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00:00 Risk Career in Charlotte missed 41.3% of games, average 16, 5 and 4, one steal, half a block, shot 47% from the field, 38% from 3 on 4 attempts per game, which is a very low efficiency for a wing.
00:18 To sign Hayward, they didn't have enough cap space, so they had to stretch Nick Batum. So that essentially made it a 40 million cap hit to sign Gordon Hayward for the next three years while Batum was on the books.
00:35 You were quite supportive of the Hayward decision at the time. I was always skeptical. How do you feel now reflecting back on the era of Hayward and Charlotte? What are your thoughts on how it went?
00:53 I look at it this way, and this is very similar to what I was saying when we were talking about free agency and cap management in the CupCheck era discussion.
01:06 You just have to use your cap space. And to me, you could certainly argue they overpaid him in a sense, because he does make more money than what other players that average 16 points per game in his Charlotte career.
01:22 Like, 30 million dollars is a lot for most players that average 16 points per game.
01:27 It's 40. We have to count it as 40.
01:30 We have to count it as 40.
01:32 Why do we not?
01:35 Because you have to waive players every year for dead cap and stuff like that. Teams do that all the time.
01:44 And that would just be a lot of baggage to add to every single free agency signing.
01:52 You don't often waive a 24 million player, Nick Batum. You waive the guy who's making 5 million on the end of your bench, not supposedly your second best player when Batum was signed making 24 million.
02:05 That was a hugely impactful long-term move.
02:11 And then Batum would have helped this team.
02:14 You tell me Nick Batum wouldn't have helped the team?
02:17 Look at how he went and played with the Clippers.
02:20 He played very well with the Clippers.
02:22 I think that was specifically because he left was why he was playing well.
02:25 He was like a DNP, like, not even a member of the team anymore, basically, at the time that he left.
02:33 But that was maybe a Borrego thing.
02:35 Borrego relegated him. Borrego relegated him to the bench and he was a 24 million guy, right?
02:42 That is true.
02:44 But who was the coach when they signed Gordon Hayward? James Borrego.
02:49 If you're going to have Borrego, you might as well give him a guy that he's going to play and that is good, or at least is like an average player for what he's going to be.
02:56 And at that time, like the upgrade that they made in what Nick Batum's salary slot was to what Gordon Hayward's was is more than worth it to me to take that dead cap hit because it didn't prevent them from signing anybody.
03:12 That's the big thing to me.
03:13 Like they were never in a position to get someone and then they did. I don't know.
03:19 Like, like, they've never been in the luxury tax.
03:21 Like, there have been so many ways that they could have maneuvered the roster and the salary cap to sign players or anything like that if they wanted to.
03:28 I've got one player.
03:30 Okay, go ahead.
03:31 So I agree with you, right?
03:32 You have to use you can't just sit there with at the time.
03:36 I think they had when they signed Hayward, like 25 million in cap space.
03:39 Don't just roll over.
03:40 I understand. Other uses that summer that could have been Jeremy Grant.
03:46 You're telling me Jeremy Grant wouldn't have been more available, better defensively, much better player than Gordon Hayward.
03:54 So, yes, use the space, use it on a younger player who doesn't have a massive injury history, chronic injury issues, a super slow healer, like doesn't really fit the timeline of the team that you're building.
04:08 Okay, you knew he was going to be bad value by the end of the contract.
04:12 Jeremy Grant is sitting there.
04:13 Another option, right?
04:15 This wouldn't have gone well, but you could have got him for a lot less is Christian Wood.
04:20 He was not a good player by the end of that contract.
04:22 Don't get me wrong.
04:23 He's now basically on a minimum.
04:25 But like even in Houston, he was he was like fine.
04:28 And he would have cost 14 million, not 40 in terms of that total cap hit.
04:34 The Minnesota Timberwolves were looking to dump salary.
04:38 Andrew Wiggins ended up trading in the Golden State and a first.
04:43 We talked about this in the previous section.
04:45 Take on bad salaries for picks.
04:47 That would've been a great trade.
04:49 Could have rolled it over a summer.
04:51 2021, DeMar DeRozan.
04:53 You want a veteran wing scorer?
04:55 Look at how DeRozan is.
04:57 Everyone bashed that deal when they signed it.
04:59 And DeRozan has been one of the most available guys you look through.
05:04 The amount of time that he's played in the NBA, his availability is outstanding.
05:07 And he takes pressure off in the same ways, being that half-court scorer.
05:11 So for me, there were other ways you could have spent the money that just made a load more sense right there and then.
05:19 The only player I think that would have been a substantial upgrade or even an upgrade at all is DeMar DeRozan.
05:27 Andrew Wiggins I think would have been worse for this team than Gordon Hayward.
05:31 Jeremy Grant I think would have been a wash.
05:33 You get a first round pick for taking Andrew Wiggins on.
05:36 That much is fair.
05:38 But this again, were they going to use these?
05:41 I feel like if you're going to litigate the Gordon Hayward tenure, you can't be like, well, they could have just gotten Andrew Wiggins in a first round pick.
05:49 They certainly could have.
05:51 Maybe.
05:52 Would they have?
05:53 Right.
05:54 Like it's also possible for them to trade Davis Bertans and Mark Williams and Brandon Miller's salary and then get Shea Gilgis-Alexander.
06:03 Like, you know, like that is possible, but it's never going to happen.
06:06 Like they could have done that conceivably.
06:09 They would not have, though.
06:11 Like they were going to sign somebody like Gordon Hayward to that salary slot.
06:16 Probably just the guy that they could have gotten to agree to it, basically.
06:19 I would imagine that they had preliminary discussions with DeMar DeRozan's camp or really any free agent in that class, because at that time, and this is another thing that I'm going to push back on.
06:30 He did not have chronic injury problems at that time.
06:32 That was not the perception of him.
06:34 That has since become the perception since he was in Charlotte.
06:37 His ankle exploded when he played for Boston because Kyrie Irving threw him a bad lob three minutes after he got there.
06:43 The next year he played 72 games, mostly on that bad ankle.
06:49 And granted, he averaged, I think, was like 11 points per game.
06:52 Next year, he was at like 18 points per game, which is basically back to like where he has been in Charlotte the whole time.
06:59 And I think he played like 52 games in what ended up being a shortened season because it was the COVID year.
07:05 And then he sprained his ankle in the bubble.
07:07 He sprained his ankle in the bubble once.
07:10 He sprained his ankle once that year in the bubble.
07:12 And he left or he stayed and then came back from that injury and played in the Eastern Conference Finals on that sprained ankle.
07:19 Won the Celtics loss in six games to the Heat.
07:22 And then he signed that deal with the Hornets.
07:24 And by the next opening day, was fully healthy.
07:27 So the injury perception has developed since he came to Charlotte.
07:31 He had a catastrophic injury with the Celtics that everyone remembers.
07:35 That is true, but it wasn't like a yearly issue.
07:39 But the catastrophic nature of the injury for me, that is something that you have to deal with.
07:46 That injury was so serious that that is going to impact the rest of your career.
07:52 Like he lost his athleticism at that point.
07:54 He was bouncy in Utah.
07:56 He did not have that anymore.
07:57 So maybe he didn't have the chronic injury issues.
08:02 Maybe that was a poor choice of words.
08:04 But he did have, you know, he had lost his athleticism and speed.
08:09 And he also had such a serious ankle injury that if that is something that if he were to ever to re-injure that, he was always going to be a slow healer.
08:16 Because there's so much damage and scar tissue already in the ankle and the foot.
08:21 So I don't think the idea that, you know, maybe it's somewhere between the middle of where we're talking about.
08:26 Right. Where I'm saying he had chronic injury.
08:28 You're saying he had one, you know, one ankle injury after the serious one.
08:31 Maybe it's somewhere in the middle.
08:33 But there is definitely you signing a player who everyone at the time said Heywood has some concerns here.
08:42 How is he going to age well with his injury history?
08:45 That much.
08:48 And I that part I completely understand.
08:50 Like I don't even disagree with that at all.
08:52 Like from a logical perspective, I just am personally more willing to bet on players that have like a problem with an injury or re-injuring something.
09:02 Or they've, you know, suffered this injury and it may affect the way that they play.
09:06 Like even if it's just mentally.
09:08 Like I'd rather risk that than risk signing someone like Christian Wood who was has had basically every team that he's played on has had the reputation of being a locker room problem.
09:19 He already went through the Hornets organization to begin with and was just never really proved anything while he was there.
09:24 He has since just been a like middling impact player basically on good teams and has bounced around the league.
09:32 Like I would just rather have someone like Gordon Hayward, even if they're going to miss, even if you could guarantee at the beginning of the year, like sign it pen and paper that he was going to miss 15 games.
09:42 Like I would just rather do that than sign somebody that you know is going to bring you a negative impact while they're actually out on the court.
09:49 Like I, it, to me, like when those opportunities were created and this is also a shortcoming of the front office, there should have just been another player to step up and fill that void, but there never really was.
10:02 It was just kind of.
10:03 - Kelly Oubre played the same position.
10:05 - Yeah, that's true.
10:06 - Two year deal.
10:07 He was that, right?
10:08 - Yeah, no, that's true.
10:09 That was, that was the one.
10:10 The first, whatever.
10:13 Was the first playoff run Kelly Oubre wasn't there for or play in run, right?
10:17 When they played the Pacers, he wasn't.
10:19 Yeah.
10:20 So that, that year when they also, when their, when their big deadline swing, their home run that they hit 420 to left center was Brad Wanamaker in a second round pick.
10:29 That would have been the time to like maybe get somebody in behind Gordon Hayward.
10:34 If you know, or if you have any sort of inkling that maybe this could happen again, because it already has before we have somebody to step up.
10:41 They didn't, they got Gordon or Kelly Oubre the next year.
10:44 So I do got to give him credit for that.
10:46 - I know I made the baseball reference earlier, but I have no idea what you just said about 420 to left field.
10:52 That's like sailed so far over my head.
10:55 I'm so confused.
10:57 - A 420 foot home run to left field.
11:00 I mean, that's actually a pretty short home run now that I really think about it.
11:04 I'd rather hit one like, like 475 and just like tank it into the concession stand back there.
11:10 - You're saying numbers.
11:12 I don't know what you're talking about.
11:14 - Oh, you don't even use feet either.
11:16 Yeah, I've lost you.
11:18 - I'm very confused.
11:20 In his time, RIP 538, ESPN's 538, which has since shut down, but you can still go back and look at the data.
11:30 Gordon Hayward, how many wins above replacement level player do you think he was in 2021 in his first season?
11:37 Probably his best season in Charlotte.
11:42 - I'll probably go, I don't necessarily have as much of a concept of war in basketball.
11:48 Like 2.3 maybe?
11:53 - Very close, three.
11:54 Three wins above replacement level player, right?
11:57 So the Hornets finished with 33 wins, all right?
12:03 The 11th pick.
12:05 If they'd have finished with 30, if they'd had a replacement level player, they would have moved behind the Pelicans, the Kings, and the Bulls in the lottery.
12:15 That would move Charlotte from the James Bucknight draft range into the Kaminga, Franz Wagner, Zion Williams, Mitchell territory.
12:25 They could have even maybe moved up more.
12:28 So not only are you talking about the impact of Hayward not being maybe what you had advertised, but he was part of the issue of the Hornets being this 30 win treadmill, middle of the lottery, NBA no man's land team.
12:45 Like that was part of the issue there.
12:48 So that's, again, another thing that I think works against Hayward.
12:52 You could say the same the next year as well.
12:54 You know, the next year they had that draft that again, they finished in a similar position, partly because of Hayward.
13:01 And now I know here you're like nicking him for, well, he never played, but then you're saying that when he did play, he contributes winning.
13:07 You're talking a little bit out of both sides of the mouth, but I think you have to like look at it from both angles.
13:12 - Yeah, no, and that is definitely fair.
13:15 And one of the things too, is I guess I would say he, while he is part of it, I feel like the bigger part, the most of the part or the majority of it here is that like his contract is big, but it's not like debilitating to like, he wasn't being paid like a maximum salary of like 38 million or $40 million a year, like himself on top of the cap it like, which then would have been like, what?
13:44 Like 48 million or whatever it would have been, it would just been like an astronomical number for anybody, even especially a player that was a one-time all-star.
13:52 But like, it wasn't so big that it couldn't have been built around.
13:55 Like there, every, nearly every team in the league, even at that time had somebody making $30 million.
14:01 Like, did it have to be the best player on the team?
14:04 No, it obviously wasn't because Lomelo was going to be the best player.
14:07 And Terry Rozier obviously had a, had an argument for the best player on the team.
14:11 Even when Gordon Hayward was there, like Miles Bridges was pretty good at times that the year before everything fell apart, but like you couldn't, there was never a point where Gordon Hayward's contract was preventing you from doing anything.
14:23 I guess is really like you could make trades around it.
14:26 Like there was never like a time where you couldn't add another guy that made $20 million or something like that.
14:33 If you needed to, like, they just never really did.
14:36 Wasn't one of the big reasons Hayward was so difficult to trade at the deadline because of that $30 million figure.
14:42 Like if they'd made it declining, he would have been down to, I think $24 million by his final year.
14:48 And then he would have had so many more potential trade options because it's easier to get to $24.
14:53 I mean, maybe this isn't a Hayward issue.
14:55 It's more of a front office issue, but yeah.
14:57 That's, yeah, that would have been my point.
14:59 Yeah. Like there is, there is definitely something here around like, I just don't know if I'll ever buy into this.
15:06 Like what else are you going to do?
15:08 You had to use it in some way.
15:10 There's just too many more ifs and buts.
15:12 Like Gordon Hayward has appeared on the list of worst contracts in the NBA every single year from the minute he signed that deal.
15:19 So yes, there are worse players probably earning even more money.
15:23 I understand that, but when you have someone who can't get on the floor and they're not playing at the level and they're on long-term guaranteed money that isn't declining, it's just too many things.
15:38 I just, you know, and it tricks Charlotte into thinking they had a competitive roster, which they like should, you know, trade stuff away for, for like the Brad Wanamaker, Montress Harrell.
15:48 And for me, it was the timing was off. The timing needed to come a year or two later.
15:54 You needed to stay bottomed out, but it was like, oh, we've managed to sign, we've got LeMelibor on the draft, moved up to the draft lottery.
16:00 Let's quickly, you know, short circuit this rebuild and we can jump back into being competitive.
16:06 And they were technically in those COVID seasons, but we now look back and we go big picture.
16:13 It was a false dawn.
16:15 It just wasn't a true reflection of where the team was.
16:19 And the other argument is like, you need that veteran presence.
16:23 You need the stabilization factor for LeMelibor.
16:26 I mean, outside of Bryce McGowan's doing some workouts, which seem to have sapped his basketball ability last offseason, I didn't hear much about Gordon Hayward.
16:34 I didn't see the Gordon Hayward piece written in the Charlotte Observer about him being the best, you know, the leader this team needs.
16:41 In fact, I feel like we've been talking about for four years how this team has lacked veteran leadership.
16:47 And Gordon Hayward, you would have thought would have a role in helping that.
16:51 But I just don't think he's inclined that way.
16:55 I think he's a lead by example guy.
16:56 That's code for he's not a hoo-hoo-rah-rah kind of guy.
17:00 Again, maybe not Hayward's fault, but I see people using that to justify the signing.
17:05 And I just don't think that's accurate.
17:07 No, that I actually do agree with.
17:10 He's not like a vocal leader at all.
17:13 Like, he seems like more of just like a come to work, like do my job, do it well, lead by example, like you said, and then just kind of go home, chill with my family, enjoy my NBA earnings.
17:26 Like that, which is a perfectly fine way to go about your NBA career and your life.
17:31 Like, I don't blame him for doing that at all.
17:32 But yeah, that would not be a reason why that they signed him, even knowing like even back then.
17:39 I don't think that that would have been a reasoning that the front office would have given was like he's going to be some sort of steward for these young guys and work with them every day and like really get on them and help them become professionals.
17:51 Like, obviously, he probably was just by doing what he does every day.
17:54 Like everybody can pick up on that if they choose to.
17:57 But it was definitely not something that he was going in and advertising every day.
18:01 And maybe on court, like if you want to go that route, that would help.
18:05 But with just the way that he played was a very team friendly and conducive to everyone around him, like succeeding.
18:12 And it's easy to plug and play in different lineups.
18:14 But that's that's a totally different, you know, argument than I think what people are making when they say they signed him for veteran leadership.
18:22 Yeah.
18:24 OK, I know the points you want to hit on Gordon Hayward here.
18:29 I don't think so.
18:30 I just I mean, he's one of my favorite players in the NBA, like in history.
18:35 So I obviously am biased in this whole discussion.
18:38 Like I like watching him as a player, but even like removing that bias, which I think that I'm able to do with how long that I've been covering the NBA and the Hornets.
18:48 I still am going to give him a C plus for this signing.
18:53 I'll get the Hornets and him, I suppose.
18:55 I think his whole tenure slightly above average, bordering on good as if he just may if he played an extra five to 10 games each season.
19:06 I think the narrative about him is just totally different.
19:09 Like and again, a lot of them is and I actually haven't said this word once, I don't think, since the beginning of the pod.
19:16 So I want you to thank me.
19:18 A lot of these injuries were unlucky.
19:20 Like when Van Vliet rolled up on his leg on the layup, like literally dove on top of him like a goofball in a meaningless regular season game and like almost broke his leg again.
19:30 He stepped on Miles Turner's foot doing a step back, which is just like if his foot was three inches to the right, he just catches it from the middle of the paint like he does every other time and runs back on defense like nothing happened.
19:41 And then, I mean, the last couple of years, they've just been kind of like weird, like old man injuries, which that's fine when you're 33 to have weird old man injuries.
19:51 But, you know, if the other ones just didn't happen before or even to a slightly lesser degree, and like you said, he's definitely a slow healer.
19:58 So that did not help.
20:00 But we were close to this being like a really, really impactful signing, I think.
20:06 And even then it still ended up being positive on the court.
20:09 I do want to say congratulations on you, you know, only using the unlucky injuries once.
20:15 Thank you.
20:16 Thank you.
20:17 It took an hour and 20 minutes.
20:18 So I think that's more than OK.
20:21 We didn't mention Robin Hayward, his wife, who took to Instagram to moan about the Hornets medical team.
20:26 She gets a straight A+.
20:28 She gets an A+ Robin Hayward.
20:30 She was like two years ahead of her time.
20:33 Yeah, like like all of her posts are just par for the course.
20:37 If you read the Hornets replies on Twitter, you know, like like people are just like totally biting that like she she was like way ahead of the game with that one.
20:45 So, yeah, definitely.
20:47 I didn't have to think about this one very hard.
20:49 Chase, it's a straight F.
20:51 Everyone said it's bad.
20:52 And the whole NBA, like then it is bad.
20:56 Like sometimes there is no like, well, actually, it's just the truth.
21:00 It's it's it was terrible the minute they did it.
21:03 It's been terrible for four years.
21:05 And the only maybe the only reason to move it from an F is because I think through that trade getting Mieczysz Man and Bertons, like if you didn't sign Hayward, you could never have done that.
21:18 That is maybe the only argument that I would even consider for it to be a D minus.
21:23 But but I'm still not moving it.
21:25 It's a straight F for Gordon Hayward.
21:27 So you went you went C plus.
21:29 We're obviously going to disagree on this one.
21:31 But I feel like.
21:35 Feel like I've been building up to this moment for four years of like trying to happily tell everybody in Hornets community, I told you so.
21:44 And I found this quite cathartic going through this process.
21:48 So thank you.
21:49 Thank you for putting up with my Gordon Hayward rants for the last four years and for the last 20 minutes.
21:55 It is appreciated.
21:57 Of course, it has been difficult to listen to you besmirch the name of one of my favorite basketball players to watch in the history of my NBA fandom.
22:06 But I have thick skin, as does Gordon Hayward, despite his thin bones and his poor ligament structure.
22:15 But here we are.
22:18 And now you've got Poku, who's now your new favorite player.
22:20 Right.
22:21 Oh, yeah.
22:22 So you gave him an F and all this Vasily Michich talk that how much you love him.
22:27 And this is an F. Look what you look at what you're doing to yourself here.
22:31 You you aren't even thankful for what you've gotten from Gordon Hayward.
22:34 He gave you one of your favorite Hornets backup point guards maybe ever.
22:38 And you aren't even thankful you gave him an F.
22:40 I'm not buying this reverse psychology jinx that we're trying right now.
22:46 And we have to finish up here.
22:48 Thank you for listening to this.
22:50 Hopefully you you you enjoyed the discussion and we will catch you next week.
22:56 Thanks, everybody. See you soon.
22:57 See you soon.
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