CHAMPIONS: Hornets Win It ALL in Vegas 🏆 | Kon Knueppel Wins MVP | What Does It All MEAN?!

CHAMPIONS: Hornets Win It ALL in Vegas 🏆 | Kon Knueppel Wins MVP | What Does It All MEAN?!

They denied us the California Classic last year. We were not to be denied this go around. The Charlotte Hornets win the summer league championship. Don Caniple, the first round pick, gets summer league MVP. Let’s talk all about it today on a joyous locked on Hornets. You are Locked on Hornets, your daily Charlotte Hornets podcast. Part of the Locked On podcast network. Your team every day. In a minute cuz we live. [Music] It’s Locked on Hornets, part of the Locked On podcast network. It’s your team every day. Thanks for making us your first listen. We’re free and available anywhere you get your podcast. And that includes YouTube. If you’re watching us on YouTube, then you just saw Doug zoom in on the dream team shirt that I’m wearing to commemorate the 2025 Charlotte Hornets summer league roster. That’s how good they looked this entire session. There’s Doug Branson. Every Hornets boxcore.com. You can also find him on his other podcast locked on NBA where he will gloat. Yes, he will gloat today right in front of the face of Matt Moore and Hayes. Did your team win a summer league championship? No. I am the one that’s the expert on basketball. Go listen to Doug on Locked on NBA. I’m Walker Mail. Listen to me every weekday on WFNZ West and Walker 12 to 3M 927 FM. So, let’s ask the question that Austin Powers asked his authority figure when discussing some of the details of a case that he was working on. But what does it all mean, Basil? What does it mean that the Hornets won the 2025 summer league championship? What does it mean, Doug, that the fourth overall selection that was pretty divisive in Khan Canipple actually gets the MVP award? And despite Khan being a heady basketball player, not only on the court, but off the court, saying KJ Simpson should have won it. If this was an all week award, then KJ should have been the guy that won it because he was the best player all week long. We see you, Khan. I actually think he earned it. I actually think Khan Kipple deserved this MVP award. So, what does it all mean to you? Well, I could tell you what it all means, but I think because we’ve eclipsed 9,000 subscribers and we are rocketing on our way to 10,000 subscribers on YouTube. Yes, we passed the Locked On Sons podcast on YouTube. Thank you to everyone out there. Now, keep going because I think we have to catch the Locked on Blazers podcast next, which might be difficult, which might be difficult because they are getting a lot of international fans right now. So, I could tell you, but I think it’s better to tell you and show you. And I can only do that with one thing, and that’s the biggest dub of the biggest dub hat since its creation. That’s what this is. I mean, it’s it sounds ridiculous. It looks ridiculous. It sounds insane to say, but this is the biggest win in in the franchise uh since they went to the playoffs in 2015 16. Look, the Charlotte Hornets came to Vegas with a goal in mind, and that was to win the summer league championship. And everybody had that goal. But I think you even heard head coach Chris Gent say that that goal was being mirrored or started even by Khan Canipple, the guy that they drafted fourth overall, who came into this game with a compression headband to keep the swelling down and a bandage over five stitches on his right eye from where he had a really hard fall that knocked him out of the previous game. He avoids the concussion somehow and is able not only to play in this game but hit the biggest shot in this game when all of the other dra high draft picks said, “You know what? It’s summer. I’m going to go start my vacation early.” Kod Caniple said, “You know what? I’m going to go help my team win basketball games. I’m going to go ahead and win the MVP of summer league.” Um, they had a goal. They they achieved the goal. They won the summer league championship. And honestly, I think it’s huge. I think hopefully it leaks into the varsity team. But the the thing is Charles Lee came into this team when he became head coach and said everything matters and this to me symbolizes that. It means that they actually meant it when they said everything matters. It was beautiful. So that that’s one of two things I think this highlights. I think that that you just mentioned. Does everything matter or doesn’t everything matter? You get to decide. How much do you care about winning this championship? How much do you care about getting better every single day? Which Charles Lee tells you when he’s going with the in-game interview with the broadcast crew? He tells you, “We’re obsessed with getting better.” That’s what that’s the culture that we’re trying to instill in this organization. We’re obsessed with getting better every single day. Okay. Do you mean it or do you not mean it? Talk. Is it Is this just something you say? Is this just something you say at the broadcast at the broadcast booth or do you mean it? I think it gives life to actually, you know, living by what you preach. The second thing is this highlights Khan Canipple being able to get the job done. This highlights he’s going to be fine. I’m not saying that he’s going to be the best player. It doesn’t mean that they made the right decision. You you I’ll let you cook in a second. It It doesn’t mean that Khan Canipple is the best player in this draft. It doesn’t mean that he’s the best one outside of Cooper. None of that. What it does mean is that with what was a pretty divisive selection, a lot of people in AC’s camp, yeah, easy to understand why guy’s got a lot of tools. A lot of people in VJ Edgecomb’s camp couldn’t take him. A lot of people in Trey Johnson’s camp, we raised our hand a little bit there. We like Trey Johnson. We would have gone with him over Khan. But when they selected Khan, I could see the vision then and then it was a little bit murkier after that first game. Hm. All right. little scary. Got to his spots, made smart decisions, but and it’s still some some rough some rough action from Khan Kipple in the first summer league game. Misses the second one and then plays really every other game after that and then shows you, yeah, I can win MVP. I can get downhill. If I get my shoulder square with the baseline, then a lot of good things happen. I’m kicking out. I might just use my body and take on that bump and then hit a layup. I’m going to hit open threes like the clutch one he hit yesterday inside 40 seconds to help win that championship. I think it highlights Charles Lee and Jeff Peterson and the culture that they’re trying to instill. I think it highlights that and I think this win highlights Khan Kipple being fine. He’s going to be just fine. Yeah, I think we ought to stick with Kanipple for a minute, but I want to get to KJ Simpson at some point because I think that uh well, let’s talk about it because you could talk about championship game MVP. Khan wins that. He showed up. 21 points in this game, five rebounds, two assists. Uh eight of 21 from the field, four three-pointers made, four of 11. The the efficiency uh is pretty much summer league efficiency for me. It’s fine. And he hit the big shot when it mattered. He was constantly hitting the floor. And again, it didn’t mage on his head. He looked like head wound hairy. Like he looked like a mix between the guy that takes the game too seriously at the Y and the guy who just snuck out of the hospital. Like I like it looked like a like it looked like a pro wrestling thing. like he should have come out in a wheelchair. Oh, he’s hobbled. No, no, he’s got the steel chair and he’s hitting the Sacramento Kings over the head and the Hornets win the game. And honestly, they had this game lock. It felt like they had this game locked up in the first quarter. They doubled up the Sacramento Kings. It was uh 32-6 at one point. And then the Sacramento Kings said, “Oh, actually, we’re going to put on ball pressure now. We want to win this thing. We want to win our third summer league championship as a franchise.” And so they they started to put the sticks to the Hornets a little bit and the Hornets never really relinquished the lead but they had to have big shots from Khan Canipple uh from I think KJ hit a few big ones. Damen Ball was big in this game for helping to keep that lead. Ryan Caulk Brener his defense was amazing. So many things to highlight but you got to look at what Khan Canipple was able to do particularly in the second half to steady this team. his vision on the floor, uh, his constant fight. I just I I loved what Khan Canipple did in this game and really all summer long. I think he’s the I think he’s the real deal. I do, too. All right, let’s move on. Let’s continue to talk about the summer league championship, the first one ever. Coming up next on the Lockdown Hornets podcast everywhere. See, Dream Team, if you’re watching at home, this is the dream team that we’re talking about today. Move over Dream Team. more con thoughts also some coaulbriner some of the other guys that we want to highlight what does it all mean I mean it’s a championship Monday baby that’s what we’re celebrating around here more still to come l [Music] first I want to tell you this episode is brought to you by Monarch Money wish managing your money felt easier with Monarch Money it can be whether you’re growing your savings or planning a big purchase Monarch puts you in the driver’s seat it’s like having your own personal CF FO giving you full visibility and control over your finances. Monarch Money isn’t more is more, excuse me, than a budgeting app. It is more goodness gracious, Monarch Money. 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You wanted to dive into KJ Simpson a little more who if you look at his summer league maybe Khan Kipple did have a point that if it was a weekl long award KJ should have won MVP he was four of 15 in this game against the Kings 11 points five assists only three turnovers seven rebounds too that should be mentioned with what KJ did. You go to that 29point victory over OKC in the NBA summer league semi-final. KJ Simpson still not a whole lot of points. Eight points, three of nine, 0 of four from the Gotta sneak it in there. Three of nine from the field, 0 of four from three-point range, 10 rebounds. Like just kind of a maniac going towards the rack in summer league, which was really cool to see. Uh against the Spurs, there was the 19-point banger. He was five of six from the free throw line. You know, I won’t go down the list, but some good stats overall from KJ. What did you think of the secondyear player who felt like the leader of this team all the way through? Yeah, Coniple, championship game MVP. I’m just going to say it right now. Uh KJ Simpson, team MVP. And you have to look, you know how I love my stats. I love my box score stats. And KJ Simpson put plenty of those uh on the box score, particularly early on in summer league. And you got to have every win. I mean, you really have to sweep this thing to win this thing. And KJ was a huge part of it. But then you look beyond the stat sheet and you see a guy in KJ Simpson that was like he didn’t have to establish himself as a leader. He just was the leader of this team. It wasn’t Tan Salon. It wasn’t Jaylen Sims who has spent a lot of time in Greensboro. It wasn’t Coniple, the fourth overall pick. It was KJ Simpson, the second round pick, who’s not even on a guaranteed contract. He’s on a two-way contract. But he came in here like a bowling ball, like a Tasmanian devil, uh like a man, you called him a maniac, like a bulldog. a lot of the stuff that we heard about him pre-draft, he’s just living that more fully uh this summer than we’ve ever seen him before and and as a leader, like get hearing him miked up and telling guys like, “Hey, you you know, you have to be in certain positions. Hey, you got to think. You got to use your head.” Like he wasn’t afraid to use his voice. And I’m telling you one thing, like if you want a spot on this team under Charles Lee, you better know how to use your voice. You better know how to talk and talk loud. And that’s what KJ Simpson was doing. and he was backing it up. And and I’ll say another thing, it didn’t matter if KJ Simpson was shooting well or not. He was still competing on defense. He was still getting insane rebounds numbers for his height and for his position. And he was he was impacting the game even if his shooting. And that that has to be something that the Hornets absorb as a team because too often even when they were healthy over the past couple of seasons, they would let bad offense leak into everything else that they tried to do in a game. And again, this is not a super talented team that can afford really to take any defensive possessions off. And so when they let the bad offense leak into the bad defense, that’s how they got blown out even when they were healthy. So that mentality that I think Coniple has too because he struggled in this game. He started one of six from three in this game. But he kept shooting and he kept playing the rest of the game. That’s the key. That’s what the Hornets have to absorb and they’ve got a great lesson here in KJ Simpson and Khan Canipple. Yeah. Speaking of just highlighting a whole bunch of stuff. What else do we want to mark with our highlighter? I think specifically with KJ Simpson, what does that represent? What is his growth from his rookie season to his second year based on what we saw in summer league? So again, right, like as as much as we want to put on the big dub hat, I think you should put on the big dub hat. If you had two, I’d tell you to put that one on as well, but I do. I’m wearing one right now. You just can’t see it. Yeah. Perfect. Great. Uh I don’t want to ask any more questions than that. If we want to talk about what it all represents, still understanding the context of it being summer league. The coaching staff, they’ve improved a couple of players. We’ve seen progress. We saw Tan Salon come in early on in summer league and show us some progress. We see KJ Simpson, who was the bulldog you speak of coming out of Colorado State, speaking with people um as soon as he was drafted by the Hornets in the second round just last year. I’ll run through a brick wall. He’s crying because he cares so much. So, it’s easy to see how you could fall in love with this guy as a prospect. But also, he needed to improve on the court. Yet, you did see that. We did get to see that this goaround as being that leader as a two-way contract guy with all of these other players around him that are younger that might look to him to guidance and apparently they all received it pretty well with Khan saying he should have won MVP with everyone else pointing to KJ as that leader. Yeah, I think the coaching staff, they can celebrate a little bit just because we’re able to see the growth from a lot of these players. Maybe even from the beginning of summer league to the end of summer league in that five, six game sample depending on how many games players played and from last year to this year. You can see the growth in the maturity of a lot of these younger players. Well, and he’s proved positive. Really, this entire team has proved positive that this organization, this front office has a type and and now we have proof that that type can lead to winning something. Okay. Yes, it it is just summer league. Summer League is for feelings, though. If my eyes look puffy, it’s because I was up until 2 a.m. writing Every Hornets box score and because I was crying. And I know I’m not the only one out there because I paid attention to the Every Hornets box score chat. I know you cried too because this team has not won a conference. They’ve not been to a conference championship ever, much less won one. They haven’t won a playoff series in nearly a decade. They have well or they haven’t won a playoff series in nearly two decades. They haven’t been to a playoff series in a decade. And they’ve never played on Christmas Day for Santa’s sake. I mean, they’ve done nothing except provide us with the joy of cheering uh for our hometown team. That’s it. They don’t have any hardware. And so this is proof that their mindset of how to how to bring in players actually leads to something. Yes. Now the varsity team has to do it. Now they now they have to continue to reconfigure this roster in a way that’s going to actually win something at the NBA level. But this is a great start. and and and also they drafted four guys that they’re going to add to this rotation over the next four or five seasons. I don’t know how you can come away from this summer league with anything but like thrilled vibes about where the Horn not only where the Hornets are going to be this season, but where the Hornets are going over the next four to five years. And they did it all without PJ Hall, who Hornets fans love and to a level I I didn’t quite expect. I knew we loved him after some dunks that he had just a couple games ago, but boy, we really, really, really love PJ Hall, especially after he signed that two-way contract with Memphis and was not available for this one. Let’s hold that thought. Let’s go uh to the other side and then discuss some of the things we may have seen in this game in the semi-final game. That’s coming up next on the Locked On Hornets podcast. PJ Hall, he’s everywhere. Yeah, PJ Hall no longer a Charlotte Hornet. instead he’s a Memphis Grizzly but we’ll get into what we saw from KG Brener. We’ll get into what we saw a little more just within the specifics of Khan Canipple’s game and share you uh share some more observations with you that’s still to come. Final segment LOH. [Music] All right, let’s get to maybe the specifics of the game and the tournament, what we saw, the skill sets that we saw on display. Where do you want to go here, Doug? More con talk. Do you want to go with Kaulk Brener, who played in every single one of these summer league games? Interesting session for him. Where do you want to go? I just found this stat. Uh, do you know how many rings Paul George has? I do. It’s pretty easy to guess. I I know that it’s zero. He’s got zero. The answer is zero. You know how many rings that Khan Canipple, KJ Simpson, Ryan Kulk, Briner, Jaylen Sims, MJ Walker, Josh Aduro, DJ Rodman, Damen B, James Banks, uh PJ Hall, you know how many rings they have? Uh do do they give rings for summer league championships? They absolutely freaking do. And they are huge and beautiful. All of them have one ring. I saw the ring ceremony. No, I How many How many do they have, Doug? How many? They have one. Well, they have I mean, if you count them all together, it’s probably because, you know, Salon gets one, McNeely gets one. They were all injured. Seion James PJ Hall gets one. Conadel said PJ Hall still gets one. So, he was there. He was on the bench. Uh even though he was signed by Memphis. Uh PJ, if they had lost, it was going to be PJ Hall a shame, though. Like I mean I would never have forgiven PJ Hall if they had lost this game particularly because of how close it was, how the margins were at the end of this game. Insane ending. Nobody could score. The defense was crazy. Everybody wanted this. It was so fun. I can’t stress this enough because I know I know Listen, people that read Every Hornets Box score, people that are everydayers on this podcast, I don’t need to convince you of the emotions that went into this, how how we’re feeling. I none of this is going to be foreign to you because you’ve lived all of the trauma that we have all lived through, okay? Some longer than others. But to people, this is going to seem ridiculous to people who just check in with this show uh because of the Mark Williams trade. I know we still have some like stray Lakers fans. We do. Yeah, it’s hilarious to see. Yeah, but like they’re going to see this as ridiculous. But you have to understand that the Hornets have not even in the games that they’ve played of consequence, the two playin games. What happened in those games? They got absolutely smoked. Why? Because they did not enter that game with any either of those playin games with any kind of sense of urgency that was anywhere close to what this team was able to enter this game with and finish this game with. That’s, you know, it’s it’s just I want it so bad for the varsity team. It was beautiful to see with the JV team. Well, and and even in Summer League in years past, you know, I remember I think it was two years ago. Well, well, right. They’d get destroyed. I mean, the first Summer League game a couple of years ago. Uh they’re down like 20 immediately by the time they get to halftime. And I remember the Rick Ross diving board GIF was going along at that time and I said, “This is the Hornets jumping into summer league. This is what we all we all expect when the Hornets go into summer league cuz they never gave us a point guard just for years and years and years. They never assembled a team the type of way that you would want your GM to assemble a team and they have the last couple of years and guess what? They performed really well in the California Classic and they performed well this year. Now it does have to go well with the varsity squad. It does. But I think you can see things heading the right direction. What were they getting paid for? What were they taking your hard-earned season ticket money and what the hell were they doing with it? If the Hornets could do this, it just puts into perspective everything that happened in those summer leagues. Everything that happened in the regular season and in those playin games where they thought, well, we’ll just roll the ball out here. We’ll develop some young we’ll develop some young players, you know, like I mean, ridiculous. It puts into perspective all of that. Um, I’m fired up if you can’t tell. Pretty fired up. We should talk a little more about PJ Hall because I I Hornets community Twitter was going through it before the game last night. Uh Sham Shirania tweeted out just hours before tip. The Memphis Grizzlies are signing forward PJ Hall to a two-way NBA contract. And yeah, so he he did not play for this game uh for the Hornets in this game because he wasn’t a Hornet anymore. He had signed a contract, a two-way deal with the Grizzlies. Um, I think he would have been my choice to have that last two-way contract if it was going to be KJ Simpson. If it was going to be Damen Ball on the other, or excuse me, Peterson who signed the two-way deal. If it was going to be him and PJ Hall would have been my choice. As much as Damen actually showed you some stuff last night, I actually like Damen Ball for what he is. Uh, he’ll he’ll get the two-way now. It seems like I I shouldn’t assume because it could be from another team, but Peterson gets it and then PJ Hall would have been my next choice. I thought he was good. I thought he had some athleticism. I thought he had some nasty. Those dunks were awesome. He was athletic. Uh like he wasn’t afraid to bow you like that. That’s fine. I I want that in a in a two-way guy. Just wants to show up for the moment. I want that. So I Yes, I would have handed him the two-way contract. felt like there was a lot of a lot of unnecessary frustration in PJ Hall signing a two-way deal with the Grizzlies because it felt like people thought this was going to have a huge huge impact on what was going to happen with the Hornets next year. And I’ll just say this, if you felt like PJ Hall was going to provide a monster impact for this Hornets team going into next year, then you thought we were already crazy down bad. And if that’s the case, then we can’t be saved. But I love PJ. I would have given him the two-way. Like, hey, awesome stuff. Those dunks were great. But yeah, like let’s call it what it is. As we get carried away wearing the big dub hat and celebrating a summer league championship. As we get carried away, understandably so. Let’s chill just a tiny bit on losing PJ to the Grizzlies. Nope. Nope. Walker speaks for himself. He does not speak for the entire show. Summer is for feelings. You know how I feel about this. Get all into your PJ Hall feelings. I will say if the if if the if the organization had put together a center rotation to this point that gave anyone any kind of confidence, people would not feel this way about PJ Hall. They would say, well, PJ didn’t have a shot anyway. But Cogrinter did not. Cog Briner did good things and he did bad things. He looks like a rookie and so but he did not instill like, oh, this guy is going to be immediate. I don’t care what the hell that depth chart that they kept putting up. They put it up again last night. remove Josh’s name, have Den Witty over Trey, man. Like, it’s just they just threw names at this, but they still have Cochrin starter. He’s not starting. There’s no way that is happening on a team that wants to be competitive. He has so many growth points to make before he is at that level. I don’t care what this center rotation looks like. But had they put something together that was a little bit more NBA ready, then I don’t think people would feel this way about PJ Hall. I think part of the feelings were, hey, this guy’s actually got a chance to compete with Kaulk Brener and and Moose and Mason Plumbley with some minutes on this team and then he goes to uh the Memphis Grizzlies. But look, they obviously they didn’t want to rush the decision. They’re probably looking at ball. They may be looking at some other folks and hey, guess what? Musa Diabate, that’s where he came from, right? So before you go saying, “Oh, well, what have they done?” Like, you have to look and and say this organization does like to look in a lot of places. They like to keep their options open. Thankfully, this version of the organization doesn’t like to keep their options open at the 15th roster position like the former administration did. No, they just like to keep their options open on the two-ways. And so, look, PJ got an opportunity. I kid with the trader stuff. Salute to PJ. He gave his heart and soul and he was one. He helped like Codimple did. KJ Simpson did, but also PJ Hall helped to set the tone of like we’re going to go out and and try to dunk you out of the gym through the ground into the core of the earth. Like that was P that that was the identity that PJ Hall was helping to establish. So salute PJ, you earned your ring. Congratulations. But if if we had lost PJ Hall a shame and for sure no fun player though. PJ Hall no longer with us. He signs a two-way deal with a different team. And now you’re right. Like that’s what I was looking at too. It’s here’s Peterson on a two-way contract. God almighty, hit the damn sound. I hate it. Trust me, I don’t want this. Trust me, I don’t want this any more than you do listening to this podcast. I In fact, In fact, I hate it way more than you do listening to it. I I can’t help but I look, I’m not laughing at you. I’m laughing with the listeners. We record in the morning. This is what I’m like in the morning apparently now for the last month. And so anyways, uh PJ Hall, really good player at first summer league and what he was able to provide, but he goes somewhere else. Any other uh details um or observations from what we saw? Uh Cochrinter, five of six, 15 points. One of the bigger point totals he put up and Cochrinter is good at getting himself in position to to make the oop play or to make the easy, you know, dunk and dish and dunk. you know, he’s really good at putting himself in that position. Hands are a little bit of an issue, though. I mean, he he did fumble away some good looks. They’re not all going to be perfect. You know, it’s it’s difficult to judge a big in summer league who cannot create for himself because he by virtue of that, he must be created for. And oftentimes in summer league, the people that are creating for the bigs aren’t as good as the players that they are going to be getting feeds from. Uh, so like simple post entry plays become a little bit of an adventure every single time. So it is difficult to judge that. But I would say there were a few plays even in this game where I’m like hands Ryan Caulpin please secure that basketball and do something with it. Uh, but nine rebounds did have a block in this game. I thought he was a factor uh down low. And there was one play where like he hits the deck going for a board. He gets a a he draws a foul, offball foul because he’s dragged down to the ground and you could just see his chest moving up and down sucking oxygen because, you know, he was putting it all out there. He was giving it all up. Um, so, you know, I I thought Cochrinter did enough and particularly in this game because he was up against Maxim Reo, who you and I were both huge fans of, and I wanted the Hornets to take both of these guys because I thought it gave you a little offense defense to look at at the center position. But I think Caulbrinter had the better game. Maxim was played off the floor because his defense was so bad. Caulk Briner was not played off the floor. In fact, he was a vital part of this win. Um I I would say with Kaul Briner, the good stuff is I still think his touch is really nice once he gets his hands on the basketball. He finishes a lot around the rim. I think he had four early buckets. Hit a three. Doug, you give me two threes from the big man. All right, I’ll take it. There’s something to work with there. He made two in summer league and made this one wide open. People just sagging way off of them. Defenses are still going to sag way off of them to just kind of pack the paint and that’ll be fine. Caulkrunner, you’ll you’ll still probably take your chances with him missing those, but if he can hit one every once in a while, that’s exactly what he did in this session. So, I’m glad he hit the three. He does have a nice soft touch when Khan Canipple just kept feeding him beautiful lobs, lead passes on the pick and roll. Uh he did a nice job of getting positioning in transition. So when the ball was changing possession, Khan and Ryan Caulkrunner had a great twoman game. But this is what Khan does. Like actually, I’ll allow the Caulkrunner discussion to parlay into a pair somebody with Khan discussion and LaMelo. So I think what Kauler did through what he was able to do well with the twoman game with Khan and LaMelo, it it’s not like what it’s not because of what he didn’t do well. It’s more so because of what he did do well that I want it at a higher level. I want to go out and get another center that can really play off of LaMelo and Khan because I’ve seen what it can look like between LaMelo and Mark who Mark Williams had a bunch of flaws. But two-man game between those two guys just as that lob threat that was awesome to see from your primary ball handler Khan Canipple, he made beautiful music with Kaman Malawatch at Duke. He did the same thing with Kaulk Briner here uh in summer league. Khan and the big guy like it that whoever plays center for a team with Khan Canipple on it, you’re going to get some awesome lead passes, some lobs, and that’s a guy that can feed you like four to six points a game depending on his usage rate. Well, Musa too, Doug, like I actually think some lead passes from Musa where Musa will dunk on you. I I Yeah, again, he’s shorter, but like Musa with some of those lobs and and just the rim running stuff. Oh, yeah. Give Khan a rim runner. give LaMelo a rim runner. Now you got a back court that can facilitate at that kind of level. So there’s some things to like about Caulk Briner, what Khan did with the big guys. But those are some takeaways, some other takeaways that I had watching this session. So Khan Kipple, MVP. He hits the shot with 35 seconds to go that essentially put them into guaranteed free throw game. So he was the clutch player of the game. But I have to shout out Ryan Cochrinter for getting fouled on a three-point shot. He was one of one from three, but really kind of sneak two of two, although I think he missed one of the free throws, but still he gets fouled on the three-pointer, getting respect from this summer league squad, and I hope it continues into the bigs. And then on that coniple three, guess who hit a bone crushing screen to help open that up? Oh, yeah. I mean, just so many. It was Ryan Caulrin. Um, all right, let me do some rapid fire shoutouts here. I’m just going to kind of go down the box score. I think we’ve talked enough about Cochran, Canipple, Suh Simpson. How about Jaylen Sims, the Greensboro Swarm superstar in this summer league, seven of eight from the free throw line, and I think he got six of those free throws made before he ever got a field goal. He just kept driving, kept getting contact. Um, he’s been huge over this summer, and I hope he sticks for with the Greensboro Swarm, but I think he’s also a threat to go find a contract somewhere else. real real quickly feels like maybe a um Marcus Garrett Wendell Moore kind of guy that you might call up in a pinch where you need bodies. It that’s the kind of body that’s the kind of player that Jaylen Sims seems to be which again might be in the danger zone if you’re doing that too many times but maybe Jaylen Sims is first in line for that kind of opportunity with all the G-League guys. Yeah, he looks I mean he got a little bit of time with the varsity squad at the very end of last year. He looks like a better player. He looks bigger, stronger, and he just looks more confident. So, again, hope he lands in Greensboro. Maybe he lands the other. Maybe he gets it over ball. I don’t know what they’re thinking right now. Uh, but that wouldn’t that would not shock me if that happened. Uh, Josh Aduro, man, big physical guy. I love this guy. Nine rebounds in this game. He really stepped up. No PJ Hall, so he had to step up in a backup big role. And then James Banks, you know, throws himself out of the game with a ridiculous violent elbow that he had no business doing that. Come on, James Banks. What are you doing? So then Aduro comes right back in and he just kept getting traffic rebound after traffic rebound in a game where points and possessions were hard to come by at the end of the game. I thought Aduro was was such a sneak star of the back end of this game. Same too with DJ Rodman, who I thought made big defensive plays and big rebounds. Sound familiar? Doing it like his daddy. Yeah. Uh, and plus even some things that is not like his dad hitting a three-pointer and just showing a lot of ball control. When the ball was in his hands, I felt totally comfortable with what he was going to decide to do. So, so good stuff there. All right, that’ll do it. That’s a championship edition, folks. I never thought I’d see the day, but it’s here. A championship edition of Locked On Hornets. Doug Branson every boxcore.com. Locked on NBA. He gets to gloat right in the face of Matt Moore and Hayes today. Make sure you go check that out. Make sure that’s your second listen. And I’m Walker Mail. Listen to me. WFNZ every weekday from 12 to 3 PM. Have a great rest of your day. We’ll be back with you tomorrow. Look at that big dub. The c the camera won’t focus, but it’s still beautiful. [Music]

The Charlotte Hornets capped off Summer League with their first championship in franchise history, led by MVP Kon Knueppel and tone-setting performances from K.J. Simpson. Doug and Walker break down what the win means for the culture Charles Lee is building—and why fans should be feeling more hopeful than ever.

It’s a CHAMPIONSHIP MONDAY for the Charlotte Hornets—and yes, we’re putting on the big dub hat and feeling all the feelings. The Hornets won their first Summer League title in franchise history, with rookie Kon Knueppel taking home MVP honors after a gutsy performance. But K.J. Simpson may have been the heart and soul of the team, leading on both ends of the court with bulldog energy and vocal leadership that perfectly mirrors Charles Lee’s “everything matters” mantra.

Doug and Walker break down how this win isn’t just a Summer League footnote—it’s a cultural signal. They discuss how Knueppel bounced back from a rocky debut, how his two-man game with Ryan Kalkbrenner might hint at LaMelo Ball synergy, and why the coaching staff’s influence is already showing results. They also get into PJ Hall’s departure to Memphis on a two-way deal, what it says about the Hornets’ center depth, and whether fans are right to be frustrated by the move.

Plus: DJ Rodman channels his father, Jaylen Sims makes his case for a call-up, and Damian Baugh impresses. It may just be Summer League, but for long-suffering Hornets fans—this one felt different.

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