NBA 2K got it half-right on Charlotte Hornets’ all-timers

I would say NBA 2K got the starters pretty much right in building an all-time Charlotte NBA roster.

The reserves? Not so much.

NBA 2K, the popular pro-basketball video game, will include its version of all-time rosters for each of the 30 current NBA franchises in its next edition. For Charlotte, that means original Hornets before that team left for New Orleans, Bobcats when the NBA returned, and more Hornets after the name change.

NBA 2K’s starters

Point guard Kemba Walker, shooting guard Eddie Jones, small forward Glen Rice, power forward Larry Johnson, center Alonzo Mourning.

NBA 2K’s reserves

Point guards Muggsy Bogues, Baron Davis and Raymond Felton. Shooting guards Dell Curry and Kendall Gill. Small forward Stephen Jackson. Power forwards P.J. Brown and Kenny Gattison. Centers Al Jefferson and Derrick Coleman.

My thoughts on starters

Those might have been precisely the five I would have chosen. Mourning and Rice are locks and probably so, too, for Larry Johnson. You could have named Curry over Jones, based on Curry’s long body of work (he is still the franchise’s all-time career scorer), but Jones was a Hornets All-Star in 2000 and started every Charlotte game he played. Walker is about 1,700 points away from replacing Curry as the Hornets’ career top scorer.

My thoughts on 10 reserves

I thought there were some head-scratching inclusions and some glaring omissions.

I have no disagreement with Curry, Jefferson, Bogues, Gill or Davis. But I question if any of the other five, with the possible exception of Jackson, belongs among the top 15 players in Charlotte NBA history.

What I would change

▪  No Gerald Wallace? He went from an expansion-draft castoff in Sacramento to an All-Star in Charlotte. He has to be on this list.

▪  Coleman over Vlade Divac or Elden Campbell strikes me as weird. Coleman replaced Divac in 1999, and it was a clear downgrade.

▪  How could Felton make this group and David Wesley not? At worst, Wesley is the same statistically, and he had far more impact here.

▪  No Anthony Mason? No Jamal Mashburn? No Marvin Williams? I think it’s an easy argument each of those players was better in Charlotte than Brown or Gattison. I’m not saying P.J. and Gatt didn’t contribute, but they weren’t Mase, Mash or Marvin.

This story was originally published August 24, 2017 at 11:05 AM with the headline "NBA 2K got it half-right on Charlotte Hornets’ all-timers."