An appreciation of the greatness that is the Atlanta Hawks
You could read this post. Or you could just admire Curtis Compton's photo, which says it all.
Michael Gearon Jr., one of the Hawks’ many charming owners, believes that print media folks in this town have failed to appreciate the splendor that is his remarkable organization. And I must confess that the achievements of this special team sometimes have had a numbing effect on this jaded correspondent. So here’s where I pay homage and bestow overdue superlatives.
• The Hawks are the greatest team ever to have drafted so badly. In my glass-half-empty moments, I wonder, “Why aren’t the Hawks any better?” With age and perspective, however, I realize I should have seen said glass as more than half-full. Positively brimming, truth to tell.
From 2004 through 2007, the Hawks had five lottery picks. They whiffed on four. They took Josh Childress instead of Luol Deng/Andre Iguodala in 2004; Marvin Williams instead of Chris Paul/Deron Williams in 2005; Shelden Williams instead of Brandon Roy/Rudy Gay in 2006, and Acie Law IV instead of Thaddeus Young/Rodney Stuckey in 2007. The only one they got right was Al Horford, also in 2007.
They batted .200 on the picks that are supposed to make or break an organization — and they not only became a winning team but have remained one. Amazing!
• They’re also the greatest team ever to have negotiated so many onerous contracts. We’re not talking Jon Koncak ancient history. In the 21st Century, the Hawks bestowed $25 million over four years on Speedy Claxton, who worked 44 games, and re-upped Marvin Williams for $37 million over five seasons at a time when nobody else in the NBA seemed to think he was more than just another guy. (On cue, seize-the-day Marvin took the money and saw his stats descend to utter mediocrity.)
But the capper, as we know, was spending $120 million to keep Joe Johnson, which made some measure of sense in that he was their leading scorer. Being the Hawks, they managed to work this windfall contract at cross-purposes. They overspent to keep the guy whom new coach Larry Drew — who wasn’t really new, having been Mike Woodson’s assistant for six seasons — had declared he wanted to de-emphasize. Sure enough, Johnson saw his bank account swell at the same time his on-court numbers declined across the board.
The effect has left the Hawks with no wiggle room under the cap, which is just another example of their tough-love corporate strategy. Cap space is for wimps!
• They’re the greatest team ever to get blown out on such a consistent basis. Gearon Jr. makes the point that only three NBA clubs — the Lakers, the Celtics and guess who — have reached Round 2 of the NBA playoffs over the past three seasons. Obscured by the glare of this awesome achievement is this factoid: The Hawks’ record in Round 2 games those three seasons was 2-12, and not one of those 12 losses came by fewer than 10 points. (Isn’t the NBA supposed to come down to the last shot? Never mind.)
In those 14 Round 2 games, the Hawks’ average margin of defeat is 15.3 points. Kobe and K.G. can’t touch that!
Because they’re such good sports, the Hawks don’t save all their collapses until late spring. They offer them up during the winter, too! Last season they managed five home losses by at least 20 points. Over the 10-day span that ended with the 20-point flop against Miami on Sunday, they lost four home games and trailed by 20 in each (and by 30 in the first and last).
Drew expressed disappointment after the Miami game that his players grew so dispirited so early, but can you blame them? For the Hawks, this is standard operating procedure: Win a few games and get people interested, then face a test on national TV and spit the bit. Nobody in the crowd seemed one bit surprised. Nobody even bothered to boo.
But here’s the thing: By rights, these Hawks should never have been good enough to get anyone to care at all. They’ve been mismanaged almost every step of the way, and still they keep breaking .500 and showing up in Round 2. And that prompts this final superlative:
• The Hawks are the greatest team ever to have been subjected to such amateurish oversight.
The way I see it, anybody can draft good players and work the salary cap and win a slew of games. Only real men of genius could get it so wrong and still have it come out half-right. Full credit to this intrepid organization for showing us how it’s half-done.
By Mark Bradley
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273 comments Add your comment
JROLL1
February 14th, 2012
8:20 am
EVERYTHING ALL ON POINT TODAY MARK!!!!! I GET A SICK FEELING IN MY STOMACH EVERY TIME I HAVE TO RELIVE THE HAWKS DRAFT!!!!! ESPECIALLY CHRIS PAUL/DERON WILLIAMS!!!!
loserville
February 14th, 2012
8:37 am
the hawks—another example of loserville ATL–rise up! 1 fluke title since 1966!!!! Rise up!!
J
February 14th, 2012
8:41 am
oh, don’t get mad at Bradley for bashing the Hawks … it’s the media’s job to bash anything and everything sports related in Atlanta.
besides, 99% of the people posting on his garbage don’t attend the games nor even really care about basketball. I’m the 1%.
J
February 14th, 2012
8:52 am
Might as well lay in to the Braves/Falcons. They have more talent than the Hawks and can’t even come up with playoff wins. Not that i’m happy with getting to the 2nd round but the other pro-teams SUCK here UNLESS you count the Atlanta Dream. Nuff said …
Arnold Ziffel
February 14th, 2012
9:01 am
We went from the backfire of the “playoff guarantee” issued in 2003 by Time Warner and the totally incompetent Pete Babcock (he must have had something really big on someone to keep his job that long) to the disfunctional Spirit and Billy Knight (still unemployed since leaving Hawks). If it wasn’t ATL, I’d say it would be impossible to get as much wrong as they have so far. They should consider doing the opposite of every hunch they have like what George from Seinfeld did when his life was falling apart. Then again, just sell the team and get this thing over with.
The Grinch
February 14th, 2012
9:10 am
J
February 14th, 2012
8:41 am
Be careful saying you’re part of the 1%. The “Occupy” movement will come after you.
Ronald Millsaps
February 14th, 2012
9:42 am
Well, David Stern himself goes out of his way to stifle the league from being officiated fairly and to give small-market teams a fair shake, so any anti-Hawks comments on his part have no credibility.
Indeed, the Hawks have been terrible for years, and the Jon Koncak reference was right-on, but in reality, it wasn’t even a top-five bad move for this team. (I once had a brief exchange with his daughter and found her basketball perception to be surprisingly bad, amidst her bragging about how good she allegedly was.)
This team could have Chris Paul and still could have Jamaal Crawford and Al Harrington. Speaking of bad trades/moves, trading Dominique was awful, as was signing Moses Malone (after 1987-88, Wes Unseld wanted nothing to do with the overrated, whiny prima donna that many mistake for a legend), as was signing the accurate-but-selfish Reggie Theus… to replace the accurate-and-unselfish Randy Wittman. (Go, Wizards.) Signing Lenny Wilkens was dumb, as was his decision to build the team around Mookie Blaylock. Lenny didn’t want the team built around a forward who shot 47% (that’s the benchmark), especially when he could build around a selfish POINT GUARD who shot 37%!
The Hawks in 2000-2001, etc. looked pretty good on paper, but I think Tom Izzo made the right move in not coming here.
Back to the vault: In 1989-90, Doc Rivers, Koncak, and John Battle missed inexorable stretches, which were largely to blame for the unforeseen 41-41 record. Instead of riding the ship, the Hawks made an immediate move, albeit not a bad one. Though it knew it had guards RETURNING, it traded one of its surplus of forwards, Antoine Carr, for Kenny Smith, one of the best REAL basketball guards, not a guy looking to distract his defender with tattoos and eccentric, selfish dribbling. I hated seeing Carr go and wouldn’t have made the move, personally, but Smith was quite the acquisition, in fairness. After the year, the Hawks made no move to keep him, foolishly saying his approximately-$1.7 million salary was excessive. Within a year, they acquired forward Blair Rasmussen for double Smith’s salary.
As ‘89-’90 ended, Smith, Carr, and Mike Fratello, one of the best coaches in league history, were gone. The “Air Force” era was officially over. Fratello’s fire was inexcusable. One of the few good things about that press conference was Stan Kasten’s crying, which at least paid respect to the fact that the outcome was indeed tragic.
Ronald Millsaps
February 14th, 2012
9:43 am
“loserville”— Drop the mean-spirited ignorance and the irreverent “Rise up!!”.
Ronald Millsaps
February 14th, 2012
9:47 am
“honest”– Dominique’s defense and passing were fine. His responsibility was indeed to shoot 30 times per game. Some of his shot selections were bad, though, and you can refer to his ankle in ‘87 and extremely-biased officiating in ‘88 per his not passing the second round.
Greg Maddux wasn’t just “average” in the postseason. Are you an in-the-closet ESPN employee?
Don’t make light of what Sherman did. A Minnesota sportswriter did so in 1991 and should’ve been dealt with for his prejudice.
Ronald Millsaps
February 14th, 2012
10:24 am
How unfortunate that my long post didn’t post; if it can be retrieved and posted, please do so.
“cps”– Said lineup looked fantastic on paper, but Moses was poisonous to any lineup he was in after the ‘83 Finals. All he did was whine, connive, and show just how selfish and apathetic about winning he actually was. He tried to run Mike Fratello out and was a cog in the process. Truthfully, bringing his sorry self to Atlanta and running Tree Rollins out was the worst move in franchise history, even worse than trading ‘Nique, even worse than firing Mike Fratello.
beejayrufino
February 14th, 2012
10:53 am
Did Joe Johnson won a ring? not yet and so as Lebron James. Even if you praise other teams such as the heat and bulls, they still has something to prove. So don’t tease the Hawks it’s not over yet.
For all of you commenting here:
If you fellas hate the Hawks, then why are you commenting here? Comment there in your Heat, Bulls or Knicks articles and not here.
GO HAWKS!! 2012 CHAMPS!
pete babcock
February 14th, 2012
10:59 am
MB- I couldn’t agree more. I would add the Hawks are the greatest team to ever be Bi-Polar. We should have seen it coming during the Celtics series. The first round series ended in 7 and the Hawks were never competitive during a game in Boston.
ag
February 14th, 2012
11:38 am
Great article Mark! Also, – this is Jeff Teague’s team. When he plays well, the team wins. Since KH return, JT is the second person to come out. Outside of one game KH has done nothing. JT needs to stay agressive and stay on the court!
ag
February 14th, 2012
11:47 am
Interesting stats.. the Hawks are 12-4 when JT takes at least 10 shots. The Hawks are 5-5 since KH joined the team from injury. JT has NOT played over 40 minutes in non of these games and has played at least 30 minutes in only two of those (1-1). The Hawks are 5-1 when Teague plays at least 40 minutes. The Hawks are 4-2 when Jeff scorers 20.
J
February 14th, 2012
11:48 am
yeah, i’m happily employed, think i’d like to bypass that 1% movement.
nique
February 14th, 2012
1:10 pm
Love the snark. You forgot how bad the fans are though. That’s got to be worthy of a superlative.
IlliniBrave
February 14th, 2012
1:43 pm
Nothing wrong with the Hawks that an unslefish, team-oriented, highly-spirited, mult-talented PG like Jeremy Lin couldn’t fix. Oh wait, we havne’t had a guy like that since… hmmm… Mookie Blaylock maybe?
Braves Fan Since 1966
February 15th, 2012
9:46 am
The Hawks management team regularly teaches us how a franchise should not be managed.
defender
February 15th, 2012
6:35 pm
You are a whiner, Mark.
Even if the Hawks were a bad team–and in fact they are not–your rambling rationalization for your pessimism doesn’t help anyone. All it does is discourage fans, players, owners and anyone connected with the Hawks.
I hate the media. Real fans ought to get angry when someone criticizes their home teams, not fall into this wallowing self-pity party.
You can’t change the past. Only the present exists, and what future we imagine.
welikebaseball2
February 16th, 2012
12:56 pm
LOL…great article Mark! Yes, good old tough-in-cheek. This is my fav of yours in a while. Classic!
Mecca
February 16th, 2012
4:13 pm
ATL is black mecca—it’s a black town—don’t be down on the hawks now—they get most of their fans from African-Americans in this city.
Jesse
February 16th, 2012
9:52 pm
What is Billy Knight doing right now? That’s the real question.
tree rollins
February 16th, 2012
10:02 pm
I’m on Gearon’s side. People don’t credit the good decisions ASG has made, and only want to dwell on what could have been. I’m also happy to not have to read Bradley’s drivel as a beat writer. I remember him as a hack back when I read the AJC at university and not much has changed in 20 years. Other teams have made worse trades, given worse deals, and have been mired in mediocrity much longer than the Hawks. How long have the Clippers been mismanaged till now? Marvin is not Chris Paul, but he’s a good defender, shooter, and a good player. The problem with the Atlanta Hawks is the Atlanta fanbase. There is none. You can attribute this to the transient nature of the city, the inherent problems with having the stadiums in a largely black downtown, while the potential fanbase dwells in white suburbia, or a lack of suitable transit system. I don’t know. But the fans stink. The best of them can only make bombastic criticism of the Hawks organization. At least they know what is going on. I live in South Korea, have followed the team via p2p connections since the Boston series and am excited at the prospect of the Hawks in postseason. Why? Because you just never know with them. Just when idiots like Bradley forecast their demise, they do something interesting. Go Hawks.