Should Hawks be worried after Trae Young's poor Game 1?
Trae Young was held to eight points Sunday in the Atlanta Hawks' 115-91 Game 1 loss to the Miami Heat in the first round of the playoffs.
Young was 1-for-9 from the field (11.1%) — including 0-for-6 from 3 — at halftime despite having the most shot attempts out of any player at that time.
It only went downhill from there.
Young finished shooting 1-for-12 — including 0-for-7 from distance — and committed six turnovers.
Young's performance is a stark contrast to his showing in the Hawks' 107-101 play-in game victory over the Cleveland Cavaliers on Friday, where the 23-year-old led all scorers with 38 points and nine assists.
On Monday's "Undisputed," Skip Bayless said Hawks fans should certainly be worried about Game 2 against a suffocating Miami squad, which Bayless predicted would earn a first-round sweep.
"'Ice Trae' yesterday was shivering. He was cold as ice. We see this happen fairly regularly. He can get shut down and shut out. He was almost shut completely out yesterday. Miami — speaking of tall task — they're just too big for him," Bayless said.
"I think he's a fine young man. He gets upset with me. He tweets at me that I'm lame. Yesterday, he was lamer because they were all over him. When you even have the great P.J. Tucker taking a few reps on him — It's just too hard for him to break loose. Yeah, he can get hot-handed, as the Heat were quick to say after the game, but they just get so physical with him. They just wear him out. They wear him down."
Young — the fifth overall pick in the 2018 NBA Draft — averaged 28.4 points, 3.7 rebounds and 9.7 assists per game on 46% shooting in the regular season.
The Hawks made it all the way to the conference finals last year before losing to the Milwaukee Bucks, who went on to win it all. Prior to that, they hadn't made a postseason appearance since the 2016-17 season.
