Nick Richards Out; Mark Williams Shines in Rotational Debut: Charlotte Hornets (9-24) Vs Portland Trail Blazers (17-16)
Nick Richards went down with an ankle sprain last game against the Laker which allowed Mark Williams who has been dominating the G-League an opportunity to show fans what he can do.
Coming off of a 134-130 victory against the Lakers the Hornets went into this game 2-2 on the west coast road trip. But Richards went down late into the last game. I remember watching this and thinking that sucks for Richards I really like it when Richards is on the court averaging 9.0 PPG, 6.4 RPG, and a field goal percentage of 61.5% on the season. But also I knew that this would be a huge opportunity to show fans exactly why we traded down to draft Williams. I talked about Williams and how I really believe that he will be an important Hornet in the future and believed that the G-League development for Williams would be night and day from what we saw in the summer league and preseason and sure enough it was. But with the bright future I believe that Williams has now shown to the average fan/media of the Hornets not everything was perfect… There are things he needs to improve on like strength on the inside, better transition offense and defense, and also less fouling which I will touch on near the end of the article. But, in the end the Hornets would fall to the Trail Blazers 113-124, so let’s dive into the the things I ended up taking away from today’s game after a tough loss and will be giving Mark Williams his own section on Everything Buzz City.
Takeaways From The Game:
Terry Rozier is expendable for a man who is on a 4yr/$96 Million dollar contract ($20 million this year) going 0-12 in 4 quarters of play and only finishing 2-17 while playing 37 minutes is unacceptable. I love him as a basketball player but I hate the contract so far this season.
Lamelo Ball after tangling up on a screen about less than two minutes left in the game was holding his shoulder, I don’t know if it’s serious or not but I hope it is nothing major. Lamelo on the night had 27 points, 7 assists, and 7 rebounds once again his impact is massive on this team, the team right now lives and breathes with him on the court.
Mason Plumlee statistically is having a good season but in the pick and roll too many times he plays the ball handler and leaves the cutter wide open and is not quick to help the defender who is out of position, about half way through the third it felt like Plumlee was tired and I was screaming at my computer telling Clifford “SUB MARK BACK INTO THE GAME!!” it didn’t happen, and a 6 point lead at the half turned into a 10 point lead by the time Williams was subbed back into the game with two or three minutes left in the third. Plumlee finished with 14 points and 8 rebounds shooting 5-7 with a impressive (by Plumlee’s standards) 4-5 from the free throw line.
Gordon Hayward had a very quite game, only making 4 shots on 14 attempts going 0-4 from deep only finishing with 10 points in 35 minutes it didn’t even feel like Hayward was on the court at times in this game, Hayward is expected to be efficient and be one of the top players on offense and defense especially with the 40 million he will be making over the next two years it’s highly possible that he will be moved soon for most likely just cap space I would be happy with a Tim Hardaway Jr. trade, his efficiency has taken a drop this year for sure in my opinion.
The team still is struggling to knock down shots especially in the 4th quarter the hornets were in the game for most of the contest but like most of the time this season when the Hornets need a shot the shot-makers are not able to capitalize on critical shots and especially in this game had open perimeter shots but could not knock them down to get back into the game.
Mark Williams:
When I saw Mark Williams enter the game with about 5 minutes left in the 1st quarter I was so happy. Although this is not his 1st time playing in the NBA this is the 1st time Mark Williams has seen minutes in the rotation that was not garbage time minutes. I was so hopeful he would show everyone what I believed he could do in the NBA based off of what I have seen from him in the G-League and he sure did scoring 6 straight points for the Hornets ending with 8 points in the 1st half in only 8 minutes of play. By the end of the game Williams had produced 9 points, 6 rebounds, 1 assist to get Rozier his first made shot in the corner, and two steals. Dell Curry at halftime said about his steals “it feels like he should have 1 or 2 more steals because he is the one that tipped it but they don’t credit the steal to the one who tipped it, they credit it to the player who picks the ball up”.
Dell’s statement shows the impact of the record breaking longest wingspan of a Charlotte Hornet player in the history of the franchise 7-7 wingspan and a 9-9 standing reach. The measurables are there to be a great defensive/ offensive big in the league the big issue is Mark at around 7”1-7”2 with shoes on Williams is only 240 lbs compared to his competition tonight Jusuf Nurkic 6’11 290 lbs one of the strongest bigs in the league, a big ask for a rookie who is down 50 pounds to be able to handle that one on one and it showed with Williams finishing with 5 fouls in just 16 minutes of play.
Nonetheless, handled himself well. Williams was good on rotational help defense in the paint area, when contesting a guard on a drive or even bigs he kind of glides on his contests and forces hard shots that usually ended up in a miss. I was super impressed with Williams, he looked at times better than Plumlee the only thing for Williams will be consistency. but I can see that improving in time he deserves Kai Jones’s minutes (around 8-10 a game) especially because Jones is just a little too raw of a player right now and just needs another year of development.. All i know that tonight the team was better when Williams was on the court in that 1st half.
A big question though is why has this taken so long? Williams has been dominating in the G-League for awhile now. But was deemed not good enough to be in the rotation over Kai Jones which now looks crazy I love Kai but Williams is way more NBA ready then Kai is. But the answer is the emergence of Richards taking away a spot at center and the veteran Plumlee who is making 10 million this year, and Clifford wants to win and wants to play the vets over the rookies because he is still in the winning mindset it will be interesting what will happen when richards come back? Has Williams shown he deserves a shot in the rotation? let me know in the comments until next time have a great one, and GO HORNETS!