The Atlanta Hawks have been on a slow decline since their franchise-best 60 win season in the 2014-15 campaign which ended in the Eastern Conference Finals. They finished with 48 wins in 2015-16 and a second round postseason elimination and this past season they won 43 games and they were knocked out in round one. They’re falling and their roster is not anywhere near the same as it was only three seasons ago.
The starting five of Jeff Teague, Kyle Korver, Demarre Carroll, Paul Millsap and Al Horford, four of which were NBA All-Stars and all five shared Eastern Conference player of the month honors in January 2016, are all long gone besides Millsap. But even he could depart this offseason and move on to another franchise closer to winning.
They’ve replaced Teague with German sensation Dennis Schroder, Korver was replaced with Tim Hardaway Jr, Carroll with a platoon of Kent Bazemore, Thabo Sefolosha and rookie Taurean Prince and Dwight Howard came to replace Horford. It’s been relatively hit or miss to this point and Atlanta is clearly not trending the right way.
When things start to go wrong, teams often make changes in the organization and it appears general manager Wes Wilcox and president of basketball operations and head coach Mike Budenholzer might be the pieces getting shifted around.
The original report of Wilcox being relieved of his duties comes from ESPN’s Jeff Goodman.
Atlanta Hawks have parted ways with GM Wes Wilcox, sources told ESPN. Story coming. https://t.co/4g53brOXrV
— Jeff Goodman (@GoodmanESPN) May 3, 2017
Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution first reported the team refutes the report.
Not saying the report of Wes Wilcox out as Hawks GM is untrue but I have spoken to two persons who have no knowledge of it.
— Chris Vivlamore (@CVivlamoreAJC) May 3, 2017
From Hawks: "There are no changes to report at his time. Any reports indicating otherwise are inaccurate."
— Chris Vivlamore (@CVivlamoreAJC) May 3, 2017
But Adrian Wojnarowski of The Vertical says some sort of moves are coming and it could also involve Mike Budenholzer.
In what could turn out to be a dramatic management restructuring of the Atlanta Hawks’ front office, owner Tony Ressler is seriously discussing with president and coach Mike Budenholzer the possibility of Budenholzer relinquishing his management title, league sources told The Vertical.
Budenholzer would continue as coach and have a significant voice in player personnel, but could ultimately answer to a new president or general manager, league sources told The Vertical.
The Hawks are also considering the removal of general manager Wes Wilcox, league sources said. Wilcox reports to Budenholzer in the current organizational structure.
Wilcox was meeting with ownership in Los Angeles on Wednesday to discuss his future with the organization and league sources say that the possibility of Wilcox assuming another role within basketball operations hadn’t been ruled out, sources said.
