Part 14 of the offseason guides features two Eastern Conference teams looking to advance deep into the playoffs after a strong offseason and season this past year in the Atlanta Hawks and the Detroit Pistons.
Atlanta Hawks
The Atlanta Hawks have always been a fun team to watch, which is nothing new. Trae Young offers a blend of scoring and passing that not many have in the NBA, and he’s one of the flashier players in the league, often pulling off some unbelievable passes, shots, and ball-handling moves. However, that comes at a price, as he is single-handedly one of the worst defenders in the NBA, given the lack of effort and size he brings to that end of the floor. It’s raised questions over the ability of the Hawks to win with him and get back to the Eastern Conference Finals they made it to in 2021. Jalen Johnson, however, stepped in and immediately raised the ceiling of the Hawks team. The Hawks were +55 in his minutes this season, the most of anyone over 1000 minutes played this year. However, a season-ending shoulder injury stopped the NBA cup momentum the Hawks had after they defeated the Knicks in the Garden during the quarterfinals of the NBA Cup. After the injury, the Hawks plummeted to the play-in after holding on to a top 6 seed in the Eastern Conference. Unfortunately, the Hawks went 0-2 as the 8th seed with a blowout loss to the Magic and a mental blunder from Trae Young that cost them their game against the Heat. However, Hawks’ fans have a lot to be excited about this upcoming season.
The Hawks had arguably the best offseason of any team in the NBA through the additions of Kristaps Porzingis, Nickeil Alexander-Walker, and Luke Kennard. All three add positional size, shooting, and length around Young. Not to mention they get to add Jalen Johnson, Dyson Daniels, and, now second-year player, Zaccharie Riascher to the mix. The Hawks did a great job of adding talent while not breaking the bank. They are currently below the tax threshold and have a current salary of $182 million with a $3 million buffer under the tax. The Hawks also have a nice collection of picks coming as they retool some of the lost capital from the failed Dejounte Murray trade. That trade did lead to the addition of Dyson Daniels, one of the best defensive players from this past season. They have the best trade asset in all of the NBA after they collected a 2026 unprotected pick from the Pelicans on draft night. They’ll have plenty of ammo to reload a trade at the deadline if needed.
Player development-wise for the Hawks should include the minor parts of skills for some of their important players. To start with, Dyson Daniel, the jump shot is one of the most important pieces for the Hawks going forward. He shot 34% from 3 on just 3.1 attempts per game. I would be surprised if those numbers didn’t go up for this upcoming season. Risacher is another player who is on the important list. After a slow start, as most rookies experience, Risacher proved why he was worthy of the number 1 overall pick, putting up the first 30-point game amongst rookies and lighting up the floor with his improved shooting in the second half of the season. His learning a bit more on the defensive end from Daniels could help him. He’s 6’10 with a long wingspan and has excellent instincts to pair with a high IQ. He’s also a great cutter, and that helps with both Young and Johnson in the half-court setting when both are in the game. The final player is Onyeka Okungwu for improvement. I think he needs to lean into becoming a stretch-5 for the Hawks. He’s much more laterally athletic than people give him credit for and offers some lineups where both he and Porzginis can be on the floor together. It should help a lot with the spacing for Young and create a ton of problems for the defense. Quin Snyder will have some fun with a team that put up 118 points per game last season and got even better this past offseason. Buckle u, Hawks fans, it should be a fun season next year.
Detroit Pistons
The Pistons had one of the best seasons recently for the franchise, long since Blake Griffin was dragging them to the 8th seed in the playoffs in 2019. Since then, it has been a laughing factory of embarrassment for the franchise. However, they have benefited from the loss that saw them draft Cade Cunningham, Asuar Thompson, Jaden Ivey, and Jalen Duren. These 4 have created a nice lineup that has been coupled with veteran presence from the front office's additions in Malik Beasley, Tim Hardaway, and Tobias Harris. The help saw Cunningham take another step forward as he earned All-NBA honors this past year and made his first All-Star team as well. Beasley had one of the best catch-and-shoot seasons the NBA has seen since Steph Curry. Hardaway and Harris both bought into the new head coach JB Bickerstaff's principles on both ends of the floor. All of this saw the Pistons make the postseason for the first time since 2019. Unfortunately, they would lose to the Knicks, but not before taking them to 6 games and seeing Jalen Brunson hit and game-winning 3 in the final seconds on Detroit’s home floor. The assignment now is how to make this past season not a fluke and replicate the success, and hopefully more this upcoming season.
Financially, the Pistons are in a great spot as they don’t have many players with a large number on their cpa sheet. They had the most cap space a season ago, as they only have $140 million in committed salaries on the books. Both Jalen Duren and Jaden Ivey are due a rookie extension deal before the start of the season, which will likely take up more of their $167 million allocations they already have. Much of the cap space was available due to the contract they needed to pay Cunningham last year, and an eventual Malik Beasley contract that fell through after it was revealed he was involved in a gambling incident towards the beginning of free agency. The Pistons got ahead of the dealings and signed Duncan Robinson via sign-and-trade with the Heat. Robinson provides a similar dimension of shooting Beasley did. They also added Caris LeVert, a nice backup and replacement for Denis Schröder, who helped a lot this past season for Detroit. They own all of their first-round draft picks until 2032 and will receive an additional two first-round picks depending on what triggers the various protections on these future picks. Safe to say the front office isn’t taking any huge swings after a highly competitive season.
Player development-wise, I still want to see Cunningham cut down on the turnovers from this past season. He averaged a league-high 4.4 a game, and if he’s able to cut off one and these turnovers from a season ago, the Pistons will be in a nice spot offensively. Cunningham improved greatly in the shooting department, as he improved to 36% from 3, with a majority of those coming from pull-ups. His reads in pick-and-roll have become much better in terms of when he shoots the pull-up or drives to the basket. I still wish he could get to the free-throw line more, as he led the NBA in drives from the guard positions, but still took fewer than 6 free throws a game this past season. Overall, Cunningham showed he can be a top 15 NBA player and proved it in the postseason as well as he averaged 25-8-8 in his first playoffs as a main option. The next person is likely Thompson, who will need to do something similar to his brother in Houston. He has the athleticism to do the same things, but I think this upcoming season will show he is worthy of being a similar player. Remember, he was coming off a blood clot issue this past season and missed parts of the beginning of the regular season. His figuring out how to punish defenses that play off of him with cutting or hanging around the dunker spot will be important for him. The final player development is what Jaden Ivey looks like this upcoming season and how he will mesh with Cunningham both on and off the floor. He’s not a willing catch-and-shoot guy next to Cunningham on the floor, but he needs to be. Ivey is very happy when the ball is in his hands, but he needs to figure out some ways to affect the game when he’s next to Cunningham. As far as a bench unit, I don’t mind what he does, as he’ll be able to get into the flow of offense this way more easily, as he’ll likely run many more pick-and-rolls when Cunningham is out of the game. There’s a chance the Pistons will challenge for the Eastern Conference, and I think that is due to both Bickerstaff and Cunningham. They should be a fun team to watch this upcoming season.
Add comment
Comments