Finishing outside of the playoffs with a 40-42 record, and losing both games in the play-in tournament, the Atlanta Hawks did not have the year that they were hoping for.
The 2024-25 NBA season was the Hawks’ second consecutive campaign without any postseason play, both of which come on the heels of two consecutive first-round exits in 2022 and 2023. They are a far cry from the team that made the Conference Finals in 2020-21, and need help both from within and outside to open up a competitive window again.
On the positive side, however, the Hawks have developed a big piece for their future internally over the past season. And he is now getting the plaudits his play deserved.
The Best Ball Thief In The Game Today
Two weeks after winning the NBA’s Most Improved Player award, third-year guard Dyson Daniels picked up another honour. This week, he was named to the NBA’s All-Defensive First team, after a season in which he made himself unignorable on that end.
Alongside stand-out sophomore forward Amen Thompson of the Houston Rockets, Draymond Green of the Golden State Warriors, Luguentz Dort of the Oklahoma City Thunder and Evan Mobley of the Cleveland Cavaliers, Daniels has been chosen as one of the five best defensive players in the league. And this is something he earned by being by far the best ball thief in the game today.
Daniels’s 3.0 steals per game average led the NBA this season, and by quite some way. Only two other players recorded more than 2.0 per game – former All-NBA Defensive Team place recipient Matisse Thybulle of the Portland Trail Blazers (2.2spg, albeit in only 15 games played), and the man for whom Daniels was trade last summer – Dejounte Murray of the New Orleans Pelicans (2.0spg in 31 games played).
Acquired as a “redraft” player in the July-time trade that saw he, Cody Zeller, E.J Liddell, Larry Nance Jr and two first-round picks move from Atlanta to New Orleans in exchange for Murray, Daniels just outplayed the man he was supposedly upgrade-traded for, and is now arguably Atlanta’s best piece for the future. Indeed, his “present” is pretty good too.
The future, though, will now cost the team more money. And with this award, the price may just have gone up.
Daniels May Now Get A Pay Rise
As this season was his third in the NBA, Daniels will this offseason be eligible for an extension.
Under the NBA’s Collective Bargaining Agreement, contract extensions are rare – the majority of contracts are not eligible for them at all. Included in those that are, though, are “rookie scale contracts”, the four-year deals for set amounts signed by first-rounders as they first enter the NBA. After the third year of those, but before the fourth one starts, players are eligible to sign extensions that will begin the following year.
“Maximum” player salaries in the NBA are dependent on various factors, including free agency status, years of experience and previous contract size. For rookie scale extensions, though, the maximum salary a player can receive in the first year of extension is simply 25% of the salary cap.
There does however exist caveats to that. Specifically, similarly to the rules for veteran extensions, a player can instead receive a contract starting at 30% of the salary cap, if they have achieved any of the following:
[A] Named Defensive Player of the Year in the previous season, or both of the two prior to the previous season
[B] Named to the All-NBA first, second or third teams in the previous season, or both of the two prior to the previous season
[C] Won the MVP award in any of the three immediately prior seasons.
By making the All-NBA Defensive team this season, therefore, Daniels is halfway to a pay rise. And given that he did not need the Hawks to make the playoffs for himself to be recognised as one of the game’s best defenders, nothing stands in his way to doing so again next year.
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