Biggest winners and losers of the 2018 NBA Trade Deadline
Loser: Atlanta Hawks
Heading into the 2018 NBA Trade Deadline, the tanking Atlanta Hawks had quite a few veterans who would’ve served a greater purpose on playoff teams and netted the Hawks some sort of draft compensation.
Guys like Marco Belinelli, Ersyan Ilyasova and Dewayne Dedmon probably weren’t fetching first round picks in such a stiff market, but getting something for them — especially with Ilyasova and Belinelli hitting free agency this summer — would’ve been nice.
The Hawks have informed veteran sharpshooter Marco Belinelli that he is on course to be traded by Thursday's 3 p.m. deadline, league sources say. Atlanta said to still be weighing its options in terms of exactly where it will send him with multiple teams interested
— Marc Stein (@TheSteinLine) February 7, 2018
Instead, the 17-38 Hawks stood pat at the deadline. They didn’t aid the youth movement with any additional second round picks or young prospects. They didn’t get any value out of Belinelli or Ilyasova while they still could. They didn’t do…anything.
Okay, so they did something. They traded Luke Babbitt to the Miami Heat for Okaro White, who was immediately waived. So they basically just got Babbitt’s $1.5 million expiring contract off the books a few months early, and may now pursue buyouts for Belinelli/Ilyasova.
Hooray for doing nothing!