Fanbase approval rating: GM Travis Schlenck

[Jamaaliver]

So the question comes up again:

What do we think of the job Travis has done in four years?

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[jayu70]

So the question comes up again:

What do we think of the job Travis has done in four years?

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A
Bottomed out, Drafted a franchise corner stone, Used his capsapce to acquire draft assets, Drafted wings to complement the cornerstone, traded for a much needed defensive Center, Used the capspace to build a team around said Cornerstone. Brought in a defensive minded coach for he bench.
He's built a playoff roster for at least the next 2 seasons (barring significant injuries) while the plethora of wings room to grow where we can determine which ones are keepers and which aren't.
If we win - we now become an attractive destination for a big time FA.

[Spud2nique]

I’d say A- to an A somewhere. Between 91-95 grade. Honestly closer to 95/100. He hasn’t hit on 2nd rounders (Bruno TBD). Kept us flexible and building around the greatest passer the NBA has seen since Stockton or Magic. He passed on Luka but he built one of the deepest Hawks teams in recent memory. Our 2015 team wasn’t this deep I don’t believe. Great work!

[tbhawksfan1]

A thread brought back from the dead

Sclenk is still here and doing great work. A few old posters seem to have disappeared though

[Geaux_Hawks]

I’d say A- to an A somewhere. Between 91-95 grade. Honestly closer to 95/100. He hasn’t hit on 2nd rounders (Bruno TBD). Kept us flexible and building around the greatest passer the NBA has seen since Stockton or Magic. He passed on Luka but he built one of the deepest Hawks teams in recent memory. Our 2015 team wasn’t this deep I don’t believe. Great work!

Hate to bring up Luka and Dallas, but I'm going there. So obviously, the Hawks and Mavs chose 2 different paths, after they acquired a superstar talent via the draft. The Mavs traded up to get Luka, and immediately went after KP. They didn't really stockpile young assets/depth the way we did, and part of that trade included giving us their FRP in the next years draft.

At one point, many would have said Dallas won the trade by a mile, but seeing things come to fruition the way they have for us, could we now be flipping the coin in our favor? I mean Dallas still has a bright future of course having Luka, but man the idea that Trae/Reddish could ultimately end up outweighing Luka alone is stellar. Will that end up being the one of the most impactful NBA trades in NBA history based off of how many rings both players win?

I guess it doesn't really matter as both teams have yet to win a ring, and that's probably going to be the deciding factor in this scenario.

[graymule]

Atlanta's roster doesn't come with a guarantee. On paper, and that's where we are right now, everything looks super great.
The Hawks have all bases loaded. Two deep with quality players for every position. New assistant coach with the reputation
of defense. Without major injuries, scoring will be no problem. Defense looks better already and could certainly improve
a lot. Don't expect to see other teams doing their layup drill on this season's Hawk team.

Until this current roster fails, Travis gets a high passing grade!

[Buzzard]

A-

Trae is a stud.

Huerter is a stud.

Omari should be a rotational player

The Doncic trade will make us a crazy deep team in 3 years...scary good.

*Grades may change after trade deadline. He’s got some work to do.

A+

He also drafted the Grand Slam that is John Collins. Travis is great at evaluating talent and Pierce is looking like a rock solid coaching hire.

I loved the Pierce hire. He was my profile picture at the Squawk his first season. I changed it to Hunter after he was drafted. I don't mind giving assistants chances. Sometimes you get that diamond in the rough. I am glad we moved on quickly though.

Nate is a proven winner and considering all his experience pretty young at 56. I hope he sticks because I like him.

[Spud2nique]

A-

Trae is a stud.

Huerter is a stud.

Omari should be a rotational player

The Doncic trade will make us a crazy deep team in 3 years...scary good.

*Grades may change after trade deadline. He’s got some work to do.

A+

He also drafted the Grand Slam that is John Collins. Travis is great at evaluating talent and Pierce is looking like a rock solid coaching hire.

I loved the Pierce hire. He was my profile picture at the Squawk his first season. I changed it to Hunter after he was drafted. I don't mind giving assistants chances. Sometimes you get that diamond in the rough. I am glad we moved on quickly though.

Nate is a proven winner and considering all his experience pretty young at 56. I hope he sticks because I like him.

Did I say rock solid. Rock=pillow Ya hope Nate does some work.

[tbhawksfan1]

TS is fine. He had to spend the money this summer before JC ate the cap space and he brought in good pieces....save Rondo, didn't like that one.

Nate and this young team are about to do much better. I hope that Nate earns the position long-term and we move forward with he and TS. Hawks get healthy, make the playoffs and actually make some noise. Man I was so peed at what was going on. Feel much better today

[D21]

IMHO, Schlenk did a great job until his first mistake last season : not singing some vets that could simulate a full roster.
Then Schlenk is saying that he made the decision to fire Pierce, and that it wasn't Ressler, but if Ressler had not put pressure on him with the playoffs, would Schlenk have fired Pierce now ? Especially the team didn't have so many injuries ? No
So he started well, made a first error last season that leaves this team at this moment with unknown future on John, and this year is not so good but because of Ressler.

[jayu70]

How do our FA acquisitions rank after the 1st half of the season?

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Tony Snell
Grade: B+
I’m not sure if anyone could have foreseen Snell being a big piece of the rotation before the season began because of how deep this team was on paper.......Snell has taken advantage of his minutes and has earned a solidified role even when everyone does return. He’s shooting 56.5 percent (!) from 3 on nearly three attempts per game.

Bogdan Bogdanovic
Grade: C
Bogdanovic hasn’t played enough to get a good grasp for what he might offer this team moving forward. The initial hope when the Hawks signed him to a four-year, $72 million contract was for him to alleviate the pressure Young receives on the offensive side of the floor. Through 36 games, they’ve only shared the floor for 140 minutes...

Solomon Hill
Grade: C-
Like Snell, no one expected Hill to be a permanent fixture in the rotation. He’s the only free agent the Hawks signed this offseason who has played in each game this season.


Danilo Gallinari
Grade: D
Before the season began, I was one of two people on staff who predicted Gallinari was going to win the NBA’s Sixth Man of the Year award.......He’s shooting nearly 39 percent from 3, which seems good if you haven’t watched one second of this team this season and just solely looked at the box score numbers. Outside of that game (Celtics), Gallinari hasn’t had many performances where he’s been a noticeable positive.


Rajon Rondo
Grade: F
From the moment the Hawks were linked to Rondo this past offseason, I could not understand it. I understand the appeal for the Hawks in wanting someone like him to mentor Young and the other young players; he’s done that. These grades are strictly based on on-court performance, and the Hawks have one of the worst backup point guards in the NBA.

Kris Dunn
Grade: Incomplete
Dunn hasn’t suited up for the Hawks since signing a two-year deal this past offseason.

[D21]

Even if Rondo has not play great bball until now, I still prefer him helping off the court, and... not playing for another Eastern team that ATL would play in playoffs in case they reach it.

[Jamaaliver]

At this point, TS seems like a strong contender for Exec of the Year. All of these guys are his acquisitions:

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[D21]

At this point, TS seems like a strong contender for Exec of the Year. All of these guys are his acquisitions:

Read on Twitter

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Whoa! 1989... If I'm not wrong, I was remembering the last time I saw them with 4 players with at least 20pts, and I think it was a game Vs NYK with Mookie, Stacey, Nique and Kevin, just before Nique was traded to LAC

EDIT: after checking, I find one in Feb 1994 Vs NYK with Nique at 34/10, Kevin at 25/14 and Mookie at 22/13 but no other one at 20pts or more. Memory problem...

[jayu70]

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“I really do think it was as simple as players just believing in the messaging,” Schlenk said. “Not that it necessarily changed that much, but I think they started to believe. We’ve won a couple games where we came back, we’ve won a couple games on last-second shots, and I think the confidence just started climbing from there where they started to believe. … Once they started to have a little bit of success, they started to believe. And they became confident. And any time you’re confident, that’s when you start to have success.”
Having veterans around was helpful on this journey, with Danilo Gallinari often telling the team they’d be fine, as long as they stuck with it, Schlenk remembered. But he also gave McMillan credit for the messaging behind the belief that the Hawks have embraced.

“I think one of the big things that he’s done is just be unbelievably consistent with his messaging with the guys,” Schlenk said. “We still play a lot of young guys, a lot of guys new to our team this year, and since Day 1 he’s been unbelievably consistent about what we’re going to do every single day. And the guys took to that. I think one of the other things that he does, he started changing some of the plays to fit some of our players’ skill sets a little bit better. Just little tweaks here and there, and it really got guys confident, got guys believing in what we were trying to do.”

As far as McMillan’s future in Atlanta, Schlenk reiterated that they don’t plan to discuss that until the season is truly over. But he’s very happy with the job McMillan has done so far.
“When Nate decided to take the interim tag three months ago, whatever it was, we told him that let’s just get through the end of the year and see where things stand,” Schlenk said. “Obviously he’s done a great job, I’ve said that publicly. I’ve told Nate that, but our stance is still the same. We’re going to let the season play out and then once the season plays out, we’ll sit down and have conversations. But to this point, short of me telling him he’s doing a great job, we haven’t had anymore in-depth conversations. That’s quite frankly the way Nate likes it and wants to do it as well. We’re obviously extremely pleased with the job he has done; I have no problem saying that. ... But we haven’t had any conversations.”

In meeting with media, Schlenk shared his thoughts on a few different topics:

On what Cam Reddish, who hasn’t played since Feb. 21 with an Achilles injury, needs to focus on in his development:
“The big thing for Cam right now is to get back on the court right now and playing. I think that’s a big part of it is just playing basketball. He’s super eager right now. He’s able to get in some just shooting drills with the guys, but he’s still not up to full-speed running yet. But we’ve spoken with him. The plan is for him to participate on our Summer League team this year just so he can get those reps, to get him a little head start when we get to camp next year. But the biggest thing, and I sound like a broken record, is he just needs to slow down. Right now, everything is just moving too fast for him. He gets in too big of a rush. Just once the game slows down for him, especially on the offensive end, we’ve seen what he can do on the defensive end. But it’s really just about getting experience. I think we all see the potential, see the flashes. But we all have to remember, he’s 21 years old. So it’s really just getting him reps.”

On Young’s development this season with a better roster around him:
“I think we’re seeing growth, for sure. But I still think there’s room to grow in his development as well. I think we’ve seen growth in his ability to get his teammates more involved. But I think that he still has room to grow with game management. When a guy hits three shots in a row, to go back to him, things along those lines. When to push tempo, when to slow it down, even though I think we’ve seen growth from him in that situation as well, managing the game late in the game. Those are the kinds of things that we continually, he will improve at, but he continually needs to improve that, but I think we’ve seen growth in that. All of our guys, not just Trae, we have a very deep team, and all of them have taken hits statistically, for the betterment of the team. And I think that’s a big step for all our young guys, and older guys.”

[Jamaaliver]

This article was written two weeks ago!

Should Travis Schlenk Worry About Job Security?

How much blame does Atlanta Hawks team president Travis Schlenk deserve for the team's struggles?

There is much going on right now in the world of the Atlanta Hawks. Trade talk, coaching change rumors, and potentially an unhappy superstar. Even with all of that, one man has been there since the beginning: team president Travis Schlenk. 

He was with the Golden State Warriors for 13 years and was present for the construction of the team's dynasty. So, the question is, if the hawks don’t reach expectations this season, should he be on the hot seat? First, let's go over some of the decisions he has made. 

Sports Illustrated

[tbhawksfan1]

It's too bad. Schlenk gave us the best chance we've ever had. I clearly read this situation as him either being forced aside or choosing to step back based on the situation with Resslers.

Been a fan since about 75 and saw this as the best opportunity we've ever had to build a true contender. Seems like it's about to internally combust.

Ressler can play the money game, but if this is the way things are going to go, I have a feeling that he will see his attendance diminish. I also think that the next TV deal is going to leave the league unhappy. I would love for the sport to take back the sport from the money

[jayu70]

Nick Ressler, Landry Fields and Trae vs Schlenk and Nate???