Mike Muscala’s Performance For The Atlanta Hawks This Season
The Atlanta Hawks have a reliable backup center, but could they find a better one?
Have the Atlanta Hawks been able to count on backup center and forward Mike Muscala this season? How does he stack up with similar players that fill his particular role around the league? Let’s check in on “Moose” to see what he’s been up to.
The 6’11” Muscala is probably one of head coach Mike Budenholzer’s favorite players. The product of Bucknell University was selected 44th overall in the second round of the 2013 NBA draft by the Dallas Mavericks. He was acquired through trade by the Atlanta Hawks. He often goes by nicknames “Jaws”, “Musky”, or “Musk” according to the good people of Basketball Reference.
Muscala spent a large portion of his rookie season in the Development League, before finally earning a spot on the Hawks roster. He is on a very team friendly deal, as his base salary for this season is $1,015,696 as referenced by Spotrac.com. The Hawks exercised his option for this, his final year of the four-year contract that he signed as a rookie.
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It was not a foregone conclusion that Muscala would make the 15 man roster following training camp over the summer. With fellow frontcourt players Edy Tavares, Tiago Splitter, Kris Humphries, Mike Scott and Ryan Kelly all competing for one of the final spots on the roster, it was thought that he could be cut to make way for a third point guard. Muscala has outlasted many of his peers, however, and maintained a valuable role in the rotation all season.
During the Hawks strong 9- 3 start, Muscala was one of the league’s most pleasant surprises. He actually led the league in field goal percentage, during this brief time-frame with a success rate of over 70 percent. He recorded double figures in scoring in 9 of his first 20 games, with a season high of 16 points November 16 versus the Milwaukee Bucks.
As the season has progressed to the final stretch, his numbers have seen a dip in production. While he has been able to excel all year as a 3-point shooter, with a percentage of 40.4, his overall field goal percentage has dropped significantly to 50.5.
It was not realistic to expect him to carry a 70.0 percent success rate all year, since he attempts many of his shots from outside the paint, but he has regressed badly. Also, he has only scored in double figures in 6 of the teams last 39 games.
Muscala currently averages 6.9 points, 3.7 rebounds and 1.4 assists in 19 minutes of action per game. Since it has been quiet on the front of “Moose” sightings from Atlanta Hawks news outlets such as this one, I thought that he likely fell out of favor with coach Budenholzer.
It is true that he missed 6 games from January 16 to January 25 with a sprained left ankle injury. But he actually has continued getting a good amount of playing time in most of the Hawks recent games.
He does not perform well when compared to some of the league’s other back up centers. Just to name a few, all of Channing Frye, Kelly Olynyk, Mason Plumlee and even Alex Len would all likely be better options. In the same amount of playing time, they all average more points and rebounds than Muscala. Frye and Olynyk score over 9 points per game, and Plumlee is actually a beast of a reserve center, posting a line of 10.7 points, 7.8 rebounds and 3.9 assists in 22 minutes a game.
Mike Muscala did not play in the Hawks last game, due to a coaches decision. With the recent addition of reserve forward Ersan Ilyasova, that may turn into a continuing trend.
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Budenholzer will routinely employ a rotation of 9 players, and Muscala may often be the odd man out. Ilyasova is a more capable scorer. Still, Muscala has had a solid season and should not fall out of the rotation for good.