Atlanta Hawks Should Wait Out The Final Year of Bazemore’s Contract
By Kit Anderson
The Atlanta Hawks are entering the final year of Kent Bazemore’s terrible contract. Despite the fact they will have options Atlanta should stick with Bazemore for one final season.
Kent Bazemore has been a point of frustration for the Atlanta Hawks and their fans. His ability defensively and shooting the ball from deep has maintained some value for the overpaid small forward.
Bazemore’s contract is one of the worst in the NBA and is finally entering its final year. Bazemore isn’t a bad player, but he is being paid as a starter.
His consistency (or lack of) demands the Hawks use him as a bench piece and focus on putting young players with more upside in the starting lineup.
Bazemore finished the season scoring 11.6 points per game. This isn’t the ideal production you are looking for from your highest paid starting player. Even with that in mind, Atlanta should stick with Bazemore for one final season.
Trading the forward at this point would be pointless considering to move on from Bazemore Atlanta would need to take on another bad contract. At least with Bazemore fans know what to expect and he can provide a bit of leadership to a young roster.
He will occasionally catch fire as well providing a young team with a veteran with the ability to go on long hot stretches.
After this season, however, Atlanta should move on from Kent unless he is willing to come back at a very steep discount.
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Despite two bad contracts on their roster (Bazemore and Plumlee) Atlanta still have plenty of cap space for the off-season and will look to land a top free agent. If they were able to have a productive off-season and add at least one impact player the Hawks will be a playoff team in 2020. Returning to relevance and giving Hawks fans a reason to be excited once again.