With Dejounte Murray trade, Hawks finally move forward and reset around Trae Young – for now

Dejounte is gone. Is Trae next?

Either way, the Atlanta Hawks must be feeling a lot better today because they finally ripped the band-aid off. One of Dejounte Murray or Trae Young had to go…at least. Today the answer was Murray, whom the team sent to New Orleans for Dyson Daniels, Larry Nance Jr., EJ Liddell and two first-round picks, league sources confirmed Friday.

Somehow, it appears the Hawks were able to recoup about 97 cents on the dollar from the reckless trade that brought Murray to Atlanta in the first place, a trade that plunged them into a crisis of relentless mediocrity but unable to sink.

For a front office that went an entire calendar year without making a single transaction more significant than promoting Trent Forrest on a two-way deal, this is a shocking and remarkable accomplishment.

Let’s compare side by side. The initial Murray trade sent three first-round picks, two of them unprotected, and a pick swap to San Antonio; on Friday, the Hawks received two first-rounders and a former lottery pick in Daniels. Veteran big Nance is in the deal as a salary match.

Recall, however, that one of those firsts initially sent to San Antonio – a lottery protected first from Charlotte – has yet to be conveyed and appears increasingly likely to turn into two second-round picks in 2026 and 2027 (This will happen if the Hornets miss the playoffs this year, as most expect).

The Hawks won’t have their own picks in 2025 and 2027 and owe the Spurs a trade in 2026, when the Victor Wembanyama-led San Antonio team should be powerful. Not great, Bob. We’ll come back to this part in a minute.

On the other hand, Atlanta just picked up an unprotected pick from the Lakers in the 2025 draft that has a very high chance of landing in the top 10. The Hawks also received an unprotected pick in 2027, although It’s the lesser choice between New Orleans or Milwaukee.

The other gem, however, is Daniels, a budding defensive specialist who joins a team whose tragic inability to contain the ball resulted in the league’s 27th-ranked defense a season ago.

Daniels has two years left on a rookie contract that will pay him $6.1 million this year and $7.7 million next year. He struggles to shoot and doesn’t really fit in New Orleans because there are so many other suspect shooters, but in Atlanta he becomes a key piece that could start to balance out the famed Matador Young.

The timing of this trade also allows the Hawks to recycle John Collins’ $23 million exception for another year; it will now be the “Murray exception”, worth $18.2 million until June 28 or 29. The Atlanta faithful will never again need to say the name “John Collins” every time they propose a trade. (I should note: $6 million will remain on the Collins exception until July 8 if the Hawks prove frisky in the trade machine.)

Atlanta can also hang another “luxury tax avoided” banner in the rafters of State Farm Arena, dropping $6.3 million below the line after their lottery triumph briefly put them above it. The Hawks have 14 players under contract, but adding Nance would seem to make Bruno Fernando’s $2.7 million non-guaranteed deal fungible; the deadline for his guarantee is Saturday, so we’ll know soon.

I joke about luxury tax avoidance, but the extra financial wiggle room opens up other possibilities for Atlanta. Signing Vit Krejčí to a roster deal appears to be a foregone conclusion, but the Hawks could also consider a small contract for free agent forward Saddiq Bey. He has a torn ACL and will likely miss most or all of this season, but the Hawks would retain their rights to Bird until next summer if he remains under contract in 2024-25.

Most notably, Atlanta can now use its non-taxpayer mid-level exemption to pursue other talent. In particular, the guard could use another shot creator for non-Young minutes.

Even without further movement, the Hawks have quickly transformed into a younger team. Daniels, No. 1 overall pick Zaccharie Risacher, 2023 first-rounder Kobe Bufkin and 2022 first-rounder Jalen Johnson — among the league’s most improved players last season — now appear to be key pieces.

Of course, I say all this as if the Hawks are done negotiating. Are they? Clint Capela and De’Andre Hunter rumors have been around for ages, but the general consensus from league sources is that the Hawks can’t get any meaningful return for them.

And finally, there’s the elephant in the room. No discussion of Atlanta’s fate is complete without discussing the nuclear option: trading Young to San Antonio and getting those picks back, which would allow Atlanta to move forward with a sincere reset of the tanking around Risacher, Johnson and Daniels.

San Antonio is the only plausible trade partner for such a move, given that the Spurs currently own three straight draft picks from the Hawks. Ideally, San Antonio is also in desperate need of an elite point guard and could easily bundle non-core salaries (Devonte’ Graham, Zach Collins and Tre Jones) to match Young’s $43 million salary. The fact that the Spurs just pushed Graham’s guarantee date to July 8 is at least sobering.

Pivoting to tank by trading Young to any other team is much more difficult. Theoretically, Atlanta could also do “The Brooklyn Special” by trading the picks they just received in the Murray trade to San Antonio to get their own picks back, but the Spurs would likely demand a premium beyond that in the first additional ones. So unless the deals for Young are in Mikal Bridges territory — think top four or five — dealing Young elsewhere probably isn’t a good move for Atlanta.

So this is once again undeniably Team Trae Young…for now.

This time, at least, the pieces fit together much better. Let’s pause to quickly acknowledge Murray, who played (and played well) through various injuries in the second half of last season, even though his name was in trade rumors and he knew he was likely gone this summer. But he and Young had no chemistry together, and asking Murray to keep both of them took away one of his old strengths.

Existential questions remain about whether this team can actually accomplish anything other than “first-round cannon fodder”—Atlanta’s record over the last four seasons is a harmless 161-157. Fittingly, they got the No. 1 pick in a year where most viewed the No. 1 pick as a useful secondary weapon but not a superstar. Play-in time!

Still, Friday was the best day for the reconstituted Landry Fields management since its inception. By getting rid of Murray, the Hawks regained the flexibility to move in a number of directions with or without Young. (Don’t overlook the fact that they’ve now escaped the Stepien Rule, for example, by trading their own first-rounder in 2026 or 2028.)

In doing so, they ended up with a younger, cheaper, more consistent squad that was better suited to their best player. It’s just unclear how long that last point will hold.

(Top photo of Trae Young and Dejounte Murray: Kevin Jairaj / USA Today)