The Hawks have called for patience but it’s a request seldom granted in the NBA.
When the season began, the Hawks may not have said outright that they had postseason goals. Instead, they seemed more focused on the long term and developing internally in the hopes of becoming a consistent championship contender. They pointed to goals of building good habits, competing hard, as well as ensuring they had unity and connection.
At the all-star break, the Hawks have played competitively. They have 35 clutch games this season and just six blowout losses. But they rank 10th in the Eastern Conference standings, seven games below a .500 at 24-31.
The Hawks have quite the hill to climb to improve their postseason outlook. They sit two games behind their closest opponent in the Bulls after dropping their first two meetings of the season. They are six games behind the Heat and Magic who hold a tie for the top two spots in the Play-In Tournament. They are 6.5 games behind the Pacers, who have won all three meetings.
The team’s predicament comes after they opened the season 6-4 through their first 10 games. It eventually hovered around .500 before it hit a skid with the loss of forward Jalen Johnson for the next 14 games with a distal radius fracture of his wrist.
The Hawks went 4-10 in Johnson’s absence, and it never seemed to fully recover. Seven games after Johnson left the Hawks rotation, forward De’Andre Hunter was lost to a knee injury. Though Hunter briefly returned to the lineup for three games, he ended missing the next 19 after undergoing a procedure to address inflammation. The Hawks went 5-14 in that span.
The absences of both Johnson and Hunter highlighted their importance to the Hawks.
The Hawks made several marginal moves last season, including trading John Collins. In doing so, the Hawks may have added some financial flexibility, but they took away from the front court without making corresponding moves to address the lack of depth and size.
The Hawks have an average height of 6-foot-6, approximately one inch shorter than the league average. So, when the team did not have Johnson and Hunter, who stand at 6-10 and 6-8 respectively, they often found themselves at a disadvantage.
In addition to that, Johnson and Hunter are two of the team’s top defenders particularly because of their ability to handle switches. With Johnson out, the Hawks had a defensive rating of 122.8, the second worst in the league and down from the 117.3 defensive rating they had prior to his injury. While the Hawks saw a slight uptick in defensive productivity when Johnson returned, with Hunter out, they still put up 119.2 defensive rating.
Johnson puts up a defensive field goal percentage of 49.4%, with opponents netting 33.5% of their 3-point attempts and 34.3% of their shot attempts greater than 15 feet.
Hunter, who often matches up against the best opposing perimeter player, has allowed opponents to make 48.4% of their overall shots, while giving up 34.3% of shots from deep.
But Johnson’s and Hunter’s return have not fully addressed the Hawks’ lack of consistent connectivity on both ends of the floor. The Hawks have still dealt with injuries with players in and out of the rotation and it still left them heading into the break with defensive efficiency worse-off than it was last season (120 this season vs. 114.2).
The all-star break gave the Hawks an opportunity to address lingering bumps and bruises. However, with 26 games left in the regular season, there is little time and zero room for error.
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