News - Charlotte Hornets - CraigB
"Too young to compete"
With opening day upon us we take a look back at Charlotte's first ever offseason, the thoughts behind the decisions and how the things look moving forward.
Gifted the 4th pick in the draft, Charlotte decided to bank on the promising trajectory of basketball prodigy Luka Doncic. With superstars such as Steph Curry, Kawhi Loneard, Kevin Durant, LeBron James and James Harden all on the board this could be seen as a bold choice, however it was the combination of talent vs contract size that won over the GM's logic. And fellow GM's didn't seem to disagree with the choice.
Although not yet proven in the 2K realm, from an NBA standpoint Luka brings a combination of versatile offensive talent and size that only a handful of players have, and then when you consider that he's only 20 years old then the company he sits in shrinks even more. Heralded as a certain future star from Charlotte brass long before he put on an NBA jersey, Luka's rookie season proved that we are looking at once-in-a-generation skill wizard who showed an uncanny amount of polish and smarts for his age.
The choice put Charlotte in very particular position. A) They have a franchise star on a small contract, and B) They have a sense of certainty that their franchise player was going to be around for a long time.
Small contract size means large cap space. And when there's space, opportunity fills it.
Charlotte took that philosophy and ran with it. What if they could create a team of value contracts that are all on the same growth timeline?
The Hornets knew they wanted young value picks, but they also knew they wanted those picks to make sense from a basketball standpoint at the same time. After all, team building is the fun part here.
So what fits around Luka from a basketball standpoint? Well Luka is a primary playmaker and scorer. He can create outward gravity with his shooting, creating a sense of space on the court with his pick&roll play. But while he's a top level offensive player, he's not a strong defender, with lateral quickness arguably being a weakness. So Charlotte decided what he needs is to be surrounded with 2-way wings that can match Luka's IQ in terms of ball movement, while being able to reliably score and defend.
Lets see what they did.
Charlotte waited over 50 picks for their next selection to come up, gritting their teeth as several targets flew off the board. But 2 targets were still there at #57: Wendell Carter and Caris LeVert.
A 3&D big was the ideal pairing with Luka. A guy that can recover on any defensive holes that Luka creates, while hitting open shots that Luka creates, and then with the space that a pairing like that can create in the lane, a slasher or 2 after that would be a key combo.
Charlotte had scouted Wendell heavily previous to this draft, and had him pinned as a future swiss army knife type of big in the mold of Paul Millsap and Al Horford. And so while Carter's shooting wasn't quite there yet, the fact that he can defend AND pass, was enough to excite the GM. Also, Carter's jumpshot motion looks good enough to believe he can become reliable in that area in future. Charlotte couldn't believe that Carter was still on the table and picked him without much hesitation.
Fast forward to #64 and now things start to get interesting. Charlotte reportedly thought about Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, Dejounte Murray and Jonathan Isaac. With Miami swiping Isaac a pick beforehand, and Charlotte ultimately preferring SGA over Dejounte, the choice came down to Caris LeVert and SGA. Ultimately the decision came down to giving Luka the point guard duties and preferring to stack up on wings. And with LeVert being a target back at pick #57, the pick to go forward with revealed itself. But Charlotte will be constantly comparing the trajectories of LeVert and SGA and wondering what if.
LeVert then brings scoring, playmaking and defense to go along with Luka and Carter. And on a good contract too.
The next 2 picks brought in Justice Winslow and Lonnie Walker. Justice, like LeVert, brings a wing who can handle play creation duties while also contributing in areas of defense. Lonnie Walker brings scoring punch, and is someone that could develop into a star if we're patient.
So now Luka has two 2-way players on his wings, a versatile big to fill the gaps, and a 6th man scorer.
Cheerful criticisms of Charlotte being overly youth hungry start to roll in, but it doesn't knock them off their plan. They know they're on track.
Charlotte determine that they have enough pieces that can handle P&R duties, and they start to target guys who can fill those defensive gaps.
The next 2 picks at #177 and 184 were Jonah Bolden and Frank Ntilklilklilkikina. Jonah provides potential as a 3&D big, which is a rare skillset. Not only that, but he provides a surprising amount of ball handling ability and it's not uncommon to see him lead the break. Granted, he will need to become more consistent if he wants to become a key player, but it's a worthy punt at this point. Franky was an exciting pick at this spot as he was someone that we legitimately perceive as a top 3 guard defender in the league. To get that at this spot was pretty special, and throw in the fact that he was only 20 yrs old at this time. Frank is a perfect fit next Luka who can allow Luka to use the ball while Frank can chip in with making solid decisions with the ball and being an absolute ball stopper on the defensive end.
The idea is: with Carter and Bolden popping out for long 2's and 3's created by Luka's playmaking gravity, this opens up opportunities for guys like LeVert and and Winslow to slash into what would hopefully be a reasonably open lane.
It's not a perfect picture yet, but that's the blueprint. Still plenty of development to do yet though.
The rest of the draft was littered with some young gun punts and some vets on big salaries (to get over the minimum cap).
In the rookie draft the Hornets came away with Nicolas Claxton and Jaylen Nowell.
Fellow GM's seemed a little surprised to see Claxton go 19th. But here's what i see: He's a 7 footer who runs like a guard, he grew up playing point guard and had a late growth spurt so he still has guard skills as a base foundation (handle, pass, shoot), he has great twitch athleticism for his height which means he's a crazy good on-ball perimeter defender already for his height which means he can switch on pick&rolls and defend ball handlers, he has a stringy leanness to him which suggests he can build a great body in the future, he's also really long. So basically he has the tools and natural instincts in place already, and the things he needs to develop are the most easily teachable traits (strengths, hand-skill polish). Due to the depth of the draft he got basically no hype, which allowed him to get slept on. So what we end up with is a versatile big who could potentially defend all 5 positions and finish, shoot and handle decently.
I forget why i drafted Nowell but i remember liking him at the time lol. Athletic slasher type with smooth moves from memory.
Upon completion of the inaugral draft the lineup then looked like this:
C- Wendell Carter Jr / Bismack Biyombo / Nicolas Claxton
PF- Jonah Bolden / Daniel Theis
SF- Justise Winslow / Evan Turner / Dzanan Musa
SG- Caris LeVert / Lonnie Walker / Courtney Lee* / Jaylen Nowell
PG- Luka Doncic / Frank Ntilikina / Elie Okobo
* - C.Lee later got dropped.
The team later signed Marko Guduric. We like his versatility and polish from the wing spot.
The team has a primary offensive star (Luka), that primary star has bigs that can hit an upon shot and defend (Carter, Bolden, Thies), there are 3 wings that can operate pick&rolls, cut and defend (Caris, Winslow, Turner), there's a tall defensive point guard that doesn't need the ball to make an impact which is perfect for Luka (Frank), there's young gunner scorer that can come in and score in bunches off the bench (Lonnie), and there are a handful of young guys who could develop into a bigger role in a few years (Musa, Okobo, Claxton, Guduric, Nowell). And with all this the team has cap flexibility which gives them to chance to make a splash in next year's free agency or even a trade to snag a big contract veteran that could take them to the next level even at this point, all the while the core continues to develop and break out.
So while the team can be viewed on the surface level as a bunch of young players that aren't ready to compete, look a little deeper and this team is actually hand-crafted to make sense from 3 parallel angles: 1) basketball fit, 2) space for opportunistic moves, 3) on a collective growth timeline to peak together and last for longer.
This has been Nic Barnshaw and this is my basketball diary,
thank you xx
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