The Atlanta Hawks have underperformed their expectations this season, even relative to their most cynical critics. While there is no singular person to blame for this disasterclass the team has put on, Dyson Daniels’ offensive regression is an obvious data point to monitor for the rest of the season.
Per the Net Points stat created by ESPN Analytics, Daniels has had the fourth-worst offensive impact in the league this season at -20, with only Shaedon Sharpe, Lu Dort, and Tre Mann below him.
To make matters worse, when standardized per 100 possessions and using a minimum sample size of 81 minutes played (ESPN’s default recommendation), Daniels falls to third worst, with Dort surpassing him. Notably, Daniels is the only player of these four who doesn’t frequently shoot, which makes his negative impact much more concerning than, say, a shooting slump from Sharpe.
This is a dramatic drop from last year. Daniels was the 169th-worst offensive player by Net Points per 100 possessions last season (minimum 400 minutes played), recording a slightly negative offensive impact. His Offensive Net Points per 100 plummeted from -0.4 to -6, representing a catastrophic decline.
Where do we go from here?
Of course, this is a small sample size that could change at any moment. Still, when watching the game, Daniels is clearly a negative offensive player. This is a stark contrast to last year’s performance, where Daniels looked like a net neutral (and the stats support this).
Again, Daniels’ negative impact comes in spite of him shooting nearly 50% less from the field. While this certainly contributes to a player’s impact in the eye test, the metrics struggle to capture the opportunity cost of doing nothing. This makes Daniels’ offensive decline particularly concerning, as the metrics likely understate his fall off.
Daniels has a simple road map to recovering his standing from last season and a more difficult path to making actual improvement.
To return to last year’s mark, Daniels must be more aggressive; simply put, he looks invisible on offense. He isn’t attacking the paint. He isn’t making his signature cuts. He isn’t even operating well as a distributor, his one constant offensive strength throughout his career.
This is almost certainly a mental problem, as there is no reason to believe Daniels suddenly lost his ability to read a defense and make a perfectly timed cut, or that he inexplicably can’t handle the ball or pass.
The path to improvement requires change beyond the mental side. Daniels can’t hit the broad side of a barn from three to start the season, and this is in line with his past struggles as a shooter. If he can just make a subtle improvement from last year’s 34.0% clip, he would be a shooter teams have to guard.
As of now, however, he is a complete non-threat from deep. He’s only shot the ball from beyond the arc twice in four games; why would anyone guard him out there if he won’t shoot?
Perhaps Daniels’ payday lulled him into a false sense of complacency entering the season. He could also just be having a bad week. Whatever the reason is, Daniels needs to wake up on the offensive side, or Atlanta’s season could be ruined by the All-Star break.