ATLANTA — The Atlanta Hawks, the same organization that fired two head coaches and demoted and eventually fired a team president in a span of 23 months, still look at times like they’re trying to play on a court of Jello. That’s not a knock on newish coach Quin Snyder, or suggests things won’t stabilize at some point. But it wasn’t comforting Monday night when the Hawks went from an 11-point lead in the first quarter to a 20-point deficit in the third against the Denver Nuggets, saw Trae Young get ejected because he just wouldn’t stop complaining to a referee, reminded everybody how horrible they are defensively, and lost for the sixth time in seven games.
Advertisement
Their record is 9-13. They’re currently sitting in 10th in the Eastern Conference, a relative play-in position. It’s Hawks’ Groundhog Day.
“Growth isn’t linear,” Snyder told The Athletic later when asked if he expected such struggles early in his first full season. “We want to just keep improving. There are times when you don’t feel that and you have to dig even more. We’re going through some things right now, and some of them we can’t control. We’re playing a different style. We’re finding out who we are defensively, and it’s a series of adaptations. I anticipated (this), particularly with a group that is doing things differently than it has before.”
This isn’t about Snyder. He has proven himself as a coach. If he fails, it’s because the pieces are wrong, the front office fails, franchise dysfunction under current ownership continues or Snyder suddenly can’t remember why he left his vacation in Costa Rica for this. The Hawks haven’t been a stable and well-functioning organization for too long. No coach is immune to criticism but they’re easy targets when players don’t cooperate, don’t fit the blueprint or just aren’t good enough.
Ask Nate McMillan, who went from The Answer to The Problem, in roughly seven minutes.
But there are two entities that need to prove something right now. One is the reshaped front office. The other is Young.
Let’s start with the easy one. Young is the team’s best player, at least offensively. He has bought into Snyder more than he ever did his first two coaches, McMillan and Lloyd Pierce, possibly the residual of realizing his own reputation was getting dinged in the process. Young is not a locker room leader. He doesn’t need to be. But he does need to leader on the court, and that means not making bad situations worse, which is what he did against Denver.
Advertisement
He complained to an official late in the third quarter about a non-foul the previous time down the court. Maybe he was justified, maybe not. That’s not the point. He said the wrong thing and got slapped with a technical. Snyder walked onto the court to complain, obviously in part to protect his player, and then he too got a technical.
That should’ve ended it. But Young kept talking. Referee Brent Haskill wasn’t having it. He T’d up Young again for the ejection.
Trae Young has been ejected late in the 3rd quarter after expressing his displeasure with this non-call. pic.twitter.com/tccRUzVuPX
— Bally Sports: Hawks (@HawksOnBally) December 12, 2023
Young exited the arena quickly after the game. Snyder didn’t want to talk about it. (“There’s nothing for me to say about that.”)
Onyeka Okongwu, one of the few regulars still available for comment, didn’t hesitate to share his thoughts when asked about the three straight technical fouls.
“Sometimes referees get sensitive — they get insecure sometimes,” he said. “They were just getting trigger-happy with the whistle tonight.”
Did Young say something twice to an official?
“I don’t know. I tried to tell him — I don’t think he heard me. I could see it on the referee’s face — he was just waiting to do something. You feel me?”
So you were trying to calm Trae down?
“Yeah.”
So Okongwu could see what Young couldn’t. Young is in his sixth NBA season and 25 years old. But talented athletes only become great, winning athletes when they mature and lead by example — not before.
Referee Ben Taylor said in a pool report that Young initiated “marginal contact” against defender Peyton Watson at the offensive end, so a foul wasn’t called. Young was warned about his complaints but he “continued to direct unsportsmanlike comments and then claps at the official,” Taylor added. The second technical and ejection followed for “continued excessive criticism.”
Advertisement
It wasn’t the lone reason the Hawks lost again. Truth is, they trimmed a 17-point deficit after Young’s ejection to four, in part because of Bogdan Bogdanovic’s 40 points (10 3-pointers), before falling. They played better. But this team needs change. The John Collins salary dump solved nothing except a potential luxury tax issue.
The new front office, led by Landry Fields and Kyle Korver, remains largely untested. Snyder denied in a lengthy interview with The Athletic having ultimate power over personnel but he clearly has owner Tony Ressler’s ear and he’s the only one with a resume of success.
The team is weak defensively. It lacks size, physicality and a presence in clutch moments. Change won’t be easy. Atlanta doesn’t own its first-round picks in 2025 or 2027 (the Dejounte Murray trade). It can’t potentially trade its 2024 pick until after the season, and even then only if it secures Sacramento’s protected first-rounder from the Kevin Huerter trade. (It’s the NBA — it’s always complicated.) That means the only real tradeable draft asset before the league’s Feb. 8 trade deadline is the protected pick from the Kings.
The Hawks had offseason trade talks with the Toronto Raptors about all-NBA forward Pascal Siakam, and those have resumed, according to The Athletic’s Shams Charania. Siakam would help immensely. He’s an impending free agent, which may limit Toronto’s return in trade. But it remains to be seen if the Hawks can match other teams’ offers, given their shortage of trade assets. They would have to move young talent.
Snyder steered clear of trade talk and thoughts of whether he can win with this group. He said what coaches say, because if they don’t they lose the locker room.
“We’re thinking about the guys we have and how we can maximize them,” he said. “They’ve bought in, they’re working, practicing hard, hitting the film. Everybody has been absolutely coachable. I think we’re learning. I’m trying to evolve a team. Sometimes the things that help you do that are the difficult stretches.”
Not a new phenomenon around here.
(Photo: Kevin C. Cox / Getty Images)
ncG1vNJzZmismJqutbTLnquim16YvK57lGpqamtiZnxzfJFsZmpqX2Z%2FcK3TpZinrJFitaLDyqxkraqRmnq6u9Snnmg%3D