2012-13 NBA Preview: New Orleans Hornets

By Kels Dayton
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Updated: October 19, 2012

14. New Orleans Hornets

HOW THEY CAN WIN: Anthony Davis is the real deal. If you don’t think he’s going to make an immediate impact, well, you’re an idiot. Davis is the only player in history to win NCAA Player of the Year, National Defensive Player of the Year, Final Four MOP, and a national title. Oh, and he also won a gold medal and was the No. 1 pick in the draft. So yeah, it’s a good bet he’ll take home Rookie of the Year honors. Eric Gordon (20.6 ppg) is another one of the league’s brightest young stars.

WHY THEY WON’T: New Orleans has Davis and Gordon, but not much else. Like the Rockets, the Hornets are ridiculously young (average age is 23.8 years old). The elder statesman is Roger Mason Jr., a t 32. This isn’t baseball, where the A’s made a run to the playoffs despite starting five rookies. The Hornets will suffer plenty of growing pains.

FINAL DESTINATION: Larry Brown said the team that got Anthony Davis would win 50 games. Not so fast. Davis is going to be a monster (probably Rookie of the Year), and will make the Hornets much better. But there’s still not nearly enough talent here for New Orleans to challenge in the rugged West.

OUR CALL: 21-61

TEAM ROSTER
NO.	NAME	POS	AGE	HT	WT	COLLEGE	2012-2013 SALARY
50	Solomon Alabi	C	24	7-1	252	Florida State	$830,000
0	Al-Farouq Aminu	SF	22	6-9	215	Wake Forest	$2,947,800
33	Ryan Anderson	PF	24	6-10	240	California	$8,700,000
23	Anthony Davis	PF	19	6-10	220	Kentucky	$5,144,280
10	Eric Gordon	SG	23	6-3	215	Indiana	$13,668,750
4	Xavier Henry	SG	21	6-6	220	Kansas	$2,323,200
15	Robin Lopez	C	24	7-0	255	Stanford	$4,899,293
8	Roger Mason Jr.	SG	32	6-5	205	Virginia	$854,389
2	Darius Miller	SF	22	6-8	235	Kentucky	$473,604
0	Dominique Morrison	SF	22	6-6	210	Oral Roberts
25	Austin Rivers	SG	20	6-4	200	Duke	$2,238,360
22	Brian Roberts	PG	26	6-1	180	Dayton	$473,604
14	Jason Smith	PF	26	7-0	240	Colorado State	$2,500,000
42	Lance Thomas	SF	24	6-8	225	Duke	$762,195
21	Greivis Vasquez	PG	25	6-6	211	Maryland	$1,191,240
1	Hakim Warrick	PF	30	6-9	219	Syracuse	$4,000,000
0	Chris Wright	PG	22	6-1	209	Georgetown