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Dan Z wrote:What's a good average of games played for players this era?
tsherkin wrote:Dan Z wrote:What's a good average of games played for players this era?
Weird question. The same as in any era. More is better.
< 60 is obviously garbage. 70+ is obviously better.
Yeah, load management is a thing and coaches have been trying that for a few years, but it also obviously undercuts wins and team positioning. Tanking is also a thing, of course, and a problem as always.
MrBigShot wrote:Trae is a victim of being so good so fast. His heliocentric style can win you a series or even two with a good supporting cast, but the hawks wont really ever contend with him playing that style. It would be interesting to see how he'd adapt if he was playing with a true superstar
Pelly24 wrote:Put trae on a team where there's a legit All-NBA guy and you'll see his teams do very well. He's a top 20 guy, and I think no worse than DeAaron Fox and probably a few others ranked above him consistently
Dan Z wrote:It's not a weird question because in this era players rest more than they have before.
tsherkin wrote:Dan Z wrote:It's not a weird question because in this era players rest more than they have before.
It is a weird question, because regardless of era norms, not playing is still objectively worse than playing as far as team success is concerned.
Absolutely, you see guys playing under 70 games a lot more than they used to, but that's still an availability issue.
Dan Z wrote:I was originally replying to someone who posted that Lillard is injury prone. My point is that he's not. He was hurt one season and the rest of his career he played a solid (or good) number of games, especially for this era.
Of course it's better to play than not play.
wco81 wrote:MrBigShot wrote:Trae is a victim of being so good so fast. His heliocentric style can win you a series or even two with a good supporting cast, but the hawks wont really ever contend with him playing that style. It would be interesting to see how he'd adapt if he was playing with a true superstarPelly24 wrote:Put trae on a team where there's a legit All-NBA guy and you'll see his teams do very well. He's a top 20 guy, and I think no worse than DeAaron Fox and probably a few others ranked above him consistently
Trae just completed the first of his 5-year extension, so 4 seasons left including this upcoming one at $40-50 million a year.
D. Murray is making around $30 million a year with the 4 seasons left on his deal.
Bogdán is making around $17 million a year the next 4 seasons.
Hunter is making about $20-25 million a year the next 4 seasons.
Cappella is making $22 million a year for the next 2 seasons and then they have to extend Okongwu after this season.
Hawks gave up a lot of assets for Murray -- 3 FRPs was it as well as Huerter.
But they essentially seem to be a treadmill team given what they did last season and the state of the other EC teams.
Not sure if they can make another big trade or some other move to sign at least another all-star level player.
Trae will be almost 29 by the summer of 2027 when the Hawks will have to decide if they want to give him a potential $300 million extension.
Unless things have changed, they will continue to be a team that is in the play-in range. Maybe they may another run to the ECF but it seems unlikely.
Do the Hawks extend Trae again if they haven't progressed to one of the top teams in the east? He will have all kinds of franchise records and maybe the fans attend games to see him?
Or do they have to think about doing a total rebuild because they don't even return to the Budenholzer team level?
I don't know what the Hawks attendance has been like or local TV ratings. But without breaking through to the ECF again a couple more times, fan interest probably can't be sustained?
Pelly24 wrote:Put trae on a team where there's a legit All-NBA guy and you'll see his teams do very well. He's a top 20 guy, and I think no worse than DeAaron Fox and probably a few others ranked above him consistently
Ito wrote:Pelly24 wrote:Put trae on a team where there's a legit All-NBA guy and you'll see his teams do very well. He's a top 20 guy, and I think no worse than DeAaron Fox and probably a few others ranked above him consistently
You think Fox a top 20 guy?? If Fox top 20 Trae is top 10
Rainwater wrote:Man, I wonder if he can get his fg avg over 45%.
tsherkin wrote:Rainwater wrote:Man, I wonder if he can get his fg avg over 45%.
He only has one season of 44%+. He shoots 6+ 3PA/g. It's highly unlikely.
He has been a negative 2FG+ every season but 2022, and a negative 3P+ guy apart from 2020 (101) and 2022 (108). 2022 aside, he has been a negative FGAdd guy. Shot-making isn't his thing. 2022 was a big year for him, but it was also something of an outlier for him from the standpoint of scoring efficiency, though he wasn't by any means bad in 2020 or 2021, but those were 67- and 72-game seasons for the league, so the additive stats didn't like him, especially as a 103 TSAdd guy in 2021.
Trae makes his efficiency bones primarily on the back of a .414 FTr and being an 87.6% FT shooter.
His main offensive value doesn't even come from volume scoring, though. He shoots more than he should, but he moves the ball (and the defense) very well. Even at more tepid to poor efficiency, he's still a plus-offensive player due to his playmaking, but come the playoffs when he worsens relative to that RS performance level, that starts to diminish. 2022 was an egregiously bad year for him the playoffs, but 2021 and this past year weren't too bad overall... just dreadful as a scorer. It does limit how far anyone can get with a "Trae is underrated" kind of argument, though. As an 18+ FGA/g player (or pick your high-volume shooting threshold), you need to be scoring pretty well for that to be a good idea most of the time. Lacking better options, sure, there it is, but it also sets a ceiling for how good that team can be if you can't get it done on that front in the postseason.
45%+ FG is going to be tough for him. He needed to shoot 50%+ from 16-23 feet, and a career-high 38.2% from 3 to get to 46% in 2022. Putting those together consistently is unlikely. He's pretty young still, of course, so we'll see what happens as he matures, as well as if he is able to reduce shooting volume (perhaps with more offensive help). Murray isn't particularly good (as a scorer) and there isn't anyone else exciting offensively on that team, so...
Rainwater wrote:Everything you have stated is my problem with Trae. He really is poor scorer but the fact he is a good playmaker and is great at getting to the line offsets that. However, if he is not doing either one of those things he is dreadful.
tsherkin wrote:Rainwater wrote:Everything you have stated is my problem with Trae. He really is poor scorer but the fact he is a good playmaker and is great at getting to the line offsets that. However, if he is not doing either one of those things he is dreadful.
He's not a "poor" scorer, though. He's very good at drawing fouls, and for the two years prior to this one, he was an elite perimeter shooter above the FT line. He also finishes short shots well. He's dog-ass in the restricted area and he isn't an elite 3pt shooter, but it works out to him being a pretty decent scorer in 2021 and 2022 during the RS. Getting to the line is also part of scoring, so separating those two doesn't make a ton of sense.
It does lend him consistency issues, of course, and it does make life harder for him against higher-order defenses, which is where using him as a high-volume scorer starts to break down. But to be fair, using most players as a high-volume scorer starts to break down. That's one of the reasons throwing huge volume and helio responsibilities at most players really isn't an ideal strategy.
Atlanta mainly doesn't have other options, though, and there aren't a lot of outlets around Trae, so it does make some sense. Murray really is quite bad as a scoring threat, and that really makes Trae shoulder a lot of pressure as a scorer. I'm not a huge fan of Trae in the volume role because I don't think he can hack that, but I see why they're trying it. What else is Atlanta gonna do?
wco81 wrote:Probably stay on course for at least the next 4 years, as long as attendance and ratings stay about the same.
Win just enough to keep fan interest but that's tread milling, though it seems like Braves are #1 in that city and Falcons would be #2 if they became at least a division winner again.
It's just a question of fan and ownership expectations, when they would throw the switch to a rebuild, as opposed to Tray playing another decade for them, likely to produce about the same results, mostly make the playoffs, win a round, maybe two rounds if things break well -- there are a lot of good young stars in the EC, many of whom already have had more playoffs success so this trajectory isn't likely to change unless Hawk can add a top 15-20 player.
tsherkin wrote:wco81 wrote:Probably stay on course for at least the next 4 years, as long as attendance and ratings stay about the same.
Win just enough to keep fan interest but that's tread milling, though it seems like Braves are #1 in that city and Falcons would be #2 if they became at least a division winner again.
It's just a question of fan and ownership expectations, when they would throw the switch to a rebuild, as opposed to Tray playing another decade for them, likely to produce about the same results, mostly make the playoffs, win a round, maybe two rounds if things break well -- there are a lot of good young stars in the EC, many of whom already have had more playoffs success so this trajectory isn't likely to change unless Hawk can add a top 15-20 player.
It's hard to build a real contender. Lots of luck required, especially if you're a reasonably good team to begin with and aren't getting draft talent. The Big Trade isn't that common, nor the Big Signing.
But yeah. Playoffs, maybe a series victory or two, that sounds about right barring any kind of major roster change. He doesn't have sufficient help around him to contend and he's a little dude and not an ATG 3pt shooter, nor an especially good finisher at the rim. It's some Herculean nonsense that Steph is as good as he is (even now) at his size, and that's a major outlier, so there's some level of inherent ceiling.
