AJC > Sports > Columnists > Archives > 2006 > May > 20
Saturday, May 20, 2006
Knight doesn’t get point
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Mark Bradley
Billy Knight has whiffed on each of his first picks in the three drafts he has overseen as the Hawks’ general manager. (To recap: He took Boris Diaw over Josh Howard in 2003, Josh Childress over Luol Deng in 2004, Marvin Williams over Chris Paul last summer.) The Hawks approach Tuesday’s lottery with the fourth-best chance of landing the No. 1 pick and, while it would be nice to see this franchise win something for a change, it might be better if it didn’t prevail in this collision of pingpong balls.
Regardless of what Knight said last week, the Hawks need a point guard above all else. The higher they draft, the less chance there is of them picking one. Why? Because no point guard in this draft class comes highly rated, and Knight insists he’s still in the collecting-the-best-talent-regardless-of-position mode. He needs to realize that the Hawks will never become a team, as opposed to a collection of talent, without filling the key positions.
They have, as the world knows, enough swingmen to staff a division. They have no center, but there’s no center in this draft. (Anyone who saw Glen Davis outscore LaMarcus Aldridge 26-4 in the Georgia Dome knows the Texan is a glorified power forward.)
There are, yet again, plenty of swing types to be had, but none — not Tyrus Thomas, not Adam Morrison, not Rudy Gay — would mark a significant upgrade on what the Hawks have. Speculation holds that the player Knight likes most is the 6-foot-11 Italian Andrea Bargnani, but history records that the last time this GM took a European it took the Phoenix Suns to turn Diaw into a player.
And Knight, for all his professed equanimity, cannot afford to draft another Marvin Williams, someone who’ll have little effect on the won-loss record. The Hawks need someone who can start right away and enhance those already in place. That means a point guard, and it’s hard to imagine Knight drafting one with his first pick. If that’s the case, then he needs to trade down and do it then. Knight missed on Paul and Deron Williams last time. He cannot afford to miss on Marcus Williams now.
Knight was in Philadelphia for the first and second rounds of the NCAA tournament, meaning he saw Williams at his best. Without his skill and strength and guidance, massively favored Connecticut would have lost both games. It was odd to watch, the gifted Huskies relying so heavily on one man, but that’s how it played out. Williams had 41 points and 13 assists (against five turnovers) in the two games, and in the latter he chased Kentucky’s Rajon Rondo, who could get drafted in Round 1, off the floor.
If Knight knows as much basketball as he says he does — and, to be honest, as I once believed he did — then he had to see in Marcus Williams the sort of player who could pull the Hawks’ many tangents together. That said, I have a bad feeling about this.
I have the feeling that the Hawks are going to wind up with the No. 3 or 4 pick and take Bargnani and then try something silly like trading for Allen Iverson — that’s this week’s rumor, you should know — and making him their nominal point guard. But we just learned with Joe Johnson that calling a guy a point guard doesn’t make him one, and anyone who turns to a coach-killer like Iverson as, ahem, an answer doesn’t really understand the question.
At some juncture the Hawks are going to have to find a for-real point guard and put him to work. Knight has a choice: That juncture can come while he’s still employed or after he has been canned for not finding one. The draft, even in a down year like this one, is where a GM earns his money. With the exception of Steve Belkin, the Hawks’ many owners have backed Knight in everything he has done. It’s time for Blunt Billy to justify that love.
Permalink | Comments (11) | Categories: Hawks / NBA, Mark Bradley
