Drafting successfully in the second round is hard. With so many confounding variables, what kinds of players should the Charlotte Hornets be focusing on?
There’s been an uncharacteristic amount of online noise around the Charlotte Hornets this offseason. Generally speaking—in that vast wasteland of weekly podcasts, trade rumors, draft talk, speculative articles, and anonymous sources—Hornets fans content themselves to hibernate in relative obscurity, perking up at the occasional acknowledgment by the wider NBA media that there is, in fact, a team in Charlotte that plays basketball. Says NBA curmudgeon Ryen Russillo:
After performing a solid four wins better than expected last season (per Basketball Reference), finishing 9th in the Eastern Conference, and holding the #3 pick in the first-ever November draft, the Hornets have begun to generate a little—ahem—buzz¹.
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Finding an upper-crust player whom the Charlotte Hornets can lean on to elevate the offense (which finished 29th out of 30) and/or stabilize the defense (a little better at 24th) is crucial for a team whose minor successes more often than not earn it the scrappy label. Traditionally, the third pick is a great place to find that kind of floor raiser too.
However, as the Eastern Conference champion Miami Heat—whose roster features a total of zero top 5 picks and only one top 10—have shown, the kind of prospect that plays winning basketball can be found all over the scouting board.
Even experts will tell you success in the draft is one part science, one part alchemy, and one part pure luck. A team needs two of the three to have a chance.
With the 32nd pick taking a quiet backseat this year, the Charlotte Hornets have another solid arrow in the quiver to take a shot on a player just outside of the first round who can cement the young roster.
I’ve taken a close look over the last 10 drafts searching for examples of the kinds of players that find NBA success within the first few picks of the second round. While my approach was more subjective than statistically-defined, I found four general archetypes for good NBA players drafted in the early 30s. Without further ado, let’s take a look at the first two categories, a featured player for each, and the prospects in this draft that best fit those molds.
¹I’m sorry. We both know it had to be done.