Woj: Hornets acquire Mozgov for Dwight

[SeanBobcats]

I definitely think this makes it more likely that Kemba is gone tomorrow. Why would we willingly take on an extra year of salary if we wanted to keep him? Maybe there are more moves to come, but it's hard to see for me

[fatlever]

Here's my thinking; we're doing the deal with the Cavs and they said they'd rather have Mozgov than Dwight.

would have to happen in july then

[MPM]

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Memories. I'll long remember Clifford living out his nostalgic fever dream by insisting on riding D12 game after game. Some truly awful basketball forever burned into my brain.

[BlackOutBuzz]

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Paging BOB to explain how useful this will be.

I'm still not sure this stuff adds up, think we're still missing a player or two. But assuming it's accurate than it essentially means that we can take in one player that makes up to that amount without sending out matching salary. Of course that doesn't protect us from luxury tax ramifications, but could be a decent asset.

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[LofJ]

Mozgov's contract comes off the same season as the rest of the 2016 free agency albatrosses like Deng, Mahinmi, Biyombo, Turner etc do, so there will be a bunch of those available and consequently most teams will also be opening up cap space. Kupchak played his hand a little too early and missed a trick.

What other tanking teams would be willing to trade for locker-room poison? The only teams I can think of are the Mavericks and the Knicks. And the Mavericks are looking to sign or draft a center, not trade for one that will destroy their team camaraderie. I'll give you the Knicks though, I wish Kupchak would have waited to see if Kanter would opt in and traded for him instead.

Could have stretched and waived Dwight over 3 seasons at a $7M hit.

They can still do that next year with Mozgov if necessary. I also think people are forgetting that the Hawks paid to move Dwight last summer. They took on a longer deal AND moved down in the draft to get rid of him. At least Mitch managed to pick up two 2nds for taking on a player with an additional year on his contract.

[Benjamin Linus]

I hate cash considerations. The league should make owners pass it down to the fans... like a little off beer prices or something

[MasterIchiro]

What other tanking teams would be willing to trade for locker-room poison? The only teams I can think of are the Mavericks and the Knicks. And the Mavericks are looking to sign or draft a center, not trade for one that will destroy their team camaraderie. I'll give you the Knicks though, I wish Kupchak would have waited to see if Kanter would opt in and traded for him instead.

Could have stretched and waived Dwight over 3 seasons at a $7M hit.

They can still do that next year with Mozgov if necessary. I also think people are forgetting that the Hawks paid to move Dwight last summer. They took on a longer deal AND moved down in the draft to get rid of him. At least Mitch managed to pick up two 2nds for taking on a player with an additional year on his contract.

True, Dwight regained some value here.

[Braggins]

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Memories. I'll long remember Clifford living out his nostalgic fever dream by insisting on riding D12 game after game. Some truly awful basketball forever burned into my brain.

Last season was surreal.

[Slava]

What other tanking teams would be willing to trade for locker-room poison? The only teams I can think of are the Mavericks and the Knicks. And the Mavericks are looking to sign or draft a center, not trade for one that will destroy their team camaraderie. I'll give you the Knicks though, I wish Kupchak would have waited to see if Kanter would opt in and traded for him instead.

Could have stretched and waived Dwight over 3 seasons at a $7M hit.

They can still do that next year with Mozgov if necessary. I also think people are forgetting that the Hawks paid to move Dwight last summer. They took on a longer deal AND moved down in the draft to get rid of him. At least Mitch managed to pick up two 2nds for taking on a player with an additional year on his contract.

Why would you want to cut Mozgov next season and roll over that cap hit to an additional season? The point being 2 2nds isn't adequate enough return for taking an year's worth of additional salary. If he had just waited till free agency was over, he might have gotten something like Ryan Anderson and a 1st or more from Houston if they missed on LeBron and wanted to open up cap space for 2019.

[LofJ]

Could have stretched and waived Dwight over 3 seasons at a $7M hit.

They can still do that next year with Mozgov if necessary. I also think people are forgetting that the Hawks paid to move Dwight last summer. They took on a longer deal AND moved down in the draft to get rid of him. At least Mitch managed to pick up two 2nds for taking on a player with an additional year on his contract.

Why would you want to cut Mozgov next season and roll over that cap hit to an additional season? The point being 2 2nds isn't adequate enough return for taking an year's worth of additional salary. If he had just waited till free agency was over, he might have gotten something like Ryan Anderson and a 1st or more from Houston if they missed on LeBron and wanted to open up cap space for 2019.

The additional $8 million owed to Anderson would have required a better draft asset coming back. But if I had to pick between the two players I'd go with Anderson simply because the team as it's currently constructed could use some additional shooters. The downside to that potential trade though is that the team wouldn't have nearly as much maneuvering room under the tax line. I doubt the team is done making moves, so that could prove to be important.

[Hornet Mania]

I'm willing to give Mitch a little bit of a honeymoon period here. This is his first move not his last, and whether it was a good move or not will be determined by the success of the overall plan.

I doubt Dwight had (or would have) more value than this, or else Mitch would have held off. Clearly Dwight lost his only supporter (Cliff) and that meant he was headed out the door, I'm sure Mitch tested the market and this was the 'best' we could do.

I still don't think we're blowing it up, this could just as easily be a move to keep Kemba happy while opening up breathing room for Borrego. Tomorrow will shed a lot more light on whether we're standing pat for a late-seed playoff push or hitting the reset button. This move was probably necessary in either case, but even more so if we wanted to compete this year.

[MasterIchiro]

Rockets and Harden already experienced Dwight in the locker room. It's easy to nitpick the GM when you assume he didn't go to EVERY team in the league and shop around for the best deal. Promoting Cody and Hernangomez signals player development. This is not a move that is a precursor to a Kemba trade or rebuild. It's about developing the core young players without interference nor complaint. This is a culture Kemba can commit to.

[TheKingofSting]

What does this mean for Kemba? We are taking on another year of salary of a pretty big contract

It's not looking good at the moment.


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[BlackOutBuzz]

Hadn't opened the Woj story until now, offers some clarification:

"The deal can't be completed until the moratorium ends on July 6. The Nets will need money to expire off the salary cap to take on Howard's salary."

So it'll be Brooklyn picking for us at 45. Then they'll take Dwight into pure cap space, thus creating our TPE.

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[fatlever]

A 'terrible' screen setter
I was speaking to a team source in midseason – this was months before the Howard trade – and he told me of the Hornets players’ frustration that Howard simply wouldn’t run the play that was called, sometimes in key last-minute situations.

Also, for a man with a superhero body, Howard’s screen-setting was often “terrible,” according to the source. Howard and former coach Steve Clifford – who was always seen as “The Howard Whisperer” – also did not have nearly as perfect a relationship as was advertised and had at least one notable confrontation. And I saw firsthand some of the eye-rolling that Howard’s teammates did when they spoke about him.

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/sports/spt-columns-blogs/scott-fowler/article213515239.html

[BeesWax]

This really looks like a move that leads to Kemba on the way out. Clears some room to have space to sign a pick that would come in with that trade. I know Kemba didn't like Dwight according to reports so maybe that is wrong but taking back Mozgov in the deal clears enough room to sign the 8 pick even if salaries match on a Kemba move.

[chabber]

I like the deal. We don't have to move an asset like Lamb to stay out of tax and we get rid of Dwight who has no value and was not going to be on this team come training camp. Could we have gotten more picks or better picks? Maybe but I could see this being the best we could do considering it's possible no one wants Dwight.

To add on to what Haywood said about Dwight, but regarding which direction the team is going. The other week when asked about our new coach Borrego, who had been hired a few weeks earlier, he responded with something along the lines of, "Who? I don't even need to know his name, Charlotte's about to blow it up. I live in Charlotte".

I've been in the camp of thinking we're still trying to keep Kemba and add pieces, but this gave me some pause.

[fatlever]

the bwood comments

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[Robot Rock]

No fan base suffers more than this one. And the suffering only gets worse with each passing day.

I look forward to the 2021-22 season, when 2018 Hornets No. 11 pick Robert Williams -- fresh off a career-high 7.8 ppg -- gets traded for a contract that adds $34 million to the Hornets' salary for three years.

[Diop]

The team seemed a whole lot better and happier without Dwight.

This might simply be addition by subtraction. Could even be a sign that we are listening to Kemba, I’m not jumping to any conclusions yet