Locked On Hornets & Hornets Direction

[MasterIchiro]

The Locked on Hornets pod prior to the rematch preseason game against the Celtics called out the front office and urged the team to make an early season decision about direction - tank or compete.

I've included a poll and want to get a sense where Hornets fans stand on this debate.

I'm on the fence.

The team is down 3 key rotation players in Cody Martin, Gordon Hayward and Miles Bridges so it's tough to know how much better the Hornets would be if Clifford didn't have to thrust undeveloped prospects into big minutes.

The 2021 draft was controversial because Kupchak took a swing on upside, confident in a young (at the time) stable core of LaMelo - Miles - PJ. Then he pressured JB to push for the playoffs with Plumlee at center. James Bouknight and Kai Jones didn't play. Kupchak thought they should've played more. Kupchak chose to switch to double dipping in the 2023 draft rather than the 2022 draft.


The end of the roster is young, inexperienced and needing more minutes for development: Kai, Bouk, Thor, Mark, McGowens. They're not ready for NBA rotation minutes as a group. Their performance might be different if surrounded by vets this preseason. But thus far we've seen too many inexperienced players sharing the floor at the same time. And Kupchak didn't bring in any vets this offseason for roster depth. It almost seems half the roster is rebuilding.

The other half is Rozier and Hayward on multiyear deals, plus Plumlee and Oubre set to leave Charlotte at the end of the season.

You could argue that the Hornets are too good for a high lottery pick as is. Or that despite the odds of winning pick #1 or #2 are low, the players there justify the tank due to their promise of superstardom. And maybe the rest of the top 10 is promising in its own right.

But you could also warn that this young product on the floor doesn't inspire fans and creates more pain and suffering than entertainment.

Sell Terry, Gordon, Plumlee & Oubre now and tank, or protect fans from the pain of watching fringe rotation players flail despite LaMelo?

[amcoolio]

I know you and yosimiteben are optimistic, and we need optimistic fans on this forum....but to me, this is the lowest point in the entire Bobcats/Hornets era.

Tari Eason rubbing his **** in our faces isn't helping either. He'd be our second best player on the team right now, that is SAD.

I'm checked out on this team and this front office. We have the worst front office and coaching staff in the league. Even over Sacramento and Detroit. MJ is now 0/2 with front office overhauls. Starts with him. Maybe he should cash out.

[MasterIchiro]

Just for the record, if I choose tanking, I would look to send Rozier to LAL for their 2027 + 2029 first round picks. I wouldn't do it for one first due to the negative value of Russ which is worse than the Batum contract in its final expiring year.

Essentially, since Russ is a sunk cost at 47 million, we'd be paying nearly 50 million dollars for 2 first rounders. The value comes from the second 50 million we don't have to pay on Rozier's 97 million extension. So maybe you could say it's like the Lakers getting Rozier at 50 over 4 years for 2 firsts that won't convey while they have LeBron and AD under contract with one championship under their belts.

However, if I were to try to keep my product watchable, I would look to flip Oubre + Jazx 2023 second (if necessary) for Richaun Holmes. Holmes' contract buys me 3 years for Mark and Kai as backups. If Miles returns or gets dealt for help, Martin returns, Hayward stays healthy and Rozier at least plateaus, maybe we weather the storm and maintain some dignity. And don't surround LaMelo with Swarm players this season like Richards, Thor, Mark, McGowens, and yes Bouknight. I also think McDaniels doesn't make a postseason roster in the East. That's what we see on the floor together during preseason, too many inexperienced players sharing the floor at the same time, with no concept of leading an offense or defense as a unit. We can see its painful and won't sell tickets. Don't treat LaMelo like he's Gelo.

[Braggins]

This team refuses to ever roll with the punches. They always zig when they need to zag and vice versa. This year is the most obvious year ever to embrace a tank with the Miles/Atkinson situations plus a seemingly great draft class, but instead of rolling with the punch, I fully expect them to stick their chin out and lean right into it by gunning for the play in tournament.

I would do Rozier + Hayward for Westbrook + 2027 LAL 1st + 2023 CHI 2nd + 2025 LAL 2nd

Westbrooks expiring actually has value for the Hornets. You can buy him out and clear a ton of cap space going into this offseason and completely retool over the next couple years. It would be nice to get more draft capital than that, but LA can just take the Buddy/Turner package if the price is going to be two 1sts regardless. Haywards contract probably makes him neutral value at best, so just getting off the salary is still good.

I would take a 2nd for Oubre and would be open to just cutting/sitting him if he can't fetch anything in a trade. Same for Plumlee.

LaMelo/DSJ
Martin/Bouk
McDaniels/Mcgowens
PJ/Thor
Richards/Williams/Kai

Theres only like a 5% difference in the odds to get the 1st pick between the team that finishes last and the team thats 8th, so that roster should easily be in contention for a top 5 pick, especially if you aggressively load manage LaMelo/Martin/PJ.

[MasterIchiro]

I know you and yosimiteben are optimistic, and we need optimistic fans on this forum....but to me, this is the lowest point in the entire Bobcats/Hornets era.

Tari Eason rubbing his **** in our faces isn't helping either. He'd be our second best player on the team right now, that is SAD.

I'm checked out on this team and this front office. We have the worst front office and coaching staff in the league. Even over Sacramento and Detroit. MJ is now 0/2 with front office overhauls. Starts with him. Maybe he should cash out.

Nuggets are 0-2. They may go 0-82 this season. How? Because I said so. I know it's early and it's only been 2 games but their preseason record is the only evidence available. So my bearish take on the Nuggets is final. It's my conclusion and nothing you can say will change my mind. Nothing.

The one catch is that the Nuggets 2023 pick is protected 1-14. Damn you Mitch!

In all seriousness, check the draft board here and find the thread asking who will be the steal of the draft for their draft position. I predicted Eason prior to the draft. And I continued to defend my choice in that thread.

So no argument over Eason from me.

However, I do prefer double dipping in 2023 over 2022. This draft could be historic. So, we will see if Kupchak vultures the Nuggets as he did the Pelicans. Pick 15 could be on the way. I still love Eason.

[Braggins]

I would think it would be less embarrassing for MJ to win 20-25 games as part of an obviously intentional rebuild strategy than it would be for them to all act like we are contending for the playoffs this season and win 30-35 games, but we have multiple years of evidence of the specific MJ/Clifford combination doing the latter. I'm not getting my hopes up for a tank.

I would be more willing to ignore the preseason performance if Clifford wasn't clearly trying to win last game by playing his healthy starters like a regular season game and they still ended up getting down double digits in the 4th to Bostons scrubs and throwing in the towel. The team has looked like complete garbage on offense and defense in all three games.

[MasterIchiro]

This team refuses to ever roll with the punches. They always zig when they need to zag and vice versa. This year is the most obvious year ever to embrace a tank with the Miles/Atkinson situations plus a seemingly great draft class, but instead of rolling with the punch, I fully expect them to stick their chin out and lean right into it by gunning for the play in tournament.

I would do Rozier + Hayward for Westbrook + 2027 LAL 1st + 2023 CHI 2nd + 2025 LAL 2nd

Westbrooks expiring actually has value for the Hornets. You can buy him out and clear a ton of cap space going into this offseason and completely retool over the next couple years. It would be nice to get more draft capital than that, but LA can just take the Buddy/Turner package if the price is going to be two 1sts regardless. Haywards contract probably makes him neutral value at best, so just getting the salary is still good.

I would take a 2nd for Oubre and would be open to just cutting/sitting him if he can't fetch anything in a trade. Same for Plumlee.

LaMelo/DSJ
Martin/Bouk
McDaniels/Mcgowens
PJ/Thor
Richards/Williams/Kai

Theres only like a 5% difference in the odds to get the 1st pick between the team that finishes last and the team thats 8th, so that roster should easily be in contention for a top 5 pick, especially if you aggressively load manage LaMelo/Martin/PJ.

I see your thinking on Lakers preferring Turner + Hield (over Rozier) if the cost is 2 firsts. Terry doesn't have that kind of value. So, Lakers don't have 2 firsts on the table for Rozier if they don't have them on the table for Turner/Hield.

We have no idea what options are there, but keeping Rozier might have something to do with poor options. No way around that. Westbrook is not taking a buyout. Lakers would've been able to move him by now if he were willing to surrender money. They've undoubtedly talked to all 29 other teams.

So, not sure how to leverage Rozier for a tank. It's not like the Jazz and Spurs gave away top players for nothing, so I don't expect Kupchak to do that, even though Rozier is nowhere near Mitchell or Murray.

[MasterIchiro]

I would think it would be less embarrassing for MJ to win 20-25 games as part of an obviously intentional rebuild strategy than it would be for them to all act like we are contending for the playoffs this season and win 30-35 games, but we have multiple years of evidence of the specific MJ/Clifford combination doing the latter. I'm not getting my hopes up for a tank.

As a fan speaking for other fans, I don't enjoy watching these preseason lineups short Miles, Hayward and Martin. It makes the Plumlee issue of not claiming the paint even more disruptive to our offense. Those are also guys Clifford needs to implement a defense and develop identity on that end.

I think most fans would tune out. Most of us are not as sophisticated as Locked On Hornets podcasters. Management knows that.

[Hornet Mania]

Tank all the way.

The team looks terrible from a talent perspective, the young prospects are all at least a year away from helping a team win. The coaching is going to be solid-ish but inflexible as to be expected from Cliff.

Honestly I'd be fine with resetting the front office and the entire coaching staff at the end of this season barring a miracle year where everyone exceeds expectations. We need a hard reset in the worst way. We're about to squander the best talent (outside of Zo) in franchise history and it makes me furious. The entire organization is pathetic and I can't even blame Melo if he skips town asap.

The only way this gets turned around in a reasonable time frame is lotto luck. So let's maximize it. Tank, hope for a great pick, put a new regime in place equipped with blue chip young talent to (hopefully) convince Melo we aren't a perpetual dumpster fire.

[yosemiteben]

I'm generally anti-tank because teams I respect and want to emulate don't tank and didn't attempt to acquire their franchise players by tanking. I get it's a minority opinion, but tanking is lazy strategy and a concession that you don't trust your FO IMO, and you'd be better out firing your GM. If you have a **** FO, you can tank and still not hit in the draft. If you have a good FO, you don't need to tank.

The updated odds aren't good enough to win the lotto for me to want to intentionally lose so we bump our odds up like 10%.

And let's be honest, if this roster is as untalented and our coaching staff as terrible as consensus says on here, we're going to be tanking just by sticking with what we have. Melo still needs to develop and I'm not wasting a season of his development for a nominal bump in lottery odds.

[JDR720]

Pre-Miles and before Atkinson screwed us, obviously we should be gunning for the playoffs.

But now? We need to do everything we can to find Melo another star. And the only way to do that is getting a high draft pick. Not the 9-15th pick, but a top 5 pick.

Our core is Melo and... yeah. None of our other young players, besides PJ, are definitely NBA caliber.

Something needs to be done because Melo isn't like Kemba, he isn't going to stick around on a bad/average team for years of his prime.


That said, we aren't going to tank. Cliff will ride Plumlee, Oubre, Richards and Gordon into the ground to sneak into the 6th seed. But, in the end, that may end up being a defacto tank, because 3 of those players suck butt and will play major minutes.

[yosemiteben]

If I'm choosing between 6th seed and 6th pick, I go 6 seed. I actually don't see that as a realistic best case outcome.

[Liver_Pooty]

Pre-Miles and before Atkinson screwed us, obviously we should be gunning for the playoffs.

But now? We need to do everything we can to find Melo another star. And the only way to do that is getting a high draft pick. Not the 9-15th pick, but a top 5 pick.

Our core is Melo and... yeah. None of our other young players, besides PJ, are definitely NBA caliber.

Something needs to be done because Melo isn't like Kemba, he isn't going to stick around on a bad/average team for years of his prime.


That said, we aren't going to tank. Cliff will ride Plumlee, Oubre, Richards and Gordon into the ground to sneak into the 6th seed. But, in the end, that may end up being a defacto tank, because 3 of those players suck butt and will play major minutes.

Hope you're right. 6 seed would be fantastic

[Braggins]

I think he meant that they would try to make the 6th seed, not that they will be successful.

[Rich4114]

I am almost never on the side of this and I can’t really fully commit or declare that I’m team tank, but because of our specific situation and circumstances I think they should call this a developmental season which would put us in the bottom 8. The reason I say that is how could this team as currently constructed even truly compete for a playoff or play in spot? As stupidly hopefully as I usually am, I can’t see it happening this season.

We had a brief window to go in one direction or the other and we chose to stay put. It’s time to pick a direction and go all in. If you want the playoffs then you better start making major trades. If you want development and a big swing in the 2023 draft, then it’s fire sale time. There should not be an in between IMO because last seasons team would wipe the floor with this seasons team.

[Rich4114]

If I'm choosing between 6th seed and 6th pick, I go 6 seed. I actually don't see that as a realistic best case outcome.

Same and same. If I felt like we had a legit chance to be in position for an above play in spot playoff seed, I’d be all in on that vs a 8-14% chance at Wemby. But the ceiling of this team as it looks right now is giving me 11th or 10th seed vibes if everyone remains healthy.

[yosemiteben]

I think he meant that they would try to make the 6th seed, not that they will be successful.

Ah, I see.

Well again, if Cliff is so awful and antiquated and our talent level is so low, seems like sticking with the status quo is as good as tanking.

[amcoolio]

I know you and yosimiteben are optimistic, and we need optimistic fans on this forum....but to me, this is the lowest point in the entire Bobcats/Hornets era.

Tari Eason rubbing his **** in our faces isn't helping either. He'd be our second best player on the team right now, that is SAD.

I'm checked out on this team and this front office. We have the worst front office and coaching staff in the league. Even over Sacramento and Detroit. MJ is now 0/2 with front office overhauls. Starts with him. Maybe he should cash out.

Nuggets are 0-2. They may go 0-82 this season. How? Because I said so. I know it's early and it's only been 2 games but their preseason record is the only evidence available. So my bearish take on the Nuggets is final. It's my conclusion and nothing you can say will change my mind. Nothing.

The one catch is that the Nuggets 2023 pick is protected 1-14. Damn you Mitch!

In all seriousness, check the draft board here and find the thread asking who will be the steal of the draft for their draft position. I predicted Eason prior to the draft. And I continued to defend my choice in that thread.

So no argument over Eason from me.

However, I do prefer double dipping in 2023 over 2022. This draft could be historic. So, we will see if Kupchak vultures the Nuggets as he did the Pelicans. Pick 15 could be on the way. I still love Eason.

Its not that they are 0-3, is that they aren't even competing

-the body language is bad
-the system is bad
-LaMelo looks like he hates this offense, he's not having fun. When LaMelo is not having fun, the morale is ****.
-the players still don't want to defend
-incredibly, we have no rim protection or rebounding, still, after screaming for it for years now
-our young players suck and aren't ready to play in the NBA
-our bench (which is our young players) cannot score, which is the whole point of the bench...if Gordon misses any time, this is by far the worst bench we've ever had aside from our expansion season '04
-we have an old white guy coach and GM that are preaching old NBA basketball and don't relate at all to this generation of players

It's really the perfect microcosm for a disaster 25-57 season, yet still not getting the best lottery odds for the best prospect since LeBron because our owner doesn't want to tank

Why, as fans, want to pull or watch this team? If they don't pick a direction and are actually trying to make the playoffs, then they are incredibly dense. It reeks of antiquation...cluelessness....incompetence.

[luciano-davidwesley]

These idiots should have tanked in Melo's rookie year. But like the f***ing morons MJ and Kupcake are, they instead go out and sign an injury prone 30 year old fringe all-star on a massive 4 year deal. Completely reestablishing us into NBA purgatory. We could have been acquiring draft picks for salary dumps ala OKC, building a chest and picking early with our own picks.

Now we find ourselves in an absolute mess.

Unfortunately our front office has the patience of a toddler stuck in a high chair and decided they needed to reinvest the cap space we finally acquired into more overpaid vets that don't give two **** about the team.

Kupcake is a useless GM. This isn't LA and his incompetence is becoming harder to deny. He should have been straight up fired after draft night for the 13th pick trade.

[fatlever]

As soon as it was clear miles wasn't playing this season, they should have immediately pivoted to a mini tank. Only a fool would think this roster can make the playoffs. There is no point in carrying Gordon, rozier, plumlee and oubre forward. We should have traded all four by now for whatever we could get in terms of cap relief or picks, flyers on young guys etc...

I probably would have aggressively been shopping bouk, Kai and Thor, simply because I don't believe in them.

But now, here we are. Give it 6 weeks. If this team isn't sitting top 8 by December, you gotta pull the plug, at least on Gordon and maybe Terry. Go for that Westbrook deal if you gave to.

Carrying the old vets into March on a 30 win team is simply gm malpractice.

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