Buzz City Beat: Charlotte Hornets Struggling Against Top Teams, Zeller a Top-10 Center?
Welcome to Buzz City Beat, Swarm and Sting’s daily roundup of the best Charlotte Hornets’ stories from around the web.
Buzz City Beat is your daily destination for the latest and best news from around the internet about the Charlotte Hornets. The team’s coming off of a disappointing blowout loss to LeBron James and Cleveland Cavaliers. In this edition, we look at the Hornets’ inability to defeat top Eastern Conference teams, Cody Zeller as a top-10 center, and an end of the year portfolio.
Hornets Still Not Up to Beating East’s Top Teams
“A line of demarcation has formed between the Charlotte Hornets and the top teams in the NBA’s Eastern Conference – and it goes deeper than what is now a combined 0-6 record this season against the Cleveland Cavaliers, Toronto Raptors and Boston Celtics.” (CharlotteObserver.com)
Charlotte’s inability to beat the top teams in the Eastern Conference is starting to get a bit concerning. While they have done a great job of beating the teams they are supposed to beat going 19-9 against the rest of the league, the 0-6 record against the top three contenders in the East is not a good sign. The Hornets need to change this trend soon if they want confidence in beating these top teams in the postseason.
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Cody Zeller: A Top-10 Center?
“Honorable Mention: Cody Zeller – He’s averaging career highs in nearly every statistical category (points, rebounds, blocks, steals and field goal percentage).” (NBA.com)
The Orlando Magic site ranked the top-10 centers in the league and left Cody just outside of the top-10 on the honorable mention’s list. They put Nikola Vucevic at #10, which is expected because it’s a ranking done by the Magic, but I would argue that Zeller has surpassed the Orlando big man this season. The Hornets’ big man is either at the #10 spot or just outside of the top-10 in my opinion.
End of 2016 Team Portfolio
“Kemba Walker has entered that Mike Conley strata where he’s clearly one of the league’s best players to never make an All-Star team. Like Walker, Nicolas Batum and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist are signed long-term on reasonable deals. Marvin Williams has fallen off since last season but at least he took less money on his new deal.” (RealGM.com)
Hopefully, Kemba doesn’t stay in that Mike Conley strata as he looks to make his first NBA All-Star team this season. The Marvin Williams’ downward trend is a thing that has been talked about more and more as the year has gone on. The Charlotte Hornets will need him to figure things out and get back to his form from last season if they want to be at their best and have a chance at competing.
