NBA Trade Rumors: 5 likely sellers heading into the trade deadline
By Kyle McKee
Atlanta Hawks
Last but not least, we’ve got the Atlanta Hawks.
The Hawks, like the Raptors, are an unlikely seller candidate; however, they need to be mentioned with how things have played out so far this season.
As the standings sit today, Atlanta sits in ninth in the East.
On the bright side for Hawks fans, they are just two and a half games back of the sixth-seeded New York Knicks for that final guaranteed playoff spot. They have also won five of their last seven and are 5-3 since the calendar switched over to 2023.
All of Atlanta’s key guys have missed a handful of games. In fact, their starting lineup of Trae Young, Dejounte Murray, DeAndre Hunter, John Collins, and Clint Capela has only played together in 20 games this season.
If you’re a Hawks fan, you’re banking on this team making a run if they can stay healthy down the stretch of the season. The health part of that makes it a gamble, but with the amount of talent they have, Atlanta is more than capable of turning things around quickly.
The talent this team possesses is worth seeing how the season ends. Waiting till the summer to make any moves if things don’t turn around might be the most logical thing for the Hawks front office to do.
However, there were reports earlier this season regarding tensions between Trae Young and head coach Nate McMillan. Is it possible for Trae Young demands a trade before the deadline? It’s possible but unlikely.
It’s more possible that Nate McMillian becomes the fall guy and gets fired soon if things don’t improve. Similarly to how McMillan got the head coaching gig in the first place when previous Hawks head coach Lloyd Pierce was fired halfway through the 2020-21 season.
It is also possible that the Hawks not only fire McMillan but look to, not blow it all up and become complete sellers, tweak the roster as the deadline approaches. One name that seems to always come up when discussing trades and the Hawks is John Collins.
According to Marc Stein, the Hawks recently gave the power forward and his camp permission to “do their own searching” for a trade partner. Additionally, according to Shams Charania of The Athletic, the Nets, Wizards, Jazz, and Mavericks are teams that have expressed interest in Collins.
If the Hawks do anything around the trade deadline it will probably be centered around a John Collins deal. They are certainly a team to keep an eye on though as the deadline approaches. Things could turn sour very quickly in Atlanta if they don’t start to figure things out over the next month.
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These five teams are obviously not the only five that could be sellers at the trade deadline. The Detroit Pistons, the Indiana Pacers, the Portland Trail Blazers, the Phoenix Suns, the San Antonio Spurs, and the Houston Rockets are all struggling teams that have players of interest for teams trying to make a splash and better position themselves for the postseason.