Hawks 2013 Presser
Posted: Mon Mar 20, 2017 4:09 pm
Wig sighs as he looks around the press room after yet another lost season.
So, as many of you are aware, we fell short yet again last season. The Sixers knocked us out of the playoffs for the second year in a row. I'm not happy. Our core is in its prime, and the jump has to made soon or not at all. While we felt our younger players still had the chance to grow, we're past the point of being able to wait for them.
We couldn't participate in RFA due to our core eating up our cap space. At least we came away with Jeff Teague on a long-term cost-controlled deal. He has shown to be a passable backup point guard, and we're ready to move forward with him in that role.
UFA was, of course, what we've been used to most of my tenure here - send out veteran minimums to older players that we think other teams will overlook in the hopes that we can offer something other than money - respect. To our great delight, Nate Robinson decided to throw in with us and Tim Duncan was ready to return to the Hawks fold. I *do* wish I'd reached out to T-Min but I can't get everything right. As UFA progressed we brought back Gee and Gasol on deals that are my kind of money. We look forward to Gee's continued progress and hope Gasol has another 6th man of the year in him. We're glad to have KG back after he started so admirably for us last year.
Then, of course, came training camp. I think our fans and players got complacent after a pretty good TC last year - Bojan Bogdanovic, who we've been grooming for a couple of years, seems to have lost some of his spark. Age hit Gasol and Duncan harder than we'd hoped. Alonzo Gee and Marcus Landry are taking longer than we thought to grow into their potential. Rookie Archie Goodwin took up video games as a hobby, apparently. An unmitigated disaster for everyone outside our core.
So, our core... Gay, Noah, and Carmelo are still in their primes... though we hear the footsteps of Father Time starting to come up behind them. Jeremy Lin and Jeff Adrien continue to improve, though we really hoped they'd make a quantum leap toward their potential this season.
We have high expectations for this squad. Like every year this is championship or bust, but I'm not sold everyone on this team is as intense as I am. We'll look at different lineups than we've tried in the past. If there is a trade to be made, we'll pursue it. If there is a way to get better, we'll look for it. Nobody had better get comfortable. Except Jeff Teague. He knows he's here for at least a year, but only because league rules say I can't trade him.
So, as many of you are aware, we fell short yet again last season. The Sixers knocked us out of the playoffs for the second year in a row. I'm not happy. Our core is in its prime, and the jump has to made soon or not at all. While we felt our younger players still had the chance to grow, we're past the point of being able to wait for them.
We couldn't participate in RFA due to our core eating up our cap space. At least we came away with Jeff Teague on a long-term cost-controlled deal. He has shown to be a passable backup point guard, and we're ready to move forward with him in that role.
UFA was, of course, what we've been used to most of my tenure here - send out veteran minimums to older players that we think other teams will overlook in the hopes that we can offer something other than money - respect. To our great delight, Nate Robinson decided to throw in with us and Tim Duncan was ready to return to the Hawks fold. I *do* wish I'd reached out to T-Min but I can't get everything right. As UFA progressed we brought back Gee and Gasol on deals that are my kind of money. We look forward to Gee's continued progress and hope Gasol has another 6th man of the year in him. We're glad to have KG back after he started so admirably for us last year.
Then, of course, came training camp. I think our fans and players got complacent after a pretty good TC last year - Bojan Bogdanovic, who we've been grooming for a couple of years, seems to have lost some of his spark. Age hit Gasol and Duncan harder than we'd hoped. Alonzo Gee and Marcus Landry are taking longer than we thought to grow into their potential. Rookie Archie Goodwin took up video games as a hobby, apparently. An unmitigated disaster for everyone outside our core.
So, our core... Gay, Noah, and Carmelo are still in their primes... though we hear the footsteps of Father Time starting to come up behind them. Jeremy Lin and Jeff Adrien continue to improve, though we really hoped they'd make a quantum leap toward their potential this season.
We have high expectations for this squad. Like every year this is championship or bust, but I'm not sold everyone on this team is as intense as I am. We'll look at different lineups than we've tried in the past. If there is a trade to be made, we'll pursue it. If there is a way to get better, we'll look for it. Nobody had better get comfortable. Except Jeff Teague. He knows he's here for at least a year, but only because league rules say I can't trade him.