Charlotte Hornets: Better Luck Next Year?

Oct. 29, 2014:

Thousands of excited Charlotte Hornets fans flock to the Time Warner Cable Arena, suited from head to toe in teal and purple gear, some of it retro, some of it brand-spankin’ new.

Doors open, and the escalators start to fill up. People skip to their gates, get tickets checked, enter the arena, and gasp; the new, modern-looking court — the ‘Hive’ — is even more beautiful in person.

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The honey comb design is nothing short of gorgeous, and the new Hornets logo is the perfect blend of intimidation and aesthetic beauty.

The Hornets take the court for tipoff against the Bucks, and the crowd is alive. People are screaming, cheering for the new era of Charlotte basketball. Eventually, after going down double digits, the Hornets are able to conquer the Milwaukee Bucks in a tight, double-overtime win. People are excited leaving the arena. Twitter is abuzz. The city is proud.

But now, 162 days later, the Charlotte Hornets have become a burden for the Queen City’s fans.

It seems, contrary to what was believed initially, that the fluke on opening night was the Hornets’ late-game excellence rather than the 20-plus-point deficit.

And now, sitting at 33-45 with no shot at a better than .500 season, it looks as if the Hornets will be counting ping pong balls once again.

This year’s playoff race has been as tight as ever, especially in the Eastern Conference. The East has been historically awful this year (the final three playoff seeds are all below .500), however with five legit playoff contenders — Indiana, Brooklyn, Boston, Miami, Charlotte — fighting for the final two spots, it’s been an interesting few weeks.

Unfortunately, Charlotte’s chances have progressively faded as the number of remaining games has decreased, and with only four contests to go, chances of a consecutive postseason berth seem slim.

Indiana welcomed back superstar Paul George earlier this week en route to a 112-89 thrashing of the Miami Heat, and are set to play the Knicks and Pistons next.

Although Miami has struggled lately, it was able to sneak past (of course) Charlotte, and after their next two tough contests against Chicago and Toronto, prepare close out the season against two of the worst teams in the Eastern Conference (Orlando and Philly).

Up in the Atlantic Division, things don’t look much better for the Hornets. The Boston Celtics have played their best basketball in two seasons as of late, and the Brooklyn Nets have won nine of their past 11 games riding Brook Lopez‘s hot streak, showing no signs of slowing down.

Sadly, it looks like the first season of Charlotte Hornets basketball is going to end in mid-April — nearly a full month shorter than optimistic fans had expected.

The Hornets are a full three games back of the eighth-seeded Celtics (as of April 8) and have just one non-playoff team remaining on their schedule.

Worse yet, the team’s entire starting frontcourt consisting of Al Jefferson, Cody Zeller and team-MVP Michael Kidd-Gilchrist is likely out for the rest of the season, each player nursing his own respective injury.

Zeller, and especially Jefferson, have been valuable on the offensive end this year for a team that struggles to generate points, and Kidd-Gilchrist has been Charlotte’s only real tw0-way force (other than Gerald Henderson … kind of). All three have missed extended time this year with an assortment of injuries, but fans hoped the trio would return for the final, critical stretch of the year.

Consistent with this season’s general trend, the team has had no such luck.

At this point, though, it would probably be in the team’s best interests to let their bigs sit out for the final few games, especially if they aren’t absolutely 100-percent healthy.

Zeller and Kidd-Gilchrist are certainly going to be a part of the Hornets future, and Jefferson may be as well; it wouldn’t make much sense for Charlotte to risk aggravating an injury for an already dwindling chance at a playoff berth that would almost surely end in the first round.

Furthermore, it’s good to let young guns Noah Vonleh and P.J. Hairston get some additional minutes, just to give them a taste of NBA basketball. Hairston was actually getting pretty solid minutes for a stretch in the middle of the season, but he has since fallen out of the lineup, and doesn’t even dress on most nights.

For Vonleh, the opposite has been the case: after appearing in just a handful of games for the first five months of the season, he’s been getting some time in recent games with the Hornets’ big guys sidelined. Vonleh has tremendous amounts of upside and hopefully, what he’s shown has been a sneak peek of what’s to come down the road:

It’s understood that playing inexperienced rookies isn’t going to add tallies to the win column, but that might not be a bad thing at this point.

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Swarm and Sting

Tanking usually doesn’t work, but the Hornets adding a few extra losses this year could potentially allow them to improve their lottery chances, perhaps edging out Denver for the eighth-worst record, or preventing the two fringe-playoff teams in the East that miss the playoffs from grabbing that ninth lotto spot.

It’s never good to accept defeat, but Charlotte has to realize that it isn’t in its best interest to blindly chase a postseason spot just to be there. The Hornets wouldn’t hold up in a seven-game series against the top-seeded Atlanta Hawks, and would be dominated in comic fashion by the Cleveland Cavaliers (at the No. 2 spot).

It’s a strange philosophy, but in the NBA, when you can’t go up, you go down. Give the prospects some minutes. Start drafting the scouting reports early on. Be excited that another season is just half a year away.

It’s time to sit back, and with sincerity just acknowledge the truth:

Better luck next year.

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