Amid the haste required to make a move when traded from one NBA team to another, Saddiq Bey brought a lot of cold-weather clothes with him from Detroit for a mild February in Atlanta.
"It's great weather down here for sure. It's very warm. I didn't expect it. I came with a lot of winter clothes. I've got to go shopping again," Bey said with a chuckle.
The need to go shopping was a small part of a whirlwind of a journey around the trade deadline for Bey.
As the Hawks made moves to interim head coach Joe Prunty and new head coach Quin Snyder, Bey achieved a rare feat: playing for four head coaches in a span of just six games.
"It's something I'm not used to, obviously, but I think I can just try to play as hard as I can and try to play my game," Bey said. "It will make the transition go smoothly."
In the midst of all that hubbub, like a quiet eye in the middle of a moving hurricane, Bey also just had to sit and wait. With some other non-Atlanta parts of the four-team trade that brought Bey to the Hawks in doubt, Bey was reduced to sitting in a chair and watching practice in his first two days in Atlanta.
As Bey watched those two days, some of the most notable three-point shooters in NBA history did their jobs in the gym.
Take, for instance, what Trae Young, assistant general manager Kyle Korver, assistant coach Nick Van Exel, and Bogdan Bogdanovic each accomplished in their first three seasons in the NBA. Trae made 497 threes, the 9th-best mark in NBA history. Similarly, Korver (491 threes, 10th place), Van Exel (450 threes, 14th place), and Bogdanovic (427 threes, 19th place) all rank among the top 20 players for three-pointers in their first three NBA seasons.
Saddiq Bey passed them all this season.
Bey currently sits in 8th place all-time with 515 threes in his first three seasons, a feat made more impressive by the fact that his first NBA season was shortened league-wide due to COVID, and he still has 13 games left in this season.
(The players ahead of Bey on that list are a who's who of shooters: Buddy Hield, Damian Lillard, Anthony Edwards, Donovan Mitchell, Klay Thompson, Luka Doncic, and Duncan Robinson.)
Since arriving in Atlanta, Bey has shot the cover off the ball, converting on 48.3 percent of his threes while averaging 11.3 points and 4.1 rebounds per game largely off the bench. Perhaps more importantly, Bey fits with a need that Quin Snyder has emphasized since his arrival in Atlanta as head coach: the need for spacing. The threat of Bey's ability to shoot, combined with his high release and quick, short shooting stroke – makes Bey one of the top few Hawks floor spacers.
To put it another way, what makes Bey valuable to the Hawks isn't just that he can make threes, but also that he can shoot them with volume: 4.1 attempts per game since he has arrived. He is more of a play-finisher than a playmaker – and that has value to the playmakers on the team.
"In my mind, if I get a little bit of space, then I have to take advantage of it. I think it's one of my strengths putting pressure on the defense and giving the defense a different look."
Onyeka Okongwu helps lead the second-unit defense that Bey has joined, and he likes the interchangeability of its defenders.
"I just try to keep it as simple as possible," Okongwu said. On the second unit, we're versatile defensively with JJ, Saddiq, and DJ. We're switching a lot. Obviously, we want to play our coverages, but I feel like we all can guard, so for something like that, if there's any confusion, switch. It's coming along great."
Given the nature of in-season changes and the number of days the Hawks have spent on the road the past few weeks, it might be natural for Bey to feel like a visitor with a new team and city, but he said that he already has felt Atlanta's hospitality.
"As soon as I came into Atlanta, the first day, I just felt welcome – like a 'Welcome Home' from each and every person that I met – the entire city. It just felt like the right place to be. I'm excited to be here. I can't wait to see what the future holds."