the market, teams would be falling over each other trying to get him.  The fact that he's not on the market is the reason you see the comments that other teams don't value him that much.  Bullshit!  Teams value elite shot creators no matter what their size is or how well they defend.  

Also Trae is literally iron man when it comes to availability, which is a massive selling point in a league where star players can't seem to stay on the court.

[parfait]

2 hours ago, Afro said:

You and I definitely share the "f*** the east" sentiment lol. 

There are only 4 teams I respect as being clearly better than us on paper. 

Boston-no stipulations. There is nothing we can do this offseason to match that roster on paper. 

Sixers-IF they're fully healthy. This is the closest one though. 

Bucks-IF fully healthy. 

Knicks-now that they have OG. 

Everybody else? f*** em, square up Lil b's. Caw caw. 

 

I still don't buy the Knicks. Even though they had players like Randall, Robinson, and Bogi out, they would just have taken minutes away from guys who were playing out of their minds (and instrumental to their wins) like Hartenstein and DeVincenzo. And with Thibs, they will ALWAYS have a roll-call of injured players. I think they had lightning in a bottle, and an Embiid injury, just to get to the second round.