NBA insider explains why the Hawks won’t even make it to the playoffs this season

Now that we are only two months away from the start of the 2024-25 NBA campaign, fans and experts have started to make their predictions as to what will happen during the basketball competition. Even though franchises still have enough time to pull off exciting trades, a certain league analyst has made a bold claim about Atlanta’s upcoming year.

This summer, the Hawks made the difficult decision of moving on from Dejounte Murray and remain committed to keep building a team around Trae Young. With their star leaving for New Orleans, they acquired Larry Nance and Dyson Daniels, as well as drafting French forward Zaccharie Risacher with the No. 1 pick.

Nevertheless, seems like some NBA experts don’t think this will be enough to change the course of this franchise, which has been struggling to make an impact in the league in the past decade. Bleacher Report’s Grant Hughes recently posted about each of last season’s play-in teams, and explained why the Georgia club will fail to make the playoffs.

Reed Sheppard (@reed_sheppard) working out with Atlanta Hawks all-star Trae Young.

“Reed is gonna be a hell of an NBA player” –@TheTraeYoung pic.twitter.com/1OCHfF4udG

— Lee K. Howard ☀️ (@HowardWKYT) August 18, 2024

“The Atlanta Hawks should finish ahead of the Bulls, a Play-In entrant last year that doesn’t figure to return to that level in 2024-25. But Trae Young and Co. are still up against a numbers game; none of the other teams that finished above them in the standings projects to be any weaker than they were last year,” he wrote this week.

Hughes expressed why other Eastern clubs have an upper hand. “In fact, it’s easier to foresee improvement than decline from each of the (deep breath) Miami Heat, Philadelphia 76ers, Indiana Pacers, Orlando Magic, Cleveland Cavaliers, Milwaukee Bucks, New York Knicks and Boston Celtics. All eight of those teams finished with at least 10 more wins than the Hawks last season.

“Maybe Atlanta can defy the odds by finding better roster balance in the wake of the trade that swapped out Dejounte Murray for a package headlined by Dyson Daniels, Larry Nance Jr. and a pair of future first-round picks,” the reporter posted.

The expert also pointed out that this could also be the year that their star player finally reaches his potential. “And maybe the Hawks will get an All-NBA season out of Young, who is once again the team’s solo on-ball creator with Murray out of the picture,” he pointed out.

The Hawks have made an effort to address their weaknesses from last season and have potentially upgraded on defense

Although there is some truth to what Grant Hughes expressed in his latest report, his predictions aren’t really considering the fact that Trae Young is still leading their offense and the organizartion have made a strong effort to address their weaknesses from last year.

“If the Hawks can’t keep pace with the eight teams that finished ahead of them last season, they could pursue future-focused trades. Atlanta could shop Clint Capela, De’Andre Hunter and any other vet who doesn’t project as a strong support piece for the next iteration of the team, which’ll be built around No. 1 pick Zaccharie Risacher and Jalen Johnson,” the expert wrote.

Even though the Hawks have traded for bigger athletes and potentially upgraded their defense, the Bleacher Report expert still believes that there are much stronger teams in the Eastern Conference who have built a longer and more stable process.

“Plus, the Toronto Raptors and Charlotte Hornets are both capable of overtaking the Hawks in the standings,” he went on to explain. “And preventing them from even seeing the Play-In in the first place.”