ESPN polled coaches, executives, and scouts on a few questions. The Hornets only appearance was not a good one.
Every year, ESPN surveys a group of coaches, executives, and scouts on a series of questions like who the best player in the league is, their predictions for awards, and a couple of other questions about hot button issues. The Charlotte Hornets only appeared once in that survey. The question—”which team had the worst offseason?”
The Hornets received three of the 14 votes, coming in second place to the Dallas Mavericks, who lost Jalen Brunson for nothing and then spent a good amount of assets to add Christian Wood and JaVale McGee.
The justification for the Hornets votes:
The Hornets received three votes for their handling of James Borrego, who was viewed as doing a good job the past couple of years before Charlotte fired him after the season, and for the uncertainty surrounding restricted free agent Miles Bridges, who was charged with three felony counts of domestic violence last month.
It’s hard to argue with the rationale. Feelings on the Borrego firing are mixed, but the team’s plan to replace him went completely off the rails when Kenny Atkinson backed out of an agreement to become the team’s next head coach. They ended up replacing James Borrego with Steve Clifford, the guy that Borrego replaced four years prior.
The Hornets were always going to be heavily dependent on internal development to take a step forward next season, but that was thrown into disarray when Miles Bridges was arrested on domestic violence charges on the eve of free agency.
Free agent center Montrezl Harrell was arrested on marijuana charges a few weeks prior to that, though those charges have been reduced to basically nothing, so that’s at least good news.
In short, just about everything that could go wrong did go wrong for the Hornets this offseason. Some was of their own doing, and some was out of their control. Regardless, it’s hard to disagree that the they’ve had one of the worst offseasons of any team in the league.