Does his shooting really matter when the passing is this historic?
When Trae Young began making national and international noise in his one-and-done freshman year at Oklahoma in the 2017-18 season, it was easy to hail his long range shot-making ability as his primary draw. How often does a skinny 6-foot-2 freshman lead the entirety of NCAA Division I men’s basketball with 27.4 points per game?
Of course, the afterthought of it all is that he also led the entirety of NCAA Division I with 8.7 assists per game.
In vogue in the NBA were (and are) Steph Curry and Damian Lillard bombing logo threes with unmatched volume and efficiency. The pace and space revolution had arrived at the professional level prior to Young’s entrance, with teams shooting more threes than ever and pull up threes from feet behind the line as a strategy du jour.
Young was obviously also a visionary as a facilitator even back then. But a nice pocket pass for a lay-up doesn’t usually make the highlight reel the same way a stepback 30-footer might.
Newly christened a franchise cornerstone on that draft day in late June 2018, Trae Young stepped forth as a singular offensive force the Hawks hadn’t had since the days of Dominique Wilkins. Young has only once averaged fewer than 25 points per game, his rookie season average of 19.1.
But so far this season, Trae Young has both reached new heights assisting his teammates while simultaneously struggling from the floor as much as ever. Sporting a per-game average of just (and I mean a relative just) 20.9 points, something just seems off with his scoring.
Trae Young is, put plainly, having the worst shooting season of his career from the field, and that includes his rookie season when he was just getting his feet wet. His 46.9 effective field goal percentage is a career-worst, and it grades out even more grimly than that when comparing it to the more efficient league environment — an 87 eFG+ or 13 percent worse than league average shooting from the field.
A lot of the trouble boils down to finishing in high-trafficked areas. Young is having all kinds of trouble finishing inside the restricted area, for example — something he excelled at compared to other players of his size previously.
He’s down to a 51% conversion rate inside the restricted area arc this season. That mark had rested anywhere from 55-60% every year since his rookie season.
Additionally, Young’s floater has absolutely abandoned him with him hitting just 35-of-76 of them for a 46% shooting percentage on those per shotcreator. This includes 24-of-59 (41%) of floaters in the paint but outside the restricted area.
I must point out that Young has been listed on the injury report a number of times early this season with what’s been called ‘right Achilles tendonitis’. He even missed an NBA Cup game in Boston earlier this season due to the injury — a game the Hawks improbably won, fines notwithstanding.
“[My Achilles injury] has been a lingering thing to start the season,” Young remarked on it on November 15 after a win over the Washington Wizards. “It just started feeling a bit more uncomfortable after the last game [prior to the Boston game].”
Young’s Achilles issue may truly take its biggest toll on his ability to accelerate into the lane on drives and finish. Young is just 46-for-110 (42%) on shots coming off of drives per the NBA. All of these marks are well below league average — a shocker for such a great scorer.
All told, this is his shot chart where red represents areas somewhat below league average and green somewhat above league average per shotcreator.
Maybe a result, Trae is passing out of drives a sky-high 49% of the time, well up from 36% and 38% the last two seasons respectively. So, he’s clearly looking to create advantages, not for himself, but for others at a much higher rate this season.
All this has seemingly left him unwilling to probe inside the arc for his own shot. And so it follows that he has thus far topped a 50% three-point rate (the percent threes as a proportion of his field goals) for the first time in his career.
Ultimately, the Hawks’ offensive rating has dipped this season, but that may largely be a product of the units the team has had to deploy when Young is out of the game. Per PBPstats, the Hawks have a robust 115.6 offensive rating when Young is on the court and a not so robust 106.1 offensive rating otherwise.
So if the poor shooting isn’t dragging the Young-led offense down, something else is keeping it afloat, right?
Right. And that thing is very clearly his otherworldly passing.
The raw stats don’t lie. As of Tuesday afternoon, Trae Young led the league with 12.2 assists per game, a full 2.5 assists per game ahead of the second-place player Nikola Jokic.
The list of players who have ever managed 12 assists per game over an entire season is just five names long. And it’s a feat that hasn’t been done since 1994-95.
Basketball-Reference/Stathead
People may question his high number of turnovers (4.8 per game). But his assist-to-turnover ratio is right in line with the other high-volume passers in the league, and he routinely attempts high difficulty passes BECAUSE the payout is often a nearly guaranteed two points if it’s an attempt towards the rim — which a lot of his passes are on a team struggling to space to floor.
Young has blossomed into a historic floor general in his seven seasons in the NBA. He orchestrates his offense in a similar manner to the great point guards throughout history, having seen just every conceivable coverage and scheme. And through processing and operating one step ahead of the defense, he carves apart foes with his wits and ability to whip passes all over the court.
Young can loft and fling the ball in a variety of manners to both avoid the traffic by the baseline and hit shooters in their shooting pockets.
Here, he directs ‘Bogi’ to cut baseline so Jalen Johnson can sink to the corner. That opens up the strong side for Onyeka Okongwu to roll and receive and easy lay-in.
The team is running fewer and fewer pure pick-and-rolls as a function of their primary offense than in years past. They still end up flowing into a number of pick-and-rolls outside of the called offense — and who can blame them with screeners and finishers Johnson, Clint Capela, Okongwu, and others?
Young, of course, has some no-look action in his bag, like below to freeze both Alex Sarr and Jonas Valanciunas.
And the re-screen pick-and-roll game has left defenses scratching their collective heads for years.
When Young is finally past his Achilles issues, he’ll assuredly regress towards his career averages. Even still, he’s never been the most efficient player from the field. He’s someone that depends on craftiness to get to the line as a big prop up for his self-creation numbers even in the best of times.
So maybe it’s time to abandon hopes of him ever being a self-creation monster — at least one with elite efficiency. But Young also has the ability to be one of the most productive pass-first players this game has ever seen, as evidenced by this season and even ones previous to this one.
The team is 11-11, alive in the Emirates NBA Cup, and are ascending. And with a new defensive infrastructure around him and a young cast of promising players, who knows? This change in profile may just ultimately prove to lead to more team success and propel the Hawks back to national relevance, something that has eluded the franchise for years.