How Charlotte Hornets could benefit from NBA season starting in December
The NBA is considering a late-December start for next season, several weeks earlier than commissioner Adam Silver previously indicated.
What would this mean to the Charlotte Hornets, who have a high pick in the Nov. 18 draft and are one of the few NBA teams expected to have considerable salary cap room this offseason?
The idea
Several national media outlets reported Friday that owners are discussing the 2020-21 season starting Dec. 22 and running about 70 regular-season games, rather than the NBA’s traditional 82. That would get the NBA closer to its normal November-to-late June span and possibly wrap up the season before the expected start of the summer Olympics in Japan.
Nothing has been decided, and the players union would have to sign off on this scheduling shift. Silver said during the NBA Finals that he didn’t anticipate next season starting before January.
The league and the players union still must come to an agreement on next season’s salary cap and luxury tax numbers. The cap and tax won’t reflect last season’s revenues, which plummeted due to the pandemic.
The draft
The Hornets jumped up to the third pick in the draft lottery, the first time a Charlotte team has improved its draft spot via the lottery since 1999.
The draft was rescheduled from June 25 to Nov. 18. Hornets general manager Mitch Kupchak said last spring he would have been ready to draft in late June; that he didn’t see the loss of the NCAA tournament and an in-person Combine as major impediments.
The Hornets have been interviewing candidates for their picks (Nos. 3, 32 and 56) via Zoom-style calls, and can bring in a few draft prospects for in-person meetings over the next three weeks.
Kupchak has said repeatedly that the makeup of the current roster would not decide how to use the No. 3 pick; that the team’s greatest need is overall talent, rather than positional.
Free-agency
Starting the season sooner would raise the urgency to set a date for free-agency; probably as soon after the draft as possible. The league can’t start free-agency without an agreement on the cap and tax for next season, because teams wouldn’t know what they have to spend.
Right now, teams aren’t allowed to make signings or trades.
The Hornets have finally reduced their payroll obligations considerably, with contracts for Marvin Williams, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist and Bismack Biyombo expiring.
When the NBA originally projected next season’s salary cap at around $115 million, the Hornets would have had in excess of $20 million in space. For now, it’s unresolved how much space the Hornets would have.
Kupchak said repeatedly over the last year he did not plan for the Hornets to be a major factor in this free-agent class. However, there are other uses for cap space, from signing lesser free agents to trading for veterans to accepting a bad contract in return for future draft picks.
Starting the season in late December would speed up free agency at a time few teams will be quick to spend. For the Hornets, that could mean bargain signings or trades that acquire draft picks in return for reducing another team’s cap/tax predicament.
Training camp
A Dec. 22 start of the regular season would mean starting training camps around the end of November. That would be a hardship for teams that advanced deep into the playoffs and would get little offseason. For the Hornets and the other seven teams that weren’t part of the restart, it would be a plus.
Except for two weeks of mini-camp this month, the Hornets haven’t been allowed to have any team activities since the season was halted March 11. Coach James Borrego and the players would welcome the chance to reassemble as soon as possible.
This story was originally published October 23, 2020 at 5:01 PM with the headline "How Charlotte Hornets could benefit from NBA season starting in December."
