2023-24 Insider Information Thread

[Afro]

Yall know I dont like the way Luka gets treated better than everyone else....but just for a thought experiment. 

Imagine if 3 years from this moment, that the Mavs have traded everyone from this run away for parts except Luka, Kyrie, Gafford, and Green. 

The Mavs now suck. Predictably. We're barraged with "Luka cant win" "You cant build a team with Luka" "Luka isnt even all that good". 

This is exactly what we're living through and its madness. Now throw in an extra layer of "Well Luka is worth more so we should trade him and build around Kyrie(lets just assume hes not 36)" into the mix. 

Is there anyone that wants to argue all of that isnt pure insanity? 

 

ETA: This is related to @KB21, not the @JeffS17 discussion. 

 

Edited June 21 by Afro

[KB21]

8 minutes ago, Afro said:

They already did! Which is what drives me bananas. It's not like its just some fantasy land we have to dream up. We've already seen that it can work! And that wasn't even that good of a team. 

And what halted that momentum?  First, they made a poor decision on the head coach.  They retained Nate McMillan when they should have gone out and hired Kenny Atkinson (Quin wasn't available then).  Then they had knee jerk reaction to what happened against the Heat in the playoffs and decided to give up a lot of assets to get Murray.  

[Bonzaii58]

45 minutes ago, KB21 said:

Discuss.  Brooks and Adams are essentially salary fillers.  The key to this trade would be getting Green along with the picks.  It doesn't knock my socks off, but it's better than sending him to the Lakers for their crap.  NOTE: I'm in no way saying this should happen.  I'm just toying around with the ideas of what could be deemed a legitimate offer for Trae.  

I don’t think I could do this trade. Only way I’m trading Trae is for a legit star. Otherwise, build around the man. Put size around Trae and defenders. I’d be willing to risk going all in this year on that instead of tanking. 
 

draft picks are such a dice roll and the hawks FO hasn’t given me much confidence that we’ll get it right. 

45 minutes ago, KB21 said:

Discuss.  Brooks and Adams are essentially salary fillers.  The key to this trade would be getting Green along with the picks.  It doesn't knock my socks off, but it's better than sending him to the Lakers for their crap.  NOTE: I'm in no way saying this should happen.  I'm just toying around with the ideas of what could be deemed a legitimate offer for Trae.

Edited June 21 by Bonzaii58
Duplicate

[sturt]

16 minutes ago, thecampster said:

and yet we got worse.

21-22 - 43 wins

22-23 - 41 wins (Heurter out, Murray in)

23-24 - 36 wins (Collins out, Bey in)

I have no insight into 23-24. But I cannot not comment on the conclusion that "we got worse."

Of course, Parcells is famous for saying "You are what your record says you are," and I mainly get that, I really do. He was coaching my Cowboys when he said it, and it really was true, and it really is a valid rule.

Parcells didn't know to add the caveat... "unless you're playing ball in a season affected by pandemic," though. Who would've?

 

That 21-22 team had a top W/L% in the conference except for those 6 weeks that Travis was bringing in players off of G-league rosters to... not just fill the bench, but start on occasion. If you're a social scientist examining it, you take out that 6-16 span in assessing that team because that group that ran a 6-16 mark was a significantly modified team... not the 21-22 team.

 

That 22-23 team by the account of many was similarly sideswiped, but by a different combination of events--some believing it was all a problem of head coaching, some believing it was that but also chaos going on in the front office with Travis' firing and the question of Junior's influence, some believing it was a problem of your 6th starter missing the first 25-ish games and taking another 5-10 to get acclimated to the new environment, and some believing that the new environment itself, this novel pairing of two high-regard PGs, was confounding the win-loss record. Me, I'm not sure how to measure which of those issues carried what amount of weight, but only certain that each did carry some, if not significant, weight.

But then, what happened in the post season should have been taken as more compelling--Nate having been replaced by someone everyone seemed to consider a strong head coach, some relatively good health, and having a season's worth of games under the belt provided some glimpses of budding chemistry. That team turned heads against the team that would be the EC champ. It was a gutty, tough, exceptional showing on the Hawks' part. There was reason... reason... to believe some good things could be just around the corner, merely by adding a little more talent... via mid-1st pick, or via MLE guy, or both.

No one knew 365 days ago that, no, not only would we not maintain talent, we would actually decrease talent.

On purpose.

 

So, no, I can't defend the 23-24 team, but I or any one of us approaching it as objectively as we can, can look past the surface stuff and perceive the whole of the picture is not well-portrayed by staring at the 21-22 and 22-23 W/L records.

Thank you for your time.

 

 

[Afro]

8 minutes ago, KB21 said:

And what halted that momentum?  First, they made a poor decision on the head coach.  They retained Nate McMillan when they should have gone out and hired Kenny Atkinson (Quin wasn't available then).  Then they had knee jerk reaction to what happened against the Heat in the playoffs and decided to give up a lot of assets to get Murray.  

I know we rehash this over and over, but I still dont think the whole "lack of a plan" part get's talked about or criticized nearly enough. 

We're now in, what, year 3 of Landry? And every in-tune Hawks media person still has absolutely no idea what this FO is trying to do? I know half of the crippling decisions were in Schlenks last hour, but I'm trying to at least look forward here lol. 

This specific FO has shown for 3 years that they have no idea how to build a roster around Trae. And thats the same FO some trust to build a roster completely from scratch? Why?  They had a specific blueprint of what to put around Trae, and they couldnt do it. We really wanna see what kind of massive BS they put together when they have nothing to go off of? 

Edited June 21 by Afro

[JayBirdHawk]

5 minutes ago, Afro said:

I know we rehash this over and over, but I still dont think the whole "lack of a plan" part get's talked about or criticized nearly enough. 

We're now in, what, year 3 of Landry? And every in-tune Hawks media person still has absolutely no idea what this FO is trying to do? I know half of the crippling decisions were in Schlenks last hour, but I'm trying to at least look forward here lol. 

This specific FO has shown for 3 years that they have no idea how to build a roster around Trae. And thats the same FO some trust to build a roster completely from scratch? Why?  They had a specific blueprint of what to put around Trae, and they couldnt do it. We really wanna see what kind of massive BS they put together when they have nothing to go off of? 

Schlenk 'stepped down' in December 2022.

That is when Landry took over.

[kg01]

12 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

Schlenk 'stepped down' in December 2022.

That is when Landry took over.

I got my tinfoil hat on here.  They snuck Landry in up under Schlenk so I'm thinking he'd lost power long before the actual turnover date.

[Afro]

12 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

Schlenk 'stepped down' in December 2022.

That is when Landry took over.

Wasn't Landry already the "GM" before that, though? 

[Afro]

Okay, yeah, Landry was made the "official" GM in June of 2022. So its been exactly 2 years. I'll leave any plotting conspiracies from Landry out of the timeline lol. 

[BrazilianHawk]

15 hours ago, JayBirdHawk said:

So I came across it:

There is so much wrong with this besides the 'Hawks don't have control of 3 years worth of picks'

Embrace a youth movement by:

1. handing over the starting PG spot to an older PG

2. Trading for 2 guys in Reaves and Rui who are the same age as Trae and another who is older.

3. Building around whoever we take in the draft when the draft is considered weak and doesn't have a clear cut #1 .

 

I,m not opposed to trade Trae (mostly because of his contract) but I like to think if they were to trade him it would be for a much better package.

 

Lakers sh!t won't do it. 

[JeffS17]

39 minutes ago, Afro said:

I know we rehash this over and over, but I still dont think the whole "lack of a plan" part get's talked about or criticized nearly enough. 

We're now in, what, year 3 of Landry? And every in-tune Hawks media person still has absolutely no idea what this FO is trying to do? I know half of the crippling decisions were in Schlenks last hour, but I'm trying to at least look forward here lol. 

This specific FO has shown for 3 years that they have no idea how to build a roster around Trae. And thats the same FO some trust to build a roster completely from scratch? Why?  They had a specific blueprint of what to put around Trae, and they couldnt do it. We really wanna see what kind of massive BS they put together when they have nothing to go off of? 

Landry has had control for about 18 months.  Hes only made decent to positive moves so far.  His reputation as a GM will largely be decided by the future consequences of the moves he makes this summer.

[Jody23]

Risacher or Clingan at #1.

[JayBirdHawk]

44 minutes ago, Afro said:

I know we rehash this over and over, but I still dont think the whole "lack of a plan" part get's talked about or criticized nearly enough. 

This is what happens when you have instability in your front office and a meddlesome owner.  There is no ONE PLAN, nor ONE VOICE, ONE VISION from the Basketball Ops side that has final decision making so there is no sustained longevity in what we are doing.

It's as if they are floating along in the ocean letting the current taking them wherever, run into a rough current or have to paddle against the tide, it becomes too much hard work, so just flow with it. 

This is not supposed to be easy or cheap. 

ALL EYES ARE UPON THEM THIS OFFSEASON. I'M WAITING AND WATCHING, WATCHING AND WAITING.

[Afro]

3 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

This is what happens when you have instability in your front office and a meddlesome owner.  There is no ONE PLAN, nor ONE VOICE, ONE VISION from the Basketball Ops side that has final decision making so there is no sustained longevity in what we are doing.

It's as if they are floating along in the ocean letting the current taking them wherever, run into a rough current or have to paddle against the tide, it becomes too much hard work, so just let flow with it. 

This is not supposed to be easy or cheap.

Yeah, and this is part of why I blame "Landry" a lot more than he probably/might should be. 

Schlenk had a plan. We all knew what he wanted to build and the type of players he was looking for. 

Somewhere along the way someone threw a giant wrench into that plan. It was around the time that Landry(and Nick) came around that the plan started to get muddy. Could it all be just Nick and his dad? 110%. Could it have been that Landry's voice got added to the FO? Cant say. But I dont think it matters. Both of the Resslers and Landry are still here, so whoever took Schlenks plan and said "how bout we make a mess instead" is still around. 

 

ETA: Im not saying Schlenks plan was perfect or would have made us title contenders. Just that he for sure had one, and then someone came along and decided we didnt need one at all. 

Edited June 21 by Afro

[ShooterSays]

4 minutes ago, Jody23 said:

Risacher or Clingan at #1.

Someone should get a poll going. 

[Jody23]

Seems to me the Hawks want the Wizards to take Sarr to ensure they don't trade out of the #2 pick.

[thecampster]

Why you shouldn't listed to Krysten Peek (defending my position last week).  Listen to the terribly ignorant thing she says between 10:10 - 11:10.  She makes the case we should tank to draft the upcoming 17 year olds, forgetting we don't control our picks the next 3 years.  Hear for yourself.  but you go ahead and hook your wagon here.

 

 

[JeffS17]

3 minutes ago, JayBirdHawk said:

This is what happens when you have instability in your front office and a meddlesome owner.  There is no ONE PLAN, nor ONE VOICE, ONE VISION from the Basketball Ops side that has final decision making so there is no sustained longevity in what we are doing.

It's as if they are floating along in the ocean letting the current taking them wherever, run into a rough current or have to paddle against the tide, it becomes too much hard work, so just flow with it. 

This is not supposed to be easy or cheap. 

ALL EYES ARE UPON THEM THIS OFFSEASON. I'M WAITING AND WATCHING, WATCHING AND WAITING.

This is so dramatic lol…

You could also describe our FO as changing course based on the changing circumstances and new information gathered.  And Im not absolving them of blame here, but we had a pretty clear direction after the ECF then it turned out it was a bit flukey of a run, our young players mostly all hit walls (Hunter, OO, Kev), we had tons of injuries, and we couldnt afford a $60M bench anymore because of contract extensions.  Also Nate was not the answer and that became obvious when he implemented his outdated, trash, schemes.  A pivot was absolutely in order and frankly, the biggest mistake we made was not pivoting sooner.

 

The irony here being one of the only things we did that you and others here approved of was bringing in your guy, Murray, which was an overpay desperation move that served as the death knell for this iteration of the Hawks.  

 

[JayBirdHawk]

3 minutes ago, Jody23 said:

Seems to me the Hawks want the Wizards to take Sarr to ensure they don't trade out of the #2 pick.

All I'll say is, whatever the Hawks are doing, they better get it right. Whatever the 'it' is.

[Jody23]

The Hawks probably want Clingan in a trade down and it likely happens with the Rockets or Spurs.