<div class="quote_poster">Quote:</div><div class="quote_post">The Charlotte Bobcats remind me of that basketball the NBA foisted upon its players at the beginning of this season. In this analogy, the Bobcats are the ball, and the NBA players are the public. That new ball went over like "New Coke" with the players -- it was such an embarrassment that the league had to replace it midseason. The Bobcats? They're suddenly hot, picking up their third straight victory Saturday night, 89-83, at home against Philadelphia. But thousands of people in our area view the Bobcats with resentment or indifference. These folks wouldn't go to uptown Charlotte to watch a Bobcats game if someone handed them free tickets and pointed to a limousine to take them there. And this attitude is far deeper-rooted than the Bobcats management team ever accounted for. Off the court, the Bobcats seem to fire or lose somebody relatively important every few weeks with no clear explanation given. The team president, the marketing chief, the top attorney, the public relations director, the TV color guy -- they have all left the organization within the past year, often under odd circumstances. This team is only in its third season, yet it has already undergone a major front-office purge. It's like an underrated Stephen King novel called "Thinner," about a guy who gets cursed and keeps losing weight -- too much weight -- no matter what he tries. Every time you see the Bobcats, there is less of them. The belt-tightening has reached almost absurd proportions. Why all the payroll-slashing? Apparently, because the Bobcats aren't selling enough. They can't make people care enough. The team isn't good enough. Also, the owners don't show up nearly enough. And when they do, majority owner Bob Johnson and icon-in-residence Michael Jordan rarely grant interviews.</div> Source
Johnson has to make a commitment to making the team better instead of just using draft picks. The Hornets ownership left too much of a bad taste in the people of Charlotte's mouths, it's gonna take playoffs to get them back. To do that we are going to need more veterans to lead the team and a coach that actually knows what he's doing.
