Charlotte Hornets: Karl-Anthony Towns is perfect trade target

The Charlotte Hornets seemingly have a young star in LaMelo Ball. Adding a complementary roster around him should be the number one goal of the front office right now – and it seems as though general manager Mitch Kupchak is doing his best to accomplish that goal, adding several interesting pieces that should help Ball maximize his skill set this upcoming season.

Charlotte Hornets: Karl-Anthony Towns would be the perfect trade target

Creating the ideal trade target for the Hornets isn’t exactly a simple task. Being in a small market narrows down the list of “tradable” stars by a large margin.

One of the most important aspects of a trade involving Charlotte would be the length of the contract left on the player being traded for. In simple terms, the Hornets should trade for a player with 2.5+ years left on his contract, rather than bringing in a star on an expiring deal (ex: Trading for Ben Simmons would be more favorable than trading for Bradley Beal, since Simmons has four years left on his contract compared to Beal’s expiring deal).

Additionally, the ideal trade target for the Hornets should probably be a frontcourt player. There is nothing wrong with having an elite backcourt combination that includes LaMelo Ball – but getting a frontcourt player that could be the target of lobs would also be really captivating.

There really only are a few players that may be acquire-able in the short term for the Hornets – and they are going to have to pay attention to who becomes available. With that said, Karl-Anthony Towns fits the bill.

Towns, the Minnesota Timberwolves franchise player for the past few seasons, has seen all kinds of instability, and recently opened up about it during a press conference.

Now, I don’t want to portray this as Towns asking out of Minnesota – because he hasn’t. He has stated in the past how he wants to build something with the Timberwolves – and things have been looking (at least slightly) better over the past year with the additions of D’Angelo Russell and Anthony Edwards.

With that said, I do want to point out that Towns is more likely to request a trade than other stars. As someone that has covered the Timberwolves, I can say that they are not exactly a well-run organization.

Speaking more towards the on-court fit with Towns, though – his combination with LaMelo Ball would be nothing short of incredible. What Towns does well is bring a hyper-modern perimeter skill set offensively – one that encourages spacing, off-ball movement, and hasn’t exactly been built around well in Minnesota.

Let’s say the Hornets ship off a few assets (for the sake of this exercise, we’ll say Terry Rozier, PJ Washington, and several future picks) for Towns. A possible long-term starting lineup could be Ball/Bouknight/Hayward/Bridges/Towns.

*Note: The package mentioned here definitely wouldn’t be the actual offer, it’s hard to know whether the Timberwolves would want win-now pieces or future assets.

That lineup… well, it’s pretty good! While the trio of Ball/Hayward/Towns may not be the Eastern Conference champions, it would certainly thrust Charlotte towards the top tier of the conference – and would make the surrounding pieces for the Hornets much more important.

You see, Towns has only been to the playoffs once in his career – the Jimmy Butler season. He hasn’t had great rosters in the past – this would be one of the most talented teams he has played for – and would drastically change the course of the franchise for the Charlotte Hornets.

That’s not to say that a Karl-Anthony Towns trade is necessary for the Hornets – but if the team wants to go all-in on LaMelo Ball and his potential, getting a second star should be the top priority for the team right now – and keeping an eye on Towns’s status in Minnesota is of the essence.