The Times-Picayune is reporting that Devin Brown, who last played in a Hornets uniform in 2006-2007, was signed by the Hornets last night.  I like the signing, and the other day I actually thought about Devin and wondered if there was a chance he'd come back now that Jannero Pargo is gone.  To refresh your memories of Brown - or introduce him to you if you didn't see much of him in the half year he played for the Hornets - here is an excerpt from a piece I wrote about him last September:

... on December 22nd, the Hornets were reeling from injuries. Peja was done for the season. West and Bobby Jackson were done for weeks. So the Hornets brought in Devin Brown - who had been sitting on his couch in San Antonio without a job up until then. In his debut he took four three pointers; and missed every single one of them. In his next game, he took seven shots and managed to hit one. By the end of December he was shooting a . . . blistering . . 34.5% from the field. I thought Jeff Bower and Byron Scott had lost their minds.

But January arrived, and the rust fell away from Devin's game, and suddenly, I found out what we had. A versatile, energetic player who could shoot with range, run the floor, and play fairly solid defense. When Chris Paul went down and Pargo proved he was not a point guard, Devin took over at the point. No one would mistake him for CP3, but he was still very solid, averaging 13.7 points, 4.8 Rebounds and 3.8 assists for the month of January with very limited turnovers.

For the rest of the season he played a vital role on the Hornets, starting at shooting guard, and providing a consistent presence . . .

 

Not long after I wrote that, the Cleveland Cavaliers signed Devin and he spent the year wearing wine and gold as a backup shooting guard, suffering in the "LeBron James must handle the ball 90% of the time and other players can only be involved if LeBron somehow doesn't make it to the hoop and throws it out" offense.

Devin will be a nice addition to the team, and has good enough ball handling that should Mike James not be the answer as the backup point, we can go to him and not be susceptible to full court pressure the way all of our other players would be.  He's also a nice insurance policy at shooting guard and his size will be a nice change from the tiny lineup we had with Paul and Pargo on the floor together.

Here are the WP48 and PER metrics for Devin Brown and Pargo the last two years - since I tend to think of this signing as a replacement for the Moscow-bound guard.  According to WP48, Brown is a big improvement.  According to PER, it's pretty much status quo.  If we get the average, I'll be happy.  Remember, a .100 WP48 is average, as is a PER of 15.0

 Devin BrownWP48PER
2006-2007.13014.3
2007-2008.08011.4

Jannero PargoWP48PER
2006-2007.033 13.5
2007-2008-.04311.9