Doc Rivers Says He Doesn't See the Trae Young and Dejounte Murray Pairing Working

Atlanta is 9-13 heading into two critical games vs Toronto

The Hawks made a huge splash last summer when they traded for All-Star guard Dejounte Murray. Coming off of a tough loss in the first round to the Miami Heat, it was clear that Atlanta would need more around Trae Young if they wanted to get back to the conference finals again. They traded away plenty of picks to get Murray but from the day they traded for him, some analysts around the NBA wondered if that would be a good pairing. 

Flash forward to their second season together and the Hawks are 9-13 and in the midst of a four-game losing streak. The team is 10th in the Eastern Conference and in danger of possibly missing the playoffs if they can't turn it around. Now, not all of the Hawks's problems are because of this pairing, but they are the faces of the franchise and were supposed to lead the Hawks to big things. 

When appearing on Bill Simmons podcast today, Doc Rivers was discussing the pairing of Murray and Young and if he thought it would work and he gave his honest assessment: 

"It has not worked. They are both small in size. Now, Murray will try to defend and he is very competitive, but he is still small at the end of the day and slight. Yeah... I don't see it working. I'm with you, I thought Q (Haws head coach Quin Snyder) would come in and change them and they have, they have been better on offense at times, but after that, they are not a deep team and you just don't see it on a night-to-night basis with them."

Hawks guards Trae Young and Dejounte Murray / Kevin Jairaj-USA TODAY Sports

Rivers did praise Young for his ability to be clutch late in games, while also criticizing Young's defense  : 

"Trae at the end of a game... no one wants to be in a one-point game and you saw it last year against Boston, you don't want to be in a one-point game when that dude is on the floor with the ball because he is capable of making shots, but the defense from him is poor and you have to do both ends if you want to win in this league"

I will say that Young has been better on defense this season and has been putting good effort in on that end. He has his limitations for sure, but his effort level has been pretty good from him. 

Atlanta has been thrown in the middle of a lot of trade rumors and if they can't get it going soon this season, more people are going to come to the same conclusion as Doc Rivers and say that Young and Murray are not a good pairing for this team. 

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