One of the teams that surprised a lot of people last year was the Charlotte Hornets. Unheralded at the start of the season, many did not see them even making the playoffs, yet be a win away from upsetting the Miami Heat and making it to the Eastern Conference Semis.
Coming off one of their more memorable seasons in franchise history, the team's top brass have made significant moves and added key pieces to their roster in the hopes sustaining their recent success.
This summer, the team saw some of their contributors sign with other teams during free agency. Al Jefferson is now with the Indiana Pacers, Courtney Lee joined the revamped New York Knicks, while Jeremy Lin is back in New York, but now with the Brooklyn Nets.
Though this may be viewed as moves that made their lineup weaker, they also made significant acquisitions not just to fill the holes left by those three players, but address their needs that were exposed in the playoffs.
Speaking to The Charlotte Observer's Rick Bonnell, head coach Steve Clifford discussed what he thinks the team lost but also knows where they became better:
“We probably don't have as many points in our lineup, we lost a lot of offense, but I think we'll figure that out. We have potential to be better defensively.”
“We were ninth in offense and ninth in defense. We knew we had better offensive personnel. We were one of only four teams to be top-10 in both, the thing that stood out more than anything was depth.
“When we had two (healthy) rotation players at every position, that’s when we were really good in terms of efficiency of play.”
The Hornets are expecting Michael Kidd-Gilchrist back to their fold after missing majority of last season due to shoulder injuries and the vastly-improved Frank Kaminsky to provide quality minutes for their squad. With the addition of Ramon Sessions, Marco Belinelli, and former All-Star center Roy Hibbert, the fans in North Carolina still have a lot to cheer about.
Given the busy off-season they've had, the 54-year-old bench boss thinks the team did really well.
The Hornets were not a top free agent destination coming in this summer and did not have as much cap space flexibility like other teams, but despite all of the challenges, they were able to build this roster which Clifford will lead once again to the playoffs, but this time, hoping for a deeper run.
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