Someone gets it.
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Rookie Power Rankings: Young drops to No. 7; Doncic remains No. 1
"He's actually further ahead that I thought he'd be at this point," Schlenk told CBS Sports.
There are two reasons to buy tickets on the Young express right now. First, he's a next-level passer. Entering Thursday, Young's 7.3 assists per game rank 10th league-wide, and as Schlenk points out, the Hawks don't exactly make a lot of shots. Plenty of Young's dimes go uncashed by the second-worst 3-point shooting team and the sixth-worst shooting team overall. Pocket passes. Cross-court flings with either hand. Pick and rolls. Lobs. The kid's got every dish in the cupboard.
Atlanta saw this coming. Both Schlenk and Atlanta coach Lloyd Pierce told me that as they went through their draft evaluations, they viewed Young's passing as his best asset. His teammates agree. "We appreciate his eyes," Taurean Prince told CBS Sports. "I don't know if people realize how good of a passer he is or not, but we appreciate it here. I can tell you that."
What the Hawks didn't see coming, and what probably nobody saw coming, was the ability Young has shown to finish shots at and near the rim despite his physical deficits. He's listed at 6-foot 2, he's not particularly athletic in terms of explosion or finishing power, and to call him skinny would be an understatement in an NBA locker room. But he's creative and super skilled. His pace, angles and handles gain him leverage, and he uses that leverage to keep defenders locked on his hip -- or in jail, in NBA parlance -- as he lofts in a variety of push shots and floaters at a 42-percent clip in the paint, a better mark than the likes of Kemba Walker, Jimmy Butler, Ben Simmons, Damian Lillard, John Wall and Russell Westbrook.
Young's efficiency dips as he gets closer to the rim -- 50.7 percent in the restricted area, a number that sits well below the marks of elite finishing point guards like Westbrook and Stephen Curry. But the kid is 20. Curry, though he was a better finisher than people realized from the jump, didn't become an elite finisher until well into his career. Entering Thursday, in fact, Young's 52.1-percent clip from five feet and in is the exact same mark Curry put up in his fourth season, when he was 24 years old. As he develops physically, Young is going to be a bigger and bigger problem finishing over, under and around the trees.
Young has been forced to do much of his damage on these types of shots not just because his 3-pointers aren't dropping, but because he's being guarded as if they are. "He's seeing a lot of things that aren't thrown at other guys until later in their career," Vince Carter, who is constantly in Young's ear, told CBS Sports.
It's true. Guys like Curry and Lillard got a grace period before they started getting blitzed off pick and rolls and double-teamed out to 30 and 35 feet, and even they didn't react perfectly to start. Who doesn't remember all those one-handed hook passes Curry used to throw away trying to pass over traps? As recently as last year's playoffs, Lillard was clearly affected by New Orleans' blitzing defense as the Blazers got swept in the first round. This is not easy. Young, on reputation alone, is getting a baptism by fire.
"I thought when I left college that would be the last time I would see [this type of defense]," Young joked after Atlanta's win in Miami on Nov. 27. "...It's crazy, I'm not even making shots right now."
