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Creating a catch all thread for perspectives on off-season transactions, decisions, and approaches to the future.

http://amp.charlotteobserver.com/sports/nba/charlotte-hornets/article210250754.html

Good read...

Seems like they are a lot more on track with that philosophy. They committed to building a winner but they didnt understand you have to have a structure of stars, lead role veterans, and cheap rookie and veteran contributors. The payroll grows to fast when it's all veterans and you strike out on most every draft pick

Build around No. 1

Still irks me to see them say the salary cap spike caught them off guard. Like, come on now.

I want to see what this roster can do with a new coach, but in my mind the problem all along is a lot of guys need to move up a position and we need to play small and fast.

Frank and Cody are both centers not power forwards.

MKG and Marvin Williams are PFs

Batum and Lamb are SFs

Monk at SG

Kemba at PG

MCW to back up both guard spots and we need to get a guard in the draft.

I might even roll with:

Kemba
Monk
Lamb
Batum
Marvin

if Monk can progress to where he is playing at an NBA level

I think the roster is good enough, with some tinkering, where it can get anywhere from 35-45 wins. But that's treadmill territory.

The team needs stars and in the Charlotte market, that means working through the draft. My prescription would be the Hinkie process but I know some fans can't handle that.

Cam Newton plays for the Panthers.

The slow & randomly sourced drip, drip, drip of information about the coaching search has me ready for it to be over.

Vanderbilt_Grad wrote:The slow & randomly sourced drip, drip, drip of information about the coaching search has me ready for it to be over.

Same here, I hope they announce a hiring by the end of the day tomorrow.

I suspect the hiring will occur late next week, perhaps Thursday with a presser Friday. Just my speculation based on twitter pops saying two favs are emerging.

GoBobs wrote:I want to see what this roster can do with a new coach, but in my mind the problem all along is a lot of guys need to move up a position and we need to play small and fast.

Frank and Cody are both centers not power forwards.

MKG and Marvin Williams are PFs

Batum and Lamb are SFs

Monk at SG

Kemba at PG

MCW to back up both guard spots and we need to get a guard in the draft.

MCW did absolutely nothing to give himself a roster spot in the NBA next season. Didn’t he shoot something like 23% on the year? We cannot roll with that guy as our backup PG.

Rich4114 wrote:

GoBobs wrote:I want to see what this roster can do with a new coach, but in my mind the problem all along is a lot of guys need to move up a position and we need to play small and fast.

Frank and Cody are both centers not power forwards.

MKG and Marvin Williams are PFs

Batum and Lamb are SFs

Monk at SG

Kemba at PG

MCW to back up both guard spots and we need to get a guard in the draft.

MCW did absolutely nothing to give himself a roster spot in the NBA next season. Didn’t he shoot something like 23% on the year? We cannot roll with that guy as our backup PG.

I don't disagree I just slotted him in there because we don't have anyone else. The roster is really thin at guard once Batum is moved to a position he is actually capable of playing.

Liver_Pooty wrote:Still irks me to see them say the salary cap spike caught them off guard. Like, come on now.

Me, too. I don't think that's a legit excuse from Polk, though it has been consistent. Might as well just come out and say that Cho was incompetent. I don't buy that the organization was caught off guard. I think it's more likely they were sold by someone at league level that it would be a ramp-up cap, not the great jump it turned out to be. But when the jump did happen, Cho did a decent job with the situation. He was really stuck, having committed to Batum through the Vonleh trade and, subsequently, Marvin to keep Batum happy and a semblance of cohesiveness.

Not getting a legitimate backup point guard...now that was a big mess up on Cho's part. Biggest faux pas of the year in my opinion.

The future, however, looks fine. I don't lose sleep over the cap problem. Lots of teams were "caught off guard" when the cap exploded, so there's not a great glut of cap room to swallow bad contracts. And there are a LOT of bad contracts in the league. Jordan will have to pay the tax if things stay the same. It's not my money, so I don't really care. I DO care about...

Moving Batum to the 3. It's a structural issue that Clifford NEVER solved.
Add a shooter, and a backup point guard - be fine if they were the same guy.
Get a shrink for Frank.
I'd be just fine with Wendell Carter, Jr. in the draft.
I'd be fine moving up in the draft, too, as long as it doesn't involve Kemba Walker in the trade.

What the Hornets need most of all is intelligence. Small market teams need to be smarter and faster and more innovative. Old school is just old. Maybe Borrego is that guy. Maybe Mitch isn't too old school. Maybe the team won't be caught off guard any more. Maybe they'll be ahead of the curve for once instead of behind whatever genius things the Celtics are doing.

Maybe the franchise will start winning. That'd be nice, too.

Trying to make sense of the eight different second round picks that changed hands in Charlotte trades over the past few days.

Going into the week, the Hornets didn't have their own 2018 pick, but did have Cleveland's 55. They also owned their own 2019 but previously traded 2020 and 2021 to the Knicks for WHG. There were no others in the pipeline.

Dwight trade: Acquired BKN pick 45 (Diallo) and BKN 2021
Bridges trade: Acquired CLE 2020 and LAC 2021
Graham trade: Traded CHA 2019 and CHA 2023
Diallo trade: Acquired OKC 2019

2018 In: Pick 34 (Devonte Graham)
2018 Out: None, though the Diallo pick was briefly here.

2019 In: OKC
2019 Out: CHA

I'm guessing Charlotte tried to move 45 in their move to 34, as they didn't have room for another rookie, but the Hawks preferred the 2019 pick. Then we flipped Diallo to replenish the 2019 stock.

2020 In: CLE
2020 Out: None

Replenishes 2020 pick traded for WHG.

2021 In: LAC, BKN
2021 Out: None

Adds two picks to replace the other pick from the WHG move.

2022 In: None
2022 Out: None

No movement and we still have our pick.

2023 In: None
2023 Out: CHA

If the other trades are any indication, we're likely to rectify this in the next five years.

Picks by year:
2018: Graham, Kulboka
2019: OKC
2020: CLE
2021: LAC, BKN
2022: CHA
2023: None

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