It was only two seasons ago that Byron Scott won the NBA’s Coach of the Year Award and took the New Orleans Hornets to within a game of the Western Conference Finals, now he’s unemployed.
The Hornets started the season 3-6, and that was enough for the Hornets to send their coach to the curb.
Taking over will be general manager Jeff Bower, who has no head coaching experience, but spent time as an assistant with the Hornets. Bower is bringing in Tim Floyd as his top assistant. Floyd served as head coach for the Hornets in 2003-04, leading them to a 41-41 record and first round playoff loss.
This was the first firing of the young season, but more are probably on the way. The winless New Jersey Nets’ Lawrence Frank has to a be a presumable next target, he hasn’t fared well the past few seasons and isn’t giving the franchise much of a reason to keep him around.
Frank was actually Scott’s replacement in New Jersey, Scott led the Nets to two NBA Finals appearances before being fired in 2004. Despite success with the clipboard, he can’t catch a break. The moment something goes a little off the track with his teams, he’s shockingly sent packing.
Shocking was how the Hornets’ star point-guard Chris Paul took the news. Paul was also caught off-guard that the team didn’t even discuss the move with him before it hit the media.
It hasn’t been a pretty start for the Hornets, four of their six losses were by at least 16 points. Firing a coach after only nine games with a sub par record (after two prior very successful seasons) seems pretty ludicrous, but it’s also become the newest trend throughout the NBA.
This team isn’t going to be a championship contender, even with Paul, they’re just not an elite team. At best, they’re a sixth seed in the Western Conference.
That’s wasn’t Scott’s fault. He was able to get this team to overachieve.
When the Hornets won 56 games in ‘07-08, good graces were on their side.
Paul had an MVP candidate season, he’s continued to grow, but the rest of his cast has flatlined. David West is a solid number two option, but this season his scoring is down nearly six points per game (15.4 ppg), his rebounding is also down to 5.9 per night. He’s not performing like the All-Star he once was. The Hornets also were getting more than 16 points a night from a healthy Peja Stojakovic that season. He’s now down to 8.9 points this season and is coming to the end of his career, along with the return of his injury-prone self. Don’t forget about the career-year that Tyson Chandler had as well, averaging nearly 12 points and 12 rebounds as a clear beneficiary of Paul’s style of play.
That same year the Hornets had a lot of great production from their bench, which consisted of players like Jannero Pargo, Morris Peterson, Bobby Jackson and Bonzi Wells.
Pargo is now a Chicago Bull, Wells and Jackson are both out of the league and Peterson is 32 years-old and barely productive these days.
They just haven’t been the same.
Chandler struggled with injuries last season and then was traded to Oklahoma City. The trade was rescinded, he wound up back in New Orleans for the rest of season (talk about awkward) and was finally traded this summer for Emeka Okafor. Okafor may be a better player than Chandler, but his ability to fit as well as Chandler did during that 56-win season has yet to be seen.
The rest of their current supporting cast basically consists of Devin Brown, Bobby Brown, James Posey, Julian Wright, Hilton Armstrong and Darius Songaila. With exception to Devin Brown and Songaila, each one of these players are shooting less than 41 percent from the floor.
The Hornets have unrealistic expectations for their team. Last season they declined because of their talent, not their coach. The decline obviously is going to carryover into the following season, since most of the holes haven’t been filled.
Bower takes over the team he built, a team that is not designed to win more than 50 games anymore. Scott had to pay the price and lose his job without much of a losing streak to even show for, just a below average team with a superstar and a All-Star forward who is under-performing.
More than likely Scott will be coaching another NBA team by next season, he has a great resume and any team looking for an accomplished coach would be nuts to pass on him.
The inexperienced Bower takes over his own creation. The ball is solely in his court, and now he is going to be held completely accountable for the success of this team.
With losing, comes frustration, someone is going to be blamed and unfortunately for Scott, he took the first hit. Yesterday the Hornets did exactly the same thing as they did when it came to building a great team around Paul, they made the wrong move. As Scott gets ready to hit the golf course, Bower and the Hornets are about see reality kick in over the next few months.
