Travis Schlenk Answers Questions on Cam Reddish Trade

We now have more knowledge about the deal.

© Dale Zanine-USA TODAY Sports

Yesterday everyone was shocked by the latest "Woj Bomb" from ESPN's Adrian Wojnarowski. Just before noon, we learned the Hawks dealt Cam Reddish and Solomon Hill to the New York Knicks for Kevin Knox and a protected first-round draft pick.

It has since come to light that Reddish had requested a trade earlier this summer. The 23-year-old wants more playing time and a shot at a rookie contract extension. Apparently, Atlanta's front office made it clear he wasn't getting either with the Hawks, so they began canvassing the league for trade partners.

New York is including Kevin Knox in trade to Atlanta, sources tell ESPN.

— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) January 13, 2022

Fast forward to this afternoon, and we got to hear from Hawks general manager Travis Schlenk on his rationale for the trade. After explaining his side of the story, Schlenk added, “(Cam) can certainly go on and have an All-Star career. He wouldn’t be the first player that didn’t have an All-Star career with the team that drafted him. I wish nothing but the best for Cam. I have no ill will towards him at all.”

When asked if he was worried about the move potentially backfiring, Schlenk said, “I don’t know if I worry about it coming back to burn me. I wouldn’t be surprised if Cam Reddish goes on to have a great career. What I came to is he probably wasn’t going to have that with us.”

With still about a month to go before the trade deadline and the team struggling, Schlenk said, “We wanted to see if a little tweak would have an impact…by doing this early it gives us a runway to evaluate.”

#Hawks GM Travis Schlenk speaks on his thought process behind trading #CamReddish to #Knicks. pic.twitter.com/lCUtrlgnOs

— Tenitra Batiste (@tenitrabatiste) January 14, 2022

So it sounds like Schlenk made a move that he had planned on for a while and now wants to use the next few weeks to survey the league. Will this extra draft pick be used in a larger trade down the road? We don't know. But Schlenk did say, “One thing I will say about draft picks, everyone values draft picks.”

The Hawks play the Heat in Miami tonight at 8:00 eastern. We will be live-tweeting and posting a recap after the game. Stay locked into Sports Illustrated's AllHawks.com for breaking news, highlights, and anlalysis.

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