The Hornets are interested in Nick Young, Jamal Crawford, Shannon Brown and Glen Davis.
The New Orleans Hornets and Dell Demps are hard at work, using the phones to plug into free-agents and express their interests. Among the free-agents mentioned in the title there are others including Glen “Big Baby” Davis, Jason Smith and the much higher priority of resigning both David West and Carl Landry.
Demps clearly knows that he has to renew optimism among the team, that it truly can contend. The question will be, how many players think that it’s an actual possibility?
Stern has left the Hornets to make their own choices
We’re still nine days off from free agent signings and trades being signed, sealed and official, yet the NBA world is on fire with Chris Paul trade rumors. Some are substantiated (the Celtics calling the Hornets), some just aren’t going to happen (the Knicks) and some are inevitably going to bubble up (the Clippers and Blazers).
If you’re a Hornets fan, the rumors are deafening. Maybe you tune it out and ignore them, staying off twitter and the NBA blogs (my preferred strategy, even though it’s nearly impossible). Or maybe you’re one who takes to defending the team; tweets, comments and facebook posts of The Knicks don’t have the cap room! Paul wont sign an extension with the Celtics! He loves New Orleans!I love it. I love your devotion. Please, keep sticking it to those annoying Knicks’ fans. Deep down they know they don’t have a chance at Paul. But I want to dispel one theory on why Paul isn’t going anywhere: That the NBA wont allow the team to trade him. Let’s do this… Continue reading this post »
It’s been a whirlwind couple of days with the lockout effectively ending and Chris Paul rumours starting up simultaneously. Hornets fans haven’t been this precarious since last years trade deadline. It seems apparent now, more than ever, that the chances of Paul being traded have increased exponentially.
Today we’re going to run through the list of items that is currently swirling around the Hornets and Dell Demps’ head. We know he has to be feeling the pressure, but in some ways he must love getting back to real work.
So with that let’s jump into it, I mean what choice do we have?
Chris Paul can be happy in places other than New York. (Photo Courtesy of The Basketball Jones - The Score.com)
Chris Broussard of the esteemed ESPN entertainment network posted an article on the Hornets starting point-guard and All-Star Chris Paul. In that article, Broussard belted out staggering claims that New York was the one and only destination for Chris Paul and that it was merely a matter of time before the Hornets had to waive goodbye to their idol and leader.
Before you think I’m some crazed, loner, Hornets fan (which in some ways I am, but I’m not too high and mighty to admit it), there are others out there that think Chris Broussard’s empty filled article is nothing but fun, water-cooler talk for most New Yorkers.
No matter how you slice it, it seems somewhere between highly unlikely and virtually impossible for Paul to end up with Amare and Melo on the Knicks. He can’t force a trade there, he’d take a financial bath signing there as a free agent, and the Hornets aren’t going to sit idly by and lose him for nothing. The CP-to-New York talk to match Miami’s Big 3 makes for fun conversation for this winter, but the Knicks lost hope of this happening the day they made the Anthony trade.
Dell Demps has his work cut out for him trying to get Chris Paul more talent.
Salary Cap flexibility is one of the things every team must have moving forward in order to add pieces to their organisation. For a long time now the New Orleans Hornets have had little to no cap-flexibility due to an array of poor personnel decisions. With the likes of Peja Stojakovic, James Posey and Morris Peterson now banished into the history books, the Hornets can move on or move up.
The question for General Manager Dell Demps is whether they can do things with or without Chris Paul.
According to Fletcher Mackel the Hornets are going to go hard afterDavid West, Carl Landry and an extra free-agent. If they can’t get them then his source says that Chris Paul will be dealt quickly, which makes sense.
So with this knowledge let’s take a look at the Hornets salary cap situation.
Gary Chouest and other Local Owners seemed poised to take over
One of the big questions that might be answered soon is whether the New Orleans Hornets are ready to sell the team to a local ownership group, rumoured to include local billionaire Gary Chouest. It’s been somewhat of a non-issue the past few months, what with the lockout and all of that, but I thought we should revisit it because it does appear to be a near formality for the most part.
Once a new CBA is there ready to be signed, expect the NBA’s front office to turn their attention to selling the Hornets. There is a lot that needs to be done in order to sell the team, mainly a vote by the Board of Governers. Lord knows they have their hands full at the moment.
How close are we to achieving a deal? I’d say a few months away. To me it comes down to two scenarios that may either accelerate or dim the pace of a sale. If Chris Paul remains on the team and the team resigns both West, Landry and another free-agent, expect an announcement soon after that. If however the Hornets can’t do any of the aforementioned things, then blowing up the roster and starting anew with a new owner next offseason might be a better alternative.
Yes this is speculation, but with the way things have gone you have to say that it’s nearing time to bring in a new Ownership group, one not run by the NBA and one willing to build for championships in the State of Louisiana.
With Free-Agency set to begin around December 9 the Hornets will need to form some kind of short list of players for the upcoming period that’s sure to be a quick fire, panic-crazy time. New Orleans knows that resigning both David West and Carl Landry are priority number one, but there are other areas which the team desperately needs upgrades in if they are to keep Chris Paul and if they are to become a better team.
This Big-Board will be updated depending on how things are going in Free-Agency. If David West signs somewhere else, we’ll put a cross through his name. If rumours are that the Hornets have Nick Young in their back pocket ready to be signed, then other shooting guards will probably fall down the list.
Folks it’s back! That’s right get excited get your jerseys back out because the National Basketball Association is right on ready to kick things into gear for a new season. Now we must advise you that things aren’t signed, haven’t gone to vote, but all signs point to that being of little issue meaning that we can prepare ourselves for the greatness.
This lockout has emotionally torn us all. I can’t believe that it will actually begin.
So much discuss heading into the season. Free Agency, Cash Considerations, Willie Green Puns (courtesy of Rohan), Chris Paul trade rumours, Emeka Okafor amnesty claused. So much, so very much.
I’m curious to see how the Players react to this. I suspect Paul Pierce is hiding in a cave somewhere waiting to come out and stop this deal. You know he will.
For all your Hornets news and content keep coming back to Swarm and Sting because there will be lots of content thrown your way!
So let’s go Hornets and let’s get to that 10,000 season ticket holders!
So with the NBA lockout set to continue in court for the foreseeable future, Hornets news will be pretty slow. But that doesn’t mean we can’t still discuss various topics. So, let us know what you want to talk about! Want to talk TV shows? I’m a huge fan of the Walking Dead. Swarm and Sting readers playing Modern Warfare 3? Let’s all hop into a game! Whatever you all want. Don’t worry, we’ll still talk Hornets as well.
Give us ideas in the comments below, on twitter @nolajake and @jsgrayson, or email me at nolajake86@gmail.com. Let’s try and have some fun while the lockout continues.
This is going to be a mess. I think that was my first thought when I saw that the players union rejected the owners’ most recent offer. I’m sure you’ve been following what’s going on so I wont recap it here, but, to sum it up, it’s bad.
Here are some things to mull over while we wait for the court battles. Why didn’t the union have the players vote on the deal? Were they afraid that it would get approved? Or was it due to a more tactical reason? Henry Abbot over at Truehoop digs into it a little more.
The players seem split on whether or not they should have voted. Glenn Davis was very adamant there should have been a vote. The Hornets’ own Patrick Ewing Jr had this to say:
Just 2 be clear I trust my reps. If they say the deal wasnt in OUR best interest then Im with them. I just wish this was over! I wanna play!
Ewing Jr is an interesting example. Here is a guy who has played most of his career in the D-League. He isn’t a millionaire; he doesn’t have an eight figure contract. He should want to take the owners’ deal so he wont miss any paychecks. This is why David Stern and many people in the media (twitterverse?) thought a deal would get approved if the union brought it to a vote. But here is a player almost blindly agreeing with the union reps. It seems to turn that concept around. Except that his father is millionaire and NBA Hall of Famer Patrick Ewing. Ewing Jr. doesn’t need to worry about money. If things get tight I’m sure his dad will help him out. I love Ewing Jr. I’m very glad he is on the Hornets. But you can’t use him as an example for why the union was right for not bringing the offer up for a vote.
And how will the affect the Hornets? In the long run this will probably be better. A hard cap and a better way to retain free agents would certainly be advantageous for the Hornets. But in the meantime, what is the current effect on New Orleans? We’ll find out soon.
Wednesday, I’ll have a post up for us to figure out what we want to talk about while the lockout heads to court. See you all then.
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