Cardiac Kemba Walker Is Leading The Charlotte Hornets To The Playoffs
By Ti Windisch
Kemba Walker has stepped up his game across the board, and subsequently the Charlotte Hornets are playoff-bound in 2016.
The Charlotte Hornets aren’t supposed to be this good this season. The Hornets’ biggest offseason moves were trading for Nicolas Batum, signing Jeremy Lin and drafting Frank Kaminsky.
Batum was coming off of his worst career season by far, Lin is a good role player but not much more and taking Kaminsky ninth overall seemed like a massive reach.
So how does a team that won 33 games all of last season come very close to winning 50 this year? Not thanks to the remarkable play of Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, who lost nearly the entire season to yet another massive injury.
Batum has been significantly better than he was last season, but he’s not the biggest reason Charlotte is suddenly good. Lin and Kaminsky aren’t either, although both of them have done well with the Hornets.
Kemba Walker has been playing out of his mind this season. The Hornets have three games left on their schedule, but Walker has already totaled more points, rebounds, blocks, field goals, free throws, and three-pointers made than he ever has in a season before.
Seeing Walker do so much is exciting, but his three-point shooting is by far the most thrilling part of his season. Kemba had never made more than 33 percent of his threes in a season or made more than 109 total threes — he’s made 179 threes on 37.8 percent shooting beyond the arc this season.
He’s been efficient from all over the floor though, setting career-highs in field goal percentage and three-point percentage. He’s 0.1 percent away from his highest-ever two-point percentage mark as well, with a small chance to surpass it by the end of the season.
Batum deserves some of the credit for the Hornets season, both through his own play and how he’s helped out Walker. Batum dishes 31.5 percent of his passes to Walker, which results in nearly four shots per game for Kemba, per NBA.com.
Cardiac Kemba is especially deadly when receiving a pass from Batum. He’s made 45 percent of his field goals and 46.3 percent of his threes coming off of Batum passes, both the best marks of any player who passes five or more times per game to Walker.
Although Batum actually leads the Hornets in assists per game this season, Walker is still a good point guard when passing back to his French friend. Kemba dishes over a quarter of his passes to Batum, who makes 43.8 percent of his field goals and 48.8 percent of his threes coming after Kemba passes.
Those two pass to each other more then to any other Hornets, and their chemistry is resulting in wins in Charlotte. Walker has made over 30 percent of his 179 threes on Batum passes.
The 55 threes Batum has dished to Walker is far more threes than any teammate has fed Kemba over the three years that NBA.com has tracked passes.
Last year Kemba didn’t even attempt 50 threes after passes from any one teammate. He’s taken 126 after receiving a pass from Batum this season.
Nicolas Batum’s career-high 15.1 points per game is certainly helping the Hornets, but his passing is doing even more for the team. There’s no question that his connection with Kemba is helping the latter have his most efficient season ever.
Head coach Steve Clifford deserves some credit too, as Walker’s diet of threes has changed this season. Kemba has never taken as many of his threes from the corner as he has this season, and he’s making a career-best 40 percent of those corner threes.
As easy as it is to simply chalk up his numbers to becoming a better shooter, there’s a lot more that goes into Kemba Walker’s fantastic season in Charlotte.
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One thing about the Hornets is simple this season, though. Thanks to Walker and company, Charlotte is good. Even if Charlotte fails to get homecourt advantage throughout the playoffs, they’ll be no easy out as long as Kemba Walker and Nic Batum share the floor.