Atlanta Hawks: Trae Young’s passing is key for the team’s rebuild

While Trae Young has struggled with his shooting, it’s his passing ability that will help move the Atlanta Hawks’ rebuild forward

When the Atlanta Hawks drafted Trae Young with the No.5 overall pick in the 2018 NBA Draft, it was met with criticism and confusion due to the reality that the Hawks had essentially traded Euro-League icon Luka Doncic for 6-foot-2 guard out of Oklahoma, Trae Young.

The way this season has progressed, Doncic is looking like everything league executives expected him to be and more for the Dallas Mavericks. On the other hand, it has been a roller-coaster year so far for Trae Young; he has had some big games and he has also had some bad ones.

But one of the biggest reasons why the Hawks didn’t make a mistake in drafting Young is because of his passing ability – something that is an overlooked attribute in Young’s game.

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When Atlanta drafted Young, they thought they were getting a dynamic and scoring point guard, with great shooting range and extraordinary passing abilities to replace Dennis Schroder, who was traded to Oklahoma City. So far, it’s fair to say that it’s exactly what they got.

With the phenomenon that Doncic has become, Young’s game has quickly become underrated and overlooked. Trae Young has No.1 pick level talent, which he displayed while playing for Oklahoma in college, where he became the first player to ever lead the NCAA in points and assists.

The second half of his freshman season at Oklahoma is where most of the doubt and criticism came, where he had quite a few poor shooting performances and his shot selection was something that was brought to question. This made him a polarizing figure heading into the 2018 NBA Draft.

Fast forward to the All-Star break, it’s not a stretch to call Young one of the NBA’s best play-makers already. Young is currently leading all rookies in assists per game, while also being top 10 in assists for all players, at 7.6 per game.

Young’s passing ability has been quite unworldly since college, where the public was exposed to it on Dec. 19, 2017 where he recored an NCAA-best 22 assists in a single game. Nearly a year later, Young tallied a career-high 17 assists against the Los Angeles Clippers in November.

Having a point guard with passing abilities at the level of Young’s should work wonders for the Hawks during their process of rebuilding. For Atlanta, having a gifted passer at the level of Young’s gives the Hawks a clear blueprint on the style of players that they are going to look for moving forward.

Drafting Young was essential in the development of Atlanta’s sophomore power forward John Collins, who is now averaging 19 points per game with Trae Young leading the show. Young’s shooting may be inconsistent, with him shooting 41 percent from the field and 30 percent from 3 during his rookie season, but with time those shooting numbers will improve.

Throughout this season so far, Young has already proved that he can take and make these shots when it matters. With all that being said, if nothing changed today, because of Trae Young’s passing, the Hawks have a blueprint on how to design their team and ATL fans finally have their star for today, tomorrow and the future.