The Atlanta Hawks currently have 14 players under contract heading towards training camp, which means they have room for one more player on the 15-man roster. After losing DeMarre Carroll in free agency to the Toronto Raptors and with Kyle Korver and Thabo Sefolosha coming off season-ending injuries, the Hawks are looking for more depth at the wing positions. The Hawks have reportedly signed Lamar Patterson and Terran Petteway to contracts with training camp invites, according to Chris Vivlamore of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.
Both Petteway and Patterson played for the Hawks' summer league team, and they were the two players on the team that impressed head coach Mike Budenholzer the most, so the training camp invites aren't much of a surprise. The contracts for both players are reportedly two-year minimum contracts with only partial guarantees.
Patterson was a second round pick in 2014 and was obtained by the Hawks on a draft-day deal. He led the team in scoring in the summer league, averaging 13.1 points per game. Patterson played college basketball at the University of Pittsburgh and was a playmaker there. While he can score the ball, he is also very good at rebounding and passing. In his senior season at Pittsburgh, Patterson averaged 17.1 points, 4.9 rebounds and 4.3 assists per game while playing point guard. Patterson is likely not a point guard at the NBA level, but he does have the size (6 foot-5) and shooting ability (37 percent three point shooter in college) to play shooting guard at the next level.
Petteway went undrafted in the 2015 NBA Draft after leaving school a year early, and he also had a good showing in the summer league, averaging 10.9 points and 4.3 rebounds per game. Unlike Patterson, Petteway is a scorer to the core. In his last year at Nebraska, Petteway averaged 18.2 points per game, which was good for fourth in the Big Ten. Petteway likely doesn't have as good of a shot to make the team as Patterson does because he doesn't do as much as Patterson can. Petteway is a scorer with good size at 6 foot-6, but he is an inefficient scorer. In his career at Nebraska, his shooting percentages were 41 percent from the field and 32 percent from three. Patterson is just as good of a defender as Petteway is, but he scores more efficiently and is a better playmaker.
It is being reported that if the Hawks don't like what they see from either Patterson or Petteway in camp, they could just leave the 15th spot on the roster open for a potential in-season addition. Patterson and Petteway were both standouts in college and will get their chance to crack an NBA roster and show what they can do at the next level.
