More Hawks Mess: Ferry Takes Leave of Absence as Copy of Report Gets Out

((ht: ajc.com))

Oy! This keeps getting worse and there are far more layers to the story of the Atlanta Hawks, owner Bruce Levinson, G.M Danny Ferry and others than anyone knew.

The latest is Friday's revalation: Ferry is taking an indefinite leave of absence from his job. And he is taking it on the heels of the disputed scouting report that got him in trouble in the 1st place was leaked to Atlanta TV Station WSB.

You can read the report in question RIGHT HERE (bottom of pg 2 is interesting stuff)

Sigh---

We are pretty sure the report, which is heavily redacted, came from bitter minority owner Michael Gearon Jr, who has been the source of most of the leaks coming out in this story. It's common knowledge in the Atlanta sports community that you could get info from him about the Atlanta Spirit that the others won't release.

That doesn't excuse what was said in the report, which is a very offensive characterization of Luol Deng. Though the rest of the report apparently speaks pretty highly of him. Deng, who was being recruited to join the Hawks, eventually spurned their interest and signed with the Miami Heat.

Ferry likely does not have a future in Atlanta. Agree, disagree or otherwise with what he said and how it got released, there's no excuse for it being put out there. None.

If you aren't from Atlanta, this is perhaps the worst place ever for something like this to happen. He (Ferry) will never escape this as long as he stays. It won't be forgotten.

Our guess is by October the Hawks have a new G.M, by next year a new owner. And by the end of the season a similar result to the past 7 or 8 seasons, good--not great, out in the first round of the playoffs.

UPDATE:

Ferry released a statement Friday afternoon through via the Hawks website:

"No words can adequately describe my remorse for the hurt that I have caused many people through the statements I repeated, most importantly Luol Deng.

Luol is a good man who I have known for many years and he has done a tremendous amount of good for his country and around the world.  I apologize to Luol and I apologize to all that I have offended. As I have said, while these were not my words, I deeply regret repeating them.  Almost all the background information I provided during the lengthy presentation regarding Luol was positive and my personal and professional recommendation during the call was very much in favor of adding Luol to our team but I never should have uttered those offensive remarks and for that I apologize.

My focus moving forward is to tirelessly work to rebuild trust with this community and with our fans. I realize that my words may ring hollow now and my future actions must speak for me.  I will maximize my time during this leave to meet with community leaders and further educate myself and others on the extremely sensitive issues surrounding race, diversity, and inclusion. I will find a way to make a positive difference in this area, and further learn from the sensitivity training that I will go through.”

Danny Ferry Audio "Leaked"

((HT: AJC.com/Vivlamore))

Here's the audio from the key passage in the Luol Deng conversation among Atlanta Spirit ownership and President/GM Danny Ferry.

It was "leaked" to the media and the HQ uses the word "leaked" in quotes because we all have a good idea who did the leaking...
Allegedly...
Just so you know... And this also from Vivlamore's piece: Ferry does not say specifically that he is reading from a background report on the available portion of the tape. The rest of the recording, requested during the investigations by both the independent law firm and the NBA, was said to be lost.
That's not good, either...

DEVELOPING: Levenson To Sell Hawks Interest After "Racist E-Mail" Discovered (UPDATED With E-Mail))

((HT: Yahoo!Sports-Wojnarowski))

The Atlanta Hawks are the schleprock of the NBA...

No matter who the owner is and how much alleged investment is involved and/or promised to the community, nothing has changed since the days of Ted Turner being the media mogul/magnate and the days of Dominique versus Larry Bird.

The destination is as undesirable as you can get. The fan base small at best and the town is apathetic toward the franchise since the cirle of life lends itself to no marquee players- which means there is little reason to wander to a downtown arena in a mediocre conference where playoff appearances are, literally, assured and the team has to overpay to bring talent in- or get them to stay.

Remember Joe Johnson...???

So, when Adrian Wojnarowski announced on his Twitter feed that Levenson was selling, the HQ has the distinct feeling that some other action was on the cusp of happening (oh, like, a lawsuit or something...) and Levenson is out...

Commissioner Adam Silver released the following statement once the e-mail was discovered...

An e-mail written in 2012...

“Following Bruce Levenson notifying the league office this July of his August 2012 email, the NBA commenced an independent investigation regarding the circumstances of Mr. Levenson’s comments.

Prior to the completion of the investigation, Mr. Levenson notified me last evening that he had decided to sell his controlling interest in the Atlanta Hawks. As Mr. Levenson acknowledged, the views he expressed are entirely unacceptable and are in stark contrast to the core principles of the National Basketball Association. He shared with me how truly remorseful he is for using those hurtful words and how apologetic he is to the entire NBA family – fans, players, team employees, business partners and fellow team owners – for having diverted attention away from our game.

I commend Mr. Levenson for self-reporting to the league office, for being fully cooperative with the league and its independent investigator, and for putting the best interests of the Hawks, the Atlanta community, and the NBA first.

We will be working with the Hawks ownership group on the appropriate process for the sale of the team and I have offered our full support to Hawks CEO Steve Koonin, who will now oversee all team operations.

The NBA and its teams have long had in place anti-harassment and anti-discrimination policies in order to facilitate respectful and diverse workplaces. Earlier this summer, the league re-doubled its efforts by, among other things, making it mandatory for all league and team personnel to receive annual training on these issues."

Levenson issued a statement where he touched on what was said as he was trying to figure out:
 ways to increase attendance at games:

"In trying to address those issues, an e-mail I wrote 2 years ago that was inappropriate and offensive. I trivialized our fans by making cliched assumptions about their interests and by stereotyping their assumptions about one another."

"By focusing on race, I also sent the unintentional and hurtful message that our white fans are more valuable than our black fans."

"If you're angry about what I wrote, you should be. I'm angry at myself, too. It was inflammatory nonsense. We all may have subtle biases and preconceptions when it comes to race, but my role as a leader is to challenge them, not to validate or accommodate those who might hold them."

The Hawks, and their interim CEO Steve Koonin released their own statement:

To the City of Atlanta and Hawks Fans,

Today’s statement from Controlling Owner Bruce Levenson is extremely disappointing and the email that he sent over two years ago was alarming, offensive and most of all, completely unacceptable and does not reflect the principles and values of the Hawks organization. In partnership with the NBA, we will work to ensure that a new ownership team will be put in place that is united and committed to the Atlanta community.

Steve Koonin

CEO, Atlanta Hawks

It marks the next, and now, last involvement of the Atlanta Spirit, LLC group in this market that has been nothing short of an absymal failure on multiple levels- arena, ownership, legal battles, behind-the-scenes desires to sell, the loss of a hockey franchise, and now "racist" e-mails that are sending them out of town on rail...

But far too late for any of it to matter as, the HQ is certain, there are very few tears shed...

Exhibit A being below...
((HT: Sportsnet))


For the record, here's a link to the full e-mail which says in part:

My theory is that the black crowd scared away the whites and there are simply not enough affluent
black fans to build a signficant season ticket base. Please dont get me wrong. There was nothing
threatening going on in the arean back then. i never felt uncomfortable, but i think southern whites
simply were not comfortable being in an arena or at a bar where they were in the minority. On fan sites i
would read comments about how dangerous it is around philips yet in our 9 years, i don't know of a
mugging or even a pick pocket incident. This was just racist garbage. When I hear some people saying
the arena is in the wrong place I think it is code for there are too many blacks at the games.

I have been open with our executive team about these concerns. I have told them I want some white
cheerleaders and while i don't care what the color of the artist is, i want the music to be music familiar
to a 40 year old white guy if that's our season tixs demo. i have also balked when every fan picked out of
crowd to shoot shots in some time out contest is black. I have even bitched that the kiss cam is too
black.

Not good...

Report: Did The Atlanta Hawks Violate Tampering Policy? (UPDATE: Yup, They Did...)

((ht: ajc.com))

Well, that's another fine mess the marketing department may have made.

According to a report Tuesday afternoon in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the Atlanta Hawks sent a letter to possible season-ticket buyers that mentions the possibility of the team acquiring Dwight Howard and Chris Paul.

Problem is: It may have violated the NBA Anti-Tampering policy since it apparently while both are pending "Free-Agents" they apparently can't be mentioned as targets by the team until after July 1st.

It's not July 1st. (at least not as of this posting date)

The paper says neither the Hawks nor the NBA will comment about it, but mentioning players by name before July 1st has been a big "No-No" in NBA circles. It's cost the Hawks and other teams a good bit of money in the past.

Read the entire AJC.com story explaining it RIGHT HERE

We kind of feel bad for the Hawks, but this is sort of funny. They have an incredible penchant for doing stuff that most teams know not to do. It doesn't appear, at least based on the report, that the team upper management was aware of this, but they should have been.

And if they didn't, well, that's a pretty big front office failure. While it would be nice to say "Marketing went rogue", the assumption should be nothing goes out without the boss's approval.

And certainly the Atlanta Spirit would operate like that...

Would they?

MONDAY UPDATE: The Hawks were fined an undisclosed amount for violating the anti-tampering policy.

The NBA is saying that three teams violated the policy- just not saying who it was.
The Rockets were reportedly another team that was guilty.

In a statement to the AJC last week, Hawks president Bob Williams said, “The (first) letter that has been referred to was written by one of our season-ticket reps of his own volition. While certainly he is a member of our business staff, his specific reference clearly does not represent how our basketball operations or our business staff have consistently communicated about free agency. It is unfortunate that this mistake, by a single ticket rep with no ill intent, occurred.”


Deadspin is reporting that is was former first-round draft pick Cal Bowdler who sent the e-mail blast...

DEVELOPING: NBA Hawks To St. Louis...???

According to the New York Post's Peter Vecsey, and his Twitter feed, we may now have the reason that the Atlanta Hawks are dumping all their bad deals...

They might be moving back to St. Louis...

It was a simple 140-character release...
Hawks are reloading, dumping money, about to relocate to St. Louis. What don't U understand bout DH only wanting to play 4 Nets

But it does present an interesting point about Atlanta Spirit and their lack of a desire to have any kind of business acumen or public relations with what's left of their fan base after the departure of the Atlanta Thrashers to Winnipeg this time last season.

And, of course, the prosportsdaily message board is running with it...

Would they (meaning Spirit) have the cojones to pull the same stunt twice...???
The HQ thinks they would... but that's just us...

So, as a salute, we give you this...


It would make sense if a group would pursue this for the ScottTrade Center.

Remember back in May, Tom Stillman and his 16-person consortium, including his father-in-law, former Senator John Danforth were introduced as the new owners of the St. Louis Blues after the Matthew Hulsizer deal fell through.

The Stillman group is the eighth owner of the Blues since 1966. They bought the team from Towerbrook Capital Partners and Sports Capital Partners Worldwide, a group headed by former franchise chairman Dave Checketts for US$130-million for the Blues, the AHL Peoria Rivermen, the Scottrade Center and what the team said was a "substantial" interest in the adjoining Peabody Opera House.

The stumbling block for anyone to get out of Philips Arena is the lease deal- which is locked into a US$75-million penalty if some party wants to leave Atlanta in the next seven years. The bonds are set to be paid off on the arena by 2028, but the debt service and any departure are not locked into one another exclusively.

So, You REALLY Wanna Know, Atlanta Spirit...??? Really...???

((HT: AJC/Schultz))

Sarge, completely, gets the credit for this...
But the HQ felt compelled to share...

The folks over at the Alexander Babbage PR firm are asking for people to respond to what they call a "fan pulse" survey... wait for it...

The first five questions are relatively harmless, but the sixth question is one of those "from a scale of 1 to 5" things...

Using a scale of 1 to 5 where 1 means "Not at all interested, I never follow" and 5 means "Very interested, I always follow," please rate your level of interest in the following.

How interested are you in the:

Sports in general
The sport of basketball
NBA overall
NBA lockout news
Atlanta Hawks front office news
Atlanta Hawks game performance/stats
News about Hawks ownership
News about the sale of the Thrashers
Non-sporting events at Philips Arena

Really...??? really...
Yup... they went there...

Here's what a lot of folks think about that question...
Exhibit 1...
((HT: JHendrix70/Sportsnet))


Exhibit 2...
((HT: JHendrix70/WXIA-TV))


Hubris is an amazing thing...

BREAKING: Atlanta Hawks sale is off

Alex Meruelo

((ht: ajc.com))

It appears the sale of the Atlanta Hawks to Los Angeles businessman Alex Meruelo is no longer.

According to a report Friday afternoon in the Atlanta Journal Constitution, the sale was ended by mutual agreement. Questions had begun to arise as to whether Meruelo had the finances to pull off the sale...it appears he didn't.

The story from AJC.com RIGHT HERE

The deal between Meruelo and the nebulous Atlanta Spirit group was announced in early August and was treated somewhat celebratorily in the city of Atlanta where the Spirit is not highly thought of.

Meruelo told the newspaper he was sad to give up on his dream, but proclaimed he eventually would own an NBA Franchise. He also said the current labor problems in the league attributed to the problems.

It also essentially means the Hawks will continue operating in the somewhat inept way they have been. While we've encountered many of the Atlanta Spirit group members and feel they are decent people, they've struggled to run their Pro Sports properties. The sale of the Atlanta Thrashers may help them with financing, but the staggeringly bad contract they gave Joe Johnson means the Hawks will be a decent, not great basketball team for many years to come.

DEVELOPING: Hawks Sale Hits Snag

((HT: AJC.com))

Stop the HQ if you've heard this one before...

Tim Tucker's piece in the AJC says that the bid of California bid-ness man Alex Meruelo has not received the approval of the NBA Board of Governors after/during the vetting process...

From Tucker:

“I have more than ample resources to purchase and operate the Hawks in a first-class manner,” Meruelo’s statement said. “I am committed to the purchase of the Atlanta Hawks.

“While I can’t comment on the details of the approval process, I have [done] and will do everything I can to bring the process to a positive conclusion.”

Can we keep laughing over this...???

Or does the HQ have to focus on the idea that Atlanta Spirit is still in charge of this until another owner is found- unless Meruelo can put up a boatload of financial guarantees...

Spirit Settles Lawsuit With Their Lawyers

Surprising no one, what's left of Atlanta Spirit settled their lawsuit with their local lawyers at the King and Spalding firm over what ASG called poor representation over their legal malpractice lawsuit against former ASG partner Steve Belkin.

Steve Collins, who represents the firm, said Wednesday that King & Spalding and Atlanta Spirit settled the US$195-million.

Spirit said in a January lawsuit that the firm negotiated a "fatally flawed contract" to end the Belkin dispute.

Collins said the terms of the settlement were confidential. The Atlanta Spirit did not immediately comment.

The HQ thinks it was aomething along the lines of recovering legal fees in the process- and that's about it... the sooner that Spirit is away from sports, the better off we all are...

BREAKING: Atlanta Hawks Sold To California Developer ((UPDATED))

That's really about all we know right now...

More when we know more... at least it looks like the end of Atlanta Spirit Group as we know them as owners...

No word on whether or not Philips Arena is part of the package, either...

UPDATE: We know more...

California developer and pizza chain owner Alex Meruelo is the lucky guy, and the NBA team will remain in Atlanta. The deal, subject to the approval of the NBA, is to be announced on Monday.

Meruelo, who will have controlling interest of more than 50 percent of the Hawks, founded La Pizza Loca. It has over 50 franchised and company-owned restaurants in Southern California.

He also heads something called "The Meruelo Group," a Downey, California-based investment firm, which recently acquired the Grand Sierra Resort and Casino in Reno, Nev., for a reported $42.45 million.

More when we know more...

1615 UPDATE: We know more... he has a quote from Mark Bradley's interview in the AJC saying:
"I'm a person who doesn't give up. I want to bring a championship to the city of Atlanta."

Meruelo would become the first Hispanic owner of an NBA team, and his holding company is the owner of one of the largest Hispanic television stations in the US- KWHY-TV in Los Angeles. If Meruelo is serious about being an owner, then tapping into Atlanta's Hispanic market would be a natural fit- albeit a tough one...

Spirit Still Hasn't Returned 2011 Ticket Deposits

((HT: WSB-TV Atlanta))

Consumer investigator Jim Strickland was thrust into the middle of a story that, some wished, already had an ending...

The HQ knows that, hopefully, the folks at True North Sports and Entertainment will give the team formerly known as the Atlanta Thrashers a good home. But the ownership group that sold the franchise, Atlanta Spirit (a group lacking in representation of both), is apparently holding season ticket deposits as long as they can...

From the WSB report:
Strickland also discovered the team's former owners, Atlanta Spirit LLC, haven't posted an update on the Web for weeks.

According to the website, before fans can get a 100 percent refund for next season, the NHL governors still need to approve the sale.

That happened nearly a month ago.

June 21st, to be accurate...
Remember...??? Apparently, Spirit has conveniently...
((HT: Sun News Network/JHendrix70))


The rationale is easy to figure- other than the major idea that the ownership group is looking to grab any kind of interest-bearing payment they can to improve their bottom line- which, really, is business...

Plain business... it's selfish, boorish, and completely unprofessional in a market where the NBA franchise is still owned by what's left of their coffeurs...

But it's business...

The HQ gets it... but any kind emotional capital they thought they had left (which, really, wasn't much) may be out the window...

Enjoy that lockout... which, being business, will mean Spirit won't have to spend any money on any level...