Our Congress is wasting more of its time debating with the NBA about its age rule (instead of spending time giving our tax dollars to banks posting billion dollar profits and union cronies who oppose trade that would grow our economy).  There are innumerable precedents to setting an age limit in a workplace, and given that the NBA is a venture entered into by free will, it is only legal and logical that it should be able to set a few basic parameters for working there.

Lots of people oppose age limits (like R Kelly, Roman Polanski, the late Michael Jackson) who argue that players have a right to earn a living.  How is this right taken away?  Players are free to work anywhere else - an office, a restaurant, even the NBDL - and as Brandon Jennings showed us last year, they can make a nice living playing basketball abroad.  The NBA has a responsibility to its shareholders to protect the value and quality of their product and have the right to do it in a manner they see fit.  PR backlash from the drafting of high school players was strong, especially among non-young fans.

Is the game any worse off for not having these players for a year or two?  Couldn't we have done without Kobe's airballs against the Jazz in the playoffs, or Lebron's bad Cleveland teams missing the playoffs, or the initally unimpressive showings of Garnett, Chandler, and Jermaine O'Neal?  And weren't Derrick Rose and OJ Mayo handsomely compensated for their efforts in college? (Zing!)

The NBA age floor provides the league with more polished, mature athletes who have built a bit of a brand for themselves in the college game.  Staying in college didn't hurt Tim Duncan or Brandon Roy, and even helped Kevin Durant and Michael Beasley.  The only people truly harmed are the failures who fold under the pressure of increased competitiveness, like Kwame Brown and his ilk.

In these columns, I have taken over as the owner/GM of your NBA franchise.  Herein I suggest personnel (player, coach, and management) and coaching changes that will take your franchise to the next level, moving from losing to winning and winning to winning big.  I have taken all salary and free agency information from HoopsHype.com, draft information from foxsports.com, and basketball statistics from ESPN.com.  Where applicable, I used the trade checker on RealGM.com.

If I were to take any NBA squad to Rucker Park with me for some playground action, I'd probably take the Atlanta Hawks.  This team has an absurd collection of athletes, but few basketball players.  For all the critics of players who jumped to the NBA fresh out of high school or didn't spend enough time in college, the Hawks are your case in point.

A quick glance at the roster and a stroll through their offensive statistics tells you, "Hey this team isn't half bad."  Actually, the problem is they are half bad.  Offensively, they're 16th in scoring, 12th in John Hollinger's offensive efficiency rating, 17th in FG%, 11th in 3pt%, and 18th in points per shot; in other words, an average offensive team.  Where things get ugly is in the more mature basketball aspects of the game: 28th in turnovers and assist/turnover ratio, 20th in assists, 24th in opponents' blocked shots, 26th in points allowed, and 27th in opponent FG%.         

The stats tell the Hawks have a potentially good offense with horrible decision making and a defense with all the intensity of an episode of Wild on E.  What to do with a team in desperate need of leadership and basketball smarts?

Solutions

Get a starting point guard.  This is a position I would definitely not fill via the draft.  The last thing this time needs is another player feeling his way through the NBA.  Joe Johnson is not a point guard, he's a 2 with passing skill.  With Johnson playing off the ball more, it would cut down his hideous turnover rate.  I would call up the Bobcats to see what it would take to bring in Brevin Knight.  Offer Josh Childress and maybe a second-rounder.  Knight comes in #3 in the NBA in assists and #2 in steals and assist/turnover ratio, glaring weaknesses for the Hawks.  Tyronn Lue is an excellent backup point guard and Royal Ivey is a good third point, especially for defensive purposes.

Let Al Harrington go.  He'll definitely want more money than he's worth - he's looking for all-star pay based on "potential,"   Truth is he's 26, at the beginning of most players' prime, and in this season as one of the two best players on his team, he shot a bad percentage for forwards, took too many threes, turned the ball over at a hideous rate, shoots free throws poorly, led the league in fouls per game, and isn't clutch or a leader. The best part: his shot blocking numbers are the same as Jalen Rose at .18 per game, just ahead of Steve Nash's .15.  Not the part of the MVP's game you want to emulate. 

With Harrington gone, draft a big man.  At the top of the draft, they have options: Lamarcus Aldridge, Tyrus Thomas, and Andrea Bargnani would all be fine selections.  Aldrige would provide low-post scoring and rebounding, Thomas plenty of defense and rebounding, and Bargnani scoring and excellent all-around shooting.  Considering the Hawks' needs in all of these areas, they really can't go wrong with any of them, but with Bargnani probably the worst choice for his defensive liabilities.  If they're feeling adventurous, they could trade down and draft Shelden Williams, but I'm nervous about all non-Elton Brand Duke players in the NBA.  (Danny Ferry, anybody?  Laettner? Dunleavy?  Is Coach K really the guy to coach NBA players in the Olympics?  That's another blog.)

Fire Billy Knight and fire Mike Woodson if you can get Rick Adelman.  Knight would be the worst GM in the league if it weren't for Isaiah Thomas.  Mike Bradley of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution quotes Knight as saying "I always take talent. ... I like good basketball players, and there are a lot of 6-foot-8 players in the draft. And 6-8 is the ideal size."  Knight dealt away Boris Diaw, the NBA's most improved player, and draft picks (which you can't do when you're a bad team) to vastly overpay a player in Joe Johnson whose skills were already duplicated and triplicated  on the team.  And as Mike Bradley points out, none of the draftees in three seasons under Knight has gotten so much as one third-place vote for Rookie of the Year.  We're minutes away from him pulling a Bob Whitsitt and saying "hey, I didn't major in chemistry."

I don't really know anything about Woodson, but all the markers of bad coaching are there: high turnovers, bad shooting, poor defense, and pouting players.  Throw some dollars at Rick Adelman, a proven winner with the creativity to maximize your team's talent.  He doesn't fight with his players through the media and he deals with problems.  Adelman is a master of offensive efficiency and could turn the Hawks into the offensive juggernaut they could be.  Defensively he creates strategies to minimize the exposure of your flaws.  He uses the 3 pointer as a weapon; the Hawks are an accurate shooting team that is in the lower third of teams as far as attempts.  With some low-post scoring to attract double teams and some ball-movement, Salim Stoudamire and Joe Johnson could become shooting sensations.

Spend the majority of practice time on defense and ballhandling.  Defense is mostly about effort; the Memphis Grizzlies are a team that by NBA standards is athletically challenged, but they're not afraid to get in your face.  This reflects on the coaching more than anything; example A is the Tomjanovich/Hamblen Lakers versus the Phil Jackson Lakers the next season.  Intelligent shot selection, good ball movement, and not turning it over will help the inexperienced defence.  Bringing in a real starting point guard and improved coaching will help. 

Conclusion

The Atlanta Hawks are actually in a pretty good position for the future: lots of cap room, high draft picks, only one large salary clogging the cap, and underdeveloped but skilled players.  They should save their money for next year when the free agency market really picks up.  Since it doesn't count against the cap, don't worry about overpaying to bring in a proven coach like Adelman.  And for GM, Spurs assistant GM Sam Presti or trainees of Rod Thorn, Geoff Petrie, and Joe Dumars would be wise choises to give the team the right combination of building for the future, bringing in veteran leadership, and cap management that make teams successful in the long run.