Offseason 2025 Thread

[HornetJail]

Honest question, not at all rhetorical:

How many teams in the East can top the top-5 scoring options on the Hornets?

LaMelo Ball
Brandon Miller
Collin Sexton
Miles Bridges
Tre Mann

I think that offense is a playoff offense in the East.

Because the offense is competitive, I'd love to follow through and add one POA defender plus one mobile defending big to the defense.

We have the matching salary plus draft capital outside our own 1st round picks to attach to it to bid on Claxton + Terance Mann, for example.

We are in position to make the defense more competitive on top of a competitive offense, without mortgaging any Hornets 1st round picks.

Why wouldn't we?

The problem is none of those guys are that efficient. I was surprised to find out that the most consistently efficient scorer out of that group is Collin Sexton. Miles had the post-COVID year where he was legit efficient but it was kinda an outlier.

Look at the context of their inefficiency.

I don't think we really need to go line-by-line with their teammates on the Jazz and Hornets.

Put them together and they're going to open the floor for eachother and shoot more high percentage attempts.

exactly. pairing scorers with Josh Green and Moose benefits nobody on the offensive end as we saw last year. if the Hornets are going to attempt to replicate the 2022 team (our most successful team since the last playoff team), the focus should be on having 3-4 potent offensive weapons on the floor at all times.

Go back to the top 8 team leaders in minutes played:

Bridges (20ppg)
Rozier (19ppg)
Melo (20ppg)
Oubre (15ppg)
Martin (bad offense)
Plumlee (terrible offense)
PJ Washington (good role player at 10ppg)
Hayward (16ppg)

all 8 of them shot 55.4 TS% or better, 5 of them scored with decent volume, LaMelo about a percentage point below league average actually being the least efficient of the bunch. Bridges shot 59.3 TS% in a defined role, with usually some combination of Melo, Rozier, or Kelly Oubre popping off on the floor. These last 3 seasons have sucked so much because defenses can key in on the 1 or 2 scorers that are on the floor at a time. They know Josh Green isn't going to punish them. They know you don't have to guard Nick Smith Jr all that tight. And I think nobody's percentages have suffered more for it than LaMelo.

[JDR720]

Our teams offense this season should be better, at least on paper.

Current Melo > That Melo
Current Miles < That Miles
Sexton = Rozier
Mann > Oubre (less likely to score 25+, but also less likely to go 2-15)
Miller > Gordon (or should be, assuming his wrist isn't screwed)

We have in theory a few good offensive bench players too. Dinwiddie, Kon, Grant etc.

One thing I'm certain of is if Lee can't make a functional offense this season, he's just a bad coach.

[Diop]

yeah as long as they run an offense to find good shots. if they stick to give the ball to one guy and let him go solo and try and score, then efficiency will stay in the toilet.

[MasterIchiro]

Pacers finished 13th in team defense in the regular season but managed to pull up to 2nd in defense during the playoffs, helping them reach the Finals.

They did have Nembhard for POA defense plus Myles Turner. Nesmith and Siakam are good defenders.

During the regular season Pacers ranked 7th in points scored.

I think it's okay if at first the offense is ahead of the defense. But the Hornets definitely have to close the gap. It's potentially much larger than the Pacers gap.

[MasterIchiro]

I am still trying to sober to the reality Peterson traded Mark Williams plus Nurkic without a contingency deal lined up. It's hard to fathom he doesn't at least have traction on a deal, but I would've hoped for more than traction. Seems he's locked in a real struggle at the position.

Had he taken BPA (Clingan) over Salaün we'd be in a much better position for the future.

Instead we are looking at surrendering draft assets.

The roster crunch is also perplexing. The quick, cheap deals to Plumlee and Spencer. The rostering of 4 rookies.

That's 6 roster spots that vanished into thin air. Now we are looking at the worst froncourt in the NBA.

He'd have to pay to unload Josh Green. It's clever he acquired 2 nice 2nd round picks to take on Connaughton. But there's no roster spot for Pat, so the owners are buying those.

Peterson had a rough, rough first offseason as a GM. His 6 additions of cheap contracts help ownership balance losses, but he has created so much work for himself.

[Chapelchilla]

I think the post July 6 contact stuff is a factor. Something is cooking.....

[MasterIchiro]

Well the more time that goes by, the more it shakes my confidence in Peterson. Hornets always seem to be the last team to settle its roster, and I get the nagging suspicion it just boils down to $.

The front office talks about harvesting picks which just means we don't want to trade them for big ticket players owed longterm money because we don't want to spend. We are crying poor but draft capital = currency. We are richer in that currency than most teams. Thus we have purchasing power yet refused to use it.

LaMelo is the only big longterm contract. I guess we want to leave him on an island again because the owners have big debts, and servicing those debts requires 6 cheap contracts this offseason and no investment in big ticket players using draft currency.

[JustBuzzin]

Well the more time that goes by, the more it shakes my confidence in Peterson. Hornets always seem to be the last team to settle its roster, and I get the nagging suspicion it just boils down to $.

The front office talks about harvesting picks which just means we don't want to trade them for big ticket players owed longterm money because we don't want to spend. We are crying poor but draft capital = currency. We are richer in that currency than most teams. Thus we have purchasing power yet refused to use it.

LaMelo is the only big longterm contract. I guess we want to leave him on an island again because the owners have big debts, and servicing those debts requires 6 cheap contracts this offseason and no investment in big ticket players using draft currency.

Agreed.

[MasterIchiro]

Well the more time that goes by, the more it shakes my confidence in Peterson. Hornets always seem to be the last team to settle its roster, and I get the nagging suspicion it just boils down to $.

The front office talks about harvesting picks which just means we don't want to trade them for big ticket players owed longterm money because we don't want to spend. We are crying poor but draft capital = currency. We are richer in that currency than most teams. Thus we have purchasing power yet refused to use it.

LaMelo is the only big longterm contract. I guess we want to leave him on an island again because the owners have big debts, and servicing those debts requires 6 cheap contracts this offseason and no investment in big ticket players using draft currency.

Agreed.

"No shortcuts" is just code for crying poor despite the accumulation of valuable draft currency. The minute you exchange that currency for real players, you are signing up to spend money longterm.

It's become absurd with this roster crunch and all the currency in place to resolve it and win games.

Seems like it could just be a smokescreen.

Maybe they surprise and bring in a player on the level of Siakam. Pacers did that for Hali and he's comparable to LaMelo.

[fatlever]

Never made any sense to me to roster 3 rookies, let alone 4..... all on full deals
And add sexton, Spencer, pat and resign mann

Jeff is in a serious roster pickle.

Sent from my SM-G973U using RealGM mobile app

[JustBuzzin]

Well the more time that goes by, the more it shakes my confidence in Peterson. Hornets always seem to be the last team to settle its roster, and I get the nagging suspicion it just boils down to $.

The front office talks about harvesting picks which just means we don't want to trade them for big ticket players owed longterm money because we don't want to spend. We are crying poor but draft capital = currency. We are richer in that currency than most teams. Thus we have purchasing power yet refused to use it.

LaMelo is the only big longterm contract. I guess we want to leave him on an island again because the owners have big debts, and servicing those debts requires 6 cheap contracts this offseason and no investment in big ticket players using draft currency.

Agreed.

"No shortcuts" is just code for crying poor despite the accumulation of valuable draft currency. The minute you exchange that currency for real players, you are signing up to spend money longterm.

It's become absurd with this roster crunch and all the currency in place to resolve it and win games.

Seems like it could just be a smokescreen.

Maybe they surprise and bring in a player on the level of Siakam. Pacers did that for Hali and he's comparable to LaMelo.

Hoping we can get Bam he would solve a lot of our weaknesses.

I'm willing to give up 4 picks if need be.

[MasterIchiro]

Agreed.

"No shortcuts" is just code for crying poor despite the accumulation of valuable draft currency. The minute you exchange that currency for real players, you are signing up to spend money longterm.

It's become absurd with this roster crunch and all the currency in place to resolve it and win games.

Seems like it could just be a smokescreen.

Maybe they surprise and bring in a player on the level of Siakam. Pacers did that for Hali and he's comparable to LaMelo.

Hoping we can get Bam he would solve a lot of our weaknesses.

I'm willing to give up 4 picks if need be.

I think we're limited to rebuild teams. Because rebuild teams would value the draft capital we're attaching most of all. And we would be sending out a bundle of players who are not going to help a team trying to win.

As far as center targets - Claxton makes the most sense.

Maybe the holdup is the bids?

Maybe the Nets won't move him?

I like some of our offseason moves, but thus far feels like there's no follow-through.

[fatlever]

Read on Twitter

[MasterIchiro]

The top unrestricted free agent at center after this season is Mitchell Robinson.

It's obvious teams looking to solve the position will have to look to the trade market.

It looks like we have to develop Moussa and Kalkbrenner on the fly and the position limits our ability to compete in a wide open East. And we won't be able to take advantage of it.

And Jeff knew about the free agent market for centers this offseason and next before he dumped Nurkic and Mark 2×.

The Lakers had to settle for a bought-out Ayton because the price of Claxton is so inflated due to scarcity.

It explains Plumlee.

Jeff should be embarrassed he passed on Clingan.

[Diop]

what if the veterans we signed Plumlee, Dinwiddie and Mann (he was UFA, so could have gone elsewhere)
were the only ones we could interest in signing here?

its year 2 for this front office and they have made it clear they are not in a rush and want to build their way. surely there is still a trade coming though to thin out the roster at the very least.

[Diop]

im sort of hanging my hat on Claxton as he is a mobile, switchable center and seems most plausible to be traded here.

Riley doesn't want to tank, he's not trading Bam. he voiced interest in Lillard after he was waived.
Unless there are more teams involved, we don't really have anything Cleveland would want for Allen.
I think Dallas will want to keep their 2 young centres as Day to Davis does not like playing center and also spends a decent chunk on the IR list.

otherwise doing what indiana did and finding a solid back up to fill the gap and hopefully develop would be cool to. Like Goga from Orlando or Jalen Smith from Chicago.

But does this front office want another center or are they happy to hope fight out the season, hope for development and take another lottery pick?

[Bassman]

im sort of hanging my hat on Claxton as he is a mobile, switchable center and seems most plausible to be traded here.

Riley doesn't want to tank, he's not trading Bam. he voiced interest in Lillard after he was waived.
Unless there are more teams involved, we don't really have anything Cleveland would want for Allen.
I think Dallas will want to keep their 2 young centres as Day to Davis does not like playing center and also spends a decent chunk on the IR list.

otherwise doing what indiana did and finding a solid back up to fill the gap and hopefully develop would be cool to. Like Goga from Orlando or Jalen Smith from Chicago.

But does this front office want another center or are they happy to hope fight out the season, hope for development and take another lottery pick?

All good points. Both the question and the dilemma are in sharp focus now for Jeffie and company. He’s stuck, and either he engineers a consolidation trade of excess guards plus first round draft picks for a decently good center/PF, or he uses minor trades and outright cuts to bludgeon this roster into submission for the new season.

[fatlever]

have faith in the moose lodge

Read on Twitter

[fatlever]

Read on Twitter

grant looks like he might be ready for season opener. he's still got 3 months.

[SWedd523]

Damn boi he thicc