Option 2: Trade the #1 pick and Trae Young and/or Dejounte Murray
Cleaning the house is also always an option. The trickiest thing about future assets is that sometimes they can be incredibly valuable and other times teams may not get a great return on investment. After this year’s draft, however, the Hawks do not have another 1st round draft pick until 2028, mainly due to the Dejounte Murray trade. If Atlanta chooses to replenish their draft selections by trading both Young and Murray, it could be a better setup for the long term.
They could also very well leverage their #1 overall pick and use it to gain 2-3 additional first round picks either in this draft or future drafts that may have a stronger pool of prospects. Something like the San Antonio Spurs trading their 4th overall and 8th overall picks this year as well as a 2025 first-rounder could make sense for both teams if the Spurs lock in on someone specific that they want to pair with Victor Wembanyama.
This would allow Jalen Johnson to take on a bigger role and let younger prospects overall take the reins for the Hawks. This can be risky, however, due to the draft lottery system, as proven by this last season.
No team wants to end up like the Detroit Pistons who lost 28 games in a row, but still fell in the draft lottery to the 5th pick, despite having the worst record in the entire league. Is the high risk worth the potentially higher reward?