Atlanta Hawks Rumors | Hoops Rumors

Pacific Notes: Green, Varejao, Dawson

February 22nd, 2016 at 3:35pm CST by Chuck Myron

Clippers coach/executive Doc Rivers reportedly plans to try to re-sign Jeff Green this summer, and he’s glad to be reunited with his former Celtics player for several reasons. Rivers was effusive in his praise of Green to Scott Howard-Cooper of NBA.com, calling him one of the best NBA people ever (Twitter link), and he’s also a fan of what the combo forward can do on the court, as Jason Jones of The Sacramento Bee details.

“I really wanted more length,” Rivers said of his goals going into the trade deadline, according to Jones. “When you look at the teams we have to beat, we need to get longer, more athletic, and we need to increase our shooting. And I think with Jeff we did all three of those things. … I thought of all the things that were offered, he was the best available for us.”

See more from the Pacific Division:

The Hawks were among a group of interested teams otherwise composed of the Spurs, Thunder and Mavericks that fell short to the Warriors in the competition for Anderson Varejao, his agency says, according to Diamond Leung of the Bay Area News Group (on Twitter). The Relativity Sports client is reportedly poised to sign with Golden State, which already released Jason Thompson to clear a roster spot.
The Clippers decided to sign power forward Alex Stepheson to a 10-day contract when the market didn’t bear a defensive guard, Rivers said, according to Ben Bolch of the Los Angeles Times.
Branden Dawson, last year’s 56th overall pick, is headed to the D-League affiliate of the Magic on assignment from the Clippers, as the Clippers announced via press release. It’s the fourth time Dawson has gone to the D-League, and the Grand Rapids Drive are the third D-League team to have taken him in. The Clips are without their own affiliate.
Kings affiliate player Vince Hunter left Sacramento’s D-League team to sign with Panathinaikos of Greece, the European club announced (Twitter link; translation via Sportando’s Emiliano Carchia). The Kings affiliate received a $45K buyout as part of the move, according to international journalist David Pick (on Twitter).

Eastern Notes: Morris, Teague, Middleton, ‘Melo

February 22nd, 2016 at 12:31pm CST by Chuck Myron

Ex-Suns coach Jeff Hornacek gave one of the most positive reviews about Markieff Morris that the Wizards encountered when they asked around the league about Markieff Morris prior to last week’s trade, sources told TNT’s David Aldridge, who writes in his Morning Tip for NBA.com. Wizards coach Randy Wittman said he only heard “rave reviews,” while Marcin Gortat and Jared Dudley, former teammates of Morris who are now on the Wizards, told the front office that Morris wouldn’t be a problem, as Jorge Castillo of The Washington Post details. See more from the Eastern Conference as the ramifications of the trade deadline continue:

The Bucks reportedly had at least passing interest in Jeff Teague, but they weren’t willing to part with Khris Middleton to get a deal done, league sources told Aldridge for the same piece. Milwaukee reportedly held tight to Middleton in talks about Ricky Rubio, too. The Hawks were trying to score both a starter and a first-round pick in would-be trades involving Teague, sources told USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt last week (Twitter link).
Meanwhile, the Pelicans were the team that clung to one of their players in their talks with the Bucks, as the conversation between those teams involving Greg Monroe fell apart when New Orleans refused to give up Jrue Holiday, according to Sean Deveney of The Sporting News.
Several teams think that if the Knicks don’t make much progress in their rebuilding by the middle of July, Carmelo Anthony would be willing to waive his no-trade clause, Deveney writes in the same piece. The Knicks spoke with the Rockets about Ty Lawson before the trade deadline, according to Marc Berman of the New York Post.
The retention of Dwyane Wade and Hassan Whiteside this summer would almost assuredly mean the end to Luol Deng‘s time with the Heat, observes Ira Winderman of the Sun Sentinel, who writes in his mailbag column. Front office executives around the league were led to believe that Deng was available on the trade market before last week’s deadline, as USA Today’s Jeff Zillgitt noted (on Twitter).

Eastern Notes: Morris, Magic, Pistons

February 21st, 2016 at 7:45pm CST by Will Joseph

The Magic could create $45MM in cap space for this summer if Orlando makes a series of moves that include waiving Ersan Ilyasova by July 1st and renouncing the free-agent cap holds on Dewayne Dedmon, Brandon Jennings, Andrew Nicholson and Jason Smith, Josh Robbins of the Orlando Sentinel details. The Magic like Ilyasova and Jennings, however, according to Robbins, so it is not a certainty that the team won’t retain them beyond this season.

Here’s more from around the Eastern Conference:

The Pistons have until 6pm Eastern on Monday to further evaluate Donatas Motiejunas’ back condition after the league granted their request for a 24-hour extension of the typical 72-hour post-trade window, Detroit coach/executive Stan Van Gundy confirmed to reporters, including Keith Langlois of NBA.com (Twitter link).
The Wizards acquired Markeiff Morris on Thursday because of his versatility and toughness, Washington president Ernie Grunfeld told J. Michael of CSN Mid-Atlantic. Grunfeld also confirmed an earlier report from Michael that by acquiring Morris, the amount the Wizards can offer under the Disabled Player Exception they still have from waiving Martell Webster has dropped, lest the Wizards pass the luxury tax threshold. After this deal with Morris, the most the Wizards can offer through the DPE to a free agent without going over the tax is just slightly more than $1MM, according to Michael. “We feel like we needed a jolt at this time,” Grunfeld told Michael in reference to the addition of Morris.
Jeff Teague and Al Horford are the only remaining Hawks from Kirk Hinrich’s first tenure with the team, and both players are glad to see Hinrich return, Chris Vivlamore of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution relays.

Southeast Notes: Magic, Jennings, Morris, Hinrich

February 20th, 2016 at 7:35pm CST by Arthur Hill

The Magic scored an impressive $8,193,029 trade exception, equivalent to Channing Frye‘s salary, from Thursday’s trade with the Cavs, reports Eric Pincus of Basketball Insiders (Twitter link). Orlando is poised to have enough cap room to sign two players to maximum-salary contracts this summer, so it’s likely that the team renounces that exception in July, but the Frye exception could still come in handy for trades around draft time. The Magic could choose to remain technically over the cap by keeping the cap holds for their own free agents and using sign-and-trades to bring in outside free agent targets. That would allow them to keep the sizable Frye exception until it expires next February, but sign-and-trades are inherently more difficult to pull off than conventional signings.

There’s more from the Southeast Division:

Magic coach Scott Skiles has been monitoring the progress of Brandon Jennings for years, writes John Denton of NBA.com. Orlando added depth to its backcourt this week by picking up Jennings in a trade with the Pistons. Skiles has been keeping an eye on the seventh-year guard, whom he coached for three and a half years in Milwaukee, and said Jennings “was playing the best basketball of his career’’ before the Achilles injury in January of 2015 that kept him out of action for about a year.
New Wizard Markieff Morris already feels at home in Washington, relays Keely Diven of CSNMidAtlantic. The power forward was traded Thursday from the Suns after a rocky season in Phoenix. He said reuniting with Marcin Gortat and Jared Dudley, who were his teammates on the 2011/12 Suns, made the transition easy.
Kirk Hinrich was caught off guard by a trade right before Thursday’s deadline that sent him from the Bulls to the Hawks, according to Chris Vivlamore of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. This is the second stint in Atlanta for Hinrich, who was also traded there by the Wizards in 2011. “I was shocked but after it settled in I’m excited for the opportunity, whatever it may be,” Hinrich said of his latest trade. “I just didn’t see it coming. I’m in Cleveland doing my game-day routine and I got the phone call. I was a little surprised.”

Chuck Myron contributed to this post.

Eastern Notes: Morris, Frye, Varejao

February 20th, 2016 at 1:10pm CST by Eddie Scarito

Pistons coach/executive Stan Van Gundy said he had no clue that Markieff Morris‘ situation in Phoenix would take the turn that it did when he acquired his twin Marcus Morris this past offseason, writes Ben Standig of CSNMidAtlantic.com. “I didn’t have any idea,” Van Gundy said. “We just knew that we liked Marcus. He was a good player, a professional guy, hard worker. We never had any problems from our end with it. I mean, Marcus was upset when it happened, upset at Phoenix, but it never had any effect on what we were doing in Detroit. He was a real professional.”

Markieff intends to approach his new situation with the Wizards the same way, Standing adds. He already has the support of Marcin Gortat and Jared Dudley, both of whom relayed positive things about Morris, the scribe notes. “You know, it’s just guys that actually know me, and not on the outside looking in,” Morris said. “Guys that I’ve actually played with and been in the locker room with. Things happen. It’s in my past. All I can do is move forward and learn from it. I’m happy to do it. And getting compliments from those guys means a lot. We’re good friends, we keep in touch. They know me as a person.”

Here’s more from the Eastern Conference:

The Cavaliers were able to land Channing Frye on Thursday despite having less in the way of assets to offer Orlando than the Clippers, who were also interested in the stretch-four, Jason Lloyd of The Akron Beacon Journal notes. Los Angeles backed away from Frye because of the two years and approximately $15MM remaining on his deal, a contract that Cleveland instead views as an asset with the cap set to jump this offseason, Lloyd adds.
The Hawks would be wise to consider signing center Anderson Varejao, whom Portland waived after acquiring him from the Cavaliers, Lang Greene of Basketball Insiders opines. Atlanta needs a backup center with Tiago Splitter lost for the remainder of the season, and inking Varejao would carry little risk and wouldn’t impact the franchise’s cap flexibility heading into the offseason, Greene notes.
Despite a somewhat slow start to his NBA career, Hornets coach Steve Clifford believes Frank Kaminsky will become a solid starter in the league thanks to how hard he works off the court, Gary D’Amato of The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel relays. “He has an NBA game right now,” said Clifford. “His biggest issue is he’s physically not strong enough to play every night against the starters. He’s worked hard in the weight room. I think in another year you’ll see him take off because of his work ethic.” The 2015 No. 9 overall pick has appeared in 53 games this season and is averaging 7.6 points and 4.1 rebounds in 21.5 minutes per night.

2015/16 Salary Cap Update: Atlanta Hawks

February 19th, 2016 at 10:01pm CST by Eddie Scarito

The NBA’s salary cap for 2015/16 is set at $70MM, which is good for an 11% increase from last season, and the luxury tax line is fixed at $84.74MM. With the February 18th cutoff date for trades now past and the de facto deadline of March 1st for buyouts rapidly approaching, we at Hoops Rumors are in the process of updating the salary cap commitments for each NBA franchise for the 2015/16 campaign. Here’s the cap breakdown for the Atlanta Hawks, whose regular season roster can be viewed here:

2015/16 Salary Cap= $70,000,000
2015/16 Luxury Tax Line= $84,740,000
Fully Guaranteed Salary Commitments= $71,162,768*
Remaining Cap Room= -$1,162,768
Amount Below Luxury Tax Line= $13,577,232

*Note: This amount includes the $75K owed to Terran Petteway, who was waived by the team.

Cap Exceptions Available:

Room Exception= $2,814,000
Trade Exception= $947,276 (Justin Holiday. Expires on February 18th, 2017)

Cash Available to Send Out In Trades= $3,400,000

Cash Available to Receive Via Trade= $3,400,000

Note: Despite the trade deadline having passed, the NBA season technically doesn’t end until June 30th. Teams are able to again make trades upon the completion of the regular season or when/if they are eliminated from the playoffs, whichever comes later. So these cash limits still apply.

The Basketball Insiders salary pages were used in the creation of this post.

Magic, Al Horford Have Mutual Interest

February 19th, 2016 at 11:02am CST by Chuck Myron

The Magic and Al Horford share interest in each other with free agency looming for the big man and Orlando having opened plentiful cap room with its trades this week, a source told Sean Deveney of The Sporting News. Zach Lowe of ESPN.com tweeted Wednesday that he expects the Magic to push hard for the Jason Glushon client this summer. Horford remains with Atlanta, though he was reportedly in play for a trade as late as two hours before Thursday’s deadline.

Atlanta was nonetheless setting a high price in trade talks for the former University of Florida standout who holds the Hawks in high regard. His Bird rights are tied to Atlanta, meaning the Hawks are the only team that can offer him a fifth year in a contract, a factor that Lowe hears will be of utmost importance to the 29-year-old. The Hawks can also give him 7.5% raises instead of the 4.5% raises other teams are limited to, so a five-year package from Atlanta would be worth $36.852MM more than a four-year deal from the Magic or anyone else, based on the NBA’s projection of a $24.9MM maximum salary for players with Horford’s level of experience. However, Florida’s lack of a state income tax mitigates that difference, at least to some degree.

Deveney speculates about the prospect of Horford and fellow soon-to-be free agent Joakim Noah, Horford’s college teammate, joining forces in Orlando. Noah is unlikely to re-sign with the Bulls, Deveney writes, a view that conflicts with Bulls GM Gar Forman‘s optimism on the matter, which Forman expressed Thursday to reporters, including Nick Friedell of ESPNChicago.com (Twitter link). Noah and Magic coach Scott Skiles didn’t always see eye-to-eye when they were together on the Bulls, but much has changed since then, according to Deveney, and players generally like working under coach Scott Skiles despite his reputation as a hard-liner, Deveney writes.

The Magic have the flexibility necessary to spend on multiple high-profile free agents if they can attract them to Orlando. They have only about $36MM in guaranteed salary against a salary cap for next season that’s estimated to be between $89MM and $95MM. The Magic will also go after DeMar DeRozan, according to Deveney, but he’s consistently made it clear he wants to re-sign with the Raptors.

Hawks Acquire Kirk Hinrich In Three-Team Deal

February 18th, 2016 at 11:53pm CST by Chuck Myron

Jennifer Stewart / USA Today Sports Images

4:16pm: The Bulls traded Kirk Hinrich to the Hawks as part of a three-team swap that also involved the Jazz, all three teams announced. Chicago, in its first trade since July 2014, gets Justin Holiday from the Hawks and Denver’s unprotected 2018 second-round pick from the Jazz, who acquired it from the Nuggets in 2013. Utah receives Shelvin Mack from the Hawks.

Hinrich returns to Atlanta, where he spent a season and a half as part of the two-year hiatus in his Bulls career from 2010-12. The 35-year-old is in his 13th NBA season and his 11th with Chicago. However, he’d never had such a limited role, with his minutes only at 15.9 per game this season, by far a career low. Any playing time he gets in Atlanta figures to come at the wing instead of the point guard spot, since the Hawks held on to Jeff Teague and Dennis Schröder in spite of rumors about both, and Teague in particular.

Atlanta did end up dealing away Mack, its third-string point guard, who, like Hinrich, is playing the fewest minutes he’s ever seen in his career at 7.5 a game. The 25-year-old Mack, a fifth-year veteran, becomes the most experienced point guard for the Jazz, who’ve de-emphasized the position in the wake of the offseason injury to Dante Exum that wiped out his season. Utah’s reported talks about swapping point guards Ty Lawson and Trey Burke fell through. Mack has a non-guaranteed salary of more than $2.433MM for next season.

Holiday, the other player the Hawks gave up, picked up a championship with the Warriors last summer and shortly thereafter signed a two-year fully guaranteed deal for the minimum salary with Atlanta. His minutes are down slightly but his shot attempts and scoring are off markedly from last year’s numbers. The primary benefit for Chicago, aside from the pick, is the financial savings, as the Bulls subtract the $1,907,664 difference between Hinrich’s and Holiday’s salaries from their payroll. That also clears the Bulls of nearly $2.9MM in projected luxury tax penalties. The deal allows Chicago to create a trade exception equivalent to Hinrich’s $2,854,940 salary.

Atlanta gets to create a trade exception worth the equivalent of Holiday’s $947,276 salary, since Mack’s $2,433,333 pay is a close match with Hinrich’s, even though a 15% trade kicker that Chicago is paying Hinrich gives him a slight bump on his salary. The Jazz remain under the cap, using a slice of the roughly $7.6MM in cap room they had entering deadline day to take in Mack’s salary.

Brian Windhorst of ESPN.com broke the news that Hinrich was headed to Atlanta (Twitter link), while Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical on Yahoo Sports reported the Jazz were getting Mack and giving up a second-round pick (Twitter link). K.C. Johnson of the Chicago Tribune relayed that Holiday was going to the Bulls and that all the pieces were part of the same three-teamer, rather than separate deals (Twitter link). Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution pegged the second-round pick going to Chicago as Denver’s 2018 second-rounder. RealGM shows that the pick carries no protection.

Eastern Notes: Horford, Calderon, Harris

February 18th, 2016 at 11:26pm CST by Eddie Scarito

The Hawks took center Al Horford off the market at approximately 1pm today, Chris Broussard of ESPN.com relays (Twitter links). Prospective trade partners were wary of Horford’s impending free agency, which made the offers Atlanta received less than enticing, Broussard adds. Point guard Jeff Teague was available until the final minutes of the deadline, with the Bucks and Nets expressing the most interest, the ESPN scribe notes.

Here’s the latest from the East:

Despite their best efforts, the Raptors were unable to upgrade their power forward position prior to the NBA trade deadline today, Josh Lewenberg of TSN.ca notes. The lack of a significant deal wasn’t due to the team’s lack of effort, with Toronto checking in on virtually every player rumored to be available, but the team found the asking prices simply too steep to pull the trigger, Lewenberg adds. “There was nothing there good enough for us, we felt,” GM Masai Ujiri said. “Anything that was good enough we felt, we just didn’t want to give up the future of our team for any of the stuff that was out there.”
Knicks point guard Jose Calderon noted that one reason his numbers have taken a hit is New York’s triangle offense, a system not conducive to gaudy stats from playmakers, Stefan Bondy of The New York Daily News relays. “It doesn’t matter how I play,” Calderon said. “Sometimes when you maybe get off on the wrong foot or people don’t know you as a player and expect something else. It’s tough to change those minds. So I’m pretty good with the way I am, the way I do stuff, the way I work. Like I said, if we go position by position, or player by player, I lost every battle in that situation. I’m not going to score more points than other point guards in this league. I’m a different kind of player. It’s not fun when you want to win for the Knicks and people want you out of the Knicks.”
The Knicks may cut the playing time of rookie point guard Jerian Grant because his lack of playing experience is hurting him and the team, according to interim coach Kurt Rambis, Marc Berman of The New York Post relays.
Courtney Lee says being dealt to the Hornets “threw him off” because he was told the previous day by the Grizzlies he wasn’t being shopped, Steve Reed of The Associated Press writes. The swingman did add that the presence of coach Steve Clifford, who was an assistant in Orlando during Lee’s rookie season, would help him adjust more quickly, Reed adds. “It helps a lot,” Lee said of Clifford. “I have a feel for him and his coaching style. He knows my capabilities and I think he’s comfortable with me in that sense. It’s just a matter of picking up the plays.”
The Pistons did extremely well in the trade that landed them Tobias Harris, David Mayo of MLive.com opines. Detroit netted a still-improving combo forward who provides exactly what the team lacked in its frontcourt and Harris’ salary will likely look like a bargain in the coming season, Mayo adds.

Latest On Dwight Howard

February 18th, 2016 at 1:57pm CST by Chuck Myron

1:57pm: Howard will stay with the Rockets, ending weeks of speculation of him getting traded, according to Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical on Yahoo Sports (Twitter link).

11:07am: There is a strong belief from Howard’s camp that he will not be traded before today’s deadline, according to Ken Berger of CBS Sports.

7:44am: The Rockets and agent Dan Fegan are hard at work to find a new team for Dwight Howard, reports Frank Isola of the New York Daily News (Twitter link). Houston is prioritizing its pursuit of a Howard trade over serious talks with the Jazz on a Ty Lawson/Trey Burke swap, though no favorite to acquire Howard has emerged, tweets Marc Stein of ESPN.com. Most executives from teams aside from the Rockets were saying as of Wednesday that a deal involving Howard was unlikely, according to Jonathan Feigen of the Houston Chronicle (Twitter link).

Houston turned down an offer of Al Jefferson and Spencer Hawes from the Hornets, league sources tell Isola, and little chance exists of those teams doing a Howard deal unless Houston’s demands come down markedly, as Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer hears (Twitter links). The Rockets called the Cavs to offer Howard, but Cleveland didn’t bite, according to Sam Amico of Amico Hoops (on Twitter).

The Celtics, Heat, Hawks and Raptors have also reportedly spoken with the Rockets about Howard, at least on a cursory level, though Houston has apparently been underwhelmed with the proposals it’s hearing. One GM told TNT’s David Aldridge he doesn’t think the Rockets want to end up with Howard still on the roster after the 2pm Central time deadline (Twitter link), which suggests Houston will bring its asking price in line with the market.

Salary concerns complicate any Howard trade. He’s making more than $22.359MM this season, but a 15% trade kicker in Howard’s contract means teams would have to match salaries based on a $22,970,500 figure for him. The Rockets are also less than $1MM shy of a hard cap of $88.74MM, so they have sharply limited flexibility. The Rockets and others expect Howard to turn down his more than $23.282MM player option and hit free agency this summer.