Atlanta Hawks: Mo Gueye scouting report, 2025 player capsule, defensive impact, offensive potential

Atlanta Hawks: Mo Gueye scouting report, 2025 player capsule, defensive impact, offensive potential

On today’s show, our Hawks player capsule series is back and we look at Mo Gay with a visit from Glenn Willis of ATL on 29 and it’s coming up right now. You are Locked On Hawks, your daily Atlanta Hawks podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. Hello friends, welcome to episode 2030 of the Lot on Hawks podcast. I am your host Brad Roland coming to you on a Sunday evening here in late July. And today’s podcast we’ll be diving in to our player capsule series once again with my friend Glenn Willis joining me from ATL and 29 to discuss Moay. First on this episode I should tell you at the top of the show to make us your first listen at Lots on Hawks each and every day. Check us out and subscribe to the podcast anywhere you find your podcast. That includes Apple and Spotify. We’re also on YouTube, so please like this video as you are watching it. And of course, crucially, tell your friends, tell your colleagues, tell your family, etc. about this podcast. Last week was very busy on the show. We had five episodes. Tyler Jones joined me on the podcast. On Friday, I dropped a episode with Dane Moore diving into the Kil Alexander Walker. That was a fun listen as well. Wall-to-wall coverage as always about the Hawks in this space. And as we’ll talk about in a second with Glenn, we start this player capsule series before the draft each year. I did a couple back in April May area for the Hawks. But now we dive in with both feet as the dead period is here in the offseason. So first up today is a look at thirdyear big man Mo Gay. What he’s good at, what he has to work on, all those things, his role for next year. We’ll get into all that and more right now with myself and Glenn Willis. I am joined once again by my good friend Glenn Willis of ATL and 29. Glenn, it’s been a while since we’ve done a non-s summer league episode of the podcast. We’re back to player capsules. I appreciate you being here. How are you? Yeah. Yeah. I look forward to to diving in here. I’m good. You know, we did a couple of player capsules, at least one full one and one kind of mini one before the transaction cycle happened. If people are new to this segment, uh Glenn is gracious enough to give me a bunch of time in the summer to basically just do looks at players, deep dives, where they are, where they have been, where they might be going. We did Larry Nance. I thought at the time Larry might be back and that did not happen. So that’s these things could go away. Um we lost a couple potential uh player capsules with Terrence Man and George Nang because they were traded after the I did my list, but we have new guys too and it’s interesting time. We’ll be doing Mo Gay on this episode as people probably already know by click click on click on the podcast. Mo is really interesting. Like I wanted to save a lot of the big guns for later, but Mo is one of the more interesting ones to me. I don’t know if you share that that that thought with me. He has he hasn’t played that much. We’ll get into all this, but um when I asked you to talk about Mo Gay today, what was uh kind of bouncing around in your mind? I mean the the the big curiosity I have is what role do they envision for him next year? Right. He he he showed a lot of growth the last two months, whatever we want to call it in the season. Um I know we’ll talk about uh positional size, you know, what he has, what he doesn’t have. And so for me, I keep kind of looking out like if they add another, are they going to add another center? If so, how does that impact his spot in the rotation? Is he kind of one foot in, one foot out and just situational game by game? uh or do they want to like kind of put him into that tenth spot maybe in the rotation and have him play, you know, 12 to 14 minutes a game and and and in cases where you’re closing defensively, you want to put a switchable lineup out there, maybe it’s more than that, right? He he had he had a few games last year where he played basically starters workload. You know, you think about especially against the Bucks and I think a lot of us kind of remember those games against Milwaukee. Um but yeah, my curiosity is what do they think of him? What do what role do they envision for him? What do they what do they think he’s capable of handling from responsibility standpoint? And because right now it feels a little a little bit like an unknown even though he did show some real growth last year. Yeah, for sure. And we’ll probably, you know, kind of do the overview and then we’ll kind of maybe circle back to to like, hey, what’s this going to look like? Because you’re right, that’s my thought, too. It’s a lot of, you know, there’s some uncertainty, but I don’t mean I don’t mean that in a bad way. I think that just with the way that they’ve operated this summer so far as we record this in late July, you know, they’ve added um really only one like major front court piece in Porzingis. Um but Mo’s role has been uneven to date. Even if they hadn’t done anything, I wasn’t 100% confident in what Mo’s role was going to be. Um he’ll have one. I’m pretty confident in that. It’s just what we’ll be going into. It is very interesting on both ends of the floor really. Um people that may be joining us um who are not always super dialed in. Mo was the 39th pick in the 2023 draft. He’ll be going into his third season. Still pretty young. 22. He’ll be 23 in November. And he’s only played 39 games so far in the NBA in two seasons. But 33 of them came last season. And he made 28 starts. And I went and looked at this. He didn’t play a competitive NBA minute last year until basically the end of January. So all of that basically came at the um from the end of January to the end of the season which again part of that was Jaylen being out part of that was Capella being out and all this Nance being out all that stuff. But he was thrust in played a pretty big role at times. He average 17 minutes a game basically down the stretch including like you said a couple times where he was basically playing starting minutes. Um and you know he was there was a few games where he was starting in name only like he was kind of getting like the old Keith Bogen seven minutes of both halves but then there was some games where he really played 30 minutes or something like that down the stretch and he became extremely valuable particularly with his defense. um if you’re okay. I want to start with the defense because that is the really exciting side of the floor with Mogay and we I would say the more actualized part of his game because I have a stat that I I don’t know if you know this because I was actually surprised. I think I kind of knew this at one point but with Mo on the floor last year in like 500 plus minutes the Hawks had a 105 defensive rating which is like great like really really really really good. Now, he doesn’t get credit for all of that, but certainly he was a factor defensively and they were able to kind of hold up defensively um when they had some personnel challenges. I I just said like he played a lot more when Jaylen was not around and when Clintit was not around which meant that their infrastructure defensively was pretty bad at times at the end of the season and he was an active plus to the point where a lot of the metrics like the EPMs and the Raptors like really love Mogay’s defense like and it’s a small sample but it also passes the eye test. At least it does for me. Yeah, it’s um for me it is the versatility, the switchability. He can he depends on space. Well, a term I use, I don’t know who else uses is his defensive range. He can get from the corner of the rim back to the corner. He can cover a large portion of the floor by himself because of his quickness and his agility and his, you know, ability to kind of move side to side. Uh and so that’s that’s where like all of his strength shows up. Uh he had he had real flashes of weak side rim protection uh last year. um was impactful there. You know, for me, when I think about teams that tend to play smaller, I think he’s he’s good in those games where uh teams that play five out, he’s the kind of defender you want on the floor often times, you know, for teams that do that. And you go up against, you know, the way that like the Clippers are built with Zubot being just an absolute beast. Like, you don’t want him getting switched on to like the biggest centers, you know, in the league. Um um but uh but for me it’s just he has a a really unique ability just to cover and be responsible for a lot of space. Uh and that’s that’s to me where his where his strength is. And then like I said if you want to switch you want to get him someone running one four pick and roll you get him to the level of the screen you can impact that he has the speed to kind of you know move up and impact that play and get back. So so I you know I thought he I thought they won several games last year they don’t win if not for his defensive production you know. Yeah. Um and and I think that was noteworthy. Oh, it definitely was. And you know, they are excited about his defense for sure organizationally. Like that’s on the reporting intel side. Like they’ve always kind of and I we’ll get into this. Um they’ve always kind of had this barrier up where they don’t really at least they haven’t until recently if it’s changed. Believe that he’s a full-time center. And part of that is what we just talked around a little bit. Like he’s really thin listed at 611 210. He’s still very thin. Um he’s not the strongest guy in the world by big standards, but he does of course, like we just talked about in a positive way, the range, um the backside protection, um the versatility defensively kind of stems from that. So, you know, it’s it’s hard to do everything and he, you know, he’s he showed some center and look, I was tracking it all year long. He really didn’t play any center until the very end of the season when they basically were out of options. They even tried Don Barlo there before they tried Mo there because and that kind of I think illustrated I think hopefully to people kind of saw what I was reporting on like they don’t think he’s a center for the most part and they kind of they put him there out of ne out of necessity but we’ll come back to this they do have some center minutes available on the roster right now and as we as we record this in late July a lot of people I think kind of including me are penciling him in not in pen but penciling him in like hey on a night with Porzingis unavailable or Porzingis turns an ankle or something like that or Kong was present an ankle is the third center Mogay and I think right now at this very moment again in late July I think it probably is and I think the end of last season maybe gave the Hawks a little bit more confidence in what he can do if he if he’s asked to do that you know kind of being a more traditional anchor and he won’t be you know standing under the rim like Porzingis will be they’re very different defenders but he can at least be like hey Quinn throw him throw him at that spot and we won’t we won’t worry as much as we might have you know a year ago. Yeah. And then there there are things you can do scheme wise to protect him a little bit. Like you don’t want him just playing straight drop. That’s not he’s not strong enough to kind of hold up all by himself there in the middle. Um but you can be more aggressive at the point of attack. You can kind of, you know, get get him up to the level like we talked about a minute ago. Uh and those are things where if you want kind of a faster defensive lineup, he he really kind of gives you that in that sense. It’d be interesting to me in a game where Porzingis doesn’t play. I mean, we have to assume he’s, you know, going to be in that mid to high 50s range. Hopefully get into the 60s if you, knock on wood, for the Hawks. Um, but if it’s Jaylen and Mo on the floor, it’s like, you know, Jaylen’s a lot stronger. I I, you know, uh, now now Jaylen’s not some huge like muscular guy, you know, but he has a stronger base. He has a stronger lower body, you know, and those things. It’s like, did does Jaylen play some center on defense in in those matchups as well? What does that configure? what does that configuration look like? Um, and then of course everything could change if they go sign a Thomas Bryant or, you know, someone like that. You know, it could kind of change a lot of that. But, um, you know, it feels like, you know, he’s someone that they probably want to lean into a little bit and like really the year three is I think this is the year to really see if he’s in the rotation on a regular basis, how consistent can he be, how impactful, consistently impactful can he be, uh, and and and those things. uh because he really does give them something that uh you know few others on the roster need it’s just his speed and his his ability to kind of cover space uh and things like that. But I I you know when they if they have to play smaller when Porzingis is on resting on the second I know back toback whatever the situation is will be interesting to me see Jaylen plus Mo on the four together how do they match up you know it’s probably a little bit dependent on the opponent you know um that that’s something I’m I’m looking forward to kind of seeing what they do in those situations as well for sure and that’s a pairing that just didn’t happen much if at all last year because like like I said Mo really didn’t take a step forward and play MBMS until Jaylen was gone. And you’re right. I think it’s very natural to say, okay, if you were trying to form a lineup that can defend without either a Congo or Bingus on the floor, you would want Jaylen and Mo as your four and five um on the current roster. And I think that would be really interesting. You have to do things a little bit differently, much more uh focus on versatility and all that stuff. But we’ll get into that if we need to uh and probably come back to it at the very end of this discussion. One more note I wanted to make sure I said. Uh he averaged 5.4 four steals plus blocks of stocks per 100 possessions last year. That’s really impressive. Like really skyhigh steel rate in particular, but block rate is up there too, but steel rate for a big like he’s got really good active hands. Some of that he he does foul a lot and that’s fine. Like it’s a young player big thing. And look, people he also played we’ll get into this, but he played some in the G- League. He was basically playing in full-time in the G- League last year for like a quarter maybe a third of the season. And I think as we’ve discussed for a lot of guys, but really with Mo took a big step forward like kudos to Ryan Schmidt and that staff for like helping him get ready to play NBA minutes and Quinn thanked them pretty much from the microphone multiple times about Mo in particular during the season last year. Like hey Mo has come a long way and it’s true and I want to just say that like the habit creation aspect is not one that like I know they have Dyson to do that and on the perimeter but as far as bigs like a Congo isn’t really that. Porzingis isn’t really that. Like um Jon a little, but like I think Mo is definitely their like most like events-based big defender. Like he just does a lot of stuff. And I I mean that in a very positive way. Like he just gets in the way. He sticks his hands in there and like if you want some havoc creation, he’s uh him and him and Dyson are a pretty crazy pairing in that uh direction. Yeah. And Kong was showed some down the stretch of the season, too. So when basically when they lost to Nance and Capella and they had to kind of really kind of play smaller lineups, they were switching a lot more congru on the ball, you know, solid solid on the ball um in space and things like that. But one thing that that changed it felt like it was about I don’t know midFebruary or so was like both the Congu and Mo when they were on the ball would would attack the ball. They look take the ball away from the ball handler. But the other thing that Mo does, you know, probably better than a good bit better than a Kong was he he realizes how quick he is and he he impacts passing lanes. He’ll jump in a passing lane, get a steal, uh and and those things where Cong, you know, doesn’t, you know, uh have that quite quite as much. And so it felt like, you know, they were helping him incrementally realize like all the things he can do to be impactful as a defender. Not just weak side rim protection, you not just helping, you know, as a rebounder, but also just creating, you know, difficulty for a ball runner that’s in front of him, loose with the ball, take the ball away from him, a passing lane where, you know, it looks like the the passing lane is safe, but because of his quickness, he can kind of get to that passing lane, get it, even if it’s just a deflection and someone else picks up, you know, those things. And so, he was ramping up his ability to kind of impact plays in the defensive half court last year down the season. And that to me was the growth was, you know, I talk all the time about, you know, veterans, one thing veterans do is they know what they’re good at, they know what they’re not good at, and they do the things they’re good at, right? And it look like last year, even as a young guy, Mo was realizing like, okay, these are the skills that I have that are maybe a little bit unique to me, and I’m going to lean into those skills to create more defensive impact. And I thought we saw that week over week over week down the stretch of the season where he’s like, I can do this, I can do this, I can do this, and was just leaning more and more into it. So, you know, hats off to the coaching staff for kind of helping him realize what those talents are and how he can leverage them and credit to him for being coachable in taking that direction because I think I think it did make a difference in a handful of games last year. Tish is brought to you by 5Hour Energy. It’s time to fuel up and turn it up with 5Hour Energy Transfusion. It brings the bold grape, ginger, and lime flavor of your favorite golf drink minus the alcohol into a quick energizing shot. 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The code is also not good with subscription orders. And whether meeting up with friends or trying to turn 18 holes into 36 holes, get the energy boost right now that you need to power through. Order transfusion flavored 5-hour energy shots today. I want to talk about the offense. Um, and it’s definitely the more uh uncertain, uneven side of the floor for Mo. And I I don’t mean that in a negative way, even though it kind of might sound like as we talk about this a little bit. It’s kind of funny and maybe a reminder to everyone, including me, about like prospects because Mo was really seen as an offense first prospect, which might sound crazy if you’ve watched him only the last year because he’s definitely not that anymore. he’s now he’s a defensive first player and like they they talk about him that way and but coming out of college like the real intrigue with Mo was that he had like a skill level as a 611 guy like that was the thought process around him and you’re taking a bet on him. Um he’s a willing shooter as we’ll get into but right now I think it’s fair to say I mean maybe you could correct me if you don’t think I’m right about this. I think it’s fair to say he is a pretty clear negative on offense. That’s that’s my evaluation on an NBA court which again he’s young. He may not be as soon as this season. I’m not closing the door on that. But as far as last year is concerned, I think it was like kind of like, hey, Mo’s offense is pretty far behind where you’d want it to be. But again, that’s why he is in the position where he is. And is that fair? Do you agree with me or am I being too harsh? Yeah. So I I thought So I thought when he when he was starting down the stretch, I think the beginning of that stretch of the season was um if you watched him play at College Park, what they asked him to do on the Atlanta Hawks was a different role, right? Yeah. in College Park, he was more central to what they were doing. They wanted him to DHO. They wanted him to be a passer. They wanted him to be a connective kind of guy. With the Hawks, they mainly kind of parked him in the weak side corner. Didn’t use him in the, you know, pick and roll and those things. And so, it was a it was a completely different role. And so, for me, it maybe was understandable that he had to kind of adapt to, you know, a different role there. To me, like it was like the last three weeks of the season, he finally started showing some innate ability to know where he was supposed to be. the timing of lifting from the corner up to the three-point break got smoother and smoother. Uh, and then he he realized too like if I’m in the weeks I corner, I can be impactful on the offensive glass as well. And so it’s another one of those things. It’s like, okay, what are the things that you’re good at? Let’s lean into those things. For me, the this, you know, it’s going be interesting to see if he shoots the ball better this this season. Uh, it’s for him to play a lot critical for him to be just a, you know, 36 37% guy from from the corner, you know, is good enough, you know, for him. um uh and those things, but and then, you know, it’s be interesting to see too in the in the preseason games when we get to October is are they letting him short roll? Are they are they kind of putting him, you know, in that context more into that action, letting him do that? Because he has good hands. He’s a pretty good processor. He just doesn’t really have the reps at the NBA level kind of being really kind of central to what they’re doing on offense. And so to me, to me, the preseason is a chance to kind of see like, okay, if uh, you know, the other team’s putting their center on Jaylen and, you know, they’re cross matching or whatever it might be, can you put Mo into the screen next? Can you short roll him? Can you give him the ball at the free throw line, have him make a decision to get to the rim or pass the corner, kick it out to the three-point break, whatever it might be. So, I’m really interested to see offensively what they’re doing with him when they start playing again uh, in in October. But I felt like he the last three weeks of the season his offensive play was a good bit cleaner and and a little bit more polished. Still more a lot more growth needed still, you know, and and certainly and he’s known I mean the you you hear them talk about he’s coachable, he’s a hard worker and so there’s probably a lot of those skills that the short rule skills you catching the ball, making a decision, reading the defensive trans, you know, rotations and those sorts of things. I would guess that’s something he’s working very hard on this summer to kind of be be viable in that of they get into a kind of a weird game where the the opponents the opposing team is cross matching and they need to use him in that role. I mean Hawks you did a the Hawks lean into a lot of guard guard screens with Tyson a ton last year. Um, but you need to have that, you know, the option of kind of being able to pull the other team’s weakest defender up into the play. And sometimes that’s if they’re hide trying to hide a defender on Mo in the corner, there’s an opportunity to kind of maybe use him if he can get enough reps to develop the skills to function as a short roller. Yeah. No, that’s all that’s all fair. You don’t, it’s funny, you don’t have my notes in front of you, but uh I I noted I think it was like the last nine games of the season, which is about the last two and a half weeks, three weeks that you were talking about, his offensive rebound rate like doubled. And it’s because they they they were letting him crash essentially, like they were encouraging him to crash in a different way than he was before. That’s may seem like a small thing, but that’s one of his best offensive ancillary skills right now is that he can go crash and create um positive havoc as a guy who is a great athlete who’s that long like um second chance opportunities, all that stuff. Um it’s interesting like he also to his credit was a very low turnover player last year at the NBA level. Only 15 turnovers in 533 minutes is actually really good. Part of that’s that he had a small role like he wasn’t they weren’t asking him to do a lot which is what you just laid out. But him not making like glaring mistakes is helpful for a guy who’s in that kind of small usage role. Uh you mentioned the shooting. He is a willing shooter and I know that people sometimes will see a bad number of percentage and kind of recoil when a guy shoots, but I can tell you and I know you have heard me say this and heard them say it probably, the Hawks have encouraged Mo to shoot. There’s never been a like, hey Mo, don’t take that shot. If you’re open, let it fly. And at the NBA level, it’s not gone in. It’s 26.7% in his two seasons of small sample size. But I will say he’s a career well at least the last couple seasons um sorry last season like 39% in the G-League from three. Now that’s not a real I mean I should say not a real number. It’s a pretty small sample too but it’s two small samples. You have one pretty bad one in the NBA and one pretty good one in the G-League. And it’s like the truth’s probably in the middle if I had to guess on Mo. But I think that there is more to his shooting than the uh box score percentage would tell you. And I think that him taking, look, he averaged 7.1 per 100 possessions last year attempts. That’s a lot of attempts for a guy playing combo big minutes. And it’s because they want him to take that shot. Like part of it he was in the corner like you said, but he got a lot of corner threes. That’s actually a number I have too somewhere. Oh yeah, he shot 12 of 49 on corner threes last year. I am a I’m kind of a mogay offensive skeptic, but I’m also very confident he’s a better shooter than that. Like that’s like, you know, 24% 25% on corner threes. Like he’s going to take more of those. I’m pretty confident in that. Yeah. And and and as we talk about often, you know, one of Quinn’s, you know, rules of thumb is if you no matter who you are, again, we always last two seasons, the Capella exception. Yeah. Except for Clint, everybody else. Yeah. No matter no matter who you are, if you’re open, you’re shooting. You take that shot, right? That is a that is a requirement for everyone on the floor is, you know, and even like Dyson last year, you know, Dyson had Dyson grew so much as a shooter the last couple months of the season, but a part of that, just like you’re saying, is the willingness to just take the shot, you know, and with that comes confidence, you know, uh, in those things. So, so I think he’s the better shooter than that, too. Um, and you know, of course, he he showed that in the G- League, but you know, I think for for them it’s like, okay, what is the offensive role? Can we can we have you doing more things than you were doing last season? Can we kind of stretch your role a little bit and get you doing one or two other things? Uh, that’s that’s what I’m really interested in seeing come October. I totally agree. And, you know, it’s just one of those things where because and I’ve been begging this, I’ll say it again now. There is on the current roster as of late July, not a single player on a two-way, on a full contract, not a single guy in the organization right now that they do not want to take threes. Not one. Now, there are degrees obviously like guys have greener lights than others, but there’s no non-shooters anymore. And that that’s been a I think a pretty intentional thing for like people always want me, you know, I always get I’m sure this happens to you on social media, too. Like, why can’t the Hawks sign center X? And center X is often a guy who’s like a total non-shooter. And I’m not saying the Hawks would never do that, but they they do seem to want a certain type of big who can do some stuff on the perimeter and shoot. And Mo fits that bill. So if he makes more shots, that would help a lot. Um it but it’s the ancillary stuff. Can you be an offensive rebounding threat? The passing like has to me has never really popped a lot. He hasn’t made mistakes, but it’s also like not his like natural strength. And it wasn’t at the college level either. like he he’ll make the fundamental easy one. I I I haven’t really seen I mean maybe you have seen more than I have on this front about his like passing vision. Again, not really his role, but have you seen anything that jumps off the screen as far as like ball mover? I mean I mean for me he looks like a guy who just hasn’t had NBA reps in that in that role. And so but but he has good hands and he moves well. He sees the floor well. And so for me, I think it’s just a matter of I mean, I I would hope they’re like really working on his short role this summer. And you putting, you know, defenders that are kind of coming from the strong side, coming from the weak side, make that read, make that pass, make that read, make that pass. Uh if no one’s rotating in, attack the rim. You know, those that’s where I really kind of want to see him flourish because he has the hands for that. But well, it’s hard for me to know how good is he at it until we kind of see them throw some of those reps toward him. Um, but I but in terms of having the raw skills like good hands and and good processing, I I think that’s all in good shape. He just need he just needs reps. So, we teased at the beginning, we’ll come back to it now to kind of wrap things up a little bit on Mo like what the role is. I mean, probably the biggest question I get about anything this time of year, it’s the dead zone. I get it. Um, is like, you know, what’s the starting lineup? What’s the rotation? who’s gonna play this position. And I get it. It’s what we’re doing right now. Um, Mo is an interesting one. Like, I’ve kind of done a rant already about like traditional depth charts and I’m not really using that format anymore, like you know, but if you wanted to do that, like I might argue Mo is the backup power forward right now. If you wanted to go through that lens, that is an argument that I would make. At the same time, there are questions like, okay, opening night, everybody’s available against a vacuum opponent, which you can’t do. I know that. Just to get out of get out of the way, Glenn, I know you’re going to tell me it’s it’s match dependent because it’s true. It is. But opening night vacuum, like, is he going to play? And I I the answer is I don’t know, honestly, right now. Um, is he the third center, which which I brought up earlier, that that’s a question that has to be answered. Like, will he play will will they play him with a Woo or with Porzingis? I don’t I don’t if they want to because that’s one of I mean other than backup point guard which has been a topic for years and years and years. Who is Jaylen’s backup is a question I get every day and it’s like it might be Mo. I mean look I’ve said this before I think Mo and Asa are not necessarily directly battling for minutes but they do come from the same pie to some degree. I think they would probably trust Mo right now more than Asa at an NBA level because Mo has two years experience. Ace doesn’t have that, but Ace has got more like it’s a different skill set. Ace has got, you know, Ace has got more perimeter skills with the ball. He’s a good ball handler. All these things that you Mo, but Mo defensively is almost certainly going to be like leaps and bounds better than ASA right now at the NBA level. So, I say all that long preamble like what’s the role going to be like? If you had to guess right now again late July, let’s say they don’t sign a third center, is that his most like frequent role? I mean, this is very open-ended on purpose because I don’t have the answer for you, Glenn. What are you thinking about this? like is he going to play regularly? Yeah. I mean, so for for me, if if I were in charge, and I’m not, nobody has ever has ever entrusted with me asked me for my opinion, you know, but for me, I think they do need a third center. And if it’s a third center where Okay, we’re we’re playing a team that’s five out, it might be Mo playing that that that fifth big role, let’s call it fifth big role. Yeah. in the rotation and and go to Thomas Bryant or whoever, right? If they’re playing a team that’s big like the Clippers or you got someone like the Nuggets, you need someone who can kind of just go be physical with Jokic and things like that. It might be that bigger center. So, for me, what I would like to see them do is have the ability to swing towards a bigger lineup or swing towards a smaller faster lineup depending on the opponent and that might even be within the game itself is when other team goes goes I mean a lot of teams like the Pacers played like four guard lineups all of last year, right? And that’s that’s a matchup where Mo works, you know, but then you go against team like, you know, if Embiid is healthy or Jokic or, you know, Zubot or, you know, the other kind of really big centers that are out there, uh, Purle, you know, and those things where you might swing it towards another center. So for me, I don’t know what their plan is right now. I I my feeling though is that, you know, I’m not counting on Chris Sporzing to play more than say 60 games. Uh, and I think that would be a good outcome in the regular season for him, but I would like to see them have a guy who’s their third center. Doesn’t have to play all the time. You can swing towards Mo when that’s the thing to do. You could swing towards that third center when that’s the thing to do. And I think I feel like that’s kind of um what it seems like makes sense to me. Um, but I, you know, I know you and I have exchanged thoughts on the guys that are out there, the guys that are still out there like a Thomas Bryant um, want to go somewhere they can be the second center, not the third. Right? There’s more minutes. That’s the way you build your next contract value. I mean, agents are dumb and players aren’t dumb about that. So, they’re trying to find a way to kind of slot into a role that’s bigger than what the Hawks have to offer. Now, the Hawks could tell, hey, we’re going to we’re going to sit Porzingas 15 times or whatever it is, and there’s opportunity there, but still, some other team calls and said, “We want to make you our our second.” Yeah. That’s obviously a more attractive situation for a guy like that to to pursue. Yeah, that is a different podcast, but that’s one of the reasons why I keep telling people like why the Hawks have this open roster. Okay, we’re recording this late July. This could change by time you listen to it, but why they have this open roster spot. It’s like, hey, there’s kind of a freeze in the league right now because everybody that’s signed has signed and a lot of guys that haven’t signed are looking for the best role because it’s just they have they have minimum offers and it’s all about like, hey, how can we springboard this for the future? So yeah, if you could snap your fingers right now and sign whichever one is your favorite player, whether it’s Bryant or Precious Chichua or Chris Buchet or a more traditional big whoever whichever guy you think you want, it’s possible they’ve already called that guy and that guy is waiting, you know, it’s just that’s the nature of what’s going on here. So, um, uh, one more note, um, contractually because we’re just here, um, they still have a cheap team option on Mo for the following season. So, he’s still under team control for another two years, which is good for a young guy. They they signed with that four-year deal with the team option coming out of uh in the second round pick that he was. So, um not not a concern yet on that front. If he breaks out, they got him for another year. They can maybe do a cheap extension. There’s all kinds of things that are in play with Mo. Um one thing I am the only thing because everybody wants me to be confident about things I say. Uh, one thing I am confident in is that if they if they didn’t add anybody, any night Porzingis or a Kongwoo is not available, Mo’s going to play. That I’m confident about. I think Mo is ahead of Asa. Again, they’re different positions, but especially in October of year one. Um, and I know this is my my bit about rookies, and it’s not about Asa. I like Asa. I think some really went well for him. All those things, but fans, I mean, people I’ve even I did a radio hit the other day, and it’s not malice. just what was asked me it was like well AC is the start the back of power four right I’m like I don’t I don’t think he is I think I think Mo is at least he should be what we saw last year Moay is ahead of Asa right now that could flip in January or February but as far as October is concerned Mo would be kind of next man up and look again he might play opening night if they go nine 10 deep and maybe he’s that guy and matchup related and um this is a team uh and we laugh about this in Vegas together Glenn this is a team that’s going to um I would they bother uh maybe flumx people that really like their traditional positions of things. Uh old school depth charts like this is not this is not a theme for that. The Hawks have a couple of guys who are in their boxes. Trey Young is a point guard for example. Uh but a lot of guys who are not in traditional boxes and I I like that. I think it’s a good thing but they’re going to flunk some people with like combinations. Backup point guard is the easiest one but even backup front court stuff too. It’s like they’re going to be like it’s going to be about who plays with who. What are you trying to do defensively? Um, are you gonna switch? All these things. It’d be interesting. Yeah. Second unit like is Canard the point guard or is Kobe the point guard, you know, and and the answer is both probably. The answer is yes. Right. Exactly. Uh and and even Nicola Alexander Walker, you know, um you know, as a third guy who can kind of function on the ball. So, I think there is a lot of fluidity to how they’re going to deploy uh quasi positional alignment, I’ll call it, you know, across the season. And I think that’s where that’s where the I the league has been there for a while. The Hawks have kind of been stuck into players that really didn’t have as much positional versatility. They built a roster this year where there’s a lot of positional versatility and I think that’s going to serve them well. Yeah, I agree wholeheartedly. Uh well, before we sign off, anything you want to add about Mo? Feel free. Um and if not, where can folks find your work? Because you’ll you’ll be back soon hopefully to do more of these, but in the meantime, people should be following all of the uh the stylings of Glen Willis. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, for me, I’m just I’m excited to see what they’re doing with him, you know, game one, preseason, game one, you know, how much they’re unlock are they unlocking some other stuff for him. That’s that, you know, defensively he does have, you know, some unique talent and skill to impact impact uh the defense um and all that sort of. So, I’m so I’m just excited to see what they’re doing with him, you know, when we get to the point where they’re playing some, you know, an actual basketball game. So, I know Hawks fans were kind of excited to see um how much he grew as a defender last year. The big thing for me is like what are they doing with him offensively, you know, and are they unlocking some other stuff for him? Because that’s really they want him to play uh like a lot. Jaylen’s in foul trouble. Oh, Mo, we need you to play 25 minutes tonight. the off the expansion of his offensive game and the growth of his you towards a broader offensive skill set is the key to making him viable for games where they need more minutes from him. And to me, that’s the that’s the big fork in the road is can they grow him offensively enough that he’s reliable and can do the things he needs to do in those moments where Porzingis is sitting on the second back to back. They need more minutes from him. I’m not really worried about the defense. I think he showed a lot there. Uh it’s it’s the it’s how broad how much more broad can his offensive skill set become for him to be viable to play more minutes. That’s that’s the thing that I’m you know really anxious to see. Yeah. It’s why I wanted to do this one pretty early is he’s really interesting. It really is like in a good way. I the end of like Mo was kind of in that realm early last year. I was like I man this might be it for Mo. Like not and not in a bad way. It’s just like the cycle of guys you know like never has an opportunity to play second round pick. no guaranteed money in the future, like you could move on from this guy at any point. Now you got the front office change, but they he showed enough and you know the sicko guys that I trust around the league. They’re not just looking at box scores who actually watch like hey what’s going on with this Mogay guy on defense like on defense. This guy can really I’m like yeah he can really guard like he’s he’s he was legitimately like not just like he was like nationally impressive defensively at times last year. So, that’s a building block, man. And I I you know, as a defensive sicko, I I very much enjoy what we saw from Mo. I know you do, too. So, I’m excited. Absolutely. Uh Glenn, folks should be following you at Willis_Glenn. Is that correct? That’s Twitter. That’s it. And uh ETL29 is the podcast home. Um and uh when when we get a little closer to the season, I’m gonna I I can’t do a ton of writing for Wes over there at Peace, but I’m gonna I’m gonna do what I can. So, um, but yeah, as I always say, like support the guys at Peace Tree. They they do awesome work over there. Wes is leading a great group over there. So, go, you know, if you’re not following all the writers over there, go fix that. Um, and support them. Um, otherwise, you know, we are a little bit of a dead zone here, you know, for a few weeks. And unless, you know, I don’t know, check our phone. Did they site somebody? You know, I’m looking I’m looking all the time. And this is one I’m I’m going to post in like 24 hours, so hopefully it’s going to hold. And if not, I will have done a topper by now that people have already watched or listened to that says, “Hey, they signed this.” Uh, so yeah, we’re in that time where it’s like we’re probably okay, but you know, Euro Basket’s coming up four weeks, five weeks away, basketball. So, yeah, it’ll be fun to watch some Free Hawks players that are going to be playing for their national teams and and all that sort of stuff. So, that’ll be fun. Um, and give us something to watch and and analyze and Yeah, exactly. Uh it’s kind of middle of the day for me, so you know, for me, I’ll probably be, you know, figuring out how to watch it after the fact or whatever it might be. But um but is it is nice that there’s other basketball content not too far around the corner because content creators need need something to uh react to. This is the original impetus for the player capsule series that we are currently talking right now. It says, “Hey, we got to fill some time.” It’s good though. I I find it very useful uh for me even prepping this stuff and hey, oh, this guy did this. I forgot. Uh so anyway, Glenn, thanks for being here. We’ll have more of these coming up later on this and we’ll see everybody next time.

Brad Rowland (@BTRowland) hosts Episode 2030 of the Locked on Hawks podcast, and he is joined by Glen Willis of ATL and 29. The show continues a 2025 Atlanta Hawks player capsule series with a deep dive into Mo Gueye, including his tremendous defensive impact, offensive profile, role on the 2025-26 team, and much more.

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