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The Hornets kicked off their road trip in Phoenix tonight, and despite pulling off the rare feat of shooting 17 more times than their opponent due to their 9 more offensive rebounds and 5 fewer turnovers, still lost by 14.

The problem hasn't changed.  It's been there from the start of the season.  The defense as a whole is weak.  The guards frequently lose their guy on the perimeter, and the interior defender either helps and his guy gets an easy dunk or putback, or he doesn't help and we see a dunk or layup.  Amare took advantage of that tonight, earning 36 points on 17 shots.  Yes, that's more than 2 points per shot, and he didn't shoot any threes.  14 free throws do that for you.

Marcus Thornton

Other than West, only Buckets was truly on his game tonight.  What's more, he looked downright pissed off in the fourth as the team tried to make one last push and failed.  He was gesturing furiously at teammates, directing traffic, attacking aggressively, and threw up his hands in disgust several times when the Suns scored to push the lead out.  I'm a little worried that next year the combined glares of Paul and Thornton might actually kill a teammate who fails to rotate.  A lot of intensity there.

Thornton finished with 28 points on 21 shots, 1 rebound, 2 assists, 2 steals, and a block.  He got no free throws at all.  Now, considering how often he drives, that may seem weird, but I'm not sure I can argue tonight.  Thornton is the best rookie I've ever seen at changing the angle of his release or double-clutching at the basket to get a clean shot off.  That does tend to cut down on the fouls called, since he's simply making his defender whiff.

David West

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The Nuggets came visiting and though the Hornets fought all game long, the Nuggets executed beautifully at the end behind Carmelo and Billups and took the win at the Hive.  The last two minutes of Hornets posessions were a bit frustrating.  They took lots of what I call "Hero Shots" as multiple Hornets took off-balance three pointers instead of chipping away at the Nuggets lead.  They had lots of chances there - but came up empty on all those poor attempts.

Still, I enjoy watching the team playing hard.  It's why I watch basketball.

Oh, and this was odd . . . the Hornets didn't seem to miss James Posey much.  Any surprise at this?  No?

David West

For the second time in recent games, I came away very happy with David West's play.  He seemed really focused and played aggressively.  Against Nene, he drove hard, picking up fouls on help defenders, and against Andersen, he did exactly what you need to do against a lanky shot-blocker - he put his shoulder into his chest, made it near impossible for him to leap quickly, and powered in a shot over his head.  Even defensively West was working hard, talking and switching and doubling on Carmelo hard in the second quarter.  He even led a fast break, taking the middle of the floor with the ball, and then sprinted ahead of the field for a fast break dunk off a turnover he wasn't even involved in.

Try as I might, I can't really figure out where this West has been all season.  He looks almost joyful out there at times.  I know its a bit of blasphemy, but sometimes I wonder if Chris Paul's intensity and continuous barking sometimes wears on his teammates.  I know if a teammate at work kept vocally pointing out my errors, I'd probably accidentally spill coffee all over his or her laptop.  Not that I make errors.  Really.

The Rookies

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The Hornets managed to eke out a win tonight against the vastly undersized Warriors, keeping alive their slim hopes of reaching the playoffs.  West and Okafor routinely took advantage of a rare game where they could outmuscle the opposition and reeled in 11 offensive rebounds between them.

The game itself was decidedly not a typical Hornets game.  Even with Collison running the point, the Hornets are only slightly above the league average at pace, so a 135-131 score would normally require a 2-overtime game.  Tonight, however, the Hornets ran willingly, got the ball quickly inside, and took quick shots.  They also kindly gave up lots of quick, easy shots to the Warriors, making it a fast and furious sort of contest.

Still the Hornets built a couple nice leads, and it was only a furious three-point barrage by the Warriors that let them come back and take a lead near the end.

Marcus Thornton

I'm having a hard time containing myself about Marcus Thornton.  Multiple times during game, I watched him score off a broken play, back-door cut, or explosive drive and swore to myself that THAT play perfectly embodied exactly what Marcus Thornton is all about.  Then the next one would come and I'd be left silently chortling and amazed.  He has what scouts refer to as "a nose for the ball" and its perfectly true.  He kept coming up with offensive rebounds, bad passes, tipped dribbles - basically anything that was in his vicinity that could be considered a 50-50 ball.

In the fourth, his drive to get the Hornets within one was the play I decided actually was the quintessential Thornton play.  It started with an explosive drive to split a double team.  At about the elbow he tucked the ball like a halfback, knifed between two players coming to help, took a hip from the one under the basket, and displaying startling strength and balance, exploded to the far side of the basket and flipped up a difficult reverse layup.

Fantastic.

James Posey

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Those of you who have read this blog for a while know that I'm rather fond of metrics like Wins Produced.  Recently, Dave Berri of the Wages of Wins produced two articles I think you all will enjoy, and so I decided I'd draw your attention to them with a full on blog post, rather than dropping them in the news section.

Professor Berri's first post addresses the sexy new NBA metric: Adjusted +/-.  As a prime exhibit as to the inherent oddities of that metric, Dave Berri details the production of the Hornets very own Darius Songaila.  To summarize, Songaila has posted pretty consistent numbers across his career according to most traditional metrics.  However, according to +/-, his impact has varied wildly, producing a significant positive impact in Washington, and a significant negative impact in New Orleans.

As a result of that post, I had a brief email exchange with Professor Berri about two other Hornets we've been focusing on the past month or so:  Our rookies.  That discussion spurred his latest post about the Hornets, addressing the rookies, a brief comparison of Collison to Paul, one of his general breakdowns of the Hornets production on the whole, and even includes a response on our own Joe Gerrity's post about Emeka Okafor.  Good Stuff.

I am a little surprised by the rookie results.  While it doesn't surprise me that over the course of the entire season Collison and Thornton have been a little below average - they did start off the season shooting poorly -  I would not have guessed that Collison would have ranked lower than Thornton.  Collison's assist and scoring numbers have been impressive, and Thornton is almost exclusively a scorer.  Traditionally, one trick ponies don't rank that high in Wins Produced.  Not the case in this situation.

Of course, that just illustrates the impact of minutes.  Buckets and his recent standard of 20 efficient points in 24 minutes is crazy, and Collison has been wracking up huge minutes to go with his huge numbers, which mitigate them somewhat.

Enjoy.

Yet again, the Hornets lost to the surging San Antonio Spurs, who completed a season sweep of the Hornets for the second time in the last four years. Even worse, the Hornets dropped below .500 for the fist time since January 2nd.

It's becoming increasingly clear that missing their leader is wearing on the Hornets, as even big nights from the rookies go unrewarded in the win column. As great as Collison has been, and again was tonight, the drop off between solid point guard and superstar player has been simply too much for the Hornets. On the year they dropped to 10-16 without their superstar, and 21-16 with him. I personally count the game they blew against Portland as being without him, since his injury led to Portland's comeback. You don't like my math? Tough.

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