The Hornets have been working out players all this week in preparation for the June 26th draft, bringing in no less than seventeen players in to take a look at.  They have another workout scheduled for Saturday - though the number of players, or who they will be, has not been announced.  The Hornets could also have more workouts scheduled next week.

So far, it's hard for me to get a handle on the players the Hornets are looking at.  It's been a mixed bag of mostly consensus mid-second round picks and undrafted players.  About the only guys they've brought in who look like they have a hope of cracking the first round have been Courtney Lee and Gary Forbes, with Trent Plaisted, Shan Foster and Kyle Weaver having an outside chance.  They have also not brought in any of the big men prospects that should be avaliable at the end of the second round.  For now, I'll assume they will be brought in for later workouts.

Outside of blogging too much, I do have a job as an Systems Analyst.  One of my job responsibilities is to generate a document used to give a really rough estimate of the cost for a Project long before I know all the individual requirements necessary to complete the project.  We refer to the document as a WAG: wild-assed guess.  I'm going to apply the principles of that document to my evaluation of what the Hornets are hoping to accomplish with this group of workouts.

  1. The Hornets are considering acquiring a 2nd round draft choice.
  2. The Hornets are considering moving out of the first round of the draft, and picking in the second round.
  3. The Hornets feel that there are enough decent prospects in this draft that a few potential players are going to slip through undrafted and they intend to snap at least one up.

I rather doubt option 1 will happen.  If the Hornets are going to make a play for a veteran through trade, then picking up Second Round picks is a distinct possibility - BUT - in the past the Hornets have preferred to trade away second round picks in return for veterans.  They don't seem to much care for them.  Good.  Neither do I.

Option 2 could happen from a financial standpoint.  The 27th pick isn't much different than the 31st pick - except that if you pick 27th you are on the hook for a guaranteed 2 million in payroll.  If you pick 31st you negotiate with the player and usually get a nice minimum contract for only a couple years.  Some team may be willing to offer some cash and their early second round pick to the Hornets in order to move up and grab someone they like a lot.  The Hornets do like cash payments, something they proved last off-season when they took on several small contracts from teams trying to get under the Luxury Tax line in return for cold, hard, cash.

Option 3 is a distinct possibility.  Some of those players don't have much of a chance of being drafted at all: Othello Hunter, Sonny Weems, Jeremy Pargo, Keith Brumbaugh, Josh Duncan, Patrick Ewing, Tyrelle Blair, David Padgett.  Nonetheless, a couple of those guys are good enough at one thing that they could stick with a team after going undrafted.

Here's the complete list of those who have worked out so far.  I'm only intersted in Courtney Lee, Kyle Weaver, Gary Forbes and maybe Shan Foster.(He's a shooter, who has shot poorly in workouts)

Guards:
Courtney Lee, Western Kentucky
Jeremy Pargo, Gonzaga
Jamont Gordon, Mississipi State
Antoine Agudio, Hofstra
Lester Hudson, Tennessee Martin

Wings:
Gary Forbes, Massachusetts
Sonny Weems, Arkansas
Kyle Weaver, Washington State
Shan Foster, Vanderbilt
Wayne Ellington, North Carolina
Mark Tyndale, Temple
Patrick Ewing Jr, Georgetown

"Big" Men(some ain't so big, but they play the post):
David Padgett, Louisville
Trent Plaisted, Brigham Young
Tyrelle Blair, Boston College
Othello Hunter, Ohio State
Keith Brumbaugh, Hillsborough Community College
Josh Duncan, Xavier