Report: Hawks reach buyout agreement with Danny Ferry

The Atlanta Hawks are set to officially part ways with exiled president and general manager Danny Ferry.

After an earlier report that the Hawks would remove Ferry - whose status has been in limbo since he left the team in September - and replace him permanently with head coach and acting president Mike Budenholzer, the team’s board of managers met Friday morning to discuss terms of a buyout.

The terms have been reached and approved, and will pay Ferry more money than he was owed on the remainder of his contract, according to Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Ferry had two years left on the six-year, $18-million deal he signed in 2012.

Ferry took an indefinite leave of absence from the Hawks before the start of the season - which proved to be the most successful in franchise history - after an old recording of racially-charged comments he made about Luol Deng during a conference call surfaced.

The Hawks stayed mum on Ferry's future with the team (and Ferry in general) throughout the campaign, and ultimately submitted Budenholzer for Executive of the Year consideration rather than Ferry, who'd constructed the roster that won a franchise-record, and Eastern Conference-best, 60 games.

The buyout will be the last move tasked to the outgoing ownership group known as the Atlanta Spirit, who are selling the Hawks and Philips Arena to a group led by entrepreneur Tony Ressler. The sale will reportedly be finalized Wednesday.

An official announcement of the buyout agreement with Ferry will reportedly come sometime in the next few days.