Ever since Big Al came to the Hornets three seasons ago, when they were still the Bobcats, he has been great for the Hornets. In his first season with the team, he even made the All-NBA 3rd team averaging 21.8 PPG and 10.8 RPG.
However, as offensively talented as Big Al is, he just seems lost on the defensive end of the floor at times. Many people don’t seem to understand why this is the case considering Al’s imposing figure, but he doesn’t use that to his advantage. He isn’t talented offensively because of his size, but because of his fluid footwork and jump shot. Therefore, it makes sense as to why Big Al can’t match up and stop guys in the division like Whiteside and Gortat.
Not to mention his inability to play quality defense, Al also has had health issues these past two seasons. This past season especially, he played only 47 games, while starting just 18 of them. That’s not anywhere near enough games for a player that made $13.5 million this season.
One last thing to criticize about Big Al is that while he is a dominant scorer in the offense, at times he can slow the teams offense down to a sluggish pace. This Hornets team has a lot of guys that fit a quick, upbeat style offense so sometimes Big Al standouts out as an oddball that doesn’t fit.
Big Al has many great qualities, but in an off season where the Hornets need to lock up youthful players that are in their prime, you have to ask yourself the question, is Big Al worth signing to another big contract? Along with other reasons I’ve listed, Big Al is also well past him prime and will most likely not have a cheap price range. Sometimes the negatives outweigh the positives even for great players, and I think this is one of those times.
This summer is going to be a chaos filled off season for the Charlotte Hornets. Not only is the cap space for the entire NBA rising, many of the Hornets key role players from this past season are becoming unrestricted free agents.
The teams main star Kemba Walker is firmly set in place with the team for four more years through the 2018-19 season, worth $48 million over that span. So no matter what players the team may lose during free agency, they will have their franchise point guard.
Kemba Walker’s robin to his batman this season was Nic Batum. It was his first year in Charlotte coming over from Portland, and he made quite the impression. The two-three swingman averaged 14.9 PPG, 6.1 RPG, and 5.8 APG, those stats alone show you why he was one of the leaders on a team who posted their best record (48-34) since 2002.
The problem with Batum, is that he will need a new contract this summer. Of course there is nothing wrong with the Hornets giving out a max contract to a guy like Batum, but this off season would be a lot simpler had the Hornets already had Batum locked down. The only problem with giving Batum max, which they will do considering Hornets GM Rich Cho said Batum is the teams “top priority”, is that this most likely means the team will lose either Al Jefferson, Jeremy Lin, Marvin Williams, or Courtney Lee. However, as long as the Hornets get their “top priority” I think things will workout just fine.
All of the Hornets players have expressed how pleased they were with the team and its chemistry this season, but the most likely player to leave is Jeremy Lin. Lin was a great backup for the Hornets this season and deserves to be paid well, but with money going towards Marvin Williams coming off his best season ever, and Big Al to keep an inside presence, it is unlikely they will have the money to keep Lin.
Making up for the loss of a guy like Lin is much easier than making up for the loss of an all-around star such as Batum, which is why he is the “top priority.”
Over the past two and a half weeks, I have maintained and updated the “Into the Hive” blog about the Charlotte Hornets and I have learned I really enjoy writing about sports. While it’s not like a real audience read my blog or anything, I still really enjoyed it.
It came with difficulties though, and one of those difficulties is that it is hard to consistently come up with new unique material. It would’ve been easy to just right a post-game wrap up after every Hornets game, but I didn’t want to do that every time, I wanted to take a more in-depth look at the team. That came with difficulties, but I’m glad I chose that approach instead of just summarizing each game.
Another difficulty I found was adding sufficient forms of media. I added fitting picture or video in each of my posts, but sometimes I didn’t feel like it was enough, however, I found it difficult trying to find places to add more pictures because I did not want the post to feel cluttered.
I think people that blog for a living and make a profit of it, go about it by finding a niche that interests people, and presenting information/advice/reviews in a pleasing way. For example, the Hornets have a great fan base in Charlotte, so anybody that is extremely talented at presenting information and keen insight on the team, could have a chance to profit from their blog or their writing. Movie or TV show blogging is a big genre that I have heard many people profit from. Somebody with a great sense of humor and is able to present their opinions on movies with that humor could definitely get their blog popular enough to where a company is willing to endorse them, or they could have their own apparel or “shop”.
People can now make money off of their blogging because it is changed how we access information in our world by providing us with a new way to read about things. For example, people aren’t just reading about news, they’re reading about someone’s opinion on news, which in my opinion, is a lot more interesting. People aren’t just reading about a new clothing line that will be released soon, they’re reading about how to wear this new clothing line or someone’s opinion on how it looks.
Blogging now provides us with a way to access information in a more unique and personalized stand point rather than just see it written in a more formal and professional format. There is nothing wrong with reading info from a formal and professional format either, but sometimes seeing someone’s specific, unique opinions on the topic of your choosing can do so much more for a reader.
The Hornets currently hold the 5th seed in the Eastern Conference, and sit just half a game back from the 3rd seed. They’re sitting pretty comfortable right? Not quite. The Hornets have been victorious in 17 of their last 21 games, but yet they still do not have enough room to sit back and breathe.
There are plenty of teams still breathing down the team’s neck below them in the Eastern Conference standings. If the Hornets drop a few games in a row down the final stretch of the season they could find themselves facing an unfavorable 1 seed/8 seed match up against the Cavs, or out of the entire playoffs at all.
If the Hornets do not make and compete in the playoffs (aka not getting swept in the first round), then this will be a failure of a season. There are no more moral victories for Hornets. The team, fans, and front office are no longer content with just making the playoffs, or blaming a bad season on injuries.
With the way the team has been playing lately, everyone is going to expect a playoff series win, something that hasn’t happened since 2002. One thing that could hold this team back, could be how they play on the road.
The Hornets have the largest difference in win percentage between home games and road games in the league. Their win percentage at home that I’ve talked about in the past is .722 (26-10), while their win percentage on the road is .406 (13-19). The Hornets picked up a tough win in Miami last night, but they still have a ways to go.
Before the game last night, the Hornets went 6-1 on a home stand, but with the season coming to a close soon, that means the Hornets are going to need to keep up this pace, but they have to do it on the road. On Saturday they face the Nuggets at home, then on Monday they face the Spurs at home, after that, nine of their remaining twelve games are on the road.
This could cause serious trouble for a Hornets team that at one point this season, lost ten straight road games. This is a different Hornets team now though, this is a team that not only has a healthy Big Al, but a Courtney Lee that seems to be fitting in great with the team. Earlier in the year before these guys were playing, the team had somewhat of a collapse when it went from 2nd place in the East, to 11th place in the East in a matter of less than a month. This should just show how crucial it is for this team to continue their winning on the road.
In these last nine road games, if the Hornets can win six, I think they should be good for a three or four seed. While there might not seem like much of a difference, when that potential game seven comes along, it’ll make a huge difference.
Finishing strong on the road for the Hornets is important for so many reasons. The team is going to have to learn how to be able to win road games in the playoffs, but most importantly the just need to WIN these games down the stretch to set themselves up for success. They control their own destiny.
In his college days at UCONN, he was the definition of clutch. I specifically remember the Big East Tournament Championship against Pitt when he used his famous step back to hit a buzzer beater for the win. UCONN also went the National Championship that year, and won, led by him. The “him” I’m referring to is of course none other than Kemba Walker.
Kemba was incredibly lethal in college, and that is one of the reasons the Hornets drafted him 9th overall in the 2011 draft. This lethality has continued into the NBA as Kemba Walker has shown that he is one of the league’s best point guards and reliable players in big moments.
Kemba has been a great leader for this team. His rookie year, he didn’t start much, but the next season he was giving the starting point guard role and hasn’t looked back. Just two seasons after setting league history by going 7-59, Kemba helped lead the Bobcats to the playoffs.
Two years after that, a.k.a. this current season, Kemba is in the midst of leading the Hornets to one of their best seasons in a very long time, and while having the best scoring season of his career at 21.4 PPG.
Another reason this should be considered the best season his career is his ability to thrive in the clutch even more so than normal this season. In the last two minutes of a game with the score within four points, nobody has scored more than Kemba. Not Steph Curry, not Kevin Durant, but Kemba Walker.
While it’s necessary to take into account that the Hornets have been in more close games than the Thunder and Warriors, this is still an impressive stat. It goes to show that when the game is hanging in the balance, the Hornets have their man that will step up and take the shot.
He leads the team, he shows as much heart and energy as MKG, and takes the big shots. Is Kemba Walker already the Hornet’s best draft pick ever? Let’s look at some other great draft picks through the years and what they did for just the Hornets:
Larry Johnson: Larry Johnson was selected first overall by the Hornets in the 1991 draft, and played four seasons with the team before finishing the rest of his career with the Knicks. Johnson was selected to the All-Star Team twice(first ever Hornet to be an All-Star) as well as winning Rookie of the Year in the 91-92 season.
Alonzo Mourning: Zo is one of my favorite old Hornets players, however, most of his success came with other teams. He was selected to one All-Star team as a Hornet, and in his rookie season he finished second behind Shaq in Rookie of the Year voting. In 1995, Zo and Larry Johnson led the Hornets to their first ever 50-win season and Zo averaged 21.3 PPG and 9.9 RPG.
Baron Davis: Baron Davis was drafted 3rd overall by the Hornets in the 1999 draft, and made two All-Star teams as a Hornet. In his 3rd season in 2002, his numbers of 18 PPG and 8.5 APG helped lead the Hornets to being one game shy of the Eastern Conference Finals as they lost to Ray Allen and the Bucks in seven games.
Emeka Okafor: Emeka Okafor was drafted 2nd overall in the 2004 draft to the brand new Charlotte Bobcats (yes I know this is not the Hornets, but they are the Hornets now so I count the Bobcats as well). He was awarded Rookie of the Year and had a solid tenure with the Bobcats, but was never surrounded with a good enough team to succeed.
After looking at all of these great players, it is still hard for me to not think that Kemba has already made his mark as the best Hornets draft pick ever. Now I know that Kemba hasn’t made an All-Star team, but if he wasn’t snubbed enough last year, it’s ridiculous that he wasn’t on the team this year. I also know that Kemba has only led the team to the playoffs once only to get swept by LeBron and the Heat, but it’s obvious that the Hornets are aiming to make an actual run in the playoffs this year.
Not only as Kemba turned around a team that had the worst record in league HISTORY, but he has also been a player that is extremely easy to like, he’s been one of the guys over the past few years that have helped bring back the passionate fans in Charlotte.
Including Kemba, all five of these guys are worthy of being considered the best draft by the Hornets. However, Kemba doesn’t seem like he’s going anywhere else anytime soon, so his impact on the team will only grow and will eventually solidify his spot as the definite best draft pick in the teams history.
Last night the Hornets won at home against the Timberwolves 108-103, making it four straight wins and 12 out of their last 15. Kemba Walker tallied his third straight 30 point game by leading all scorers with 34. Early in the third quarter, the Hornets were trailing, but Walker’s 21 points in the third quarter alone was able to propel the Hornets to yet another win at home.
Yes, another win at home. The win last night improved the Hornets home record to 22-9 on the season. That win percentage of .709 is bested only by the five teams (the Spurs, Warriors, Cavaliers, Raptors, and Thunder) that have the five best overall records in the league.
There are some people who don’t fully believe “home court” has much to say in the outcome of the game, but it’s hard to believe that a 22-9 record at home, and a 12-19 record on the road occurs just by “chance”.
Of course for some teams, there may not be much of a home court advantage. Whether it’s the fans, attitude of the team, or just by a happenstance, some teams clearly don’t play much better at home than on the road. It’s not just bad teams either, for example, the Washington Wizards are a solid team, but their win percentage at home is .485 (16-17), while their win percentage on the road is just slightly lower at .483 (14-15).
The Hornets are clearly not one of those teams. At home, they average 104.6 PPG, while on the road they average a mediocre 100.2 PPG. Even the team’s leading scorer Kemba Walker shows a drastic difference in his scoring. At home, 22.5 PPG, on the road, 19.9 PPG.
As you would expect, their opponents are much worse when they have to come into the Hive. Hornets allow 102.6 PPG on the road, but 98.4 PPG when they get to play in the comforts of Charlotte. This puts the Hornets point differential at 6.5, in their favor.
So what is it that makes this Hornets team so good at home this season? Well it all starts with the recent name change last year making this team the “Charlotte Hornets” once again.
When the Hornets were in Charlotte the first time, they led the league in attendance EIGHT times in just fourteen seasons. At one point, the team played in 364 straight sellouts, that’s almost nine straight home seasons (41 games) of sellouts.
The fans in Charlotte absolutely adored the team. Whether the team was having a good or bad year, the support for the team was through the roof. They fans and city consistently made the team feel at home.
Then, in 2002, the team was taken away and relocated to New Orleans. The city was absolutely devastated. Eventually in 2004 Charlotte were given another team, the Bobcats, but it just wasn’t the same. The Bobcats had to follow up on the Hornets craze in the 90’s, but they didn’t have the famous purple and teal, or the historical significance.
So here we are now in 2016, and the Hornets are back. I don’t personally know any Hornets fan that was not happy about the name change. It’s obvious in the arena, those diehard Hornets fans are back. The fans and the team are turning Time Warner Cable arena into a place that teams should be scared to play in.
Of course this isn’t saying there were no Bobcats fans, because I, along with most Hornets fans, also supported them. However, the team was horrid for the majority of their seasons. It wasn’t always a team to be proud of, it wasn’t a team that could rally support and bring a city together.
This Hornets team, and even last year’s disappointing 33-49 team has brought the city together again (along with some help from the Panthers). Of course it will take some time for everything to feel like it did back when the old Charlotte Hornets were buzzing, but the atmosphere and performance in the Hive this year certainly show that things are headed in the right direction.
As we all know, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist missed the first half of the season due to a torn labrum, but when he returned, he played in just seven games before tearing his labrum in his shoulder once again. This forced MKG to undergo season ending surgery, and thusly became another season cut short for the 6 foot 7 small forward out of Kentucky.
Back in 2012, Kidd-Gilchrist was drafted 2nd overall by the Hornets (Bobcats at the time), and has actually been labelled a bust by many. However, while he hasn’t transformed into a superstar like the draft pick before him Anthony Davis, he is far from the “bust that can only play defense” that many make him out to be.
Think about this, last year the Hornets finished 33-49. MKG was plagued by injuries again last year and only played in 55 out of the 82 games. In the 55 games he played, the Hornets went 27-28, mediocre, but when you compare that to their 6-21 record WITHOUT Kidd-Gilchrist, that looks pretty good. Had MKG have gotten to play the full year, the Hornets would have won at least six or seven more games, giving them a chance at the playoffs.
While the Hornets are much better this year, it should still be noted that they were 5-2 in Kidd-Gilchrist’s seven games and he put up numbers of 12.7 PPG, 6.4 RPG, 1.3 APG, and shot 54.1% from the field. The numbers show that MKG makes this team better, but they don’t tell the whole story.
Kidd-Gilchrist is widely known throughout the league as one of it’s best defenders. He’s athletic, lengthy, quick, hustles, and does everything that creates the recipe for a great defender. The energy he brings on defense makes the entire team’s defense better, there is a reason they have had one of the league’s top defenses in the two seasons prior to this one. This season, the Hornets are allowing 102.2 PPG, but in the seven games MKG has played, they have only allowed 96.5 PPG. Despite the small sample size, this is still impressive.
Everytime Kidd-Gilchrist steps onto the court, he brings a fire that not many have. Every loose ball that he dives for, every time he saves a ball that was surely headed out of bounds, he emits that energy to the rest of the team. It’s clear just by watching that entire team loves having him on the court, his hard work rubs off on them and makes them a much better team.
All of that praise for MKG isn’t to say the Hornets aren’t performing well even without him this season, because they certainly are. It is just to show that they could be even better if he were not injured. As I’ve stated before, the Hornets have a realistic chance of claiming good playoff position, but with MKG, it wouldn’t be completely unreasonable to think that this team could make the Eastern Conference Finals.
It’s not just his defense and energy that makes this team better anymore. Over the two past year or two, MKG has worked relentlessly on improving his jump shot that was clearly broken. Kidd-Gilchrist has transformed into a player that can take on a role in an offense from inside AND outside the paint.
While it’s not likely that MKG will ever be a player that can carry an offense in scoring, his ability to be versatile and drive the basketball can greatly help spark a Hornets offense that at times can be lackluster.
There are some Hornets fans that wouldn’t mind to see MKG traded, and that’s not completely unreasonable given his trouble with injuries, but MKG is young and his potential is through the roof. Trading him now in the fourth season his career when he only keeps getting better, would surely be a move that the Hornets front office would regret.
Kemba Walker is the team’s go to scorer, Big Al is the big man down low, Nic Batum does a little bit of everything, but if this Hornets team is to become a championship caliber team in years to come, MKG might be the biggest key for that to happen.
With 23 remaining games in the season for the Charlotte Hornets, they sit at 31-28, 3rd in the Southeast division, and 6th in the Eastern Conference. In their last 12 games, the Hornets are 9-3 and seem to have finally found consistency with their offense and defense. So now the question arises, just how high can this Hornets team climb?
Aside from the Cavaliers and Raptors who practically have the top two spots locked up given that there is a 5.5 game gap between 2nd and 3rd, the rest of the conference is pretty tight. There is just a five game cap between spots 3-9 in the conference. This means that the Hornets sitting in 6th, are only 2.5 games behind the 4th place Heat, making them that much closer to having the home court advantage in their first playoff series. As a matter of fact, they are only four games behind the 3rd place Celtics.
Climbing that many games on good teams is no easy task, however, the Hornets have a more-than-favorable upcoming schedule. Out of the next ten games, the Hornets SHOULD win at least eight of them. Just four of those games are against teams with a record better than .500, and three of those games are at home, which is by far where the team is at their best.
Last night, the Hornets improved to 20-9 in Buzz City with a 126-92 win over the Suns. It was Nickelodeon 90’s night at Time Warner Cable last night and the team sure played like they did when they were at their best in the 90’s, and were backed by a passionate group of fans that make coming into Buzz City and winning a difficult task. It goes to show how much better the Hornets are when they are at home, and aside from the game in Philadelphia against the 76ers tonight, the Hornets have seven straight home games after that.
Kemba Walker had a game high 26 points in the 126-92 win
Courtney Lee seems to be getting comfortable with the Hornets system, Big Al is back in the lineup and scoring with efficiency, and Kemba is playing as good as ever. This combination paired with the Hornets remaining favorable schedule sets up the perfect equation for the Hornets to get a top 4 seed for the first time since the 1997-1998 season. While the odds aren’t necessarily in Charlotte’s favor, fans here have good reason to be hopeful that we can climb even higher in the Eastern Conference standing.
Much as it seems easy for the Hornets to climb in the standings, they can just as easily plummet in them if they get complacent. The Pacers and Pistons (7th and 8th in the conference) are just half a game back of the Hornets, the 9th place Bulls are just a game back, and the 10th place Wizards are just 2 games back. So if the Hornets slip up and drop a few games they should win, they could find themselves in an uphill battle for a playoff spot.
This scenario doesn’t seem quite as likely as the Hornets climbing considering that other than the Wizards, all of the aforementioned teams behind the Hornets are .500 or worse in their last ten games and are just simply not playing as well as the Hornets are.
Should we Hornets fan expect to definitely finish as the 4 or maybe even 3 seed? No, but is this an attainable goal for a team that has hit its stride even without MKG? Yes.
Into the Hive 