The Atlanta Hawks need a starting-caliber center and they’ve been rumored to be interested in several over the last few weeks.
The Atlanta Hawks need help down low. Their current center rotation consists of Alex Len, Damian Jones, and Bruno Fernando.
Len has been very spotty. Sometimes, he looks like a long-term staple of the team, and others, he looks like he shouldn’t be on the court. In the 2019-20 season, he has more games where he scored under five points (12 games) than he has games where he scored over fifteen points (7 games).
To add to the disappointment, he has more games with less than four rebounds (11 games) than games with double-digit boards (7 games).
This underwhelming play is hurting the Hawks. John Collins isn’t the best shooter, nor defender and shouldn’t be playing center, but sometimes he has to when Len, the teams best center, is ineffective.
The Golden State Warriors traded the Hawks Damian Jones for Omari Spellman over the summer, and it’s looking like Atlanta lost that deal. Spellman, while unable to play the center position effectively, has been great for the Warriors. Since the new year began, Spellman is averaging 13.7 points and 4.9 rebounds per game. Jones’ stats haven’t been anywhere near as impressive.
Since 2020 started, Jones is averaging a measly 4.2 points and 3.8 rebounds per game. Aside from a decent stretch of performances from late November to early December, Jones has been forgettable for the Hawks. As each day passes, it becomes clearer that Jones is not the long-term answer at the center position.
Bruno Fernando has been okay-enough considering the commonly excepted expectations for him heading into the season. He’s a second round pick — someone who usually takes a few years to develop and doesn’t peak in their rookie season. He’s seen limited action with the College Park Skyhawks of the NBA G-League, but he was a force on both ends of the floor.
Right now, Fernando isn’t the answer to the Hawks’ center search, but if he continues to develop over the coming seasons, he could one day be just what the team needs.
The team has been rumored to be looking at a number of players, including Andre Drummond, Jakob Poeltl, Steven Adams, and former Hawk, Dewayne Dedmon. Here, we’ll rank these big men from who the Hawks should target least to most based on fit.