Hawks’ Al Horford drawing interest from multiple NBA teams

Al Horford is the perfect center for the Atlanta Hawks’ system, but it’s believed that multiple teams will be making calls about him until the NBA trade deadline.

In the Atlanta Hawks’ unselfish, floor spacing, ball movement based offense, Al Horford is the perfect fit at center. He has a great mid-range game and has made more three pointers this season (28) than the previous eight years of his career combined, and with his passing and solid rim protection he’s an extremely valuable player to them. Plus, he even became an All-Star for the third time last season during the Hawks’ sudden 60-win outburst.

So, why would the Hawks consider trading him? It’s hard to see why they would right now.

However, Steve Kyler of Basketball Insiders has reported that while the chances for teams to land Horford are low, they will still keep trying right up until the NBA trade deadline on Feb. 18:

"The odds that the Hawks explore Horford trades are pretty low, but given his pending unrestricted free agency there is a risk that the Hawks could lose him to free agency for nothing in return. League sources peg Horford as a player teams will call about all the way up to the trade deadline, but the stance from the Hawks has him as somewhat untouchable.That could change as the deadline and the risk of losing him gets closer, but given how the Hawks have handled pending free agents under the current leadership, there is a sense the Hawks will offer Horford a full MAX offer in July, so unless his camp indicates otherwise the Hawks seem poised to hang on to Horford."

Even though multiple teams are interested and the Hawks are off to a difficult start this season with a 14-12 record and the 10th seed in the East, it’s doesn’t look like they’ll be making many major moves. At the very least, it’s hard to see they would trade Horford, who is easily one of the top two or three players they have.

Plus, as a group who play based on team basketball without superstars, it’s not likely that they’ll look to package Horford with someone else to try and ‘upgrade’ or pursue the highly sought after Sacramento Kings center, DeMarcus Cousins.

As Kyler pointed out, though, Horford will be an unrestricted free-agent next summer, and the worry of losing him for nothing if he suddenly decides to walk away will be something the Hawks’ front office is considering. But until any more rumors emerge surrounding Al Horford, he doesn’t look like a center you should be focusing on as someone who’s inevitably going to be traded.