NBA Season Preview 2018-19: It’s good to be (Trae) Young

The Atlanta Hawks are still taking shape. Trae Young’s playmaking could be the element that binds them all together.

The Atlanta Hawks are somewhat of a blank slate going into this season. They’re young, in full-fledged rebuilding mode, tanked throughout last season, and are looking to rookies and second-year players to lead the way this year. And unlike fellow bottom-tier teams like the Suns or the Magic, the Hawks don’t necessarily have any established players to anchor to.

Per the below graphic by fellow Nylon Calculus contributor Bo Schwartz Madsen, they’ve got the fifth-lowest roster continuity in the league, with under 60 percent of the total minutes played from last season going to players still on the roster.

Typically, banking on youth is not a recipe for producing wins in the NBA. But in Atlanta’s case, they’re betting that it’s good to be Young (see what I did there).

Passing on the opportunity to grab international wonder boy Luka Doncic, the Hawks called their shot and locked in on the explosive Trae Young, tapping him to lead the franchise back into relevance. Then they went in on their Warriors-lite strategy and for good measure, also selected the sharpshooting Kevin Huerter and Villanova’s Omari Spellman to complement Young. With the presence of John Collins and Taurean Prince as well as the underrated Dewayne Dedmon, if you squint just a little, you can see the outlines of the Hawks’ plan taking shape. But make no mistake; this plan is centered around Trae Young taking his college exploits and translating it into the pros.

That’s because Young was a transcendental player in college, a prodigious passer who stretched the field in a way not truly seen since the Steph-Curry-at-Davidson days. Surrounded by a dearth of talent at Oklahoma, Young effectively was the Oklahoma offense, sporting a 37.2 percent usage rate, per RealGM. He had a monstrous 48.6 percent assist rate while also pouring in 27.4 points per game. Young had four different 40-point scoring games in his lone collegiate season, also setting an NCAA record with 22 assists in a single game (one in which he also put up 20 points, becoming the first player to do so in twenty years).

But we already know Young’s offensive abilities are special. In my own draft database over the last decade, he was 99th percentile in assist rate, 98th percentile in usage, and 89th percentile in 3-point attempt rate. He’s a high IQ player who reads the floor exceptionally well, and whose shooting efficiency should only improve as he acclimates to NBA talent and spacing. Alongside players like Deandre Ayton and Miles Bridges, Young was identified by my draft model as having star equity (read: upside) on offense. It’s why he was the only guard in the Top 10 of my draft projections.

It’s the other stuff which gives pause. Trae Young is listed by RealGM at a measly 6-foot-2 (25th percentile in my draft database) and 180 pounds (ninth percentile). We’ve seen what happens to small guards in the NBA, and Young isn’t as explosive an athlete as some of his smaller counterparts either. What happens when he has to fight through a few tough screens on offense? How will he react on a drive when the paint suddenly gets crowded? And while those are all fair questions, my draft model’s ratings for Young suggest that his basketball IQ should mitigate at least some of those concerns, as long as he can condition his body for the grind of an 82-game season and keep his effort levels up on that end of the floor.

Trae Young had virtually unprecedented offensive influence at Oklahoma. His NBA value is tied to how he’s able to translate some of that impact and 3-point shooting ability while adjusting to the speed, style, and overall talent level of an NBA game. Previous mythological shooters like Jimmer Fredette never actually materialized in the pros, for various reasons, but Young, who brings more to the table than those players ever did, offers the best hope yet to those searching for the second coming of Steph Curry. And if he really starts showing signs that he can, in fact, approximate that, then the Hawks and their fans should chalk this season up as a success.