Hawks Offer Damp 1 Million Less

[jaywalker72]

http://sports.espn.go.com/nba/news/story?id=1842804

Man, and I hope the years were less as well....Nice job, Billy...whew....

[Weez]

Some will liken this to the Hawks pursuit of KMart, that is, making offers that they believe will be rejected, but nevertheless grabbing some headlines...and making deals/offers that are respectable, but not be willing to budge on "morals(?)

Wanna be a Hawk? We'll pay you, but you have to know what you're getting into ~ my interpretation of Knight's approach to Facy...

and for this, again, I am encouraged.

[jezmund]

That's great news. Publicity is a move in the right direction for this team in its own right. Looks like we are gonna go all out for Stromile and maybe some off the list of: J.Barry, D.Jones, B.Sura, J.Harrington, and J.Pryzbilla.

[cyman3]

yea, its a good PR move... to be active in the FREE AGENCY season.

this is very similar to the MARTIN talks...

NY or ATL, i think he'll go to NY (who has a better chance of going to the playoffs next year).

[emeans]

Don't spend 9 million dollars for 6 years on a 30 year old Center. Billy Knight knows what he is doing!!

Use that money on young talent and build smartly.

We don't need Dampier. Sign Pryz and Swift and call it a day.

[capstone21]

Thats great. I have more and more respect for Billy. Let Isiah overspend on everybody.

I was nervous we were going to give Damp a contract he does not deserve. Just because we have cap money does not mean we have to spend it.

Swift will be a nice addition at PF if we can get him and then we can sign Prys or Rebracca to fill the hole at center. Sura as our sg and then maybe Harrington or Best as our bu pg and the lineup is basically there.

JT/Harrington/Ivey (IL)

Sura/Childress

Harrington/Diaw/Smith

Swift/CC/Hendu

Prys/Collier

...not a bad lineup. We probably still have a few bucks to spare and next year when Hendu and CC come off the books we can go after a star or look to fill the gaps some more.

[TheDude]

any centers becoming free agents next year?

[Final_quest]

The free agents for next year include Eddy Curry, Tyson Chandler, Samuel Dalembert, Zach Randolph, Ratliff, Illgauskas, and Kwame Brown. All of these guys are RFA except Illgauskas and Ratliff.

The only guy I could see us getting is Kwame all the others will either be matched or not pursued by the Hawks. The list looks good, but when you analyze I think the Hawks have a better chance with Dampier or Swift.

[Derek]

Samuel Dalembert is a guy I would look at if I were Billy.

[Final_quest]

I agree, but he is a RFA. Philadelphia definitely would match any offer.

[TheDude]

i would at least throw some money at them..we'll have plenty of capspace and may be hard for other teams to match...and that'll be our one spot of weakness..

i'd go for brown, dalembert, and curry (he's still really young)

[JB20]

Sean Deveney from The Sporting News reported today on a sportstalk show in Detroit that Dampier is using Atlanta to drive up his personal market. He figures that he can get more than what Atlanta is going to offer from another team by saying he's going to sign here.

[Final_quest]

If that truly is Dampier's strategy it's not exactly working. I mean, the reports came out that the Hawks were offering $1 million less than the Knicks.

Even without signing anyone this offseason, except Collier, the Hawks have been major players in the market. They are partially responsible for setting the prices for all the players. I'm waiting to see what good this will do for us.

If we can sign either Swift or Dampier, BK deserves his props.

[AHF]

Quote:

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If that truly is Dampier's strategy it's not exactly working. I mean, the reports came out that the Hawks were offering $1 million less than the Knicks.

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Huh??

He said Dampiers' strategy was:

Quote:

---

Sean Deveney from The Sporting News reported today on a sportstalk show in Detroit that Dampier is using Atlanta to drive up his personal market.

He figures that he can get more than what Atlanta is going to offer from another team by saying he's going to sign here.

---

Isn't that EXACTLY what happened?

[Final_quest]

Nothing has happend yet. The point of negotiation is to bring prices up. Has Atlanta done that? No.

My take on that post was that Dampier was thinking Atlanta would offer higher what other teams haved. Surprise, we offered less. The Knicks offer $9M. We offer $8M. How does that drive up his personal market?

Now that teams know the Hawks are only offering $8M, they still have to beat the Knicks offer, not the Hawks. If you can explain this a different way, I'd be very interested to hear how Atlanta's lower offer is driving up Dampier's price.

If you think the threat of him signing here is what's driving up the price, I'd have to disagree. It's still the Knicks offer that everyone has to beat, not the Hawks.

[AHF]

I never said the Hawks OFFER was driving up prices and neither did the quote. The quote and I said that Dampier could use Atlanta to get an offer that would be higher than the offer he would ultimately receive from the Hawks which is exactly what happened. The only question is whether the Hawks' cap space was a factor in him getting the $9 million offer from the Knicks (i.e., better make a good offer now before I visit the Hawks).

I agree with you that the Hawks offer does not help in negotiations at all at this point.

[Sage11]

I was concerned that BK was losing his cool in this market. Glad to see that he is sober. Nice work BK.....