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Woot!!!

Are they contenders yet?

Shhh! Hush. While it's really cool for them because no one would have put them in this spot before the season began, there's still a lot of season to be played. The Western Conference is just too close.

Chris Paul..Best young PG in the league...

#1 Chris Paul

#2 Others

ChrisTheFuturePaul wrote:Woot!!!

Are they contenders yet?

Karma. Blown Achilles for Chris Paul upcoming.

and?

Craig McDermott wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



Karma. Blown Achilles for Chris Paul upcoming.

i was going to say something like that
when the lakers got to the top
bynum and ariza went down

So where are all the fans who said Deron Williams was better then Chris Paul before the season started?

^ jazz board

Congratulations to the Hornets. They're playing very well and have a good mix of players.

The bench is a little weak, although it didn't look that way against Portland because of Pargo's career night.

The 'however' arises because the Hornets have played the weakest schedule in the league. They rank 30th on Sagarin's rating. For instance, comparing NO to last night's opponent, the Blazers (who rank 7th) you'll see that NO's record against the top 10 teams is 4-7, while Portland's is 8-10. So portand has a better % against top 10 teams and has played 7 more games against them. Against top 16 teams, NO is 10-10 while Portland is 12-13.

The Hornets have a tough 2nd half of the season ahead, but there is no doubt they are legitimate. They also appear to have the type of personell that can be effective in the playoffs. The one thing they appear to be missing is a loud, noisy, home crowd.

meh, you can point to 'Strength of Schedule' ratings all you want, but the bottom line is they're 20-8 against Western Conference opponents, which is tops. Their road record is also best in the conference at 15-5. Margin of victory during their current 6-game winning streak is 20+ ppg. Highest differential in the West (+5.7).

Not to mention they've won 14 of 16 games. So they're doing something right. They've beat Phoenix twice, split the series with Portland, beat Dallas once, beat Denver once, beat LA once, and so on. They're not getting fat solely on weak teams.

Not surprising that over this 6-game stretch, the bench has been phenomenal, accounting for about ~35% of the team's total points.

Chris Paul is the truth

So every time a new team takes the lead in the West can we start a new thread?

j-ragg wrote:So every time a new team takes the lead in the West can we start a new thread?

I appreciate your cynicism, but considering that

a.) the Hornets have never been in the top 5 since moving to the West, much less #1

b.) most people were inking them for another barely .500 season with playoffs a mere possibility

So, yeah.

No worries man, you got a reason to be excited.

legacyinthemakin89c wrote:So where are all the fans who said Deron Williams was better then Chris Paul before the season started?

im a fan of chris paul and i think he's one of the greatest players in the league. but its not ridiculous to put deron on his level. he scores and passes just as efficiently and can defend bigger guards. he scores less and gets fewer steals. but as they always say he's bigger and more durable...

with the way the West is going, you better pull away with the #1 spot or next week you'll be in the 6-7th place (generally speaking).

2poor wrote:meh, you can point to 'Strength of Schedule' ratings all you want, but the bottom line is they're 20-8 against Western Conference opponents, which is tops. Their road record is also best in the conference at 15-5. Margin of victory during their current 6-game winning streak is 20+ ppg. Highest differential in the West (+5.7).

Not to mention they've won 14 of 16 games. So they're doing something right. They've beat Phoenix twice, split the series with Portland, beat Dallas once, beat Denver once, beat LA once, and so on. They're not getting fat solely on weak teams.

Not surprising that over this 6-game stretch, the bench has been phenomenal, accounting for about ~35% of the team's total points.

all well and good, but some other facts should be added...

the 20-8 conference record: 10 of those wins, exactly half of their total, have come against the 4 bottom dwellers in the WC...the sonics, wolves, grizzlies, and clippers. And another came against the only other team in the conference with a losing record, the Kings. That's 11 out of 20.

The 15-5 road record: They have some quality wins on the road, but 10 of those 15 wins came against not only the WC doormats but the EC doormats as well.

Point differential: well, if you have a steady diet of minnesota, seattle, memphis, philidelphia, and charlotte, your record and point differential will reflect that.

SOS does have some relevance, and there's no escaping the fact that the Hornets have had the weakest schedule in the league.

It doesn't mean they aren't for real...they certainly are, it just means they have a bit more to prove in the 2nd half of the season, and the schedule will make it more challenging then the first half.

LOL @ the Hawks.

2poor wrote:-= original quote snipped =-



I appreciate your cynicism, but considering that

a.) the Hornets have never been in the top 5 since moving to the West, much less #1

b.) most people were inking them for another barely .500 season with playoffs a mere possibility

So, yeah.

Most knowledgable bball fans and analysts knew NO were going to make the PO's and were just victims of injuries. I'm skeptical of how much of a contender they are though their bench is thin and their lack of a home crowd will hurt them in the PO's. There's a reason they've been so good on the road and mediocre at home.

15-5 on the road
14-7 at home (winners of 8 of their last 10 at home, 5-game home winning streak)

...mediocre? they're not even paying attention to all that.

NOLA.com wrote: "I'll be lying if I said it's not disappointing," Chandler said. "You always as a basketball player want to play in front of big crowds. At one point during the beginning of the year, it was frustrating. But it's almost like now, I don't pay attention to it anymore.

"I kind of blank it out. I think that's one of the reasons we started to play better at home, because we've all blanked it out. I think earlier in the year, we were thinking about it too much."