It's beyond me how anyone can look at this team and pretend that it can afford acquiring a starter--through trade or otherwise--who would represent essentially the same level of defensive performance that Trae brings.
Sure, we and every other team always can use more better shooting, but we have a special need for defense in the backcourt, and so it's a non-starter to talk about Beal or Heild.
Kirschner added Oladipo to the conversation:
"I’m not sure if he’s “gettable,” but Victor Oladipo is someone who could make sense for the Hawks as a secondary playmaker and surely cover up for Young’s defensive limitations. I don’t know if there are long-term injury concerns on Indiana’s side, but trading for him now would allow the Hawks to see how he fits before he hits free agency in 2021."
Unfortunately, though, he closed down that part of his interview with Hollinger w/o giving him a chance to comment.
It's not necessarily predictive of anything, but it is notable that the chatter among reporters and bloggers when you google Oladipo's name is growing. Suspicion is that IND will eventually swap him in spite of their infatuation with him simply because of the cold hard facts related to his health and to his contract situation.
He is the quintessential perfect acquisition for ATL, imo, both from the perspective of what he brings to the starting line-up (a proven top-tier talent) and from the perspective that he is, indeed, potentially "get-able" for the very reasons that IND has reasons to be concerned.
Everything Schlenk has told us about his priorities points to a top priority of identifying and luring a veteran elite player to this roster at this stage, and given the practicalities of Collins' contract, Young's contract, our cap space, the inventory of players available in free agency this and next summer, and the perceived likelihood of attracting an elite player to ATL based on history being virtually nil... there almost can be no question but that acquiring Oladipo is Schlenk's most promising hope in an otherwise mostly empty field of dreams.
The only other plausible target is only a trade target in the case of a sign-and-trade scenario: Brandon Ingram.
Would he be a possible straight-up free agency acquisition though? We have the cap space for it, of course. Hollinger doesn't consider that even plausible.
However, an ESPN roundtable conversation with four anonymous team executives before the season was interrupted rendered a very different opinion. Theirs was that there are no guarantees as to what NOP will do. The consensus was that Ingram's not proven himself worthy of a max contract, and that if NOP lets him go into free agency and bring a contract back, the contract very well might allow him him an early ETO that creates more complication for them. Apart from that interview, there is a perception among some if not many that once Zion arrived, Ingram's game took a step back--though to be fair, that's to be expected when two featured players are new to each other.
Ingram's been quoted recently as acknowledging that he had no second thoughts to playing in the bubble, and one can read between the lines of this quote, "I think playing in this will – it could help me out," that he realizes he still has some convincing to do before free agency starts.
Me, I've always taken the perspective that if Schlenk likes the package that the player brings to the roster, there is no reason to not pursue him--at least apart from some significant trade first, such as for Oladipo.
However, it is very much plausible that Schlenk does NOT like the package because there are some ambiguities about what kind of player and what kind of person Ingram will ultimately prove to be. It could go either way. He's only 22, and one can make the case that he's shown both positive and negative signs in terms of how much of a team player he will be considered and similarly but different, how much of a leader. His talent is irrefutably similar to a young Kevin Durant, so it's very tempting to shove all the chips to the middle and just go for him. But that doesn't seem to be something we should expect from Schlenk. He seems much more cerebral than that.
Then again, the Knicks also have enough cap space to go after him. And it's really for that reason that I'm less bullish on Schlenk's pursuit, or at least his successful pursuit--New York is New York, and Ingram definitely strikes me as the kind of personality who would prefer to be playing in the most prominent market he can.
