1. Nice win tonight, 92-89 over the visiting New Orleans Hornets. AP story here, box score here.
2. For a Friday night game early in the season, against a top Western Conference team, with Chris Paul making his only visit of the season, attendance was poor at the Cable Box ($1, Rufus On Fire) tonight. On the bright side, there were a handful of fans rocking old-school Charlotte Hornets teal-and-purple gear in honor of the Hornets debut in Charlotte 20 years ago. Fun to see…
3. The story of the game from the Hornets perspective was that they basically came out flat and never got going. Stojakovic and Mo Pete kept the Hornets hanging around in the first half; Chris Paul woke up in the second half to help New Orleans take the lead briefly late, but the Bobcats finished strong. Tyson Chandler and David West were almost invisible tonight.
4. For the Bobcats, Raymond Felton had a strong game shooting the ball (7-9 from the field, 5-5 from the free throw line) for 20 points, while DJ Augustin and Adam Morrison hit big shots late; but this was essentially a well-rounded team effort. Of note, the Cats were money at the free throw line all night: 29-31 for 93.5%.
5. After barely getting off the pine in the first few games, Matt Carroll got a fair amount of run tonight. Strangely enough, it was often in a lineup with Adam Morrison on the floor as well. I’m still not sure how we got away with that on the defensive end. And after some impressive minutes in the past few games, Shannon Brown got a DNP-CD tonight.
6. The bigger story right now, though, is the allegedly imminent trade of Gerald Wallace. Ugh, it’s late and I can’t even begin to count the ways that this sucks. We all knew that LB would want to shake up the roster to some degree, but it would be much more palatable to me if it were Carroll, Morrison, May, or even Felton moving.
It would also be more palatable if any of the rumors involved the Cats getting back an equally dynamic player or at least a starting PF – not Eddy freaking Curry. All I can hope for at this point is for this thing to fall through. I had wondered in the offseason if Brown was going to appreciate Gerald’s game; but so far this season, things have seemed fine and Gerald looks indispensable. Please don’t screw us up, Larry.
7. Scott Fowler from the Observer got an interview with Jordan earlier tonight, which is great and all. But he is trying to pass it off as some big scoop that Jordan said he’d like to become the majority owner of the Bobcats someday. You think so, doctor? Wasn’t that the intended eventual purpose of his involvement with the Wizards? And didn’t he flirt with buying the Bucks at one point? Nothing to see here, even if the AP is trying to make a story of it…
-E
