Hornets Hype

1. Chris Paul’s wizardry. There is no other word to describe it. The way he slips into the lane, like dancing. The way he eludes bigger players. That little running teardrop. The feeling that any time you watch a game, you could see something really, really special.

2. CP was the obvious one, but a couple of weeks ago I got to thinking about how I was really craving a good David West game. A good David West game is sneaky, silky, and subtle. It’s a dagger from mid range that looks so easy. It’s 30 points before you realize he has 10.

3. James Posey’s tall socks. I love Pose. I love tall socks. I own his jersey AND a pair of NBA regulation tall socks…. Okay, fine, this one might be particular to me. But I miss tall socks.

4. How Peja starts out the season really dark and then gets pastier and pastier as time goes on. Oh, and I guess, real things too. Like, “Peeejjjjjjaaaaa for threeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!”

5. Julian Wright’s bounce. What can I say? He’s got that thing in his step. Leap for the stars, JuJu.

6. Mercilessly tormenting Mocking on Twitter Being snarkily sarcastic toward Devin Brown jokes. I know, I know. There’s a place reserved for me in the Special Hell.

7. My seat. It is very comfy, although I wish it had a cupholder. It has a nice glass wall behind it to lean on. It has a good view of the bench. In fact an all right view of pretty much everything except someone standing in the Hornets’ bench end on the right elbow shooting a jumper. I’ve been sitting in the same seat for three years running. I’m rather attached to it. And, the New Orleans Arena janitorial staff being what it is, if I put a sticker on it that says “TICKTOCK6′S SEAT” it’ll totally be there at least 3 weeks before someone removes it.

8. Westitude. This is my term for the scowl on David West’s face when he’s being particularly beastly. Or doing things like tapping Dirk Nowitzki’s face. Or not smiling in pictures.

9. This is for things we haven’t seen yet– “Chris Paul to Emeka Okafor! Ohhhhh!”, Ike Diogu’s potential finally being realized, a young and hungry second unit.

10. This is for things we’ll never see again– the Crescent City Connection, Ryan Bowen hustling down the court, game winning threes from Rasual Butler, Tyson’s goofiness.

It’s been a long summer, longer than we would have liked, and it took me until about August to realize it, but… I miss my team. I don’t care about the trades. I don’t care about Game 4. I just want to see you out there again.

As far as the future goes, I wish only one thing for you: That when the lights come up and you get out there on the floor, you go hard and never look back.

We are really looking at a different team this year, aren’t we?

Today the Hornets made the move we’ve been anticipating all summer, trading Antonio Daniels and a future 2nd round pick to Minnesota for Darius Songaila and former summer camp whiz kid Bobby Brown. OK. On the surface this one’s not much to look at. Bobby Brown is a backup PG, insurance in case Darren Collison’s rookie season doesn’t take off as expected, but at 1/5 the price. He’ll be quicker than AD too. Songaila is much-beloved, at least by Wiz fans on Twitter (shout out, Wiz fans on Twitter! Nowhere to go but up this year.) We added another 6′9 backup big… but I’m told he can hit jumpers too. So I thought, “OK, cool, more bench depth. Minor, but cool.”

Yeah. And then I actually looked at our bench stats. Pop Quiz: Off the top of your head, just guess how many members of the Hornets bench Darius Songaila did NOT outproduce in 2008-09? He averaged 7.4/2.9. Please, guess.

One. James Posey.

I mean, I knew our bench was poor last year– somewhat due to the fact that many of them who should not have been starting were forced into it at some point because of injuries– but what those statistics are saying is that over half the previous Hornets team was dead weight. Fine, you want to do rebounds per 48? Heh. Hilton 8.6 > Posey 8.1 > Songaila 7.2. That’s what you want, your backup center barely outrebounding your 32 year old small forward. The point is Songaila still would have  been a better backup big than most of our woeful bench. Only one backup could manage over 3 rebounds per game, and that was Sean Marks. Who was recently signed back to the team, and rightly so. A guy plays the best basketball of his career for you and it’s the right thing to do. Do we hope we never see him starting again? Sure. Is it a good free agent signing? Absolutely. I do want to note that the Hornets roster is up to 15, however, and we usually carry 14 guys to start the season. Another move? The only guy who can be cut after training camp is, I believe, Marcus Thornton, and I just don’t see us doing that (He was spotted working out with CP & Mo Pete today… OK, not spotted in real life. Spotted on Mo Pete’s twitter. But still. He’s doing all the right things so far.)

Anyhow, best of luck to AD in Minnesota, where they’re hoarding point guards like they’re going out of style. He always seemed to be a real vet with a great attitude on the bench. Coincidentally, Emeka Okafor just got his number 50 back. I just got a pair of teal and yellow sneakers. Training camp starts in 19 days.

These facts don’t have anything to do with each other… other than that they are all good signs.

New Orleans will miss you, Rasual Butler. We’ll miss your resilience. We’ll miss your indestructibility. We’ll miss you because of all the things I said in this post I wrote in March.

So he didn’t fly of his own volition. He was traded to the Clippers today for a 2nd round pick. It was a move that I called “pulling a Marcus Camby.” (Link, for those of you were living under a rock this time last summer. Oh, and sorry to ruin the end of the movie for you, but Denver lived.) By that I mean, he was a starter, he did his job well, and he was traded to save the team $8 million. For the sole reason that we have other guys on the roster who are capable of taking up the slack at his position. Is it a salary dump? Of course. Is it a bad move because it’s a salary dump? No.

I certainly am puzzled by people who are confused by this deal, as well as people who think it in any way points to “OMG THE HORNETS ARE TOO CHEAP TO EVER PUT A WINNING TEAM AROUND CHRIS PAUL HE NEEDS TO LEAVE”. My number one assumption going into this offseason was that either Rasual Butler or Mo Pete would be moved. Were there really people who didn’t think so? You have two guys who are the same age, who play the same position, who have roughly the same stats at that position, who play the same role in the offense of the #5 scoring option who gets open threes because people are looking at Peja/CP/DWest, who are both long all-right defenders, who’ve each been the starter 1 out of the 2 last seasons. I would have been much more surprised if they were both on the roster in October.

Is it fair to whichever guy doesn’t end up starting, to be on the team and not playing the role you want? Is it fair to the team, to ask them to pay $4M-6.5M salaries to two guys who are interchangeable, when they’re over the luxury tax? Is it fair to Marcus Thornton, to light up summer league and sit in a suit all year? I mean, these are legitimate questions.

You know I was all about being the spearhead of the “FREE MO PETE” movement last year. But that was never a knock on Rasual Butler. (OK, it was a knock on Devin Brown, but we all know about that so I won’t go into it here.) Butler did a great job. He was the only guy on the team who didn’t miss games because he was hurt. (Even Posey, the iron man runner-up, had to sit a few out at the end.) Last year, that was so huge. At the Hive’s statistical analysis in the second half of the season showed that Butler slightly out-Mo Pete’d Mo Pete at being the starting shooting guard. But a lot of us remember 2007-08, when Peterson was the starter and ‘Sual was in DNP-CD limbo in a suit at the end of the bench because his shot had completely deserted him. It was one year ago, guys. There’s no need for despair here. Mo’ll be fine. The only gamble here is knowing he won’t have an NBA tested backup (well, unless you count De–). But even if Thornton’s clueless, surely one of Peja/Posey/Wright can swing on over.

What does this all add up to? The Hornets have essentially saved $10 million this summer, through this and the TC trade, and are now only over the luxury tax by about $3.8 million. And they’ve managed to do this… arguably without getting worse. I don’t know about you folks, but I suspect the ol’ GM is not as think as y’all stupid he is. No?

Man, this one still stings. In a personal way more than a basketball way. Because all the guys on this team grow on me and it sucks to have to let them go. Strangely, the thing that brings it home to me more than anything else is when I get down to the end of the post… and I realize this is the last time I’m ever going to use the “Bop” tag. But it stings because this isn’t ‘Sual’s fault. He and Mo just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time– that is, the same place– Mo’s contract is longer and less attractive– it’s math. But I hope it doesn’t diminish the year he had in 2008-09. The fact that he was a rock for us when the team needed one.

This was a guy who people made fun of for having a terrible year and missing shot after shot. Sit for a moment and try to imagine what that must have been like: your team has its best season in history, while you’re in a suit having your worst. Watching. But this is a guy who took that and worked. Who came back stronger, better. Who won a starting spot. In the end, that’s why saying goodbye to Rasual Butler doesn’t seem right. In the end, what more could you have asked of him?

“And God help you if you are a phoenix
And you dare to rise up from the ash
A thousand eyes will smolder with jealousy
While you are just flying past…”

In case you’re wondering how something remotely like this blazer (Oh, who am I kidding? There’s nothing like this blazer. There’s just this blazer) comes to exist, it’s actually made out of the same material the Hornets voodoo doll giveaways were made from. I have been informed that, sadly, we cannot look forward to seeing these in the team store, as they are not going to be mass-produced. This is a one of a kind thing.But, you’re thinking, who would wear this blazer anyway? Oh, I can think of a couple people…

Emeka Okafor. So hot right now.

1) Craig Sager. We have, what, two TNT games this year? Someone make it happen.

2) George Shinn. It’s his team!

3) Gil McGregor. Anyone remember the conversation he and Bob Licht had on air about how they wanted to buy matching teal seersucker suits for the playoffs? Yeah.

4) Hilton Armstrong. He’s a silly person. This is a silly blazer.

5) Me. You know it!

** For those of you who came here via Ball Don’t Lie, it is important to note that he didn’t show up in New Orleans wearing this jacket. It lives in the Hornets team offices somewhere, apparently, and Okafor threw it on during his photo shoot. That’s why it doesn’t fit. People. Srsly.

This only works if you are a really, really fast reader, but if you click the link below, you can see what looks like our 2009-10 schedule (the dates match up, and the games are different from last year) before it redirects back to last year’s schedule. Oh, NBA, fining people for leaking schedules and then putting them up on NBA.com. UPDATE: The whole schedule appears to be up now. I’ve posted it.

http://www.nba.com/schedules/index.html?team=hornets

It looks like:

• We have several nationally televised games again
• We start 10/28 on the road at San Antonio
• First home game is vs. Sacramento
• For once, we end with a bunch of home games as opposed to the asskicker of a stretch run we’ve had the last two years

But again, that’s if this is indeed the schedule. We’ll find out for sure this afternoon. Also this afternoon is the Hornets’ press conference to officially introduce Emeka Okafor. I’ll probably throw up some links related to that later.

(Yes, my mood is “cold.” What? The A/C is madly ridiculous at my desk.)

That is all.

http://neworleanshornetsblog.blogspot.com/2009/07/hornets-sign-free-agent-forward-diogu.html

Logical argument is apparently a lost art in today’s culture.  Chris Paul, in Vegas to watch the Hornets’ Summer League team, was asked about Tyson Chandler, and how that trade might indicate that even someone like him could be traded.  His response: “In this league, anything can happen,” Paul told Pro Basketball News. “I can be dealt. It’s possible. It’s possible.”  Courtesy of the Times Picayune.  Notice the gap in the quote?  Who knows what was said in there.  Nonetheless, the resulting headlines in the national media were:

1. Paul says trade ‘possible.’  - Pro Basketball News
2. TRADES: CP3 thinks he could be traded.  - ESPN Insider
3. Chris Paul thinks he could be traded.  – Dimemag.com

Some headlines might be better, if one scours the net?  Right?  Okay.  Let’s take a look around.  The Times Picayune read: “New Orleans Hornets president Hugh Weber says there’s no way Chris Paul will be traded.”  Of course that headline was belied by the additional inclusion of: “the [Hornets] are desperate to dump salaries to avoid having to pay the tax penalty next summer. Due to its financial limitations, New Orleans is the only team in the Southwest Division that has yet to acquire a player through free agency or by a trade to improve its roster this offseason,” and then included the above CP quote, attributing it to Pro Basketball News.  This was followed by the quotes from the Hornets organization that led to its headline, and then absolutely no comment on either.  Way to analyze all the facts before you.

Sports Illustrated got close too.  Their headline?  “Hornets Will Not Trade Chris Paul.”  Good right?  Well, not if immediately followed by this: “Chris Paul told a reporter there’s chance he soon could be traded,” the article then quotes the purported financial/trade situation of the team from the TP (see the above), and then simply added that the Hornets say they won’t trade him, without bothering to include the quotes from any of the Hornets people.  And again, no analysis of the information.

Chris Paul, himself, nauseated by the explosion of articles about his “imminent trade,” used Twitter to tell the world: “Jus for the record too…I’M NOT GOIN ANYWHERE!!! No clue what Chris Thomasson was talkin about, but I didn’t say any of what he was sayin.“  So there it is, the truth.  No matter what was said in a hypothet, this was and is the truth.  CP knows it.  The Hornets basketball organization knows it.  And any serious basketball fan or  journalists, should damn well know it.  Why would the Hornets trade CP?  He’s a once in a generation talent.

Instead of letting it go at that, Pro Basketball News decided to follow up with “Paul Feeling the Pressure.”  Where, Thomasson argued the whole conversation was taped, and that this was what Paul really said.  Allegedly his editors listened to the tape and backed him up.  Okay, but what was the context?  What were the words before, after, and in between?  The reason Paul doesn’t remember it, in my opinion, is because he was talking in general, how the NBA is, how no one’s safe (remember to even qualify for a no-trade clause,  the player must have at least eight years of service time and four with the same team, and must then bargain for one in their contract; to my  knowledge, only Kobe has one).  As Hornets team President, Hugh Weber, said: “I think [Chris] was talking about the nature of the business and the fact that the question was asked the way it was.”  Funny how Thomasson didn’t address that point.  Just become some crafty reporter backs a star player into an awkward answer doesn’t mean his integrity is in place.  To the contrary, manipulating an honest person into giving a random quote that you intend on using as an inflammatory headline proves just the opposite.

Case in point: in supporing Thomasson, notorious Chris Paul-hater, Brett Pollakoff, posted the following article on NBA Fanhouse: “Chris Paul Caught Lying on Twitter?”, in which beyond supporting his fellow “journalist,” Pollakoff called CP a jerk for pretending not to have said what he said, and naive for not understanding the media business.  Right.  Why would Chris think that his opinion on a throwaway hypothet would be a headline?  How naive.  Or maybe it’s indicative of a larger problem; funny how the media always paints it as a player being too foolish to keep his mouth shut rather than the artificial frame of discouse constructed by a willing media agent who cares more about his name in the byline and his next paycheck than even the smallest smigden of self-respect, or dare I say it, the Truth.

So how did we go from having a completely hypothetical, sure, anyone can be traded, argument to “he soon could be traded”?  Simple.  The almighty dollar.  Today’s it’s all about the scoop.  First in time, first in line.  To get paid, that is.  Alternatively, create a crazy enough headline and just maybe enough people will jump to your site to bump your ad revenue.  What, CP is getting traded (to who)?  What, CP is a jerk (what he’d do)?  Either way, it’s about money.  Should Freedom of the Press even apply to these people?

There was a time when “journalists” researched their sources.  They got corroboration.  Apparently, today, it doesn’t matter.  So they have a tape and tore the quote out of context, guess that makes it okay.  Besides, no one trusts the internet anyway.  So what’s one more stretched truth?  Moreover, who really wants truth in an age when bickering people thrown into awkward situations with suggested responses is “entertainment?”  Reality television is the new gladiatorial games, and like then, the masses now eat it up.  It had occurred to me that sports was the purest form of entertainment left, an honorable exercise where persons are forced to play by the same set of rules and compete, their individual and/or aggregate excellence determining the winner totally removed from any political, personal, religious, or other frame of bias.  Only the media keeps ruining it.

The Truth Is Out There.  Only no one’s looking for it.  Although, apparently, no one misses it.  Maybe we should all be to blame.  We all bury our heads in the sand and accept headlines as truth when all they are is a collection of words carefully crafted by someone with an agenda.  As for me?  I’ll keep thinking for myself.  Chris Paul is going nowhere.  He’s our savior; not just for the Hornets, but for all of New Orleans.  His importance is uncomparable to any other in sports right now.  As we’ve said here over and over, his performance on the floor isn’t just MVP like, it’s historic.  As ticktock6 shared with you all, we just went to the Basketball Hall of Fame.  No Chris Paul there yet.  But someday he will be.  And while I hope it’s in a Hornets jersey, I can’t say that for sure.  Anything’s possible.

So maybe tomorrow’s blogosphere will have headlines of “Even Hornets’ bloggers unsure Chris Paul to remain in New Orleans.”  But as for me, I believe he’ll be here for a long time .  It’s what Chris said, it’s what the GM said, it’s what the team president said.  And it’s what I say.  Make up your own mind.

Addendum 07/20/09 by Ticktock6:

It took me forever to locate this post, which I remember reading back in June, because I originally thought a Celtics blog had done it. Turns out it was a Mavs blog, but it’s a fantastic account and critique of how one basketball “news” outlet put out a Rajon Rondo trade story, lifting out-of-context quotes made in 2007 out of an article and implying that they were recent. The story was then picked up by SI, ESPN, and other major news outlets and reported as fact. This was done without double checking the first story or attempting to put context to the original quotes which they then passed on to the public. And so a whole story about how all the Celtics hate Rondo was manufactured out of nothing and perpetuated all over the internet. Rondo’s agent was pissed, and rightly so. I wanted to post this link as another example of what we’re talking about and to emphasize that we’re not against this because it’s Chris Paul– we’re against bullshit like this in general.

ESPN True Hoop, good stuff.  ESPN headline: “Buzz Kill: Hornets thriftiness costing team?”, not so much.  For those of you that may not know, True Hoop likes to aggregate various media sources and present them all for the reader in one place.  What spurred this headline?  John DeShazier, who wrote in the Times Picayune:

The silence has been deafening, the inactivity telling. All we can figure is that the Hornets didn’t seriously intend to add any meaningful pieces in free agency, that their declaring a willingness to pay the luxury tax if it meant putting together a championship-caliber team was hollow. The franchise seems to have done everything in its power to make sure it doesn’t add payroll this summer. … If the Hornets can’t or won’t do what they have to do to catch the Lakers and to beat the Nuggets, Spurs, Trail Blazers, Jazz and Mavericks, then they shouldn’t sell bluster, knowing full well that fans and players are going to call them on it. The lack of activity wouldn’t be so glaring if the Hornets hadn’t gone out of their way to sell the theory that they’d move boldly, swiftly and effectively to plug their holes. Instead, the teams that really were interested in getting stronger let their wallets do the talking. They roared; the Hornets haven’t yet even mustered a whisper. Their silence if deafening, and their inactivity is telling.”

I wanted to respond by posting on ESPN, something I rarely do, but wasn’t sure if I had an account there, so here’s my retort that would have been posted there:

John DeShazier is one of the least-credible and exaggerated sportswriters in New Orleans.  The fact is, the Hornets as of today, have significantly higher payrolls than the teams he mentions: Denver, San Antonio, Portland, Utah, and Dallas, as well as Cleveland and Orlando.  Only Boston and LAL seem to be outspending the Hornets.  New Orleans simply is standing by the team they’ve put together, which wasn’t healthy last year, and is putting trust in their draft picks.  Considering they like to have 14 guys on the roster, they only have one more slot to fill.  To suggest inactivity is always a negative is foolish.  They easily could have hosted a firesale this summer.  To their credit, they’ve realized the mistake made with Chandler last year and are trying to keep a winner together.  It makes me sad that this joker somehow makes an ESPN headline.  New Orleans is not “penny-pinching” by any stretch of the imagination.

Feel free to double check my numbers on HoopsHype.com.  I mark New Orleans at $78M, with others at: Denver $72M, San Antonio $76M, Portland $48M, Utah $73M, Dallas $69M, Cleveland $77M, and Orlando $77M (with Boston at $79M and LAL at $84M).  The fact that the national media spreads its usual ignorance by using a local sportswriter defies all reason and only perpetuates the complex feeling of persecution that New Orleanians often endure.  Maybe we should stop blaming the national media if the TP writers have no clue.   Or maybe the TP should hire a fucking basketball person and the rest of the country should wake up.  This isn’t some kind of transcendantal realization, it’s a few minutes of research.

That’s all right.  No problem.  They can all suck it when Chris Paul is eating everyone’s souls next year and the media flip-flops more than Bill Clinton on Monica Lewinsky.  This team gets it now.  They know their time is now.  They want vengeance.  And CP, the Grief Merchant, will deliver it.

According to the Associated Press, the NBA Salary Cap has been set at $58.68 million, about $1 million less than last year’s Cap.  The NBA Luxury Tax also dropped, by about $2 million, to $69.92 million.  The midlevel exception has been set at $5.85 million.  The new Cap and Tax went into effect at 12:01 a.m. today, allowing the real free agency period to begin.  Will the real Jeff Bower please stand up?

As of today, the Hornets are committed to 11 players, for $77,575,998.  Yikes.  Expect them to sign three more, and if both draftees, they come cheap, and whoever else (Marks?), cheap too.  But that’s still a $1 tax per dollar over the limit, which means Georgie is paying $8 mil out of pocket, plus loses out on certain revenue sharing.  As of today.

Free hats. Disclaimer: This picture was not supposed to look so naked. There

We checked out the official Hornets draft party last night down at Gordon Biersch, as some of you who might have been following my Twitter feed already knew. Living in New Orleans we usually try to make it out to as many of the Hornets events as we can.

It was about an hour before the draft when I hopped into a space at the bar and started to follow the rumors that were going down on Twitter, which was creaking along there and might have actually died at one scary point due to Michael Jackson’s death (RIP). Everyone was running with the idea that Phoenix might be trading Amare Stoudemire to Golden State or Ben Wallace to New Orleans for Tyson Chandler or possibly both. Meanwhile an older gentleman at the bar was buying me shots of Jager and trying to convince me that I did not, in fact, want to watch the draft at all– I wanted to go across the street to Harrahs and play the slots.

I was pretty sure I wanted to watch the draft, however, so I stayed, and chatted with some nice people I’d been Twittering back and forth with (I’m not sure Twittering is the verb, but I really hate to say Tweeting, so I’m going to declare that, on this blog at least, I was Twittering.) After a while mW got there. Oh, in fact here we are (The below video is approximately 12 seconds of me yelling because I can’t hear myself. I actually had no idea if you could hear me at all until I just watched it. Um, you can. Because I’m yelling.):
Hornets draft party! on 12seconds.tv

Now, for those of you looking for all the salacious celebrity pics, I forgot my camera and was following the draft on my laptop, which I had out on the bar. I also realized that I’d picked a spot close to one Hornets table, but the players were actually at a different table on the opposite side of the room. So not only did we not want to lose our spot, which I had staked out 2 hours prior, but there were about a hundred people packed into the approximately 30 foot space between us and CP. I was more concerned about melting before we even got as far as the #13 pick than stalking Hornets players. Therefore I had to acquire all these pics the good old-fashioned blogger way: uncredited, from Getty Images. But I will assure you that Chris Paul and Julian Wright were there. I could hear their voices, even if I couldn’t see them. (If it had been Tyson Chandler, I probably could have seen him over the crowd from my barstool, but we are talking about CP here.) The Hornets ran some interactive fan contests, and it seemed like everyone packed into that itty bitty area had fun.

CP is interviewed outside by some local stations, ticktock6 realizes in terror that this is the same CST mic that was stuck in her face into which she has NO. EARTHLY. IDEA. what she rambled on about. Oh help.

I have to admit I was unenthusiastic about #21 pick Darren Collison. I know next to nothing about him. Well, I know next to nothing about college ball in general, so that’s hardly a surprise. But I really thought we should’ve take DeJuan Blair, who ended up falling into the second round presumably because teams were scared off by his knee surgeries. I am fairly sure I managed to control these opinions when some cameramen came up and shined a light on me and asked me what I thought. I am also fairly sure I talked for a while. I am also fairly sure the two Jager shots had a significant effect on the fact that I kinda forgot about this whole experience till the above picture of Chris Paul and the CST mike jogged my memory and I realized that’s who I talked to. So, if you’re watching whatever draft montage they put together and air as a pregame or halftime feature next fall, and the girl wearing turquoise and (I think, oh lord) a Hornets draft cap backwards comes on and talks a mile a minute, that is me. CST, feel free to not use this footage. Anyhow, I feel a lot better about the Collison pick today, having checked out At the Hive’s post regarding his stats (they’re right up there or better than some lottery PGs). He was a 4 year college kid and didn’t have the hype of some of the others, but I think we’ll all remember we have a guy named David West who was in a similar situation when we drafted him and turned out all right.

I should make a note here that by the time we left the party I’d managed to collect Hornets beads, a turquoise T-shirt (I already have this particular one, and it’s XL… we may have 1 or 2 up for grabs), and the aforementioned Hornets draft cap, which was given to me by @hornetsdotcom. I have been asked a lot of times around town where I got such and such magnet or sticker or whatever, and the answer is you should try to make it to at least one official watch party a season, because they give out massive amounts of Hornets shwag. This particular party, however, should probably have been at a larger venue, because the place was packed wall to wall from when the draft started through when Chris Paul left. But overall, the staff at GB is highly awesome and they’ve hosted some solid Hornets events.

This nice man drew CP's picture

There were other fun moments about the draft, like the Minnesota Timberwolves Mad Point Guard Rampage of 2009, but the other significant moment for the Hornets didn’t happen until we were already home. We watched Blair finally go to San Antonio (where he’ll probably be perversely good, causing us to hate San Antonio more than we already do), and LSU product Marcus Thornton go to Miami at 43. Then a couple of minutes later, David Stern’s apprentice minion (I didn’t know that Stern doesn’t hang around to do the second round, funny!) came to the podium again. As soon as he said, “The Miami Heat convey the rights to the #43 pick Marcus Thornton…” I just had a feeling it was us. And sure enough, it was! So the Hornets ended up with two picks after all. (From what I’ve read today, Thornton was always on our board, and as soon as he didn’t get picked in the first round, the Hornets got on the phones.)

Whew. Crazy end to a crazy week in the NBA. But you know what? We got through another big trade week without selling low on Tyson Chandler, who, I have been vehemently arguing to anyone who will listen, deserves a chance to prove he can rebound from his injury before we melodramatically rant and rave about how he’s “NEVER GOING TO BE THE SAME AGAIN!” We turned a lone low #21 pick in a junky draft into two guys who can hopefully fill roles on the roster and allow CP to get some rest and the Hornets to shop Antonio Daniels’ expiring contract with no worries. We drafted safe, 4-year player types. The Hornets’ front office sneakily drafted a 2nd rounder who, if he makes the team, will appeal to local fans and create buzz. Sometimes I am concerned that they don’t “get” this market, so that was a good thing to see. And maybe I’m being a girl here, but it kinda made me all warm and fuzzy to see the team give the local kid a chance to play for his hometown team.

About the t-shirt. I’d give it to a commenter who wears an XL, but I don’t know…. I think the Hype Cat has an interest in it…

Hype Cat's New Hornets T-Shirt