With the recent revelation that Kemba Walker is on the trade block, a few other big names on the Hornets have been mentioned as on the chopping block as well. The whole reason Kemba needs to be traded is to help clear out another bad contract from the Hornets so that they can properly rebuild, starting from scratch with none of their deadweight. Nic “I Hate Juan-Carlos Navarro’s Balls” Batum is one of those “bad contract” guys. Can you believe that he’s getting paid 22 million this year, and then AN ASCENDING AMOUNT OF MONEY FOR THE NEXT THREE YEARS AFTER THAT? All for a guy who’s averaging 11/4/4 on 40% from the field and sub-30% from the threezone. I get that he’s coming off an injury and maybe shouldn’t even be playing right now, but even in his prime this dude was not worth that money. And now the Hornets will have to trade their franchise cornerstone just to clear him off the books.
Remember when the Hornets pulled off a Miles Plumlee-Dwight Howard swap when everybody thought the Plumlee contract was totally immovable? Can they pull off something like that again? Like trade him back to the the Trailblazers for the bad contracts of Meyers Leonard and Moe Harkless? Or, you know, the Hornets could just keep Batum, since he’s not a bad player, just overpaid, and they could have him lounge around in the locker room providing veteran wisdom and sipping espressos from the little espresso machine he keeps in his locker. That wisdom probably isn’t worth 25 million buckaroos but it’s worth something, at least.