The Hawks were picked to finish third in the Eastern Conference, behind the Cavaliers and Bulls, in a survey of NBA general managers released by the league Tuesday.
The survey also picked the Cavaliers to win the NBA Championship (53.6 percent) and LeBron James to win the league MVP (39.3 percent).
In the survey, no general manager picked the Hawks to win the East. The team received 13.8 percent of the votes to finish second, 34.5 percent to finish third and 17.2 percent to finish fourth. Overall, the Hawks had 12.8 percent of the total votes behind the Cavaliers (38.9 percent, 96.6 percent to win) and the Bulls (24.7 percent, 3.4 percent to win).
The Warriors were selected to win the Western Conference.
Also:
* Coach Mike Budenholzer received votes as best coach in the NBA. Gregg Popovich (93.1 percent) was the easy winner. Steve Kerr also received votes.
* Budenholzer (6.9 percent) finished third behind Kerr (58.6) and Popovich (27.6) as the head coach that runs the best offense.
* Kyle Korver (10.3 percent) finished second behind Stephen Curry (79.3) as the league’s best pure shooter.
* Korver (69.0 percent) easily defended as best player at moving without the ball.
* Korver (13.8 percent) finished third behind Andre Iguodala (20.7) and Draymond Green (17.2 percent) as best role player.
* Jeff Teague received votes behind John Wall (53.4 percent) for fastest player with ball.
* Tiago Splitter received votes as the most underrated player acquisition.
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