Charlotte Hornets Reside In Mediocrity
When will the sickening cycle of high lottery picks and early playoff exits end?
We all have this one friend in a group. Maybe it’s you. You all go out to eat, you each order a meal, and the meals eventually arrive.
Now, as luck would have it, one meal of the bunch is not quite right. Your friend ordered an eight ounce sirloin steak, and it’s cooked medium rare instead of the requested well done. In addition, they mistakenly complimented the steak with a cheesy potato rather than the baked potato your friend ordered, and to top it off there’s a questionable object located on the east side of the salad plate. Could be a piece of cheese, but has a slightly slimier texture.
Now, maybe with one of these hiccups in the meal the order could be salvaged without complaint. But with a trio of mishaps, most would send the meal back. Your friend however isn’t one to step on toes, and eats the meal. He digests it without issue, but it isn’t enjoyed as genuinely as the others at the table. It doesn’t bring the same satisfaction of receiving what he ordered, and he has to pretend it was just as good as the Chicken Carbonara that Jeremy ordered (and told everyone every step of the way how good it was).
My people, I just introduced you to the Charlotte Hornets.
North Carolina is basketball country. From its rich tradition on Tobacco Road with power programs to the ever-expanding rolodex of Division-I and NBA players from the Tar Heel State, hoops have always taken priority.
That’s why the Charlotte Hornets ineptitude has been so frustrating, stunting the growth of what has the potential to be one of the best small markets to play in.
The Hornets outperformed expectations last season, finishing 48–34 and pushing the Miami Heat to seven games in the first round of the Eastern Conference Playoffs. If it weren’t for a few vintage Dwayne Wade plays in game 6 to stave off elimination, Buzz City may have moved on.
After falling short, Charlotte headed into the offseason with plenty of questions regarding bringing back many of its core pieces. Attempting to capitalize on the momentum from the previous season, the Hornets brought back Nicolas Batum and Marvin Williams on long-term deals and extended Cody Zeller in October, investing over $220 million between the three.
Charlotte let Courtney Lee, Jeremy Lin and Al Jefferson walk, casualties of decisions to invest the team’s money elsewhere.
This season, the Hornets have crash-landed on a familiar floor after being fashioned as a trendy mid-seed playoff pick in the preseason.
Their problems haven’t been unlike the Portland Trail Blazers’ this season. Two franchises desperate for success each get an unexpected taste of the sweet nectar. The nectar aftertaste aligns perfectly with several rotation pieces being up for new contracts, eager to capitalize on team and individual success.
It forced both front offices’ hands to replenish as much as they could, because what’s the alternative? Risk returning to that dreaded late lottery position?
Portland has started to figure it out, mostly because Damian Lillard and C.J. McCollum are too good not to and Jusuf Nurkic has helped tremendously in the middle.
With Charlotte, the margin for error is a good deal smaller with a group of talent that is described optimistically as “average”. Kemba Walker’s playmaking has become even more emphasized, as the 6-foot-1, 170-pound guard has to create virtually every quality shot in the half court.
Walker is going to join Allen Iverson, Isaiah Thomas and Terrell Brandon as the only players 6-foot-1 or shorter to have at least a 28 percent usage percentage and seven win shares in a single season.
Make no mistake, it’s been out of necessity. Defenses have taken their chances with the likes of Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, Jeremy Lamb and a “shooters gotta shoot” minded Marco Belinelli spotting up around the Connecticut product.
Batum is averaging career highs in points, assists and free throw attempts per game. But his per game scoring is a facade for the career-low field goal percentage and career-high usage rate. His shot chart reflects his laid back style that settles for jumpers in a pick-and-roll heavy offense.
According to NBA Stats, Batum ranks in the 16th percentile in the entire association in pick-and-roll ball handler points per possession, despite over a quarter of his possessions coming in that role.
His probing manner is an advantage for some players, but it backfires on Batum who often is too high to slip the pocket pass or fails to make the defense pick their poison, opting for the pullup jumper.
The rest of the roster is littered with plus role players like Cody Zeller and Kidd-Gilchrist. Zeller has thrived as Charlotte’s super-screener, as he’s third in the league in screen assists per game.
If running backs buy their offensive line gifts after a Pro Bowl season, Walker should certainly reward Zeller with a trip to Bojangles at least. Zeller possesses far and away the highest plus-minus number on the team, and that’s not a coincidence. Despite his modest numbers, the Hornets were smart to lock Zeller up as one of the better young bigs in the league.
Kidd-Gilchrist’s situation is a bit more complicated, as Charlotte had its best season without him last year. The Hornets have tried to pigeon hole him into the 3 spot with Batum miscast as a shooting guard, and the numbers say the team has only a slight edge with its starting wing pairing together.
The small forward position has changed even since MKG entered the league in 2012. And I’m sure if you told any Hornets personnel back then that the number 2 overall pick would be a total of 7-for-34 from deep in five years, they would likely laugh, wink and say only tweaks needed to be made. But here we are.
Having a wing who isn’t even worth a fake closeout playing major minutes puts immense pressure on the offense and its health. The Memphis Grizzlies and Oklahoma City Thunder have found ways to make it work because of Marc Gasol and Mike Conley’s creativity, and Russell Westbrook doesn’t need space, he creates it.
Charlotte has tried to be smarter by flashing Kidd-Gilchrist to the short corners for offensive rebounding opportunities and drop-off finishes but that is a futile payoff for the massive price paid by the third-most pick-and-roll heavy team in the league.
Swapping Kidd-Gilchrist for Lee in the starting lineup and a regression by Marvin Williams has plummeted the Hornets 3-point shooting to 18th in the league this year after finishing in the top-10 last season.
Shooting the long ball often and efficiently was a vital part of the attack last season, as Charlotte also ranked fourth in both 3-point attempts and makes last season.
Another important component of the team last season was team defense. Head coach Steve Clifford’s scheme emphasizes low turnovers and minimizing opposing fast break points. Though both Hornets’ teams from the past two seasons are in the same neighborhood of defensive ratings, Charlotte finished with the fourth-best defensive rating in crunch time last season. This season, they clock in at the second-worst in the entire league.
Walker, Batum, Zeller, Kidd-Gilchrist, Marvin Williams, Jeremy Lamb and newly acquired Miles Plumlee are all signed through at least 2018–19. So the question remains, what is this core? Is it the 48-win team that pushed Miami to the brink, or this year’s iteration that is beginning to shut down players in favor of better lottery luck?
I get these decisions aren’t made in vacuums. There’s no doubt that ownership was eager to hold onto any inkling of success with the name change (Rufus Lynx still haunts me) and with Walker still improving and entering his prime, that general manager Rich Cho brought back Batum and Williams is defensible.
But paying Miles Plumlee $12.5 million a year until 2020 hurts, especially when he’s an older poor man’s version of Zeller and somehow more expensive.
For a franchise with no division titles nor conference finals appearances under its belt, the front office seems to be drinking the Kool-Aid too. The cute, plucky Charlotte Hornets are content to stay that way. Every move for the last few years screams “I WANT 43 WINS AND TWO HOME PLAYOFF DATES” with little variability either way.
And again, Charlotte isn’t Boston. There’s no banners hanging in the rafters. But isn’t that what they should be trying to change?
All stats courtesy of NBA Stats and Basketball Reference.
