Hawks struggling with injuries, defense and 4th Q woes

[Jamaaliver]

Is there any way we move on from Nate after only a single season?

Atlanta is 0-2 since trading Reddish, and the defense is still a mess. There are no signs of it improving any time soon. The team collapsed in the final few minutes in back-to-back games against Miami and New York. It’s not just the defense that is wrong. Multiple players have now publicly expressed frustration with unclear roles, with John Collins speaking up about his unhappiness offensively and Danilo Gallinari saying roles are less defined than they were last season.

Needless to say, there’s a lot that needs to be fixed in Atlanta.

The Athletic

[HMFFL]

^
I doubt we're willing to do that.
Change is needed but Nate deserves to stay. While I disliked Pierce very much it's time for the players to be blamed.

It's getting rather frustrating at this point. Playing zero defense won't get the job done and the team relies on CC too much.

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[wco81]

Good comeback win on MLK Day.

Maybe it will help the team turn a corner.

[jayu70]

As at 01/22/2022, Games Missed Injuries/Covid:
Trae - 4
Bogi - 17
Hunter - 28
Collins - 5
CC - 9

Wright - 5
Huerter - 7
Okongwu - 32
Gallo - 10

[Jamaaliver]

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[Jamaaliver]

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[jayu70]

SSS but improved defense:

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While they dropped their next two games, one in Miami and one against the Knicks at home, something noticeably changed with the Hawks. Their effort was visibly better. Perimeter players fought around screens, the big men hustled to their spots, and everyone closed out on shooters.

[Jamaaliver]

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[New_Hawks_Era]

See how quickly things can change, they look like a totally different team. Especially defensively.

[Jamaaliver]

After losing five straight and nine of 11 dating back to Christmas, the Atlanta Hawks seem to be getting back on track. On Wednesday, they blew out the Sacramento Kings, 121-104, in a game that wasn't as close as the score suggests. That victory was their fifth in a row.

Trae Young has understandably garnered much of the attention throughout the season, but it's another young Hawk who could be the key to getting back into the playoff mix.

Onyeka Okongwu didn't make his first appearance of the season until mid-December, and he didn't become a fixture of the rotation until Clint Capela went down with an injury. But averages of 15.1 points, 9.6 rebounds and 2.6 blocks per 75 possessions, as well as having the team's third-best raw plus-minus despite only playing in 15 games, suggest Atlanta could have a long-term anchor inside.

Bleacher Report

[Jamaaliver]

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[Jamaaliver]

Nate needs to make some adjustments:

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[jayu70]

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[Jamaaliver]

Now we can't hit the broadside of a barn in visiting arenas:

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[Jamaaliver]

Hawks at the All-Star Break

Defense concerns, tough upcoming schedule and other observations

1. Defense is a serious long-term issue

Back on media day, before training camp opened this season, Clint Capela sat at the podium and expressed his belief that the Hawks could have a top-five defense this season. Now fast forward a few months after media day, and here’s what Capela told The Athletic earlier this week about the team’s defense this season: “I feel like the team we are, we’re more offensive-minded. There aren’t a lot of guys who take pride on defense, so it’s hard."

How did it get this bad? Well, there’s been regression on that end of the floor from almost everybody on the roster. There are only three players currently in the Hawks’ rotation who have graded out as a positive defender, per D-EPM, and that’s Capela, John Collins and Onyeka Okongwu. That leaves a total of zero perimeter defenders who’ve been a positive for the Hawks. Lack of effort has been a recurring answer as to why the Hawks have struggled.

Atlanta has been a disaster on the perimeter. Trae Young currently ranks as the seventh-worst individual defender with at least 1,000 minutes played this season, according to D-EPM. Hunter has graded out as a negative defender, Reddish was a disaster, Huerter wasn’t as good in the primary defender role when Hunter went out with his wrist injury like he was last season, Capela regressed from being a Defensive Player of the Year candidate last season, Bogdanovic hasn’t been close to the defender he was last season and Danilo Gallinari and Lou Williams aren’t stopping anyone coming off the bench.


2. Offense, as a whole, is not a concern

It’s probably a safe bet that any team featuring Young is going to be elite offensively. He’s also taken a leap forward on that end of the floor, as he’s posted the best efficiency numbers of his career thus far. The Hawks have done a good job surrounding him with ideal role players to maximize his skill set offensively by having several high-level 3-point shooters on the roster in Bogdanovic, Huerter, Hunter, Collins and Gallinari, and some of the best roll men in Collins and Capela. Young is such a creative genius offensively that it’s hard to ever imagine a team he’s on faltering on that end unless the roster construction was so bewildering, but it’s not in Atlanta.


3. Hawks do need more on-ball juice

Young is the only player on the roster who the Hawks can trust to take over games by himself. That’s an issue because when you look at the top teams in the Eastern Conference, almost all of the top teams have at least two who can have the ball in their hands in the final minutes of a close game.

The Hawks have Young and … ???

Bogdanovic and Huerter can get buckets but neither is on the level of any of those players listed above. Hunter hasn’t shown enough consistency to be that player. Collins’ game isn’t built to be a play creator. That leaves the Hawks in a precarious spot if Young has an off night from the floor, which is what we saw last week in Dallas when he didn’t have it and the team didn’t have much firepower around him.


4. What to make of Hunter

The Hawks still believe in Hunter long term and still consider him a big part of their future plans. It’s understandable why they would still view him highly; he’s 6-foot-8 with over a 7-foot wingspan, is a good 3-point shooter and a strong on-ball defender. The warts should be a bit worrisome though if he’s going to continue being the starting small forward in the years to come. He’s been a below-average finisher at the rim, is a poor rebounder for someone his size, his handle isn’t great for someone playing mostly on the perimeter, his passing ability just isn’t there right now and he has a tendency to get lost off the ball defensively.

It’s encouraging that he has the ability to be matched up with opposing teams’ best perimeter player but, ideally, you’d want someone to be a bit more well-rounded than what he currently is.


5. Hawks have failed to live up to expectations so far

All offseason the Hawks felt like most people across the country still weren’t putting enough respect on their name for accomplishing what they did. For those who thought Atlanta’s run to the conference finals was a fluke, they haven’t necessarily been proven wrong. The Hawks have been one of the most disappointing teams across the league this season. There’s no excuses for the Hawks anymore. They got rid of the coach they didn’t want to play for any more last season in Pierce. They got rid of Reddish, who didn’t want to be here and had bad energy. They’re almost completely healthy right now, which is always a rarity in the NBA.

Very early in the season, Young commented how the regular season was a lot more boring than the playoffs, and that mindset has shown itself numerous times throughout the season so far for the Hawks.

The Athletic

[Jamaaliver]

We look bad. If we miss the playoffs, does Nate lose his job?

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[Jamaaliver]

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[jayu70]

John Collins may be out awhile? Finger and Foot.

Collins has played with sprained fingers in the past, but never to this extreme. He played with a sprained finger in last season’s playoffs, still able to bend it but playing through the pain. He underwent an X-ray on his finger last week, and the results came back negative.

Deepak Chona, an orthopedic surgeon at Stanford University and the founder of SportsMedAnalytics, said Collins has a boutonnière deformity on his ring finger after examining an image provided to The Athletic. It’s related to a sprain but involves the structures that hold the tendons in place, so, essentially the person has trouble straightening the middle joint of the finger. It’s generally treated with the use of a splint full time, ranging from four to six weeks, followed by part-time use of the splint for another few weeks until the joint is able to straighten on its own. Surgery is needed in special cases, for instance, if the bone underneath the tendon is fractured, but that’s not common.

Chona said if Collins continues to play through this injury, his finger will not be able to undergo any meaningful healing, even over the course of several weeks, because the treatment requires the finger to be immobilized in a splint for the tissue to heal. The best-case scenario would be to hope for minimal partial healing in about two to three weeks and moderate improvement in his shooting with Collins becoming used to his shooting hand being compromised.

.........Collins said his finger has progressively gotten worse because he’s jammed it in practices and games since he initially hurt it in the Detroit game. Because the finger isn’t close to healing, he’ll have to work through not being able to grip the ball properly, which is what he’s battling now. For his foot, Collins doesn’t have the same bounce as we’ve come to expect.

https://theathletic.com/3181117/2022/03/14/john-collins-injury-dilemma-poses-a-valid-question-regarding-the-hawks-at-this-point-am-i-hurting-or-helping/

[jayu70]

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[HMFFL]

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John's finger looked very bad from the picture I saw. I don't think he plays again this season.

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