Column: Nothing personal, but Hawks need to deal Young; Loughdmouthings: dumb people in charge, a wise CFB coach, dumb decisions, selling out, and more Loughdmouthings
It’s long past time for Atlanta to realize that the time to move on from Trae Young as arrived. Nothing against him, but the fit is no more. It doesn’t seem like he makes them better.
By Michael A. Lough
The Sports Report
centralgasports@gmail.com
We’ll debate that draft-day trade another time – I worked up stats a year or two ago that indicated Dallas won it, and that gap has only grown – but Young doesn’t seem to make the Hawks a contender.
And teams that want to win do what it takes to try to win. Stunning trades can be part of the equation.
I never got the talk about dumping Dejounte Murray. Never got this NBA thing about the trade deadline and jettisoning for teams not going anywhere this year. Why is that? Don’t NBA teams like to, ya know, build? Don’t they realize the benefits of stability?
Dumping Murray, who they had just gotten, would have been idiotic. The Hawks didn’t do idiotic. So there’s still a chance.
His play should open the door to look at a trade for Young. Nothing against Young, but, well, the Hawks aren’t progressing, and yes, the quote-unquote top player will be a target for why.
He has nice numbers, no doubt, but is Young making the Hawks a winner, and players better? Doesn’t really seem that way. And it’s not to say he won’t succeed more somewhere else.
Fits matter. And there’s something missing about this one.
Right now, it feels like Young has something in common with Desmond Ridder. Ridder had such an inconsistent season in 2023 that it was very easy to feel that he’d never get the fan base, and would struggle to get the team behind him.
Not as person or teammate – neither was any kind of issues – but as the quarterback leading the team.
Not everybody is built to walk off the plane as a rookie and be a program’s focal point, and succeed in doing so, especially when one is 20 years old.
No, nobody really thought Luka Doncic would blow up like he has, and there have been some grumblings about Doncic’s skills slowing the progress of the Mavs and other players.
But they reached the finals. And Atlanta struggles to get the final conference berth every year.
Young may go somewhere else and succeed, and that’s fine. Doesn’t mean it was a bad trade, just means perhaps he fits better somewhere else, and his departure clears some air in Atlanta.
With draftee Zaccharie Risacher and Nikola Djurisic – fundamental 6-7/6-8 wings from Europe – joining the team, it’s a good team to make a major tweak in the philosophy.
And picking up some cap room is never bad.
Loughdmouthings (and some catching up)
Need a reminder of the incompetence of people in charge? OK, well, no, daily life brings that, but here’s one.
Some idiot – related to who gave Jimbo Fisher those inexplicable deals? – is the reason Detroit fired Monty Williams after one season – one season – after signing him to a six-year, $78.5-million contract.
Williams’ buyout? 67 mil.
Greedy people will laugh and say, ‘Good for him.’ We need fewer greedy people in this country. Soon.
Detroit needed to fire a few other people, because shouldn’t you be fired for making such an apparently dumb decision that became a ferociously expensive dumb decision? …
Sooo, the NBA moved the second round of the draft to 4 p.m. on Thursday so as not to conflict with the 9 p.m. presidential debate?
Man, how decision-makers don’t fall down more.
Have it at 6, cut down on the time between picks, and it’s done at 8, 8:30. Plus, exactly how much of an overlap did the NBA think there’s be between the final picks of the second round and the debate?
Not many. Other sports didn’t stop/delay/reschedule for the debate.
Silly. …
If I can go a day without hearing “Nobody gave us a chance, nobody expected us to do anything” along with “I got to give him/her/them their flowers”, it’ll be a damn good day. Stop it. …
I love NCAA regional baseball. Next time Georgia or Tech hosts, go. Go, go, go. Or Auburn, or Alabama, or wherever you’re near. It’s just awesome. So much strategy, so much blood, sweat, and tears. Goose bumps stuff, that Tech-Georgia final was. People who were there will talk about it like it was a football game. So, go, go, go. …
Catching up: Dear Georgia fans who part-time double as Falcon “followers”: Please stop with griping that Atlanta didn’t talk to Todd Monken at all in the search.
If you paid attention or read much, it’s easy to get the inference that Monken doesn’t want to be a head coach and deal with head coach headaches, either in college or the NFL.
And that’s fine. Makes him almost more respectable, to know he has a great job, is one of the most known coordinators in the game, wins, and makes plenty of money.
Had he been head coach, he wouldn’t have done at Georgia what happened at Georgia, wouldn’t have gone from Stetson Bennett to Lamar Jackson – holy crap, Batman – and wouldn’t be in a position to have two national championship rings and perhaps a Super Bowl ring in a pretty short span.
He went 13-26 at Southern Miss from 2013-15, and was not known to be interesting in the obsessive recruiting schedule in college.
Monken is 58, and no doubt celebrates being able to ignore National Crapshoot Day.
He’s fine. …
The sons of Deion Sanders – um, didn’t one file bankruptcy of $11 million? - bought Deion Sanders a mansion awhile back, with a pool, wine cellar, and indoor movie theater.
Under no definition or circumstances is any of this what the NIL or compensating players was supposed to lead to.
It’s actually quite a middle finger to the whole process. And makes more people fans of Colorado State. Which will have a better season than the Buffs. Again. …
Random Unrelated Thought: The fifth choice on any automatic voice menu at a business should be to immediately talk to a human being. …
High five to Boise State head football coach Spencer Danielson.
He said – and it was naturally screwed up by too much “media” – in May that – and this is glorious – that the program wasn’t setting up ways for those who hadn’t shown up yet and done nothing to get paid.
As it should be, as some other coaches talk.
“If you’re looking for the easy way and you’re looking for a handout, don’t come to Boise State.”
So much media botched what he said and what he meant that he had to clarify it. He’s simply not going to coddle greedy and mostly overrated – they read too much of the recruiting ranking butt-kissing crap thrown out every day – teen agers before they’ve done a damn thing.
Wow. Standards. Makes Boise State a team to put on your root-for list.
Sure wish the $13-million man and $12-million man and all the other overpaid hypocrites had the balls to say the same thing. They’d still win, they’d still get the same recruits, their system wouldn’t change.
But yes, talking with balls – wait, what? - is a nice thing. So, don’t expect it.
You can expect this pathetic selling out to continue, from astounding productions for visits. VISITS! Very successful coaches have sold the hell out – to assuaging those who write about recruiting to greed and enabling to continue.
It’s embarrassing, really embarrassing. …
Random unrelated reminder: Nice people can be subpar at their jobs. Just because you know or like somebody doesn’t mean they do a good job.
Really doesn’t. …
From Mike Bianchi of the Orlando Sentinel:
“With Tennessee’s first College World Series championship …, the SEC has now won five straight baseball nattys and 10 of the last 15. The only thing more commonplace than national championships in the SEC are Waffle Houses.”