Hornets start fresh for second half of the season

TROY HULL | THE CHARLOTTE POST

Adding veterans like Seth Curry (30) at the NBA trade deadline breathed new life into a Hornets roster that needed change for the future.

The Charlotte Hornets are finally trending in the right direction, and how they handle the offseason will play a huge role in bringing the fan base back completely as the faithful long to break the NBA’s longest playoff drought, dating back to 2016.

The days of Kemba Walker and Al Jefferson bringing the buzz back feel like a lifetime ago, and Hornets fans have seen just four seasons of plus-.500 basketball since the Bobcats returned to Charlotte in 2004-05.

Following a lifeless, injury-marred first 50 games of the 2023-24 season – which was surrounded with optimism for LaMelo Ball’s return, Mark Williams’ sophomore season, and Miles Bridges’ reinstatement, paired with Brandon

Miller’s debut – the Hornets actually have some buzz, thanks to an aggressive approach from the new ownership team of Rick Schnall and Gabe Plotkin at the trade deadline.

While Charlotte’s revamped roster won’t lead them to the upper echelon of the league, the Hornets are much closer to relevance with a competitive rotation – and they have another top-10 pick on the way, as well as future draft capital to make a potential splash trade down the line.

While the “what-ifs” can go on all day, one thing is for sure – The “New” Hornets have a lot of convincing to do to bring the fans back for good, as Charlotte currently ranks dead last in attendance, at an average of just 16,130 fans per game.

Faces of the franchise

While injuries have limited Ball’s progression and production, the onetime NBA All-Star still ranks among the top 15 in the league for jersey sales, ahead of two-time MVP Nikola Jokic at No. 13.

After signing the richest deal in Charlotte sports history over the summer, Ball has played in just 22 games (11 at home) as nagging ankle injuries continue to sideline him. While Ball is owed just $11 million this season, his rookie-max extension kicks in for 2024-25, taking over 25% of the team’s current cap at $35.2 million annually – meaning that Charlotte needs its most expensive asset on the court.

While the losses have continued to rack up in Ball’s absence, Buzz City has seen the emergence of No. 2 overall pick Brandon Miller, providing optimism for the future as he continues to progress at a rate that  surprises one of the greatest players the NBA has seen.

“He’s here for a reason. I love what I see from him at this stage of his career,” LeBron James said of Miller. “The best teacher in life is experience, and he’s experiencing being out on the floor and also being a focal point of the offense. The talent is obviously there.”

Ownership kept Ball informed with their draft selection of Miller, and it was clear that Schnall and Plotkin prioritized Miller’s growth and usage rate in the offense with trade packages – moving fan-favorite Terry Rozier for a 2027 protected first-round pick.

And Miller – who participated in the NBA All-Star Weekend’s Rising Stars Challenge – isn’t taking that prioritization lightly.

“My main goal is to win,” he said. “Win with Charlotte, just win in the playoffs, and bring a great atmosphere to Spectrum Center.”

Turning point

Charlotte’s trade deadline decisions were a clear success. And with former general manager Mitch Kupchak stepping into an advisory role, the Hornets have begun a hunt for a new decision-maker in the front office to pair with Schnall and Plotkin, who were very involved with the team’s personnel decisions, according to Kupchak.

While Charlotte boasts a revamped roster with five new players, multiple future first-round picks, and an ongoing search for a new general manager, there are off-the-court renovations coming – and fast.

In early January, the Hornets announced $260 million in renovations coming to the Spectrum Center, closing the arena for the next two summers, concluding ahead of the 2025-26 season. The city-approved funds are revamping the look and feel of the entire arena, adding 2,500 lower bowl seats and modernizing the nearly 20-year-old arena.

While the additional seats are enticing, Charlotte needs fans to fill them. And not Madison Square Garden South, or Crypto.com Arena East fans. The Hornets need Charlotte-based fans to buy into the team, which ranked fourth youngest in the NBA with an average age of 24.28 ahead of the season.

That means playing a fun brand of basketball, rostering All-Star and All-NBA caliber players and most importantly, winning. And since the purple shirt guy trash-talked Dwyane Wade one too many times, resulting in a blown 3-2 series lead against Miami in the first round of the 2016 playoffs, Charlotte hasn’t known that feeling.

Steve Clifford was Charlotte’s coach then, and after four years of James Borrego, the reunion with Clifford hasn’t been efficient in the win column.

Is Clifford right for a rebuild?

Since returning to Charlotte, Clifford’s results have been brutal, skewed by an insurmountable number of injuries to both stars and ancillary pieces. The Hornets are 40-96 over a season and a half with Clifford, including a bottom-three defensive efficiency prior to the trade deadline.

"I mean, let’s be honest, it’s why I was brought here and to this point, I have failed pretty miserably is we don't care enough about defense all the time,” Clifford said before the deadline. “We’re better than we were in some ways but we’re a sometimes team. Sometimes we run back, sometimes we don’t. Sometimes we care about guarding the ball, sometimes we don’t. When the ball starts going in the basket, a lot of times we don’t care about defense anymore. You’ll never win. You might win games; you might have a decent year, but you’ll never win. You’ll never win a playoff series; you probably wouldn’t win a playoff game. You've got to defend in the NBA.

“Last year, the one thing I felt good about was we had a stretch of 20 games after the All-Star break where we were second in defense,” Clifford continued. “They bought in, we took it to the next level and for whatever reason, we have not gotten anywhere close to that this year. I don't care who we play, if you play the right way you can give yourself a chance to win.”

In the three games following the trade deadline – albeit a small sample size – the Hornets have the third-best defensive rating in the NBA (104.1), behind just the Dallas Mavericks and Minnesota Timberwolves. And that is still missing Mark Williams, the team’s best rim protector.

Whether Clifford will get another chance to break the playoff drought is yet to be seen.

Changes have continuously been made since Schnall and Plotkin took charge, and the Hornets are trending in the right direction for the first time in quite some time.

Comments