If you haven’t been paying close attention to the Hornets lately (and why would you unless you’re a sadomasochistic Hornets fan), let me fill you in on a little bit of secret knowledge that isn’t even that secret anymore: Devonte’ Graham has been in a slump for the better part of two months. Coincidentally (or not so coincidentally), that’s the stretch where the Hornets went from “not very good team” to “extremely bad team”.
In the two games before this, Graham went 0-of-7 for zero points and 1-of-10 for six points. He’s like the one reason you would ever care to watch Hornets games, and if he’s not playing well, there’s just no point at all to tune into the game. Did shooting in the three-point contest sap his powers? If we put him on a plane back to Chicago and have him stand at center court in the United Center while muttering incantations sourced from occult tomes, will that bring his powers back? At this point, the Hornets’ top brass should be looking at any and all options to revive Graham, who has gone from being an MIP candidate to only being a candidate for All-Three-Point-Shooting second team.
Okay, I just made up the All-Three-Point-Shooting second team (the first and third teams are similarly fabricated) but I would totally be in support of adding those teams next to the All-NBA and All-Defense teams. We gotta get Graham some hardware of some kind because you know the Hornets are never going to win any for themselves.