At The Hive

Meet 2x Florida’s Mr. Basketball The Charlotte Hornets selected the 19-year-old Duke Freshman and Florida native Vernon Carey Jr. with the 32nd pick in the 2nd round of the NBA Draft. Carey Jr. is a rim running big that offers a lot of bounce and energy on the boards, the type of player that should complement #3 overall selection LaMelo Ball in pick and roll situations. Vernon Carey Jr. was a 5-star recruit out of Fort Lauderdale, Florida at his high school NSU University School (yeah, I know…) Carey Jr. averaged 21.7 points per game and 9.0 rebounds per game in his senior...

Photo by Kent Smith/NBAE via And the team has already began acquiring big-name talent to surround him with It hurts to say this, but Hornets general manager Mitch Kupchak lied to us; he went on record — many times! — to say that he didn’t anticipate Charlotte making a splash in free agency, and that they planned to make a collection of smaller moves throughout the off-season, which doesn’t exactly sound like the framework for signing Gordon Hayward to a four-year, $120 million contract (sign-and-trade details are still being negotiated with Boston and a...

William Purnell-USA TODAY Sports This is unrelated to the Gordon Hayward signing. The Charlotte Hornets have come to an agreement with former Kansas State guard Xavier Sneed, according to Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports. Undrafted free agent Xavier Sneed out of Kansas State has reached an agreement with the Charlotte Hornets, @Gary_Durrant tells Yahoo Sports.— Chris Haynes (@ChrisBHaynes) November 23, 2020 We don’t have any specifics on the deal, but I’m assuming it’s another one of those Exhibit 10 contracts that will have Sneed in camp with the Hornets...

Photo by Brian Babineau/NBAE via At some point cap space needs to become players, and the Hornets knocked it out of the park by signing Gordon Hayward. Friends, I’m absolutely shocked at how negative the At the Hive community is about the Charlotte Hornets signing Gordon Hayward to a four-year, $120 million contract. As of the writing of this article, only 45% of you were “excited”, 20% were “indifferent”, and 35% were “disappointed/angry” based on this poll. I’m speechless. No parent wants to call their child ugly, and few passionate NBA fans are...

Jeremy Brevard-USA TODAY Sports We break down the reasoning the Hayward signing, rumors, and the best sign-and-trade possibility. The Charlotte Hornets signed Gordon Hayward to a 4-year $120 million deal on Saturday. That obviously takes the largest portion of the show, but we do have a few other things to talk about in the back half of the show. Here’s what we’ve got: Apparently we should’ve taken the Hornets reported interest in Hayward more seriously Zach is apprehensive and the size of the contract Hayward’s effect on the team’s development...

Photo by Kent Smith/NBAE via But probably not for $17 million. The Charlotte Hornets have come to an agreement to bring center Bismack Biyombo back to the team, according to Chris Haynes and confirmed by Rick Bonnell. Free agent center Bismack Biyombo has reached an agreement with the Charlotte Hornets, league sources tell Yahoo Sports.— Chris Haynes (@ChrisBHaynes) November 22, 2020 No word on the terms of the deal yet, but I’m fairly confident Biyombo will be taking a pay cut from the $17 million he made last season. Biyombo will provide some veteran depth...

Photo by Streeter Lecka/ The Hornets caught everybody by surprise and made a splash in free agency, and it could work. The Charlotte Hornets did something very outside of their norm and made a splash signing in free agency, inking forward Gordon Hayward to a 4-year, $120 million contract. There were some rumblings about the Hornets interest in the former All Star in the days leading up to Saturday, but I don’t think anybody took them seriously. Turns out we should have been. As is the case with any major move this franchise makes, outsiders are looking for ways to...

Photo by Jacob Kupferman/ Was not expecting this, but it should be interesting. The Charlotte Hornets are signing Gordon Hayward to a four year, $120 million contract, per Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN. Free agent Gordon Hayward is signing a 4-year, $120M deal with Charlotte, per source.— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) November 21, 2020 I don’t know how this deal will work logistically, as the Hornets currently don’t have the cap space to make that signing outright. We’ll have to wait for more info, which I’m sure we’ll be coming out very soon. I don’t...

Photo by Carmen Mandato/ We want all the Kentucky players. The Charlotte Hornets will sign former Kentucky wing Kahlil Whitney to an Exhibit 10 contract, according to Adam Zagoria and his sources. They will sign Keandre Cook to the same type of deal, according to Bryan Kalbrosky. Former @KentuckyMBB and @rc_basketball wing @KahlilWhitney will sign a Exhibit 10 deal with the Charlotte Hornets, per his agent.— Adam Zagoria (@AdamZagoria) November 20, 2020 Former @MissouriStBears guard Keandre Cook (@_Drecook) has signed with the Charlotte Hornets, per source....

Photo by Nathaniel S. Butler/NBAE via The Hornets four draft picks all got to meet the Charlotte media in person for the first time today. The Charlotte Hornets just wrapped up media availability for each of the four Charlotte Hornets selections in the 2020 NBA Draft. We’ll get to some tidbits from the press conferences in a minute, but first here are the jersey numbers each player will be wearing: LaMelo Ball: #2 Vernon Carey Jr.: #22 Nick Richards: #14 Grant Riller: #20 Now, onto the questions and answers. None of this is Earth shattering, as pretty much all...

Jeremy Brevard-USA TODAY Sports The Hornets knocked this draft out of the park, so it’s a lot of fun to talk about. The Charlotte Hornets made four selections in the 2020 NBA Draft on Wednesday night, and by all accounts, they absolutely nailed them. We go through pick by pick and talk about all of them. Our reactions when the Hornets landed LaMelo Ball with the third overall pick What makes LaMelo Ball such a good prospect The parts of Ball’s game that need improvement and if and how we think he’ll improve in those areas Our favorite parts of his game to...

Photo by Nathaniel S. Butler/NBAE via This is new. Now that the 2020 NBA Draft is complete, it’s time to hand out immediate and definitive grades to all the teams. These grades are meaningless in the grand scheme of things, but it is interesting to see how unbiased observers view the draft process for the team. In this case, just about everyone has nothing but good things to say about the Charlotte Hornets. Let’s run through some. Keep in mind that most of these only account for the first round for some reason. ESPN draft experts were asked what team they would...

Photo by Mitchell Layton/ The UDFAs are starting to trickle in. The Charlotte Hornets have made their first move post-draft, inking guard Nate Darling to a two-way contract per Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN. UAB guard Nate Darling is signing a two-way deal with Charlotte, his agents Mike George and Nate Daniels of @OneLegacySports tell ESPN.— Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) November 19, 2020 Darling spent two seasons at UAB, but transferred to Delaware for the 2019-20 season. There, he averaged 21.0 points, 3.9 rebounds, and 2.8 assists per game while shooting 39.9%...

Photo by Gregory Fisher/Icon Sportswire via The Hornets added one of the best scorers in college basketball with their final pick of the night. The Charlotte Hornets have selected Grant Riller with the 56th overall pick in the 2020 NBA Draft. This wraps up the draft for the Hornets. We’ll keep an eye out for any undrafted free agents the team elects to bring in for camp.

Photo by Silas Walker/ The Hornets continue to add front court depth with the Kentucky product. The New Orleans Pelicans selected center Nick Richards with the 42nd overall pick in the 2020 NBA Draft, but he’ll be coming to the Charlotte Hornets via trade. No details on the compensation yet. Richards profiles as your prototypical run and jump big. He doesn’t get steals. He doesn’t get assists. But he can catch and finish very, very well. In his final season at Kentucky, 14.0 points, 7.8 rebounds, and 2.1 blocks per game while shooting 64.2% from the field and...