EP 166: Listener Mailbag! How can the Hornets get Better?

Mark records this one solo and breaks down the Hornets’ fun win over the Heat, including a vintage LaMelo Ball performance with 30 points and 13 assists and more encouraging signs from Charlotte’s young core. He also digs into a big-picture roster question: are the Hornets set at center with Moussa Diabate and Ryan Kalkbrenner, and is power forward the spot that needs more attention moving forward?

Later, Mark answers listener questions on possible rotation changes, why Sion James may be the weak link in the current 10-man group, and whether players like Liam McNeeley may deserve a bigger opportunity. He also gets into the always-heated Brandon Miller vs. Scoot Henderson debate, including how many first-round picks Portland would have to attach to Scoot in a hypothetical Miller trade.

To close the show, Mark shares a new Love of the Week and Heartbreak of the Week, reacts to poll results from Hornets fans, and heads to Media Corner with stories from Serbian basketball culture, a Red Star vs. Partizan rivalry moment, and a great Belgrade pickup story that somehow turns into a Kemba Walker and Vasilije Micić crossover.

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Transcript

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Hello and welcome to the Hornets and Heartbreak Podcast. My name is Mark Bernacke, and I'm here by myself today. Tim is out sick. We were supposed to record yesterday, but he was he was out sick yesterday as well. We tried again today, but he's he's unwell, so uh you're gonna get a solo episode from me today. Uh first time doing it, so so bear with me. We'll be back to normal uh programming next week, next Wednesday. Um, but I had this whole outline prepared and didn't want to miss it. Um so we have listener mailbag questions. We asked people to submit questions on Instagram. You can find us at Hornets Podcast on Instagram if you want to join in on the fun. Um and we got a question from Michael thoughts on Heat Hornets from Tuesday. Uh very straightforward question there, Michael, but uh good good enough. Um and my thoughts are the fun hornets are back. They kind of went away there for a few games, you know, against the Blazers and the Kings. Um, we were just kind of barely winning against mid-teams. We lost to the Heat. We lost to the Suns. Um, got beat pretty badly by the Spurs. So we had a five-game stretch where the team was not super duper fun. Um, but they were back. They were back on uh Tuesday night. And you know, the Heat had won eight of their last nine, so yeah. I mean they were without BAM, but that's nonetheless a good win. We won by 30 points. Uh again, 30 points. Iconic Lamello game. Uh I called him out last podcast about not having any assists recently, but in the first seven games of March, he was only averaging five assists per game. And on Tuesday night, he had 13 assists uh while also scoring 30 points. So Lamello just an absolute master class. Um another kind of highlight, and I'll have to go backwards from what I said on the last episode, is Kobe White had a great game. Uh he had a first half where I think he had 11 points, and he had 11 points in the third quarter alone. Um yeah, one of the best showings, not the best showing, the best showing that he's had as a Hornet. 8-15 from the field, 24 points, and he was kind of steadying our offense in that second quarter, third quarter when the Heat were kind of still within range. And yeah, we just blew out the Heat in the fourth quarter, 40 to 18. I would say the low light of the game was probably Brandon Miller continuing to kind of struggle. It wasn't his worst game of late, but he was six of 15 from the floor, and it felt like you know, another kind of off game from him where he had four fouls and foul trouble a little bit. Um, and that was following a game against the Spurs where he was he was not very good, not very effective from the field. But yeah, the Fun Hornets are back. Um, you know, like I said, over those past five games, I was kind of thinking, was that long win streak just a mirage? Are are we just back to being, you know, mid? But no, no, the heat game proved that uh we're still really, really good and we still do blow teams out like that. Uh we'll see what happens tonight against the Magic. All right, Darius asks, not trying to be future focused, but is there a clear need for an upgrade at the four or the five position? Um I think the answer is no. And I'll say the answer is no because we're just not really at that point in the team's development where there's a clear need for an upgrade at really any position. Um, you know, we gotta let these young guys grow and grow together, especially at the five. So um it's hard to believe that Musa Diabate, the 43rd pick in the 2022 draft, and Ryan Kochbrenner, the 34th pick of the 2025 draft, could be the center rotation of the Hornets future. But I mean, I'm saying that because of their draft picks where they were picked, but I mean, I think they've looked pretty good, and I think we need to give it a shot for the long term. Um, both these players have played beyond expectations for the season. They're both making like two and a half million next year. Um, I mean, specifically, Diabate has been exceptional. We said earlier he's the most improved uh Hornets player. Um, and I mean Cock has his limitations with his lack of speed, but uh he just is an absolute beast on the defensive end, um, putting up a lot of blocks per game. And I mean, this is coming off of a game where Moose had seven rebounds at halftime and two steals and a block at halftime. Um, so I don't really think you can get much better bang for your buck. Um, and Moose Diabate is like maybe a generational rebounder. So yeah, we gotta we gotta let this play out a little bit. Um and I mean Cockbrenner's a rookie, Mousa's young. Let's see how that goes. Now at the four, we have three players that qualify as as fours, as power forwards. Uh Miles Bridges making 23 million next year. We have Grant on the books for 14 million, and Salon uh for 8 million next season. Now, I don't think we're gonna be picking up T John's fourth year option. So all three of these players are potentially off the books not next year, but the following year. And I think that's something that the Hornets could try to get ahead of. Um, could try to get ahead of that potential problem this offseason and go make a trade or draft someone else at the four. Now, if we are trading like somebody like Miles Bridges, I don't really think realistically you're gonna go get a better power forward than Miles Bridges. I think what you would be trying to do is get some draft picks there and try to get kind of an even younger uh power forward that could fit with this core. And that's a dangerous move to make for a team that's kind of thriving. I don't foresee them doing that. But if there's a world where like we trade Miles Bridges for I I don't know the exact player, but somebody like who's even maybe slightly worse than Grant Williams, but we get like a first-round pick. Um, a good first round pick included in that. Um, that could be a deal worth making with Miles only having one year left on his deal. I kind of think that the Hornets are just are just tied to him at this point, and I don't foresee him moving, but I I think that's the kind of move that they should be looking to make. Where we're getting a little a little bit even younger. Um and yeah, we have so many, so much draft capital coming up that realistically, like the player, the four or the five uh man when Con Kanipple is 25 is not gonna be Miles Bridges, I think. So we should we should try to get that going as soon as possible. Um but yeah, I don't really think the the place on the roster to upgrade is in the starting lineup, um, to be honest, at the moment. Obviously, you can't touch uh Lamelo, Khan, or Brandon Miller at the moment. TC asks, if you were the head coach, what if any changes would you make? Um so TC, I was just talking about it a little bit and hinting at it. What is the weak link of the Hornets 10-man rotation? So at point guard, we got Lamelo and Kobe White, shooting guard, Khan and Sion, uh, small forward, Brandon Miller, Josh Green, power forward, Miles and Grant, center, Mooson and Cog. Um, and I think it's undoubtedly uh Sion, unfortunately. So there's been a lot of hype around this year's rookie class, um, and deservedly so. But I think that Sion James got off to like a very good start, and since then he's not been that good. Um, there was one player with a negative plus minus against the Heat, and that's Sion James. Uh at the beginning of the year, Sion shot 14 of 20 from three in the first eight games of the season. If you remove those first eight games, he's shooting 32% from three, 36% from two, that's 33.6% from the field, and that's not good. Um, in 2026, he's shooting 27% from two-point range. That's 27%. That's not good. Love his hustle, love his defense, but he is unfortunately the weak link in the rotation at the moment. Um, his offensive box plus minus is a minus 3.1. The only player on the team with a lower uh or a worse offensive box plus minus is Trey Man. And Trey Man has been awful this season. Um, Trey Man's at minus 4.2. So, I mean, I just don't really agree with how much Charles Lee is playing Sion James. I'm fine with him getting minutes. I mean, he's a rookie, like, presumably he's not a finished product at the moment. He's gonna improve. But why is he playing 23 minutes per game while Josh Green is averaging 16 minutes per game? Like, that just doesn't make sense. I understand that maybe he can take the ball up the court and Josh Green is not as good at doing that. Uh, and he plays harder defense than Josh Green, but the offensive difference between those two players is just so massive that if we're trying to win games, we should be playing him a little bit less. Um, and then also, if we're trying to develop our team, this is not really a Charles Lee thing, it's more of a whole Hornets organization thing. But I mean, was Liam McNeely like that much worse than Sion? I mean, I kind of feel like we should be giving McNeely a little bit more run. Um again, unfortunately, I think that Sion has not been good enough to be getting that many minutes. And yeah, I mean, cut out 10 of them and give them to McNeely. McNeely needs to needs to play too. He was a higher uh draft pick, he's younger. Um, he can develop, he shoots the ball better uh than Sion does. Yes, Sion is a great, great defender, um, especially for somebody this young, but but offensively that the team just struggles when he's on the court. Um and other defenses know that Sion is very, very hesitant to shoot, and it hurts us. So if we're trying to win now, play Josh Green more. If we're trying to play for the future, then play McNeely more. Um, and I'm not saying McNeely's better than Sion, but let's let them both play. Like, there's not really a reason to just be picking one of them at the moment. Um, and sorry to be negative, but we keep it real on this podcast, as you know. Um, and that's that's the one thing that would do differently if I was Lee. And Sion's just kind of the classic, like, Cody Martin uh type player that like coaches just love, right? And and like I understand why he's he's fun when he's playing well on the defensive end of the court, but you know, if he's not gonna make his shots, if he's not gonna take his shots, then I don't think, you know, if he doesn't develop that skill, he's not gonna be long for the NBA, unfortunately. Alright. Um now we got one more question here, uh, and that is from Austin. How many firsts would the Blazers have to add to Scoot to get Brandon Miller now in a trade? Um and I thought about this a decent amount. We got Mikael Bridges, uh went from Brooklyn and New York for five first-round picks plus a first-round swap. DeJounte Murray moved to New Orleans for Dyson Daniels plus two first-round picks. Desmond Bain got four first-round picks plus a 2029 pick swap, along with KCP and Cole Anthony. Um, and this is a this is a tough question for the Scoot Henderson supporters. I think it's I think it's five. I think it's five first-round picks. Um I I was tempted to say four, but I don't think the Hornets want to move off Brandon Miller. Like, there's no reason to mess up this team's chemistry. So I think it's five first-round picks. Um, and Scoot Henderson at this point, like, has been pretty bad in his first couple of seasons. He's shown flashes here and there, but Scoot is not really demanding much on the open market. Like, like, if you should just say Scoot's available, I don't know if you're getting a first round pick for Scoot Henderson anymore. Um, so so the Scoot addition in the trade is like very small. It's four or it's five, I think. And five if you're really into Brandon Miller, it just kind of depends on on what the Hornets would actually be looking for there. If they were like trying to move Brandon Miller, then maybe maybe somehow it goes down to three, right? But if the Blazers just call them, I think it's I think it's five. Um okay, thank you everybody for the questions. Again, that's at Hornets Podcast on Instagram. If you want to join in and ask some questions next time we do something like this. Moving on, um I just wanted to talk a little bit about Khan versus Cooper, which is heating up again. Um, Khan's in minus 210, which is basically like a two-thirds chance of winning the rookie of the year. Um, if you ask me, that's that's too low. I'm I'm gonna go on a little rant here again. Um, because the Cooper Flag fans on Twitter are just getting to me. Uh it's it's getting to me that people really think that Cooper Flag should be the rookie of the year. And I don't know why I care so much about this award for the record, but I really, really care about it. I cared about it when Lamello was a rookie. Like, maybe it's because it's Hornets fans, we just have nothing. So at least give me this rookie of the year. Um, so here we go. I'm going to do uh a cleaner version of a previous segment on this show. Longtime listeners will know what I'm talking about. So Cooper Flag, since he's come back, the Mavericks are two and seven. He's shooting 41% from the field and 18% from three. That's worse than Sion's numbers, I was saying earlier. Uh last night, Cooper was 6 of 15 from the field with six turnovers and 17 points. Okay. So that's if that's your rookie of the year, oh yeah, Cooper is just you know better. He has to lead the whole team. Lead the whole team to what? Seven losses out of nine games? Alright. Um on Twitter, I've just been responding to Mavericks fans recently. That's been my been my new thing. Uh, and so this Mavs guy tweeted teenagers with a thousand points, 250 rebounds, and 250 assists, Kobe Bryant, LeBron James, Luka Doncic, and Cooper Flag. Yep, that's it. That's an elite list. Here's the thing is that Khan would be on track to achieve this. He only needs 22 more assists, but Khan's 20 years old, he's not 19, so he doesn't he doesn't make the cut. So that's just a very misleading post trying to get Cooper Flag in some rare air that Khan can't touch. But guess what? Khan's gonna get there. He's just 20. Unfortunately, he was not in the league when he's 19, and Cooper Flag is. So don't love that one. Don't love that piece of propaganda there. Here's another one. All things Mavs tweeted: if anybody's voting on Rookie of the Year based on Darko or Vorp, you should be stripped of your vote and any media credentials for all of eternity. And that was in response to James Plowwright. You know, James Plowwright, former uh I don't know, team member on uh All Hornets Podcast Network, who tweeted out these advanced stats that Khan is winning in. Well, here's one that's not too complicated. Khan makes his shots more than Cooper by a lot. By a large margin. When Khan shoots the ball, it goes in more than when Cooper shoots the ball by like 10% of the time. Okay? It's not close. So here's here's a nice uh con stat for you. The most games with 20 plus points on 50-40 uh 100 in a season. Steph Curry 22, 2015. Steph Curry 21, 2016. The third most, con Knippled with 19 of them this year. Again, he's at 19 games with 20 plus points on 50-40, 100 shooting. Khan Knipple's the rookie of the year, y'all. Come on. Let's let's get this over with. We can do the voting now. Um, I just have one more take here. I think people would just start like Cooper Flagg looks like a better basketball player. Because visually he does, right? But after you watch enough tape of Khan Knipple, you realize how good he is at basketball. But if Khan Knipple and Cooper Flag show up to like a basketball court and you had the first pick, you're picking Cooper Flag and you're probably picking somebody else random before you pick Khan Knipple. You're gonna find out his name is Khan Kanipple, and you're not gonna pick him, right? So Khan does not have the name or the looks going for him. He doesn't look the part of a rookie of the year in the NBA, but he is. Alright. Two new segments for you. Um, first one, love of the week. You know, this is Hornets and Heartbreak, so we gotta talk about love just a little bit. Uh, and that's that Musa Diabate left the game with an injury. But hold on, you need to wait for the next part. But now he's off the injury report. So when he left the game in in the fourth quarter against the Heat, I'm like, dang, like, why was he still in the game? This was like so classic Hornets, another player injured, he hurt his left wrist. Like, how many games is he gonna miss? And now he's not even on the injury report against the Magic. I mean, how the tides have turned, knock on wood, like, I don't know, do whatever you gotta do. But the Hornets used to be so plagued by injuries, and just to have a nice prolonged stretch of injury-free basketball, again, please. I hope this stays the way it has been. It's been so nice. And to see Musa Diabate, like not actually be seriously hurt, that's my love of the week. Heartbreak of the week. Gotta do the other other side of the coin. Is these damn Eastern Conference NBA standings? Uh, the Hornets, 35 and 34. You know, we have been red hot in 2026. We haven't moved up the standings like at all recently because everybody's doing so well. Um, the Magic are 38 and 30, the Heat are 38 and 31, the Hawks are 38 and 31, the 76ers are 37-32. So we we just like can't climb up the standings, and I'm gonna say that the Hornets are extremely likely to still be in the 9 versus 10 game in the play-in. I know that's probably not what people want, not what you want to hear, but that's pretty likely at this point. If we go 10 and 3 over our next 13 games, and the Heat and the Hawks just go 7 and 6, we'll have the same record as them. Right? So we have to go 10 and 3 to catch up to the Heat and the Hawks if they just basically go 500. Um, so barring us really, really playing well or one of these teams doing really, really poorly, I think that we're still gonna be in that nine versus ten game. And that doesn't mean that we can't make the first round, but it means it's a lot harder because you have to win two games in a row. I do think that we can move up to the nine and past the sixers at least. Um I think that's that's super in play, and obviously anything's possible. We could move up to the seven, but um, I would just be iron getting a home game for one of the play-in games, and that might that might be a win at this point. Again on Instagram, we put out a poll. Um, how do you think the Hornets season will end? 21% of people said losing the play-in, 34% of people said losing the first round, and then 45% of people said second round Eastern Conference finals or finals. Um, yeah, it might be a little optimistic. Might be a little bit of uh some homer bias going on with those poll results. Um I mean, I would love it if we if we can make the first round. That's that's all I want. I haven't seen a playoff series in so so long. It's been since 2016, it's been a decade. Please just give me some playoff basketball. I just want to watch um one playoff series from the Hornets. Um but I mean, if we end up losing in the play-in, we're getting the number one pick, anyways. Okay. Tim loves doing media corner. Um, as listeners may know, it's not my favorite segment, so we're replacing it today because I'm the only one doing the podcast. Uh, we're gonna replace it with uh Serbian basketball story. Um, so I went to I was in Serbia last week, I was in Belgrade, and I went to a Serbian basketball game. There's two teams in in Belgrade there's Red Star and there's Partisan, and they hate each other. That's a whole different story, but I can confirm the rumors. Uh the environment is insane in this Serbian basketball game. It's Belgrade Arena, that's where they take place. Um people were smoking cigarettes in the stadium. Like, never seen that before, obviously. Um, when you go to your section, there's no assigned seating because everybody's standing, so you just find somewhere to stand and you stand. Um, there's chanting throughout the entire game. It was so loud, like on just random free throws, or just like on a made layup, it was the loudest I've ever heard in an NBA arena in in Belgrade. It was crazy. And they beat the number one team uh in the Euro League. And I'm gonna butcher the pronunciation of this real quick. Let's see if I can do it. Fenabachi, this team from uh Istanbul. That's who they played against. Um, yeah, electric game. Lots of former NBA players playing in the Euro League. Like, you know, you always hear people, oh, they're going to play in Europe. Well, can confirm there's a lot of NBA players in the Euro League. Uh Chima Moneki, Jordan Noara, um, Jared Butler, Semi Ojole, DeNantes Montiunis. All played for Red Star. And this guy, Cody Miller-MackIntire, real ones remember him from Wake Forest, also a North Carolina guy. Um, yeah, lots of former NBA players, but there was always like one Serbian on the court. So they would just have four NBA guys and then one Serbian always on the court at all times, just to like please the fans, I'm pretty sure. Um, yeah, and then for Fenner Fenabacci, uh, I'm probably just completely butchering that. We're gonna call it Fen from here on out. THT, Talen Horton Tucker, the center of their offense. Uh, he touched the ball on like every single possession, which was pretty funny to watch. Um, but yeah, Red Star pulled it out um and beat Fenerbachi. Um great game, great experience, would recommend. Okay, so in Serbia, they have this rivalry between the two Belgrade teams, Red Star and Partisan, they play in the same arena, and there's this famous rivalry game called the Eternal Derby when the two teams face off, and it's just mayhem. Like it's just madness. But the two teams hate each other, Red Star and Partisan. Um, I went to a Red Star game. So come to find out, Michic, former Hornets legend, Vasilier Michic, is now the highest paid player in Euro League. He makes like five and a half million dollars, doesn't play for either of the Serbian teams. Um, I'm forgetting exactly who he plays for right now, but yeah, highest paid player in the Euro League. So the next day, I'm playing pickup basketball with these guys, and they are like, Oh, you're from Charlotte, like Charlotte Hornets, like Kemba Walker, Lamelo Ball. And when I make a three, they say Kemba, right? And they're like, so that's like super fun that they know the Hornets. Um, so then I hit I see this guy and make like a sick pass, and I say, Michich, thinking like I'm gonna get like a great reaction, you know. He that I know who Michic is, and he looks at me, he waves his finger back and forth, he goes, No, no, no, no, no, no, no. And I'm like, okay, that's super weird what happened after the game. I ask him, like, why'd you say no no Michic? He says, Brother, he played for Red Star. I'm a partisan fan. I hate Red Star. And that's all he needed to say. Alright, anyways, uh, that's Serbian basketball story time. Uh, if you like this episode, I don't know what's wrong with you because it was just me and no Tim was here, but if you like the episode, please follow um on Spotify. Uh, subscribe on Apple Podcasts, leave us a review, um, hopefully a five-star review. Share it with a friend, share on your story when we post an episode. Uh, appreciate all the support. And it has been real. See you next Wednesday.