Hornets WAIVE Nick Smith Jr., Closing the Book on the DISASTROUS Jalen Duren Trade!

Hornets WAIVE Nick Smith Jr., Closing the Book on the DISASTROUS Jalen Duren Trade!

The Hornets are finalizing their roster by cutting it down ever so slightly. Nick Smith Jr. the next guy waved. There’s only one more to go. We’ll process the Nick Smith Jr. wave and figure out who’s next. All today on Locked on Hornets. You are Locked on Hornets, your daily Charlotte Hornets podcast, part of the Locked Onet. 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. There’s Doug Branson. Every hornetsboxcore.com. Also a producer on Yahoo Sports Daily with Jason Fitz and Caroline Fenton. and I’m Walker Mail. Listen to me WFNZ every weekday from 12 to 3 PM. Sports Radio 927 WFNZ. This episode is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers can bet just $5. And if your bet wins, you’ll get $300 in bonus bets to use across the app. Download the app today. We always appreciate FanDuel for their support. Got some news today. Doug got some AB block material. Michael Scott tweeted out earlier about 4 hours ago. The Charlotte Hornets are waving Nick Smith Jr. League sources told Hoops Hype he averaged 9.9 points, 2.4 assist, and 22.8 minutes while starting 27 of 60 games played for Charlotte last season. He shot 37% from three-point range so far during his NBA career. So, couple things to take care of just real quickly. Who was Nick Smith Jr. as a Charlotte Hornet? Well, again, he did play in 60 games last year. He appeared in 111 games overall over each of the last two seasons. He did play almost 23 minutes per game last season. Started those 27 as Michael Scott mentioned. Only shot 39% from the field. He shot 43% from three his rookie year. Remember he was towards the top at one point leading all rookies in NBA in three-point shooting. That might have actually been the case at the end of his rookie season. That shooting percentage went down significantly from 43 to 34. and he averaged again the 9.9 points per game. So actually I don’t want to say decent numbers not efficiencywise but did get a decent amount of run but in the end when you sign all of the guards Doug when you acquire Colin Ston when you bring back Trey man you even sign Spencer Denwitty you draft Khan Canipple you draft Liam McNeely who’s a more of a wing but still you draft James you you got all of the guards And unfortunately, it always felt like this was going to happen. It felt like the easiest cut to make after Dcoin Jeff was let go. So, he’s the first domino to fall. Nick Nick Smith Jr. always felt like the second domino to fall. And that officially happened today. Yeah, this is obviously uh not a surprise to us. It’s not a surprise to anyone who’s been listening this off seasonason as we’ve been trying to sort of map out how the Hornets were going to end up cutting cutting this roster down. Um Nick Smith Jr. came in uh with you know obviously that first year in Arkansas was marred by injury and so a lot of people were leaning on the high school tape and he was a highly touted prospect going into his one and only year at college. So, people were leaning on that, saying there’s a lot of potential, there’s a lot of promise. Uh, but you have to be patient and you have to give him an opportunity. And I think in fairness to the Charlotte Hornets, I think they did give him those opportunities both in Greensboro, but also with the big club. I think all you can ask for as a young developing prospect is to get some run uh have a few uh injuries, give you an opportunity, and he certainly he had that. Uh but unfortunately what he didn’t have was consistency as an offensive player. But I have a lot of respect for Nick Smith Jr. because he did uh fight back from that injury and and did uh improve his game. I think particularly defensively committed last season to what Charles Lee wanted to do defensively with this team. It’s just that offense was ne never able to justify I think a lot of the just natural physical negatives and skill negatives that came with him on the defensive end of the floor. And then early earlier in his career with the Charlotte Hornets, I think the game he was moving a little fast, the game was moving a little fast for him. It started to slow down, but I just think he ran out of time in Charlotte as they started to shift. They’ve started now to shift towards more veterans, more players that can actually help them win now and out of the development focus that they’ve been in for a few seasons now. As far as getting the opportunity, absolutely did. I just mentioned it. Appeared in 111 games, started 27 last year. Yeah, a lot of your opportunity came because of injury, but you were awarded more of an opportunity than a lot of second round picks. And he wasn’t a second rounder to be clear. He was a 27th overall pick. So, I shouldn’t say you get more than a lot of seconds, but maybe you even got more than what your play dictated. Um, especially your rookie season because there just wasn’t a lot of talent on the roster and the talent that was here. They’re banged up constantly and they hit IR all the time. So, there you go. You got a lot of opportunity. And I think this coaching staff did like Nick Smith Jr. enough to keep giving him a go at it. And he was not drafted by this regime. He was drafted by the old one. And I do feel like Charles Lee came aboard and said, “There’s something here. I want to explore it. In summer league, we’re going to throw everything at you. You’re going to you’re going to guard the opposing team’s best player in summer league. We’re going to challenge you to facilitate more playmake for others while also finishing better at the rim.” And he worked at it. That’s the unfortunate part of all of this. And we’ve mentioned this before. Feel like we should say it again. James Booknight got plenty of opportunity here. Did not go as even swimmingly as the Nick Smith Jr. experience did and didn’t handle it well. Did not handle it at all. Tried to fight the coach. Tried to handle the coach by the neck. I just I mean the the James Book Knight stuff is truly wild. That draft in 2021, some truly wild stuff. But Book Knight got the opportunity, didn’t do the most with it, and and obviously also handled it poorly. Nick Smith Jr., everything that you would hear, everything you saw, everything you heard from him specifically, all was glowing, all was, “Hey man, I I care about this. I want to work at it. I appreciate the coaches throwing all of this at me. I want to get better.” I’ve interviewed him, I think, twice, maybe maybe three times. Always a delight, like talking with him. Really cool dude. uh and like funny too. Like I liked his personality. This this was going to happen. I tweeted it out. It was unfortunate yet inevitable at the same time. The Hornets shifted towards all the best players that we can go after are all guards. I we want to get faster. We are going to lean all the way into offense with the lack of front court depth and the lack of centers that we have. So Nick Smith Jr. is a victim of all of that. Deserves a spot in the NBA, but he’ll get one. Yeah, he has a great attitude. I mean, that that will take you and and he does have like a just a good rhythm on his shot, a good shot form, and so he gets in the right sit situation and gets hot, then yeah, I mean, he could he’s a fringe NBA player in between the GLeague and, you know, the back end of an NBA roster. So, that that’s going to take you a long way. I just think if one of those skills would have come along, been more consistent, been able to be counted on. You talk about the playmaking. I mean, there were just simple passes, particularly in transition, that you take for granted because you see them a thousand times as you watch an NBA season pass by. There were just passes that he couldn’t make. And it was just it was disappointing. Uh because the Hornets, I think, wanted to run. And we’ve talked about it a lot. Why couldn’t they run? Why weren’t they a faster paced team? Even though year after year, they’ve been saying, “We want to get faster.” And it was because there were several players on the roster. Ball gets in their hands in transition and and bad things happened. Uh turnovers happen. They were ineffective in transition. That wasn’t all Nick Smith Jr.’s fault, but he was one uh piece of that. The the final thing that I’ll say is that he may also have been a victim of what all of these teams are starting to learn about the collective bargaining agreement, which is that if you want your books to be healthy in this second apron territory, particularly if you’re trying to compete, the thing you have to do is is draft a lot draft and and really hit on some of those players and and sign them to longer term deals on small money. So, like if you look at uh Seion James and Ryan Cochr Brener, both drafted in the second round, both signed and in the upper part of the second round where where players do usually get guaranteed money, but those guys signed four-year deals with club options in the fourth year at around 2.2, you know, accelerated up to like 2.7 2.9 in the final year with the club option. But that’s that that gives particularly if Cion one of Seion James Ryan Cochrren or even um um Lee McNeely if one of those players hits it just gives you so much flexibility both in both in trade conversations but also in being able to invest more in the top of your roster and not get yourself into trouble. So, you add four players. Yeah, that’s you add four rookies, that’s going to tighten up the rest of the roster. And and he was a victim of that. All right, coming up next on the Lockown Hornets podcast. Everywhere, more Nick Smith Jr. discussion. How the Hornets acquired him is actually an interesting story and does feel like the very very end of I I shouldn’t say that, but we’re close. We are close to the end of the mistakes made by the Cupcheck Jordan era. We’ll talk about it more coming up next. LH. [Music] This episode is brought to you by Skiims. We appreciate Skiims as always. 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But remember, the Hornets acquired him because in 2022, the Hornets had the 13th and the 15th pick in that NBA draft. Wow. Loved the conversation going into that one. Remember those episodes? Well, who are they going to take? One pick in the lottery, just in one pick just outside the lottery. Seems like a real opportunity to improve the talent on your roster. Okay. So, I remember the Hornets selecting number 13 overall, Jaylen Duran, a guy that you and I were both very high on. A guy that you and I both loved. And I also remember tweeting out, “I know the Hornets too well to understand that the possibility of them trading this pick immediately is all the way all the way here. It’s all too possible.” Sure enough, they do it and everybody makes fun of me because I called my shot. I called the Hornet shot for him. They trade Jaylen Duran. Not only did they trade Jaylen, it it’s it it was a very weird trade. In fact, Ben Roarbach of Yahoo Sports wrote this on June 23rd, 2022. In one of the strangest trades of NBA draft night, the Detroit Pistons acquired University of Memphis big man Jaylen Duran in a three-way deal with the New York Knicks and the Charlotte Hornets. And what the Hornets got out of that was the Denver 2023 first round selection and four second round picks over the next two years, all via the Knicks. Okay, so the 2023 first from Denver ended up being the 27th selection in 2023. Thus, the Hornets take Nick Smith Jr., why was that one of the worst moves of the Jordan Cupcheck era, Doug Branson? This is why I’m sicker than you, by the way. Like, if we were to do a sick because you called the shot, I had hope. I saw the Jaylen Duran dick come in and I thought, my ship has come in. Jaylen Durren, the guy that I’ve been calling for, physical big. Hey, that’s exactly what the Hornets needed. Uh, somebody that could just brute force, rebound, uh, knock guys out of the way. Um, how’s he doing? He’s, you know, he’s not an all-star, but he’s doing pretty good for a team that is winning basketball games right now on the team that acquired him on draft night. Still on that team. Okay. So to me, because I think I I do think that this Nick Smith Jr. waiver ends what I consider to be the biggest case of franchise malpractice in the Cup, Jack, Jordan era. I’m not I need to do a little bit of thinking before I could say it’s the biggest piece of piece of franchise malpractice within the within the confines of of basketball moves in the history of the franchise. I don’t know if I go that far, but in the Mitch Cupchack Jordan era. Now, you might hear that and immediately go, “Whoa, whoa, whoa, wait, hold on. You just got done talking about James Book Knight.” And don’t forget, they traded up to get Kai Jones and both of those players completely washed out and made uh zero to to one could argue negative contributions to a team. And when you miss that badly on first round picks, two first round picks, that sets your franchise and did to a certain extent set the Charlotte Hornets back several years. So you might say, hey, how could it be worse than that? And I would say it’s worse than that because in that instance, Mitch Cupchack was trying. He was try he was he thought James Book Knight was the right move. He thought that uh Kai Jones was he took a swing on Kai Jones and a lot of people loved that swing and and he just swung and missed. Okay. And and definitely I’m not I’m not letting him off the hook for that. But the reason why the the Jaylen Duran trade, the pick trade for a worse pick is because Mitch Cupchack is not a dummy. He’s not a dummy. Like he’s been in the league too long. He might be old school, but he’s not a dummy. You don’t trade for a worse pick because, you know, you think that’s the best move for the franchise. You do it because they didn’t want to pay the the amount of money requisite, a 13th overall pick according to the rookie scale. They didn’t want to add that money to the roster. So, it’s a combo. Michael Jordan on probably already on the precipice of selling uh whatever stake he ends up selling in the franchise. and and so they they really they hurt the franchise because they want to save money. It’s the most some of these things happen and you go you can kind of make an argument that it’s like oh I get it you were trying to save money. This was the most explicit case that I can remember in the franchise’s history where I go okay you were obviously doing the worst thing for the team just so you could save money and then on top of that you get an opportunity to maybe hit if Nick Smith Jr. hits. Maybe some of that is salvaged, but it didn’t happen. This really is less about Nick Smith Jr. though, than just the philosophical underpinninging underpinnings of that entire era, Mitch Cupch, Michael Jordan getting together and not making this franchise better. It’s a very specific take. It’s also one that I very specifically agree with because you’re right in terms of consequences. You can’t argue that the 2021 draft class was the worst thing to happen for this team in the last however many years because you draft James Book Knight flamed out spectacularly so. Same thing with Kai Jones. Neither one of those guys were on your roster for more than a year and a half. It was a complete and utter flame out on two guys that you drafted in the top 20 that could have really helped your team. Fair enough. I completely agree with you. Mitch Cupcheek liked a couple guys, decided to draft him. That’s totally fine with me. That night, I keep going back to that draft night in 2022. Doug, you remember that episode, right? It’s a famous one. The lights went out. The light the lights went out. That’s right. It was and and that was the uh it was the metaphor. It was the symbolism of the lights going out. Uh and and it almost went out of my heart. Like my hope uh I think almost it was almost the survivor when they you know they take the flame out when you’ve been ejected from the island. That was the tribe has spoken. The Yeah. The Mitch Cupchack Jordan tribe almost spoke on my behalf. Um and and I almost walked away from the island. We were playing road games. Both of us were on the road. I was in Asheville for a wedding and I forget where you were. I think you were doing something for Locked On at the time because you had that position. and we both suited up, ready to go, and we discussed a move where the Hornets actively decided they would like a worse draft pick in 2023 so they could avoid paying somebody at 13. And also be because they tried to spin zone it and say they didn’t want another roster spot for a younger guy and they’d rather save it for a veteran and the spin zone still just didn’t make any sense. What veteran? What veteran ended up being name the veteran? No. And and they always left the roster spot open. That was the thing. They always left the roster spot open and said, “Oh, yeah. We’re doing this for flexibility.” Well, not roster flexibility because you never filled it. And and you could have I mean, you were plenty injured. Instead, it was all about flexing the wallet and making sure that there was plenty of cash available and to make it an attract I think make make whatever the franchise was make it more attractive uh for the eventual sale. it. So, it it’s not even about the consequences of Nick Smith Jr. not being a lot. The process should be questioned all over the place here. Every every sense of that process should be questioned as to why you would make a trade. A lottery pick you would send to Denver, a team that was contending for an NBA championship, I believe. Did they win the NBA championship that year in 2023? I believe they did. And then 2024 was the Celtics and then this past season. So I think that’s right. Yeah. 2023 Naggets ended up being the 27th pick next year. A team a team that was contending for the championship. You decided we’ll take that team’s first round selection next year and instead instead of taking this 13th overall pick, there were four second rounders. Like I okay, we should acknowledge that there were four second rounders, but man, like that’s a real real spot to improve the talent. And you’re right, the process should be questioned. Not not even Doug, like because we can go through the names. This this is that’s my favorite game. Whatever, right? Like we can go through the names. You missed out on some names. Okay, you missed out on Jaylen Duran. You could have doubled up at center if you wanted to. You don’t like that philosophy? Fine. You could have drafted a few other names. And you know, Tari E is somebody that would have been interesting. I don’t know. Loravia Brandom, I I’m not even really interested in that. It’s just I wasn’t even really interested in all the names that you passed up on because they turned out to be so great. I Doug, I don’t think if Nick Smith Jr. would have turned out to be an absolute stud. There’s still no justifying the decision they made on draft night of 2022 and Nick Smith Jr. ended up not becoming a stud. So yeah, I I I think you’re dead on with this. I’m totally with you. We don’t talk about that a ton when we go and we cover ourselves and explore all the terrible moves that that regime made. But this is the one that got us the most frustrated because it was blatant and there was no justifying it. The most hilarious thing when you look back at that draft is that they could have had Musa Diabate at 43. You could have had Musa at 13 and you passed on him. That demon now. Yeah. Now you want him. Okay. It’s too late. Yeah. That’s the whole And that’s the whole thing, too, about like the to to criticize. And again, you have to hit on your draft picks, particularly your first round draft picks, particularly your lottery picks. You have to hit on those. I mean, this is what we praise Prey for. This is why he’s built a mammoth team there in in Oklahoma City because he just I mean in this draft this was the uh the Jaylen uh Jaylen Williams that was one pick before the Hornets. This was the Jaylen Williams draft. So he constantly hits on those lottery picks, right? You have to do that. So I’m not I’m not saying that. I’m not justifying oh well you know they took Book Knight and Kai. They thought it was Look, you have to hit on those. At the same time any criticism of that is hindsight 2020 in the moment. Uh maybe they should have had a little bit more intel on Book Knight and his attitude and different things like that, but particularly with the Kai Jones thing, I mean, they were just taking a swing there. But that’s second guessing. This in the moment, everyone knew like what’s going on. In fact, you know how many times since uh Jeff Peterson has taken over and even a little bit before that when the new ownership group was getting more involved in, you know, making Mitch Cupchack do some things that maybe he didn’t want to do. You know how many times we’ve been on this show and go and and went, “How did they do that? How did they pull that deal off?” That doesn’t like I look at it. I mean, the Colin Saxon one being the most recent. You look at it on paper, you go, “This is it. How did they pull that off?” That was what the Nuggets were doing. They were like, “What is what? How did I What there? What they they want what?” And I forget what they got. I forget what they got the the Nuggets specifically because it remember it was Detroit ended up getting the you know, obviously Detroit ended up getting the Duran pick and we got the Nuggets pick. So, the Nuggets weren’t doing that. Detroit was like, “Wait, you want to do what for what?” And and the Knicks did I I forget. Yeah, it was a very odd trade, but no, that’s a good point. We can end on this before we talk about the next cut, but the point is Josh Green is one of those moves where it’s Oh, okay. Yeah, man. You want a 3 and D guy that has some promise that played on a team that made it to the finals. Yeah. Okay, sure. We’ll take Josh Green for two second round picks. That’s it. Absolutely. That’s a bet you make every time. you can’t stand Josh Green and yet still still you understand the process in that moment and it absolutely was the right decision. Josh Green, I don’t know if it’s working out. I think most people would say it’s not, especially with the injury, but I’m not here to dunk on Jeff Peterson because in hindsight, the move didn’t work. I still praise him for that move. Josh Green can never play another basketball game for the Hornets. I still praise him for that because I’m not judging it based off of hindsight and what happens, what are the fruits from it. It’s the process. It’s smart. It makes sense. It’s getting in and trying to win on the margins when you weren’t trying to win on the margins by trading for a worst pick and collecting four second rounders. That’s a 13th overall pick, man. It’s a high selection. It’s a lottery pick and you decided I’m good. You had two. You had two picks. So, you could have packaged both of them and moved up to go get somebody if you wanted to to ensure I don’t know to get a top 10 selection. Yeah, man. Anyways, I it’s it’s done. Nick Smith Jr. was the selection in 2023. He’s gone. He’s cut. We’re on to a different era. Yeah, we onto a different era. We won’t talk about this as much in the future, but I would challenge the the the hardcore Hornets fans, particularly the ones that are paying for season tickets or paying for multiple games a year. Don’t forget this. Don’t forget what we talked about here and hold the team accountable and let your wallet hold them accountable if they ever try these shenanigans again. Uh where where you are actively making the team worse to save yourself money and asking people for their hard-earned money. It was disgraceful. It was a disgrace. And and I will say the saving grace is that they still did get Mark Williams out of it and he looks to be the center of the future for this team. Oh, did they trade him twice? They did do that. All right, coming up next on the Locked on Hornets podcast. Beast everywhere. Who’s going to get cut next? We figure out if we can rumage through the sicko satchel. That’s all coming up next. Lol. 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Those are the conversations you have on on a niche daily, a specific team daily sort of NBA podcast and everything seems to be right on track with what we guessed. We thought the first cut was going to be Dcoan Jeff. Made total sense. He’s gone. It was a more interesting conversation to have because this was a younger guy that was a highly touted prospect coming out of high school. We liked the pick on draft night, by the way. like what once we got to 2027, we liked or excuse me, 2023 with the 27th pick. We liked Nick Smith Jr. as that selection. I remember us we were in the room together. One of the few times we were in the room together watching the Hornets. We were like, “Okay, I like that one. That that makes sense for the kind of talent that he had.” So, whatever. Um, well, he was a fall he was a falling star because of the injury, which always makes me nervous. But having watched uh some of that high school film, I was like, “Okay, yeah, there’s there’s like something here.” If the shooting comes along, the Hornets have never been able to make that kind of prospect work for whatever reason. I mean, they just cannot the smaller shooting guard that is supposed to shoot. I I don’t know what it is. Just if it’s unlucky or if it’s there’s something in the development system that’s not quite right. they don’t have the right guy there to to help that player, but they have just never been able to make that kind of guy work, which is why, you know, I’m a little bit heartened that, you know, James is not in that mold. Uh Coniple certainly not in that mold. Liam McNeely not in that mold. Uh so I’m Yeah, that’s good. Yeah. Uh I I got stalled, but yes, uh Devonte Graham kind of, but then they traded him and they they made good on that one. But you’re you’re not wrong for for the most part. That’s been true. So anyways, Nick Hicksman Jr., interesting conversation, but it always felt like he was going to be the next guy out. Now, the next cut. This is where it gets a little tricky. I still think there’s an easier answer for me. Perhaps you disagree. I think Pat Conetan is next out the door. They acquired him in a trade when they sent Vasameich to the Milwaukee Bucks. But the reason they acquired Pat Conetonin was only for salary filler. Milwaukee wanted to shed that salary. Really what the Hornets wanted to do is, yep, you guessed it, acquire, I believe, two second round picks. We can look that up, but they acquired picks, sending Vasameich to Milwaukee and Milwaukee wanted to shed salary. Eventually, they let go of Vasa, who had a contract that allowed them to absorb it and then get rid of it immediately, saving some cab space. So, because of that, Doug, like they didn’t seek him out because they valued Pat Conetonin. What they did was they wanted the second round picks. And with Spencer Denwitty, they did seek him out and they signed him to a veteran deal. Not a lot of money, but I think Spencer Denwitty is the next guy that you would have a debate between who’s going to get cut between Pat and Spencer. And they did actively sign him. They wanted him. There were no picks attached to him. There were picks attached to Pat Conetonin. It would make sense in my opinion if he was the next guy out the door. Now, all that makes sense to me, too. I guess is it going to be a training camp battle of like which of these veterans has something left in the tank? Which one can contribute? And more than that, I think what does the what does the franchise value at this moment in time? Do they val if Spencer Denwy does have something left in the tank? Do they value the depth at that position or do they value Pat Conetson’s contract and and being able to swing use that swing that if he if Pat Coneton, let’s just say he doesn’t have anything left in the tank, he’s not going to be valuable as a player to another team. Uh then do they value the expiring contract and I think it’s like $9.4 $4 million using that as a tool to get another deal done or to help facilitate someone else saving the money to get under aprons and blah blah blah blah boring numbers stuff. Uh so they have they have options here. I I think if if you’re asking me what should they do after enduring this many years of injuries, I’m always going to say death, death, death. like if if Pat Coneton has nothing left and Spencer can contribute on the floor, uh then obviously you I think you should take the player, u particularly if you’re setting yourself up to try to actually win basketball games. Maybe if this was a year ago or two years ago, I would have leaned more on like, well, they’re going to be bad anyway. There’s literally no shot of them being good, so go ahead and hold on to a contract that you may be able to flip at the deadline. But I think they should start to get more serious. And serious teams don’t do that. They just fill their teams with depth and that way if you have one or two injuries you’re not completely crippled. Yeah. And so the reasons you would keep Pat by the way they the Hornets did trade Vasameich for Pat Coneton and a 2031 second round pick and a 2032 second round pick. So those are the two second rounders that came back in that deal. The thing that would blow all of this prediction up would be they value having $9 million on the books that expires next season that they could trade away. So maybe that’s the case for him. And Pat Coneton does have a relationship with Charles Lee. They worked together during Lee’s time in Milwaukee. They did win a championship with one another. Conetan was a rotation player on a team that battled in the postseason. And I don’t know about Charles Lee’s specific like individual responsibilities that he had, but I do know that he was a player development coach. I know that he was lauded for his work with Chris Middleton, rehabbing with Chris Middleton. Same thing with Grayson Allen. Never heard anything about his work with Pat Coneton. But maybe that’s just because he’s not a headline type player. Grayson Allen turned his Milwaukee season into a big contract with Phoenix and Chris Middleton is a multi-time all-star. So maybe he did and that relationship would have some kind of effect on whether he’s on the roster. So it’s a possibility. I I don’t think it’s just, oh, this is easy. Nothing to see here. Coneton’s out the door. It’s it’s just the thing that makes the most sense to me if they went out and signed Spencer Denwy. No. Yeah, I I’m I’m totally with you. I I think this comes down to a maybe just a little bit of looking at it in training camp and then making a call there and saying who can who’s who’s got something left? who can help us contribute. I don’t know that they have the answer to that question. One more thing on Nick Smith Jr. before we before we move uh on from this. Uh some may question the timing like why not give Nick Smith Nick Smith Jr. an opportunity to fight it out with Pat Coneton and Spencer Denwy and the rest of the back end of this roster and make his case. I think if you’re the Hornets, you did Nick Smith Jr. favor in that if you already had your mind made up for financial reasons and roster construction reasons, then you give Nick Smith Jr. the opportunity now to make that case on a team where he’s actually got a shot to do that. I don’t know that he necessarily had a fair shot to do that anymore with the Charlotte Hornets because of everything that had already happened. So, I think this was Look, I’m sure if you ask Nick Smith Jr., he’s going to be like, “Bleep that. I didn’t want to get cut.” Nobody wants to be cut. I mean, just ask Mark Williams how he felt about being traded, right? That’s going to sting. Uh, but it’s going to give him an opportunity to go find a situation somewhere else where he can be successful. Um, yeah, some comedy moments. I’m trying to think of if there were any comedy moments with NSJ like there were with Nick Richards when Steve Clifford yelled, “Set the bleeping screen.” Uh, I I think there Well, not so comedy, but Nick Smith Jr. I I do I I the introductory press conference he said some stuff I I I’m not sure if he got fined for it. Uh nothing that I can repeat but I I do remember being like oh man come on now you can’t say words like that in front of everybody introducing you to the Queen City. We were actually doing a radio show when he was speaking to media and it was kind of awkward because Weson Walker was airing right where he was uh where where he was speaking to media and people picked it up on our microphones over to the side broadcasting the show. So there’s a moment. Um we’ll always have some of the more impressive summer league performances. Charles Lee absolutely getting into his chest. I mean that in that first opportunity for Charles Lee to coach the summer league a year ago and really challenging Nick Smith Jr. and again like I think Nick Smith Jr. to his credit stepped up to that challenge. He could have very easily been like dude who are you like I’m not no I’m this is my game you know you’re the new guy I’ve been here for a few years. Plenty of young guys have done that in the past. He didn’t do that. that he stepped up to the challenge and and gained the respect of the head coach. And so, yeah, I mean like it would not shock me like like if the I mean Miami Heat, they just lost Hero. Maybe there’s a spot there. Like if he ends up being a backend player for the Miami Heat, like would that shock me? Absolutely not. No, no, no, no, no, no. Uh, by the way, careerhigh against Toronto, had 28 this past season against them. And uh I’m trying to think of some other games just real quickly if there’s something that we’re forgetting of like some wow game that I’m just trying to rattle on my brain for it. Yeah, they did win against Cleveland and he had 24 in that one. I think I remember that game. Six of 11 from three. So he was on fire. Nick Smith Jr. speaking and helped them win that one where there’s a lot of like season highs and and highscoring totals where the Hornets uh lost a lot of those games and he just got a lot of garbage run. But we’ll always have the Cleveland game where he beat a good team and he scored 24 on good three-point shooting. All right, NSJ, thank you, sir. It was fun. That’ll do it for Locked on Hornets. We appreciate everybody making us your first listen. We’re free and available anywhere you get your pods and that includes YouTube. Go check out Doug’s Substack. Every hornetsboxcore.com. Also, go check out the show he helps produce, Yahoo Sports Daily with Jason Fitz and Caroline Fenton. And I’m Walker Mail. Listen to me. WFNZ every weekday from 12 to 300 p.m. We’ll be back with you tomorrow. [Music]

The Charlotte Hornets have waived guard Nick Smith Jr., and we process the move that was unfortunate yet inevitable due to a crowded backcourt. This decision officially closes the book on the infamous 2022 Jalen Duren draft-day trade, which we revisit as one of the worst process moves of the modern era.

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