Hopes and dreams, they’re fickle beings. Sometimes, they’re dashed rather early in an NBA season. A training camp, media day and summer full of optimism can evaporate before November even arrives. As we progress into the second week of the season, which slow starts appear most worrying?
The Sportscasting crew identified three teams off to less-than-stellar beginnings we should monitor moving forward. While disaster may not be imminent, changes are imperative for these squads to actualize the lofty goals with which they entered the year.
Let’s get to it.
Atlanta Hawks
Before the 2025-26 NBA season kicked off, Las Vegas odds projected the Atlanta Hawks with a strong 46.5 win total, tied for fourth in the Eastern Conference. Yet through five games, the Hawks are 2-3 with a minus-8.6 net rating, far more concerning than their raw win-loss total. Atlanta ranks 22nd in offensive rating and 24th in defensive rating in the early hours of the season.
For an optimistic rest-of-season projection, several of Atlanta’s major weaknesses should be correctable with more reps and time on task. The Hawks are a strong half-court team, ranking 11th in half-court offense and eighth in defense, but their transition offense (20th) and defense (28th) have been putrid.
Constant miscommunications and struggles with cross-matches have spoiled an otherwise talented and disruptive defense. Ideally, the Hawks clean up their transition woes and lean on their half-court defense to outpace teams, paying more attention to leak-outs and early offense matchups.
If Atlanta is to reach its ceiling as a top-four seed and legitimate playoff threat, the offense must improve. The Hawks can feed more touches to players like Luke Kennard and Nickeil Alexander-Walker as secondary handlers but this Atlanta team still lacks reliable perimeter creation beyond Trae Young, who’s now sidelined with a right knee sprain.
through four games, luke kennard ranks seventh on the hawks in on-ball rate (10.5%), seventh in touches per game and LAST in usage (12.9%), 13th of 13 hawks who have played any minutes at all
this offense needs easy buttons and luke can provide them at least somewhat https://t.co/FFFg4H8Dvh pic.twitter.com/wOvpQovM2V
— ben pfeifer (@bjpf_) October 29, 2025
Young’s athleticism and physicality look their best in a few years and Kristaps Porzingis is a mismatch weapon who changes how defenses can cover Young. Down the road, offensive development from Jalen Johnson, Dyson Daniels and Zaccharie Risacher could boost Atlanta’s offense but it might lack the horses beyond Young and Porzingis (who has already missed two of four games) to field a playoff-worthy unit. -Ben Pfeifer
New York Knicks
Have you ever wondered why some teams don’t fix their 3-point shooting problem by simply just shooting more threes? I have three words for you: know your personnel. If your team doesn’t have a lot of volume 3-point shooters, you probably don’t want to attempt a lot of threes.
Don’t believe me? Well, take a gander at the 2025-26 New York Knicks. After finishing 27th in 3-point attempts per game, the Knicks entered this year with the desire to change that. Through four games, they’re third in this category. The problem is these shots aren’t coming naturally in the flow of their offense. Rather, many of them are ill-advised shots, even for NBA players.
How do we know this? They are only hitting 33 percent of these shots (24th) and their offensive rating has gone from top five to bottom 10 (23rd, to be exact).
I love that head coach Mike Brown is trying to add his own unique imprint on this roster. But offense was never really the problem for the Knicks. It was their defense, which, for the record, has looked a little bit better thus far. I’m concerned the Knicks are worrying about something not really broken and forgetting to address the team’s true weakness.*
*If the Knicks keep taking all these contested threes, they will eventually start hurting their defense, as many missed contested threes lead to layups on the other end.
I’d also add that two of the Knicks’ marquee signings, Jordan Clarkson and Guerschon Yabusele, are off to rough starts. Both of them are shooting under 34 percent from the floor. I really thought depth was going to be more of a strength for New York this season (that was also before Malcolm Brogdon decided to retire) but that doesn’t appear to be the case either. -Mat Issa
Orlando Magic
The Orlando Magic are undeniably not off to a great start. After being touted as the third fiddle in the Eastern Conference all summer, the new-look Magic, with their trio of Paolo Banchero, Franz Wagner and Desmond Bane, sit 2-4 through a week of action.
The problems are on both ends. Their offense ranks 21st, putting up just 112.3 points per possession across six games. The Magic haven’t had a top-10 offense since Dwight Howard was around and it looks like that trend might just continue. As their offense sputters, their No. 2 defense from last season has fallen off a cliff, conceding 117.3 points per 100 possessions. Astoundingly, they’ve already given up 130 or more points in two games, something they did just nine times all of last season.
So, what’s behind those numbers causing their poor start?
It would be easy to cite incorporating their new arrivals, particularly the sharpshooter Bane, whom they spent a haul to acquire, only for him to start the season shooting 25 percent from three. That said, their overall offensive process has been poor, too.
Bane’s addition has done nothing to improve their abysmal 3-point rate from last season (down to 29th from 21st) and Banchero has started the season shooting 21.7 percent beyond the arc on nearly four attempts a night. Perhaps, one of their biggest issues is the ball is still in Banchero’s hands a bit too much. With Bane also in the fold now, it’s limited Wagner’s ability to impact games the same way he did last season.
— Jesp (@jespvg) October 30, 2025
The offensive confusion has also bled into their defensive identity. The Magic were second in opposing turnovers last season and sixth in scoring off of those chances. This season, they’re 12th and 21st in those respective categories.
It’s early but there are enough alarm bells here to wonder whether the tried-and-true identity the Magic built over the course of the past few seasons can deal with some cracks in its foundation. Otherwise, we might have to adjust our expectations accordingly. -Es Baraheni
