The Purging Begins

Rumors out of Charlotte have new Bobcats' coach Larry Brown up to his old "Nobody buy a house" ways.

We'll start with the obvious: blowing up the roster is not exactly along the lines of torching the Sistine Chapel. The 'Cats have never won more than 33 games in a season, and with Michael Jordan as the GM, they've done nothing to counter the argument that the surest way to suck in the NBA is to hire an ex-star player in a personnel advisory role.

HOWEVAH -- and yes, one does miss Steven A. Smith from such conversations, if only in theory -- the problem is that Larry's not exactly a genius when it comes to these moves himself. He inherited a team with a tolerable point guard in Raymond Felton and no reasonable power forward on the roster, unless you count Emeka Okafor, who serves as their center. Sean May shows flashes, but can't stay healthy and when on rehab, can't stay thin. So in the draft, Brown pushes for... DJ Augustin, another point guard, while quality bigs were on the board. Oh well, you're going to be in the lottery next year anyway, so why not?

Once this domino falls, it's time to start pointing fingers at the players who actually produce. The latest to generate Brown's ire is swingman Gerald Wallace, who fantasy owners love for multi-category numbers, but real basketball fans are more or less indifferent to. He doesn't have enough of a jump shot to play in the back court, and isn't strong enough inside to play three, but he can do some things, especially in the open court. On a good team, he's an outstanding sixth man. On the Bobcats, he's trade bait for not enough return, because that's what happens when Larry comes to town.

The trouble here is that bad moves have a domino effect, and overwhelm the good. The team traded for Jason Richardson from Golden State a year ago; despite some flaws, he might be the best player in the history of the franchise, and if he isn't, it's only because bad men matter more in hoop, and Okafor was a #1 overall pick. But since they also pulled the trigger on the Adam Morrison Experience (another Jordan Special), that's a more or less complete hole, where they should have the starting small forward that makes Wallace a good bench player.

Since they also took on the breathtakingly bad Nazr Mohammed contract (big money for a bad player, woo hoo!), they don't have the flexibility they need to get a useful power player in the event that May turns out to be, well, useless. And since they decided to cut Felton off at the knees, they can distract themselves with the idea that they can't be good until Augustin learns the position and becomes NBA-ready. Which, well, is somewhat problematic, considering that he's (very) undersized and likely to be a defensive sieve even if he does make it in the league.

Adding to this vacuum effect is the fact that the owner (BET president Bob Johnson, one of the few minority owners in all of sports) has been hemorrhaging money and looking to sell. So you've got an owner whose heart isn't in it, a GM who hasn't shown any ability in the role (Kwame Brown, anyone?), and a coach that's approaching ancient, gives a new meaning to the word nomadic, and seriously may have lost the fastball for good after that nine-mile train wreck in New York. The other night in the garden, he was going up and down the bench screaming for a player, Jared Dudley, to get in the game... when he was already in. We may be in the stage where Larry can only have soft foods here.

What will happen is that Brown will eventually find a core of athletic hustle players who buy into what he's selling. He might even develop a tolerable scoring situation if Augustin and Richardson can survive the hazing. The Bobcats will trend up in 1-2 years towards a .500 team. Brown and Jordan will receive the media mouth jobs for turning around the franchise; heck, they might even become an 8 seed in the East. But the ceiling will be limited to no more than a few games over break even, because Brown will have ran off more talented players and driven his management team to distraction.

Then, it's time to go pitch the monorail to some other franchise. Oh, and what I've just laid out here is the best case scenario.



Shocking that they have attendance problems, isn't it?