Who should start at center for the Charlotte Hornets? Willy Hernangomez or Cody Zeller?
By Noah Purser
Willy Hernangomez made a strong case to be the starting center in Las Vegas’ Summer League. Nonetheless, Cody Zeller won’t give up his presumed starting spot without a fight.
After trading Dwight Howard to the Brooklyn Nets for Timofey Mozgov, a lump of cash and multiple draft picks, the Hornets indicated they had other ideas for the future of their frontcourt. As of right now, that future lies in the hands of Willy Hernangomez and Cody Zeller (and Bismack Biyombo, of course). Cody Zeller has the experience with starting, but Hernangomez has made some strides that might encourage a more significant role.
In James Borrego’s new offensive scheme of pace-and-space, stretching the floor will be crucial. Therefore, Zeller (reportedly) and Hernangomez have been working on their shots from range. Hernangomez had a rough debut for his new jumper, shooting 0-4 from range, but was able to still contribute an impressive 16-point, 14-rebound performance.
Willy would later show that he was capable of making three-pointers and would end Summer League shooting 39% from behind the arc. He also shot 74% from the free-throw line, a good indicator of how well a shot will translate.
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On the other hand, Cody Zeller has never been much of a floor-spacer. He has worked to be a prototype center, working on his ability to consistently hit a mid-range jumper, and even tried further expanding his range in years past. His attempts have been rather futile, though, as Cody has shot a career 25% from three on 16 total attempts.
Cody’s fit within Borrego’s new offense will likely be more focused on his ability to run the floor in transition and keep the offense free-flowing while holding things down on defense. Though Cody doesn’t post the eye-catching stats every night (only averaging 0.7 blocks during his career), he does feature a 104 Defensive Rating and 2.2 Defensive Win Shares (an estimate of how many wins a player contributes due to their defense alone).
Though Cody may make strides as a more versatile offensive player, Willy’s game on offense will play off of the likes of Nicolas Batum, Malik Monk, and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist very well. Cody’s focus will have to be on the defensive end, as he could very well end up seeing the majority of his minutes next to Frank Kaminsky.
The concern with Willy Hernangomez in the starting lineup is his ability to defend, which is. . . not great. In the starting lineup, possibly next to the shorter Marvin Williams at the four, Willy would be tasked with defending large, aggressive NBA specimen. Though this might not seem concerning at this current juncture, let’s just say Willy is going to have to deal with a lot worse than Dakari Johnson, who dropped 20 points and grabbed 8 rebounds against Hernangomez.
Ultimately, I think it makes the most sense to start Cody Zeller. Cody has experience with the guys in the starting lineup and had fantastic advanced stats before the arrival of Dwight Howard. Cody is a pest down low for opposing bigs and has his own tools offensively to create offense for himself and others.
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Doing so would also allow Willy to play next to Malik Monk, Dwayne Bacon and MKG, offering more spacing and possibly taking some playmaking responsibilities off of Monk’s shoulders. Besides, if the worst comes to worst, the Biz is back and eager to get minutes in a Hornets uniform again.