The Atlanta Hawks have gone 2-1 since John Collins went down with a strained foot even beating the third-seeded Cleveland Cavaliers 124-116. Their loss came at the collective hands of the Boston Celtics who were in the midst of a nine-game winning streak and have only lost once in the month of February.
Collins averaged 21.7 points and 9.0 rebounds with 1.0 assists while shooting 54.7 percent from the floor over the last three games.
He registered three straight 20-point performances and five in the last seven games.
The Hawks have a winning record in those games, but just barely at 4-3. That in combination with their performance after he went down heading into the break, and the break itself, does open the door for some speculation about Collins’ long term.
Recent run aside, the Atlanta Hawks are better off with John Collins in the lineup
We have long been big fans of Collins going so far as to lobby for the Hawks to match whatever offer he received from another team as he ventured into free agency. That final number came in below a max deal and everyone seemed happy. But, as the season went on and the Hawks began to struggle, news broke that Collins wasn’t totally satisfied with his role on offense.
The most notable development out of that is that not much changed in Collins’ favor after that by the numbers.
His scoring has gone down from 17.7 points per game on 54.6 percent shooting while knocking down 42.7 percent of his threes to 14.9 points on 52.0 percent shooting and 31.6 percent on his shots from long range.
But the Hawks, who were 17-21 at the time of the comments, have gone 11-9 since.
That may not seem like much but there was a point in the season where Travis Schlenk went on the radio and blasted the team’s effort while questioning his decision to bring everyone back.
It is worth mentioning that the lineup that has started games in Collins’ absence, with Danilo Gallinari in his place, sports a much better net rating of 22.6 compared to a minus-0.1 for the usual five. The Gallo lineup, naturally, also has a better plus-minus checking in at 3.7 to just 0.2 for the Collins group.
The Hawks are 24-26 with Collins in the lineup this season and 4-4 without him. For his career, they are 24-48 when he sits and 118-171 with him. Both are losing records, as is to be expected for someone who spent the start of his career on bad teams.
But the difference is a 333 winning percentage compared to .408 whenever he plays.
The Hawks went into the break about as well as one could have hoped. And Collins’ name was thrown around in trade rumors prior to the deadline.
With Ben Simmons a member of the Brooklyn Nets now, however, it is unclear if there are any other stars the Hawks could pursue that would be considered enough of an upgrade to move off of Collins who is clearly the heart and soul of the team.