Here at Sparty and Friends, we have reached NBA preview time. There will be one team per work day leading up to the season opener (Celts vs. Cavs, October 28th at 8pm on TNT). The teams are ordered by record starting with last place and going up through the non-playoff teams, followed by the playoff teams in order of elimination (or lack there of in the Celtics’ case). You can find the full list of our previews here.  We’ve knocked off the Heat, got hate mail about the Thunder, had a guest writer for the Express Grizz, praised the T-Wolves marketing team, got lazy and had a Clip show, went to the circus that is the Knicks roster, took the Buck by the horns antlers, and now we meet a cat named “Bob”…

The Charlotte Bobcats are boring. There is virtually nothing exciting about their entire franchise. Nowadays, we care about interesting. It’s why the Red Sox and Yankees are on TV all the time. People want interesting. The ratings are always higher for Sox/Yanks or a Kobe/Shaq match-up. We want excitement. The Bobcats don’t have it. Michael Jordan is the “part-owner and Managing Member of Basketball Operations” for this team and that doesn’t even break the interesting barrier. They hired Larry Brown to coach. Nope, not interested. They have Jason Richardson (a top 5 dunker of all time) but still they don’t have intrigue. What will get them the attention that no one is really certain they deserve anyway? Hit the jump to find out…

Before I tell you what it is that could make this team interesting, let’s find out a little more about them…

Last Year’s Record: 32-50 (2nd to last in Southeast Division, 4rd to last in Eastern Conference, 8th to last in the NBA)

Coach: Larry Brown

Expected Starting Lineup: Raymond Felton, Jason Richardson, Gerald Wallace, Emeka Okafor, Nazr Mohammed

Expected Bench Contributors: D.J. Augustin, Matt Carroll, Adam Morrison, Jared Dudley

Can I do this?

As you can see, the team has a large difference between the talent level of their starters and bench. If one of those guys gets injured and they have to start a bench player, they will be demolished. I would look into HGH if I were this team. Without it, they won’t be able to play enough minutes to be decent. Even their starting five isn’t that good. Raymond Felton is a mediocre point guard that MJ drafted because they went to the same university. His point and assist numbers both showed an increase of .4 on their average between two years ago and last year. That isn’t a big enough change to indicate that he is going to be great someday. His career shooting percentage is below %40 and last year his 3-point percentage was %28. Keep in mind that he is 6″1. Then you have Jason Richardson who is really good. Unfortunately he is also really unhappy about getting dealt to Charlotte from San Fransisco. Gerald Wallace is so underrated that he’s now overrated and has to come back from last season’s injury. That injury is what we call a “Grade 3 Concussion” which is defined by the American Association of Neurological Surgeons as ones that “involve post-traumatic amnesia for more than 24 hours or unconsciousness for more than five minutes. Players who sustain this grade of brain injury should be sidelined for at least one month, after which they can return to play if they are asymptomatic for one week.” Ouch. Did I mention that it was his 4th concussion in 4 years? No? Perhaps you forgot because you had a Grade 3 concussion less than 24 hours ago. Okafor is pretty solid although he is no Dwight Howard (I will never stop bragging about my call on that one) and Nazr Mohammed has a severe case of being Nazr Mohammed. Larry Brown has made good teams out of veterans before but I doubt this is one of those times.

Yesterday we encountered the Bucks and their five point guards, today we meet the Bobcats who only have two. Not only do they only have two, but Felton isn’t that good and Augustin is a rookie. Matt Carroll is a random white guy and Adam Morrison is a random hippy white guy who cries, has diabetes, long hair, and is coming off a season where he didn’t even play a single game. Then of course you have Jared Dudley. Then of course Jared Dudley has mental and behavioral issues. So, that’s your bench! Sound good? No? That’s why I have a plan to make this team more interesting…

What's that slogan... you know, for that company... oh, right. "Just Do It"

Bring back Jordan. No seriously. Do it. You know he wants to. Everybody understates how good he was with the Wizards. He might have been Floor Jordan instead of Air Jordan but he was still Jordan. Five years ago he still averaged 20/6/4 per game. He might not be able to do that but he can still play. He would clearly be a big help as the 6th man and you could keep his minutes down that way as well. If he wears 45 this time it would be his age. He is still a great shooter and is in decently good shape. He came out of his office last year to scrimmage with the team once and the guys said that they were amazed by what he could still do. I’m telling you this could work.

The bottom line would be that people would actually care about this team unlike right now. They would be a better team, but not by much. Also, if he’s playing he might control less of the personnel moves, which we all know is good because he’s terrible at that. Now I know that this doesn’t seem like a good idea, but really think what would happen if Jordan returned. It would be a threepeat of fake retirements. Add that to the two threepeats of championships and you get a threepeat of threepeats. Nothing could be better than that unless someone threepeated a threepeated threepeat and I’m not even sure what that even means. If you think about it, it’s really his fault that they are this bad in the first place. The least he could do is play if it will make the team better. You look at their roster and tell me that Jordan at age 45 isn’t better than almost every bench player on the team.

Basically, this team is going to be bad. Worse for them is that there is almost no chance that they will be bad enough to secure a top five pick much like last year. I don’t expect them to do anything significant. I would define “anything significant” as competing for a top pick or a playoff spot. They just have too much for one and not enough for the other.

The Youtube clip is Jordan in practice last year with the Bobcats. If you don’t think he could do these moves for jumpers on an NBA court today, you are just plain wrong. Enjoy his airness…

Prediction: 30-35 wins, 9-13 in the Eastern Conference

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