New Report Links Multiple Candidates to Atlanta Hawks Open Front Office Position, Including Multiple Former GM's

The Atlanta Hawks are currently looking for a new president of basketball operations. Atlanta made the move to fire former general manager Landry Fields earlier this offseason and promoted Onsi Saleh to the the position. When they announced they were firing Fields, they also said they will begin the search for a President of Basketball Operations and have hired Sportsology Group, a leading provider of strategic advisory and operational support in the sports industry, to direct the process. Today, Zach Klein of WSB-TV in Atlanta reported "The Atlanta Hawks are casting a very wide net in their search for a team president" and mentioned former Hawks GM Danny Ferry, former Nuggets GM Calvin Booth, former Kings GM Monte McNair, Shareef Abur-Rahim, and ⁠Elton Brand.

per multiple NBA league sources… the Atlanta Hawks are casting a very wide net in their search for a team president.
One name is very familiar to Hawks fans…. former GM Danny Ferry.

Ferry will interview for the job along with Monte McNair, Calvin Booth, Shareef Abur-Rahim… pic.twitter.com/FY0TqxmneI
— Zach Klein (@ZachKleinWSB) May 2, 2025

This is an interesting list to say the least. Ferry was the GM for the Hawks and was hired in 2012, but then stepped down in the summer of 2015. From ESPN, " Ferry's departure ends a 10-month indefinite leave of absence that followed the release of an audio recording of a conference call with ownership in which Ferry was heard repeating culturally insensitive comments from a scouting report about Miami Heat forward Luol Deng. ESPN reported this past weekend that the law firm hired by the team -- Alston & Bird LLP -- conducted 19 witness interviews and reviewed the contents of more than 24,000 emails and found no evidence that Ferry's comments on Deng were motivated by bias."

Ferry has been working in the NBA since his departure from Atlanta. He was a special advisor to the general manager for the Pelicans from 2016 to 2019 and has been a consultant for the San Antonio Spurs since 2020.

McNair was hired by Sacramento before the start of the 2020-21 season and helped put together the team that ended a decade-plus playoff drought in 2023 when it went 48-34 to finish third in the Western Conference. McNair won NBA Executive of the Year in 2022-23.

Booth was promoted to be the Nuggets' GM for the past three seasons after Tim Connelly left for the Minnesota Timberwolves. Booth's first season was Denver's championship season in 2022-23, but he drew a lot of ire from Nuggets fans due to his lack of re-signing key players from their championship run such as Bruce Brown, Jeff Green, and Kentavious Caldwell-Pope. He was often criticized for not putting a better team around three-time MVP Nikola Jokic.

Shareef Abdur-Rahim is is the president of the NBA G League while Brand has been working in the front office of the Philadelphia 76ers.

There was no mention from Klein about former Warriors GM Bob Myers or Wolves GM Tim Connelly, who had reportedly drawn interest from the Hawks according to reports.

Stay tuned for more.

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