Buzz City Beat: Looking at the Charlotte Hornets’ Future, Kaminsky Finds His Rhythm

Welcome to Buzz City Beat, a daily roundup of the latest and best news and stories from around the web about the Charlotte Hornets.

The Charlotte Hornets will look to continue their playoff push as they host the Denver Nuggets in their next outing. In this edition of Buzz City Beat, we look at the team’s future, Frank Kaminsky finding his rhythm and the struggle when Kemba Walker and Nicolas Batum sit.

Ranking the Hornets’ Future: Hope and Despair (BleacherReport.com)

"The problem with Charlotte is its lack of flexibility. Sure, we know who’ll be playing for the Hornets for the foreseeable future, and we know a mid-tier playoff seed is a solid high-end projection if everything goes right."

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: Charlotte’s stuck in mediocrity.

Their future looks to be more of the same as they have little to no cap space for next season so the same roster will probably be in place next year. That isn’t such a bad thing as they underperformed this time around so they will probably bounce back and make the playoffs. Although, we shouldn’t expect a huge jump.

While there is hope that the Hornes will return to postseason play, their lack of flexibility is a problem because it offers little to no room for growth. The team won’t be bad enough to get a top-five pick but they also won’t compete for a title. Mediocrity isn’t always bad but there isn’t a lot of promise in that.

Kaminsky Finds His Rhythm in Charlotte (FanSided.com)

"That dichotomous nature makes Kaminsky equal parts interesting and difficult to confine. Both introverted and eager to draw attention, he remains a mystery. Effort has clearly been made to take the leap in his career but he eschews the label that being in the NBA is work. “I never viewed college as job. I’ve never viewed this as a job. I’m just having fun and doing what I love to do.”"

Frank is not only an intriguing player on the court but also an interesting person off of it. He has made headlines for his dancing, among other things, but he also continues to improve his play for the Hornets. The latter is what fans are looking for out of Kaminsky and he has begun to find confidence in his shot this season.

This year has definitely been the best of his career and while many will never let Frank live down that the Hornets declined four first round picks to select him, he has proved his value from a basketball standpoint. He is becoming a more consistent shooter but there is still a long way to go for the big man. David Ramil did a great job of breaking down the fact that Kaminsky is finding his way in the league and how it takes a few years for most young players to adjust to the NBA.

Team Struggles Without Both Their Mainstays (ESPN.com)

"The Hornets are at their best with both Walker and Batum on the floor. It stands to reason that Clifford should maximize the number of minutes they play together. But that depends on a bunch of follow-up questions: How good, or bad, are a team’s five-man bench mobs? How good, really, are those Walker-Batum minutes? How does Charlotte manage when just one of them is on the floor?"

Next: O'Bryant Likely Out for the Season

Balancing and staggering minutes has always been a difficult science for coaches in the NBA. With the second unit struggles for the Hornets this season, keeping Batum and/or Walker on the court was difficult for Steve Clifford considering that both needed their fair share of rest. Staggering his stars minutes will still be a task next year but having a more capable bench will help bridge that gap.