The Charlotte Hornets are only talented enough for moral victories

The Charlotte Hornets are only talented enough for moral victories

Coming up today on the lockdown Hornets podcast yes the Charlotte Hornets lose to the Chicago Bulls but can we count it as a moral Victory we kind of needed one after Tera roier called us out for having losing in our DNA the front Court really specifically the forwards they

Provided a lot of winning DNA despite the loss here Steve Clifford also had some interesting comments on those comments from Terry Rosier I’m going to break it all down today on lock on Hornets yes the lock on Hornets of the locked on podcast Network your team every day in a minute cuz we Live it’s lockon hornets part of the lockon podcast Network your team every day thanks for making us your first listen we are free and available anywhere you get your podcast and that includes YouTube today’s episode is brought to you by prize picks prize picks is the easiest and the most

Exciting way to play daily fantasy sports go to prize.com lockon NBA and use code all lowercase locked on NBA for a first deposit match up to $100 I’m Walker mail you can listen to me on the radio here in Charlotte sports radio 927 WFNZ no Doug today I’m flying solo you

Should still read his work on his substack every Hornets boox score.com there you can also find information on how you can text him can’t text me I don’t have my number available for that kind of stuff which you know I don’t regret but Doug that’s what partially

Makes him go fruit salad yummy yummy partially makes him go crazy because he doesn’t escape the craziness that is Hornet’s world and so continue to be The Wiggles theme in his head by singing fruit salad and text him your Hornet’s thoughts you can get that subtext information on his substack every Hornet

Boox score.com I got to tell you not going crazy after this one though it’s weird I saw our guy Rod Maro tweet this out and I agree with him glad the Hornets got a moral victory tonight yes I understand how weird this is considering Terry roier just called the Hornets

Out for having a losing culture and here I am feeling good about a loss yeah perhaps that actually does speak to the Hornets culture or the very losing DNA that is in my body as we speak I am I embrace a loss therefore I probably do

Have losing my DNA I totally get it we needed a good performance though I’m just telling you how I see it they pretty desperately the Hornets pretty desperately needed nay not a good performance a respectable performance and I think they gave us that tonight in the

117 110 loss to the Chicago bows because they go to halftime and they’re actually up up once they go to the locker room by a bucket third quarter collapse doesn’t happen we’ve seen that quite a bit the Hornets might compete in the first half just as we saw against the New York

Knicks and then in the third quarter doesn’t matter if it’s on the road doesn’t matter if it’s at home they’re going to get beat down by 20 I said to you know uh my girlfriend I was watching with said he we’re about to see a 134 Run for the opposition but no that

Didn’t happen and so you actually have a pretty close game going into the fourth quarter and that’s when they scored their most points it wasn’t a collapse it was still tight enough it’s just Kobe white kept hitting shot after shot after shot he’s been on a tear this season 35

Points for Kobe white one point off of tying his career high at 36 he got that in 2021 against the Sacramento Kings and got fouled at the very end of this game just ran into a Hornets player to try to go to the foul line after they had

Called off the dogs misses the first free throw to tie that career high so he ends up with 35 but still a great performance from him yeah I Hornets needed this one man I know it’s a loss I sound crazy you can hear me wrestling in

My mind how crazy that is but after Terry roier and lamelo ball were in the news for all the wrong reasons as it pertains to the Hornets right you just needed something to go out there and go right for this team and know they didn’t get

The win but I was texting with Doug and I agree with him I think tonight you saw the Hornets everybody cared everybody showed up everybody put forth the effort and actually executed pretty well I’ll take 110 points from this team and then defensively I think for the most part

They did all they could until they got to the fourth quarter and they just didn’t stop ball well enough that’s what Steve Clifford told you after this game if you get beat off of the first dribble then you don’t stand any chance Kobe white is lightning quick he’s also

Really strong and that’s a bad matchup for anybody trying to guard at the point of attack you don’t have Dennis Smith Jr anymore now he did praise Frank Nina for coming into this game and playing well he said his words not me he said played well despite only playing 10 minutes and

Going 0 a four from the field but that’s Steve Clifford if we’ve ever heard him right he thinks somebody played well because of their defensive effort even if they go 0 of four he said he didn’t check out the plus minus but they were plus nine was the highest plus minus to

Be fair to him and so defensively that’s something that you wish you had a little bit more consistently on this squad but it’s going to be tough to stop Kobe white and he even gave credit to Demar J rozan I actually think yeah surpris PJ was on Demar quite a bit tonight and

Demar only hit four field goals out of the 10 attempts that he had he got fouled and got to the line eight times made six of those free throw attempts but honestly it really wasn’t Demar D rozan that beat you like that it was Kobe White and vvi who each took 22

Field goal attempts and vuvi made 10 of them Kobe White made 12 of them including four of 10 from three-point range so this was a Kobe game they just didn’t have anybody that could keep Kobe white in front and then because of that he gets to the paint at least on the

Second dribble and then Nick Richards got in foul trouble Steve Clifford also said that Nick Richards getting in that foul trouble picking up five with a lot of the fourth quarter to go he said that killed him and when you can’t protect the rim at all Nick Richard’s only

Playing 25 minutes despite being the only Center you trust I mean we’ve you know talked enough about Nathan Minah God bless him there’s just nothing he can do and there’s just no way you’re going to be able to defend a center as skilled as vuich so when Richards goes

Out then I’m sorry I’m not going to be able to do it we don’t have anybody else so Mark Williams is out you don’t have a center rotation anyway if Nick Richards is out then it’s going to be tough to stop Nicole a vuvi I I just think the fact that’s that

Terry roier said that this team has losing DNA that it’s different Steve Clifford addressed those comments as well and we can get to that on the other side I think that you needed to show up tonight and the forwards did that also we’ll talk about that in a moment and

And I we’ll we’ll discuss some of the other reasons but at least they executed well enough and they did put wor the effort where honestly this team is so bad at 10 wins they got out talented Kobe white is really coming into his own remember as a former first round pick a

Lot of hornets fans wanted here Alex Caruso one of the better defenders in the NBA Brandon Miller you know took him to the free throw line that was fun and they have a a good enough team that’s 23 and 26 they’re right there at 500 and

They had only lost by seven they were there in the fourth quarter and eventually just too much Kobe white we can move on coming up next on the locked on Hornets podcast I do want to get to the forwards that all played well miles of bridges how about him going for I

Believe six three-pointers PJ Washington played well I think offensively defensively and Brandon Miller continues to impress we’ll get to the forwards in their games and then I want to get to more Steve Clifford comments about what he would expect from this team if they were indeed healthy like where they

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Again go to prize picks.com lockon NBA use code lockon NBA for a first deposit match up to $100 can’t get mad at the front court tonight can’t get mad at them at all how about the way that the forwards played against Chicago and really you see all

Of them go for at least 20 points Brandon Miller another game in the 20s 21 points for Brandon Miller eight of 21 from the field so not the greatest shooting night but still looked really impressive three of 10 from distance and so one more and you like what he was

Able to do from distance there miles Bridges speaking of shooting from Beyond The Arc he was six of 13 I believe that’s the most three-pointers that he hit so far this season tied with it and he was 11 of 20 from the field 15 rebounds that’s good for miles and then

30 and 30 points so 30 and 15 what more can you five assists too like miles miles was really good he kept him in this game I thought specifically for miles it’s something that he’s always been very good at the right hand despite being a lefty I thought you really saw

His right hand on display maybe even Eric Collins made a comment about it but even like when you pull the spin move there’s a lot of momentum that allows you to possibly lose that basketball but the fact that he’s able to control it so well with his off hand he was impressive

So Miles Bridges Brandon Miller and you know I got to talk about my boy PJ Doug’s not here to refute it you guys can on the YouTube comment section but that’s fine I don’t care I’m going to talk about how well PJ played 26 points

For PJ 10 of 17 from the field three of nine from three-point range and here’s what I like from PJ I thought he showed a lot of fight Brandon showed a lot of fight too I don’t think Miles was just in his bag I I I think Miles was playing

Well he was getting to his spots he was also a attacking I think PJ even if he shot nine three-pointers the fact that he had eight inside the two-point Arc and finished what was it I guess seven yeah seven of the eight field goal attempts if my math might be wrong but

He finished well inside two-point range and he even had that big bucket at the end of the third quarter I believe to tie it where he was banking it in and showed some fire if if you often criticize this team for not having enough fire and you point to some of the

Players maybe laughing on the bench like lamelo like book Knight like Bryce mcgaw’s or you know you go back to the Terry roier comments or you think defensively them allowing 140 points just means it’s zero effort I I totally get some of that stuff I do think that

You’ve seen a lot of fight particularly from Brandon Miller I think PJ to was like showing some of that emotion I love seeing that from him um I I thought Cody made a few good plays in this one remember he’s got a lot of ball handling duties with Brandon Miller in the back

Court Cody had six assists not a good shooting night for him but I thought six assists was pretty good and they just didn’t turn the ball over I mean in the first half they had two turnovers they had seven in the second half which you’d

Like to see that come down a little bit I know PJ had one of them when there was a miscommunication they were down 10 PJ Washington and miles it looks like there’s going to be a dribble handoff or you’re just setting miles up at the top

Of the key for him to run the offense and Miles continues to go down the sideline PJ thinks he’s coming over and then so he just is flipping the ball up it goes right out of bounds so that was just a miscommunication being careless with the basketball but for the most

Part if you’re going to get outrebounded which you weren’t badly you only got outrebounded by four but if you are still going to get outrebounded then you have to take care of the basketball and for the most part they did that tonight the Bulls only had nine turnovers when

It was all said and done too and so the fact that you evened that up then that’s how they’re able to come away with this Victory but I I really was impressed with what you saw from the forwards and we can even focus on Brandon Miller who

Is by far the biggest bright spot we can spend some time on him man I think the Highlight that’s going to go viral I’m already seeing it on my timeline it’s Brandon grabbing the basketball and everybody’s just spreading out and watching him on offense there’s not any

Cutting there’s not any set that they’re running it’s just straight up five out Brandon Miller out there beyond the three-point line and it’s him against Alex Caruso and Alex Caruso is like what a top five perimeter defender in the league at the guard position at least so Caruso on Brandon Miller yeah Brandon

Has the size on him but sometimes it’s hard to get leverage on those little guys I can tell you at least playing you know yball like it’s very different from the NBA perhaps there’s like a league or two between playing at the Y and playing

In the NBA I get that but even just playing in the post one of the things I don’t think people realize is when you don’t have leverage like I hated playing against the football players the linebackers that were like 6’2 so if I’m 66 even 6’1 you’re a bowling ball you

Get under my hip you’re not going to be soft about it and then you just drive me out of the pain I’m like damn I’m trying to get down there and I can’t get any position on you despite being the bigger guy that can happen too especially out

There on the perimeter with Caruso stronger guy can get under the hips of Brandon Miller and not let Brandon get to his spot but oh wait Brandon did and so you see him get to the foul line and he had to battle for it too he was

Giving in the body a little bit got to the foul line and created enough space to hit a step back and that’s what everybody was rolling with because we recognize the moment because we recognize oh that’s Alex Caruso he’s doing that too on the foul and look man

I’m telling you when I when I was worried about Brandon as the number two overall pick some of the reason as to why I was worried is dribbling through traffic in the paint specifically because I thought his handles were good like out there on the perimeter with not

A lot of pressure in his face and that he could even you know he could get by that way he could even Thrive that way but once you got into the paint thought he might lose the basketball there creating the separation was a worry getting by his guy going to the rim and

Then finishing all of those were concerns and they’re still there to be honest with you like those are present with him as a basketball player but okay if you’re just going to make every outside shot you ever take again just going to make all of them three-point

Line that’s cool I hit those mid-range I’m just going to shoot over the top of you then all right you know we we can figure out that finishing at The Rim stuff later go ahead and hit the fadeaways against some of the best perimeter defenders in the NBA I’m good

Go ahead and do that and that’s exactly what he did against Chicago and we’ve been seeing that from him despite being tired and I know he said he doesn’t believe in the rookie wall I get it I believe him that he doesn’t believe in that we’ve seen him be fatigued and yet

He continues to produce look I you’re not going to hear any complaints out of Brandon Miller from me like I I do think defensively he was one of the guys Steve Clifford was talking about not being able to stop ball but as I mentioned a lot in the first segment Kobe White’s

Really tough to stay in front of Brandon is tasked out here with staying in front of Jaylen Brunson you guys remember that Nicks possession where it was Jaylen Brunson actually lost the ball in one of those second half possessions Brandon’s in front of him and just just had to stay there a

Little too long Jaylen didn’t give it up and then eventually got by him but like what do you want him to do he stayed in front of him for 7 seconds and then you know the eighth the ninth as it’s starting to dwindle down on the shot

Clock Jaylen gets by him and Jaylen brunson’s an All-Star and so he connects but yeah man but what Brandon’s been doing he’s been impressive I mean so impressive First Team all rookie for sure impressive despite the rookie ladder not putting him up there despite National NBA podcast talking about assar

Thompson a little more for a while like Sasser at the beginning and no disrespect to those guys it’s just you have wimy you have chess and then you have Brandon number three I’m not dropping him past the top five you can’t do that and the way he’s

Balling right now I don’t know why you would want to do that so with Brandon having the emergence that he does right on top of you know PJ playing well here miles playing well here and then lamelo if Gordon could just play and come back at all Mark Williams you would

Love to see this team healthy and then see what they can do there right well that’s exactly what Steve Clifford wondered and we’ll get to those comments coming up in the last segment coming up on lockdown Hornet Steve Clifford talked about where they might finish if they

Were all healthy and ready to go and we can go to some Steve Clifford comments about Terry rosier’s uh passing remarks on the Hornets having the losing in their DNA we can get to some more of that in the last segment of lockdown Hornets I’m not dropping a this episode

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NFL okay so here we are giving all the love to the forwards the way that they were able to perform tonight and you can also see them hopefully continuing like whatever momentum they were able to build going into the next game their next game is against Oklahoma City on

Thead Road in a couple of days I believe that game will be taking place on Friday Oklahoma City is one of the best teams in the league and I I think so many people when they want to get out of the mud and they want to make that

Transition as a small market franchise from never making the postseason to okay now we are the fun team you know like the Hornets used to be like a couple years ago when they were the fun team that gets to the playin tournament maybe gets a little rowdy

And then you get to the playoffs well OKC it’s like a Christmas story they skipped the the Sinister triple dare and went right for the throat with the triple dog dare OKC just straight up skipped the oh we’re a fun play in tournament team like oh okay we’re a

Little Rowdy oh we might compete with the playoff series no we’re going all the way up to number one number two like that’s perfect case scenario because you have an MVP candidate you hit on Chad holgren at the top of the draft you hit on Jaylen Williams in the middle of the

Draft and now now we’ll see what they do on the trade market with a bajillion different picks to see if they can go get a veteran you would love for the Hornets to be able to do that but they’ve never been able to so okay if they were

Healthy then where would they finish they’re they’re not going to be OKC right well Steve Clifford does still think that they would be a pretty good basketball team especially in the Eastern Conference and if you hear what Steve Clifford had to say this was before the game going in to Chicago and

Steve said if we had everybody and played pretty good which is kind of funny so he said if we had everybody and played pretty good to me we could have been a fifth the sixth place team A fifth or sixth place team but we’re not

That now and you coach a team like this differently than you coach a team like with Kima and those guys and I’ve got to be able to do that to help them more too and so he talked about how it’s not really the franchise that is responsible now Doug

Is somewhere twitching like this as I say that as Clifford defends the franchise breaking down how it unfolded from his point of view and you can find more of this information on Rod Boon’s article part of the Charlotte Observer but Steve Clifford said I think the

Thing you have to get is just why is this happening I think we made the playoffs two or the or two of the first three years our best team we had here we were sixth in the Eastern Conference we won like 47 48 games we lost to Miami in

Seven games but we we had seven free agents and we only had enough money to bring two of them back you lose Big Al you lose Courtney Lee you lose Jeremy Lynn Troy Daniels he said somebody else he couldn’t remember it might have been trevan Graham but he said somebody else

All in the same year and the next year our starters were like eighth in plus minus but we couldn’t bring all those guys back and then we never got depth again he just doesn’t think it’s a money issue this time it’s pretty clearly a health issue and so he’s not telling you

That it’s an excuse but he says look in these two years these injuries have crushed us and yet I’ve got to find a way that we can play better that’s my responsibility is that we play better and I think most fans like it when their coach takes accountability but he’s

Right he’s saying it’s not an excuse we got to find a way to play better but if you’re injured like this then yeah it’s going to do a number on you and you’re not going to be able to reach that fifth or sixth place ceiling that that’s what

I’m interested in you can comment in the YouTube comment section right here part of the Community page you can tweet at us if you want to whatever but I’m interested like is Steve Clifford right in this if they’re healthy like and and I don’t remember it can’t be all the way

At the other end of the spectrum right like if we’re going to do this the correct way it can’t just be yeah if lamelo played every game if Mark played every game if Gordon played every game no if you had everybody with normal Health luck then is this a or sixth

Place team like I I can’t lie to you if I evaluate it I don’t think they’re that high because hell fifth like fifth means you’re in there by a couple of spots and that’s tough I you still have a good Eastern Conference I mean after all Steve Clifford and the Charlotte Hornets

Have told you a million different times that this Eastern conference is not your daddy’s Eastern Conference that’s just not how it is you got some really good teams where the heat are a seven seed we just saw them in the play in tournament and they messed around and got to the

NBA finals the eighth seed is over 500 Chicago of the team you just lost to but also competed against they’re 23 and 26 the Hawks are 20 and 27 and so I think that’s where you start to roll with the magic bulls and Hawks that’ll put you in that 810 seed

Like I If You’re fifth or 6th then you’re talking about Pacers territory 27 and 21 and Philadelphia is fifth Philadelphia and I know they’ve had some losses where Joel embiid hadn’t been playing just a little too rich for my blood to say that but I get his point at

Least you would get to the playin with that nucleus and I think that’s about right and I think that’s when we start to criticize Mitch cup and this team for building a squad that pretty much at normal Health luck and their ceiling it’s making a case for the six seed

Which it’s tough you know maybe that’s okay but pretty much on average if this season normal Health luck played out at like a 100 times how many times would they get to that sixth or fifth I’d probably say like you know 15 I don’t not not many I think most of the time

They would finish anywhere in that 78 n 10 range going to that playin tournament and if you get there and you win great give me a playoff series that would be a huge win for this franchise but they just haven’t been able to stay healthy

And then I’m going to allow this to be sickly bring me back to the first point leading this podcast because this team hadn’t been able to stay healthy because one of the big story lines is lamelo’s laughing on the bench he doesn’t take it seriously and his street Clos James book

Knight Bryce mcgaw’s nobody’s taking it seriously these young Bloods not playing out here like because that’s a real storyline of Hornet’s Twitter making everybody go crazy because Terry roier is now saying hey my DNA ain’t Los I’m here with the heat culture Jersey on that’s y’all man I’ve been I’ve been out

Of that franchise for a week and a half I’m different now and because of all of that that’s what brings me to the beginning of the podcast and telling you I’m going to take this moral Victory the bar is low it’s on the floor it’s on the floor just step over

It for me and I’ll be happy I get it I know what I’m asking for and what I’m not asking for but I’m telling you I just don’t want the Hornets to get destroyed and that didn’t happen we saw effort we saw some level of defense the defense that wasn’t played was because

Of limitations and not because they didn’t care 117 110 they lose to the Chicago Bulls and we’ll see if we can make some noise with the Charlotte Hornets against the Oklahoma City Thunder a couple of days from now when they play on the road on Friday that’ll do it for lockdown

Hornets thanks for joining me riding this thing out solo make sure you still go check Doug out though on a substack every Hornets boox score.com and you can listen to me on sports radio 927 WFNZ every weekday from 12: to 3 p.m. on West and Walker have a great day we’ll be

Back with you to finish out the week tomorrow come Friday Morning he

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