It’s been almost half of the NBA season, but only one noticeable big trade has happened up until now. After the biggest trade in sports history involving Luka getting traded to the Los Angeles Lakers, the 2025 NBA offseason was arguably the driest offseason in this decade. Even though nothing happened in the offseason, NBA teams still did not make one single move until Jan 7th, 2026, when the first trade in the 2026 season happened, which was the Atlanta Hawks sending their four-time All-Star point guard Trae Young to the Washington Wizards in return for CJ McCollum and Corey Kispert.
In 2021, Trae Young looked like the future for the Hawks. He became a legend in Atlanta and also the villain in New York. He silenced every fan in the Madison Square Garden and bowed to the crowd, dragging a young, scrappy team to the Eastern Conference Finals. It felt like Atlanta finally found their franchise player, a small, shifty guard that could not only score from anywhere, but also find teammates and throw any type of flashy pass to them. They looked like they were next in line for title contention, but this turned out to be the high point.
However, after that cinematic run, the Hawks hovered in the play-in tournament for several years up until now, and this season was a turning point. In the 2026 season, the Hawks struggled when Trae Young was on the court. When Young got his MCL injured and missed a few weeks of basketball, the Hawks went on a 9-5 (9 wins, 5 losses) run with future star Jalen Johnson leading the charge. And up until Jan 8th, they are 15-12 without Trae Young, and only 3-7 with him. When the Hawks played without Young, the team played more team ball instead of a one man offense. They also allowed their opponents to score fewer points, played with more fight, ball movement, and communication.
But with this little sample size, this could not have been enough alone to make the Hawks association pull the trigger. The main reason why the Hawks did this trade was because of one person, Jalen Johnson. As mentioned before, he led the Hawks team to a winning record when Trae Young was out due to his injury. When he led the offense, the team was more oriented and balanced, they passed the ball around until they found the open man, and they played with pace and anticipation. Jalen Johnson is averaging 23.5 points, 10.3 rebounds, 8.3 assists per game while shooting at an efficient 52%. It now seems clear that the Hawks did not include Trae Young into their future, and this trade for Atlanta acts as a salary dump, freeing up space for future trades or other moves to improve their roster.
Most people might see this as a horrible trade for the Atlanta Hawks, since on paper it’s trading away an All-Star level guard in his prime that can’t defend in return for another non-defender who’s a decent and underrated scorer. However, in the modern NBA, teams led by small undersized guards that are an absolute cone on defense hardly have success in the Playoffs, since teams will focus on finding the mismatch, and with the NBA mainly based off of screens and switches, in addition to bigger guards and wings, even centers, being able to have playmaking and dribbling skills, unless the team is full of elite level defenders like the 2016-17 warriors, the defensive incapability of the small guard will be infinitely enlarged any playoff series. So with the Hawks having depth in their wing positions and rising star Jalen Johnson leading the charge, moving on from Trae Young is not really a bad move.
On the other hand, the Washington Wizards was a clear winner in this trade. Not only do they win in terms of “on paper value”, they also didn’t give up any picks, which is impressive. They traded away CJ McCollum, who was in the way of the Wizards developing their young players, since he doesn’t play defense and only acts as a pure efficient scorer who needs the ball in his hands. However, now that they got Trae Young, he can act as a veteran in this organization, bringing in experience and also pairing his playmaking skills with rising star Alex Sarr. With the New Orleans Pelican’s first round pick, the Hawks can very much likely get a top 4 pick in the 2026 NBA draft, and if so, with the depth and high ceiling talents of this draft, they can get their future franchise player, pair them up with Trae Young and Alex Sarr and other young role players, the Washington Wizards can improve their circumstances in a short span of time.
This is the summary and commentary of the Trae Young trade.
