Lance Stephenson: Hornets' Immediate Fate Hingest On Him

Lance Stephenson‘s contributions are going to be an essential part of the Hornets’ potential playoff run. Luckily, he’s picked a good time to bring his A-game…

Imagine this: you walk into the local supermarket, looking to find the perfect orange. You need one more orange to finish your pitcher of homemade orange juice. You find one that seems perfect, but someone else buys it before you can. But not to worry, you find another one that seems to be a near-perfect piece of produce.

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Then you go home, peel the orange, and realize that it’s not actually an orange… it’s a lemon, effectively ruining your entire pitcher of orange juice.

But worse yet, that lemon has demonstrated the ability to be an orange in the past. One year ago, that orange was the NBA’s leader in triple doubles.

Oh yeah… the orange/lemon hybrid organism is Charlotte Hornets guard Lance Stephenson.

Unfortunately, Stephenson — who had a hell of a season last year — has been like a lemon this year: sour. He’s made Charlotte fans grimace with at least one head-scratching play each game, and his numbers on the year are nothing but ugly. As of Mar. 12, the Hornets’ shooting guard is averaging 8.8 points, 5.1 rebounds and 4.6 assists per game. He’s been regressing since his first game in a Hornets uniform, and has been more of a liability than anything else.

Unfortunately, the Hornets need him to legitimize their playoff aspirations.

Fortunately, he’s started to step up his game, and it’s come at a good time.

The Hornets are gearing up for their final 20-game stretch of the season, which is undoubtedly the most critical time for a team fighting for the playoffs. As it stands right now, there are five teams competing for two spots. Indiana (29-34) holds the seventh seed, and Miami (29-35) holds the eighth. After Wednesday night’s heartbreaking loss to the Sacramento Kings, Charlotte is half a game out of the playoff picture. Tailing them closely is Boston, and Brooklyn and Detroit are both within six games of the eighth spot.

Stephenson, luckily, can help with that.

Charlotte made the playoffs last year without Lance, but were crushed in the first round by the eventual-finalist Miami Heat. For precisely that reason, Michael Jordan opted to sign Stephenson last summer. Although the relationship hasn’t been worth the $9 million Charlotte is paying this season, Stephenson has appeared to have turned a new leaf and rediscovered his confidence.

He’s been averaging 9.8 points per game in his past five contests, which, relatively, is quite good for him this season. Better yet, he’s knocked down half of his shot attempts, and hasn’t shot below 40 percent in any of his five contests. He’s been knocking down midrange shots with some regularity (for some time, he was shooting with a weird mechanic that he’s since corrected), but more importantly, he’s started to understand that he is at his best getting looks in the paint and using that galloping step to get around his defenders. Prior to this month, really, he was settling far too much, taking 10-foot pull-ups in the paint rather than finishing at the rim.

He’s also been more active without the ball, cutting after entry passes and crashing the offensive glass. That was a huge aspect of his game in Indiana that had been absent this season. As you can see, he’s been capitalizing on his easy looks:

Stephenson moving, rather than just camping on the perimeter, can only be a positive for Charlotte. Under Steve Clifford, the Hornets have always been more isolation-oriented, but with Kemba Walker coming off of knee surgery and Al Jefferson being afflicted by a myriad of lower-body injuries, they are going to want some other sources of scoring. Michael Kidd-Gilchrist has stepped up for Charlotte, but the majority of his points have come off of offensive rebounds or one-dribble drives, which teams try to clamp down on in the playoffs.

Lance Stephenson, although not the most athletic, has always been a talented player. He can handle better than most shooting guards, and his creative — sometimes almost Tony Parker-esque — finishes can be problematic for even the best rim protectors out East. The jump shot hasn’t been there this year, but he’s heading in the right direction.

Stephenson is also a crowd pleaser who feeds off its energy, and that is a hell of a dynamic in the playoffs.

And as much negative attention that his antics might garner, he certainly knows how to bother even the league’s best. He plays pesky defense, poking and slapping at the ball. It can result in foul trouble and getting beaten on some plays, but it certainly heckles his matchup.

Bottom line: Stephenson knows how to play postseason basketball, and if his past two seasons have shown anything, it’s that he wants to be there. His breakout came in the 2013 playoffs, and up until November 2014, he showed no signs of regressing. By the looks of it, he’s back on track now.

Lance Stephenson, the lemon, didn’t quite work out for the Charlotte Hornets. He’s got 20 games left to prove that he can be the orange-est orange of all the oranges.

Next: Charlotte Hornets' Playoff Chances Against Potential Opponents

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