The Hawks Blog: Season Grades After 50 Games

I hadn’t done a Hawks Blog yet but I figured the 50 game mark was as good a time as any to write the first piece. I’m going to give some grades but keep in mind that I’m going to be looking at things in terms of expectation and potential. So here we go.

Record: 29-21 (.580), 11th best record out of 30 in NBA.
Position: 2nd in Southeast, 9 games behind Orlando.
Playoff Position: 4th in the Eastern Conference.
Overall Team Grade: B+.
Offensive Grade: C+.
Defensive Grade: B.
Bench Grade: A-.
Coaching Grade: B-.
Health Grade: C-.

Reality Check: You have to keep things in perspective when grading the Hawks’ performance so far. I mean, yes, they’ve had some ugly performances and bad losses recently. They are only 2 games over .500 since their 6-0 start, they’ve fallen completely out of the race in the division, and it’s obvious that they are on a much different level than the top 3 teams in the Eastern Conference. But you have to keep things in perspective. Despite their stunning “near” upset of the Celtics in the opening round of last year’s playoffs, most people did not expect big strides from the Hawks this year, particularly after Josh Childress decided to go to Italy rather than resign with Atlanta. The Hawks had been progressing over the last few years but doing so at a snail’s pace. Even last year when they reached the playoffs for the first time since the 1998-1999 season, they were still just 37-45. I was hoping for a winning record but I expected that we’d be around .500 this year. I hoped that we’d make the playoffs again but I thought there were definitely 6 or 7 teams better than us in the East. And most basketball people thought that somewhere around 40 wins and a 7th or 8th place finish in the East was possible for the Hawks if things went well. So considering all of this, if you’re a Hawks fan you’ve got to be thrilled that the Hawks are 8 games over .500 and currently holding the #4 spot in the Eastern Conference standings.

Mid-Term Grades: I was tempted to rate the season an “A” so far and I probably would have had I done this blog 2 weeks ago when the Hawks were 26-16. Another reason that Hawks fans should be happy with the 29-21 record to this point is that the team has compiled that record despite both Josh Smith and Al Horford missing a bunch of games. But that’s actually another reason why I decided not to give a grade of “A.” While the Hawks have steered clear of any season crushing injuries, the bad injury luck that has plagued them over the last 3 or 4 seasons has been present again this year. This is a big part of the reason that I gave the coaching staff a favorable grade. The team often seems to lack focus, direction, discipline, etc. but the record is solid despite the injury problems and I think you’ve got to give the coaches some credit for that. And you really have to give the front office some credit as well. The Hawks might have been even better if Childress had stayed here but all that really matters is that he obviously didn’t want to be here. That made the Hawks look really bad in my opinion and I didn’t think they did enough to try and replace Chill. But so far the bench has been one of the brightest spots of the season if you ask me. The Hawks still have depth issues to be sure, but it’s much better than it used to be, and the guys that we did manage to bring in to make up for the loss of J-Chill have done all that could have been expected of them.

I’ve got much more to come on the Hawks but I decided to split it up into different blogs rather than just putting it all in one epic blog.