Associated Press

Michael Jordan donates $2 million to Hurricane Florence recovery efforts

By Kurt HelinSep 18, 2018, 5:25 PM EDT
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Michael Jordan is North Carolina through and through. His father is from Wallace, he played his high school ball in Wilmington, he won a national championship in college as a North Carolina Tar Heel in Chapel Hill, and he is now the part-owner and chairman of the Charlotte Hornets.

All those cities have been in the news the past several days for the wrong reasons — they have been part of the devastation Hurricane Florence has unleashed on the region. There are 34 reported deaths from the storm, 26 of those in North Carolina.

To help out, Jordan is donating $2 million to the relief and recovery efforts. Jordan is contributing $1 million each to the American Red Cross and the Foundation For The Carolinas’ Hurricane Florence Response Fund.

“It just hits home,” Jordan told The Associated Press. “I know all of those places: Wilmington, Fayetteville, Myrtle Beach, New Bern, and Wallace… So quite naturally it hits home, and I felt like I had to act in a sense that this is my home.”

This is not all Jordan and his Hornets are doing to help out. Charlotte and Fanatics teamed up to design a T-shirt with the Hornets logo in the middle of the states of North and South Carolina surrounded by the words “Carolina Strong” and 100 percent of the net proceeds from the shirt sales will go to the Foundation For The Carolinas’ Hurricane Florence Response Fund

On Friday, more than 100 members of the Hornets organization will partner will help pack disaster food boxes at Second Harvest Food Bank of Metrolina. The disaster food boxes – with Food Lion donating the food — will be shipped to Wilmington, N.C., Fayetteville, N.C., and Myrtle Beach, S.C., and distributed to those who have been directly impacted by the hurricane. The organization’s goal is to pack 5,000 boxes.

 

Report: Spurs hiring Brent Barry to front office

Jeff Gross/Getty Images
By Dan FeldmanSep 17, 2018, 10:01 AM EDT
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Brent Barry came up in the Pistons’ and Hawks’ recent general-manager searches.

He’ll get his start as an NBA executive in San Antonio.

Adrian Wojnarowski of ESPN:

During his 14 year playing career and time as a TV analyst, Barry has shown the basketball intelligence and interpersonal skills to suggest he’ll succeed in this role. Working for Gregg Popovich and R.C. Buford could add valuable experience.

Barry played four seasons with the Spurs, winning titles in 2005 and 2007. He returns to San Antonio at a turbulent time for the franchise. Several key players – including Barry’s former teammate, Tony Parker – have left the team.

Michael Jordan, Hornets, NBA raising money for Hurricane Florence relief efforts

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By Kurt HelinSep 14, 2018, 9:30 PM EDT
5 Comments

Hurricane — well, now tropical storm but still dangerous — Florence is battering the Carolinas and part of the Eastern seaboard of the United States, having left at least five people dead and many more with damaged homes, without power, and much more. Despite all the warnings and evacuations, the devastation is going to be extensive, there was no way around that.

Michael Jordan, the Charlotte Hornets, and the NBA are teaming up to help out those in need.

“It’s truly devastating for me to see the damage that Hurricane Florence is doing to my beloved home state of North Carolina and to the surrounding areas,” Jordan, the Hornets lead owner, said. “The recovery effort will be massive, and it will take a long time to repair the damage and for families to get back on their feet. Together with the NBA, we have launched a platform to aid those most impacted. Please join me, the Hornets organization and the NBA and donate to one of the local organizations assisting in the relief and recovery efforts.  To all those affected, stay safe and know that we’re here to help.”

The three sides are raising money for a variety of charities —  American Red Cross, Direct Relief, Foundation for the Carolinas, Second Harvest Food Bank, the United Way of Central Carolinas — and fans can donate money to the cause.

Just click this link to get to the donation site (or type in http://cares.nba.com/charlotte-hurricane-relief-efforts).

The Hornets, and the NBA through NBA Cares, will be doing volunteer work to help as well once everyone gets past the initial relief efforts.

 

 

Spurs on precipice after losing Kawhi Leonard

AP Photo/Darren Abate
By Dan FeldmanSep 11, 2018, 12:46 PM EDT
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NBCSports.com’s Dan Feldman is grading every team’s offseason based on where the team stands now relative to its position entering the offseason. A ‘C’ means a team is in similar standing, with notches up or down from there.

Magic Johnson won NBA Finals MVP in his age-22 season, and the Lakers contended for championships for the next decade.

Tim Duncan won NBA Finals MVP in his age-22 season, and the Spurs contended for championships for the next decade and a half.

Kawhi Leonard won NBA Finals MVP in his age-22 season, and… only four years later, San Antonio is just trying to sneak into the playoffs with an old roster.

Leonard did his part, until last season at least. He grew into a perennial MVP candidate, the NBA’s best defender and an elite offensive player.

But that all came crashing down over the last year. Leonard got hurt, and a distrust between him and San Antonio grew. It’d be difficult to determine how much blame to assign each side even if we knew everything, and we certainly don’t know everything.

What’s clear: The Spurs are bearing the brunt of the breakdown.

Their trade of Leonard to the Raptors – for DeMar DeRozan, Jakob Poeltl and a top-20 first-rounder – was a devastating sell-low. That probably wasn’t the Spurs’ best offer in a vacuum, but they were reportedly limited by their own parameters – preferring to send Leonard to the East and valuing immediate contributors.

That’s the effect of a 69-year-old coach running the front office.

Gregg Popovich is an all-time great coach, and if he wants to avoid rebuilding until retirement, he has more than earned the right. Embracing youth and accepting losing probably doesn’t appeal to him at this point.

Popovich has proven masterful at getting players to understand their responsibilities and executing them, and that’s why his teams have been so consistently good in the regular season. He’ll need another supreme coaching performance to get this squad into the playoffs in a loaded Western Conference.

The most common oversimplification of the summer is that the Spurs are basically just adding DeRozan to a team that won 47 games last season because Leonard barely played anyway. San Antonio also lost important cogs Kyle Anderson (signed unmatched offer sheet with Grizzlies), Danny Green (traded to Toronto) and Manu Ginobili (retired). Tony Parker left for the Hornets, too.

At least San Antonio got Popovich a few players familiar with his system, re-signing Rudy Gay (one year, $10,087,200), Davis Bertans (two years, $14 million) and Bryn Forbes (two years, $6 million) and signing former Spur Marco Belinelli (two years, $12 million). None of those players came cheap.

Newly signed veterans Dante Cunningham and Quincy Pondexter could help, too.

The Spurs aren’t completely punting the future. They drafted Lonnie Walker No. 18 and Chimezie Metu No. 49. Belinelli’s and Forbes’ salaries decline in the their second seasons. Bertans’ is flat.

Teams run into trouble when they prioritize the present regardless of greater circumstance, and the Spurs did that to some degree. But they also have Popovich and LaMarcus Aldridge, both of whom will make it easier for San Antonio to win next season. Popovich doesn’t need much, and Aldridge’s interior style can prop up lesser supporting casts.

That said, I’m still not sure the Spurs have enough.

They’ve been headed for trouble for a while, as their relationship with Leonard deteriorated. That didn’t all happen this offseason, though that’s when the dam broke.

Offseason grade: D-

Hornets’ offseason not quite a joke, but not much better than that

AP Photo/Chuck Burton
By Dan FeldmanSep 11, 2018, 10:13 AM EDT
6 Comments

NBCSports.com’s Dan Feldman is grading every team’s offseason based on where the team stands now relative to its position entering the offseason. A ‘C’ means a team is in similar standing, with notches up or down from there.

At least Mitch Kupchak avoided the most biting wisecracks at his expense.

After getting fired by the Lakers in part for giving Mozgov a ridiculous four-year, $64 million contract, Kupchak’s first roster move as Hornets president was… trading for Mozgov. And maybe Kupchak is that delusional about Mozgov.

But Charlotte later flipped Mozgov to the Magic for Bismack Biyombo, who’s much better and paid only slightly more. That deal might have just fell into Kupchak’s lap, as Orlando is overloaded at center anyway and needed to aggregate salary to acquire Jerian Grant.

Still, Kupchak’s original sin with the Hornets stands. He traded Howard’s expiring contract and wound up with Biyombo, who’s due $17 million each of the next two seasons. That extra year of high salary could be disastrous.

Kemba Walker will be an unrestricted free agent next summer, and Charlotte has even fewer means now to upgrade its roster around him. Maybe a max contract and loyalty will convince him to stay, but at this point, Walker’s max salary might push the Hornets into luxury-tax range. That has always been a no-go for owner Michael Jordan, which means Walker returning could force downgrades elsewhere.

How appealing is any of this to him?

Charlotte could argue just shedding Howard’s presence will help, and it might in some ways. But he was also pretty productive on the court, and that counts, too.

Charlotte could also point out it got a couple second-rounders (plus $5 million) in the Howard-Mozgov trade and a couple more in the Mozgov-Biyombo trade. (The Hornets also got two more-second rounders by taking known Clippers target Shai Gilgeous-Alexander at No. 11 then trading him to L.A. for the No. 12 pick, used on Miles Bridges.) But those second-rounders don’t near the going rate for accepting $17 million of 2019-20 salary. The Hornets would have been better off just buying out Howard and ending their salary commitment after this season.

At least all those second-rounders are already going to good use. Charlotte traded two for No. 34 pick Devonte’ Graham, who looked good in summer league.

Graham could help with the Hornets’ biggest weakness, backup point guard. So could Tony Parker, who received $5 million guaranteed with an unguaranteed salary next season.

But that’s a high price for the over-the-hill Parker, and that money probably could have lured a more productive player. Surely, part of Parker’s appeal was his ability to help new Charlotte coach James Borrego – hired from the Spurs – install his system.

Borrego replaces Steve Clifford, who’s a good coach but wasn’t Kupchak’s guy. Kupchak is clearly putting his stamp on this team.

Kupchak is one of the most accomplished general managers of all-time. He built multiple championship teams in Los Angeles. But he also appeared out of touch late in his tenure there. Is he a good general manager whose bad breaks just happened to have come most recently, or has he fallen behind? It’s a question he’ll settle in Charlotte.

The early returns are not encouraging.

Offseason grade: D