Should the Atlanta Hawks look at trading their former No. 4 pick?

According to Darryn Albert of Larry Brown Sports, the Utah Jazz are showing interest in Atlanta Hawks wing De’Andre Hunter. This is understandable given how Hunter has performed this season, especially as he was seen to be one of the best players in the playoffs despite playing only one series.

The Hawks and the Jazz are both looking at turning their rosters over this offseason, most probably via trade. The Hawks don’t have a huge amount of wiggle room to sign free agents due to their salary cap situation. This situation will be clearer prior to free agency though after the Hawks decide whether or not to guarantee Danilo Gallinari’s contract.

However, at this point, we need to assume that the salary cap situation will remain status quo until the Hawks make a move. This means that for the Jazz to get Hunter, they need to make a trade. Given that the former Virginia standout is entering the fourth season of his rookie deal, the Hawks won’t be able to trade for a franchise player without adding more pieces.

Why the Atlanta Hawks would need to make several trades to make this work.

In order to trade Hunter, the Hawks would want to get a decent return because, after some injury-interrupted seasons, he is starting to develop into a truly exceptional player. His ability to defend at a high level and switch to offense is becoming a rare commodity in the NBA these days.

Getting Donovan Mitchell in return is not an option as the Jazz are looking to build around him. Other players who are currently around the same value as Hunter are Royce O’Neale, Juancho Hernangomez, and Rudy Gay, none of which are enough to make it worthwhile to make the move for Hunter.

There are several players who are of higher value like Jordan Clarkson, Bojan Bogdanovic, and Mike Conley. None of these players are likely to move the needle for the Hawks enough to trade Hunter and another player. This really only leaves Rudy Gobert as an option for a return for Hunter.

This means that the Hawks will need to trade one of the higher paid players on the roster. If the Hawks traded Bogdan Bogdanovic and Hunter then they would be moving two wings for another inside player who does not space the floor.

This means that Clint Capela would have to be one of the players traded otherwise the Hawks roster becomes too pivot focussed and unbalanced. However, Hunter and Capela are still not enough to match the salary of Gobert meaning that they need to add a third contract such as Jalen Johnson.

This would mean that the Hawks would be sending out three players and only getting one in return. This would have such a significant impact on the Hawks depth, and their ability to gain depth. This would mean that navigating a full NBA season plus playoffs would be even harder, especially if one of the stars suffered an injury.

This means that they would then have to trade another top paid player to create more room to get the quality mid-range players required to make a potential championship run. This is not plausible for the Hawks unless they got a third star into the team, which is going to be difficult.

Trading Hunter to the Jazz is a bad idea unless a third and/or a fourth team is bought into the deal.