The Hawks front office and coaching staff came down to the Arena for morning
workouts on both Saturday and Sunday this weekend, with a few big names coming
in to strut their stuff. Saturday saw Wake Forest's Jeff Teague as the
headliner, with Jermaine Taylor (Central Florida), Lester Hudson
(UT-Martin), Aaron Jackson (Duquesne), Dar Tucker (DePaul), and
Manny Quezada (San Francisco) on hand as well.
Sunday brought Tyler Hansbrough from national champion North Carolina
as well as Memphis' Shawn Taggart, Georgia Tech product Alade Aminu,
and Syracuse G Eric Devendorf.
Here are a few nuggets on the action:
- Teague looked smooth. He seemed very calm and self-assured going through
the paces, and showed off a lightning-quick crossover.
- Lester Hudson turned some heads on Saturday. The 24-year old reminded some
of Flip Murray with his story (in the diamond in the rough sort of way), and
with his performance. No doubt about it, the guy can score. He stroked it pretty
well from the perimeter in the workouts, which backs up his reputation (he
averaged 26.6 ppg in his two seasons at UT-Martin).
- Hansbrough showed why his nickname is "Psycho T". His intensity is really
something to see close up, as he really got after it with Taggart and Aminu.
That's not to knock any of the other players who've worked out for the Hawks so
far (and Taggart and Aminu both returned the favor), but Hansbrough does seem to
take it up a notch, much as he did throughout his career.
- Taggart was somewhat of an afterthought at Memphis playing with teammates
such as Derrick Rose, Chris Douglas-Roberts, and Tyreke Evans, but he showed
some nice skills inside and out on Sunday. At 6-10, he could create some
match-up problems in the NBA if he can hit shots as consistently as he did in
the workout.
That concludes the scheduled individual workouts for the Hawks in advance of
Thursday's draft. One more possibility that has surfaced – after initially
declining prior invites by the Hawks, Ty Lawson’s camp has reached out to the
club regarding a potential Wednesday workout. This one may or may not happen,
and for good reason. Being the day prior to the draft, Wednesday is the single
busiest phone day for the Hawks’ decision makers.
Stay tuned….