Atlanta Hawks: Trae Young is the Offensive Fulcrum Atlanta Needs

Shooting

I hate to end on a down note, but Trae Young’s shooting must be discussed in any conversation about his future with the team.

Young was drafted with the stunningly hyperbolic idea that he would be the next Stephen Curry. Clearly, that’s an over-the-top and impossible-to-live-up-to comparison, as Young’s stellar passing and terrific feel more accurately resembles a player like Steve Nash or Jason Kidd rather than the greatest shooter to every play in Curry.

While Young’s overall raw numbers look quite ugly on the year (39.7 percent shooting from the field and 29.5 percent shooting from long range), it must be noted that his numbers are on an uptick over the past month.

Ice Trae is visibly more comfortable taking shots from long range of late, and the numbers bear it out: Since December 16, Young is shooting 42.3 percent from three-point territory on 4.4 attempts per game. Though Curry is taking 9 more triple a game than Trae at 13.7 per game over that span, he is shooting 43.7 percent from long-range. Maybe they’re not so different after all?

Lastly, the degree of difficulty on these shots is fairly spectacular, as noted by a Tweet from statistician Bo Schwartz:

As you can see, Young leads the league in pulling up from the logo, and his shot has been falling from that distance of late.

If Trae Young can keep up his recent successes at pushing the pace, driving to the rim and pulling up from long range, the Atlanta Hawks will benefit in the long-term. Even if the shot never comes full circle, the Atlanta Hawks still have a threatening force at the point guard position, which is always important in the NBA.

Statistics courtesy of Inpredictable, BBall Index, ESPN, Basketball Reference and NBA.com; current as of 1-18-19.