Trae Young is now a Washington Wizard and CJ McCollum and Corey Kispert are now Hawks after the first in-season trade of the 2025-26 NBA season. It’s still weird to think about, I know.
With the hang up over a new extension for Young a key factor in the divorce, the Hawks opted for an expiring contract in McCollum to go along with Kispert who is under contract for two more seasons after this one at an annual value of $13.5 million (with a team option worth slightly over $13 million in 2028-29).
CJ McCollum figures to be the more immediate impact player of the two, with his vast experience in this league and ability to still score in a multitude of ways.
Even in his 13th year as a professional, McCollum is averaging 18.8 points and 3.6 assists on 30.9 minutes per game while shooting 45% from the field and 39% from three (on 10.7 attempts per 100 possessions). For a moribund Wizards offense, Washington scored 113.5 points per 100 possessions when McCollum was on the floor and 107.2 points per 100 possessions when he was off per pbpstats.
But it’s really how he scores his points that intrigues me as it relates to these Hawks. Under Quin Snyder, the Hawks have seen a drop in pick-and-roll and isolation sets and an uptick in dribble handoffs and plays ending in cuts. It’s a fundamentally different offense than his predecessor’s, and that figures to continue in the wake of Young’s departure.
Atlanta’s offensive rating sits at a 114.8 as of Saturday morning, 19th in the NBA, which would be their worst finish since 2019-20. Compare that to when Young was on the floor (for just 10 games and 280 minutes) when they posted a 121.7 offensive rating per pbpstats.
There’s no doubt that even with McCollum and Kispert coming in, the offense just won’t reach the same heights without Young. But there’s still a big opportunity to address what I feel is the biggest weakness of the Snyder era offenses.
When Atlanta’s offense is on this season, they can dice you up with off ball player movement, ball movement, screening and spacing from sideline to sideline. But when it’s off, there is a lot of around-the-horn passing and little to threaten defenses going downhill.
The driving gravity of Jalen Johnson, Dyson Daniels, and Nickeil Alexander-Walker in particular have been huge towards pulling bodies into the paint. That trio all have at least 340 drives on the season with the next closest Hawk is way behind with 142 per NBA’s tracking stats.
But what happens when you can’t get all the way into the paint? What happens when the shot clock is running down and you need to create separation for a shot?
This is the area in which the Hawks really struggle the most to create. Only Johnson and Alexander-Walker have more pull up shot attempts than Young, who is third on the team with 80 attempts despite being 12th in minutes.
As a whole, the team is 28th in pull up attempts per game (17.8), 26th in pull up three-point attempts per game (7.6), and 29th in pull up three-point accuracy (27.9%). Certainly, you’d rather generate open catch-and-shoot three-pointers than rely on less efficient three-pointers off the dribble. But there still needs to be that threat present to give defenses something to think about.
In steps CJ McCollum, professional bucket getter.
He came into this season on a ten-season streak of scoring at least 20 points per game. He’s often referred to as one of the best players to never make an All-Star Game, especially after this season that will see Jamal Murray break through there.
He’s slowing down at this stage of his career and isn’t much of a driving threat anymore, but he can definitely still create off the bounce. McCollum is 14th in three-point pull up attempts and 17th in the NBA in all pull up attempts as of Saturday morning.
Among players in the top 20 of pull up attempts this season, McCollum is third in effective field goal percentages (eFG%) behind just Shai Gilgeous-Alexander and Jamal Murray. For reference, some of the names shooting a worse percentage on similar volume include Luka Doncic, Devin Booker, Jalen Brunson, Jaylen Brown, Anthony Edwards, Donovan Mitchell, and Kevin Durant.
Clearly, he’s not a player the caliber of those mentioned above, but in this one area — the singular most problematic area of the offense I believe — he can be a major asset to the Hawks going forward. To be sure, McCollum is on an expiring contract and recently turned 34 years of age, but for the short term, he can help diversify the offense and bail the team out when the shot clock nears zero.
You need to look no further than his demolition of the Hawks earlier this season largely behind unconscious pull up shooting.
In this game, he went 17-for-25 (68%) and 10-for-13 (77%) from three en route to 46 points, his third-highest scoring output of his career.
Contrast that to Friday’s third quarter when the Hawks struggled mightily to get going. In a quarter in which they shot 7-for-22 (32%) overall and 2-for-12 (17%) from three — with one of those two makes a last second heave from Onyeka Okongwu — they could have used a CJ McCollum.
While Vit Krejci is shooting a blistering 47% from three, he’s overburdened in a role where he needs to create shots off the dribble late in the clock. This step back at the top of the key is just too awkward a shot for him:
And while Alexander-Walker has been a revelation this season, he’s shooting below 40% eFG% on pull up shots — not a surprise given this is his first high volume season ever. He can struggle when shooting in traffic, so giving him a double screen and bringing three bodies into the action wasn’t the right idea:
This trade return is reminiscent of bringing in Caris LeVert at the trade deadline last season, an archetype of player who could operate as a ‘1’ or a ‘2’ and break cold spells with self-created buckets. Even just having the steady ball handling of a veteran combo guard on the court can relieve some of the playmaking burden from others with just the threat of getting to a certain spot on the floor.
McCollum arrives as the oldest member on the team, and he’s obviously not a direct replacement to replace Trae Young nor is he a long-term building block. But he plugs a huge hole at a position of need, and he can help turn around as this season is starting to slip away.
He’s expected to suit up for the Hawks for his debut later today in the Bay Area. And that first launch off the dribble will be a sight for sore eyes.