Float like a Butterfly, Sting like a Hornet

Mark Williams has been showing something

As you can see, this is a post about the Hornets’ young big, but also, shout out to Nick Richards, who in his debut with the Suns, looked like the missing piece for them in many ways. 21 points with 11 rebounds on 7-8 shooting and a +21 on/off on the game… Charles Lee may be a big-man whisperer.

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Mark Williams, the #15 pick in the 2022 draft, has played 78 total games in his 2.4-year, injury-plagued career so far. That’s less games than AJ Griffin, who retired after his second season; Christian Koloko, who missed an entire season because of a heart condition; and Chet Holmgren, who has had two injuries cause him to miss significant time, including his entire first season.

This season, Williams began his gameplay in Charlotte’s first game of December, and has ramped up to an impressive level. After his first 7 games in which he didn’t surpass 20 minutes in a game, Williams has averaged 28.5 minutes per game with averages of 17.8 points, 11.8 rebounds, and 2.6 assists on only 1.4 turnovers on 65.3% shooting and an impressive 76.2% from the free throw line. Over his last 3 games (an even smaller sample size), he’s put up 24/16, 31/13, and 19/19 on 70% shooting. It’s been something to behold in Queen City.

What Stands Out

As someone who admittedly does not watch a ton of Hornets games, I always connected Williams to the semi-athletic-but-super-long rim-running bigs, like Rudy Gobert or Clint Capela, who are valuable in their own right. But after watching his movement on the court, I am reminded of what Suns fans always hoped physical specimen Deandre Ayton could be more often.

As I mentioned with Ayton, there are a lot of big guys who don’t have the aggressiveness to dunk over people all the time. But Mark clearly does.

For context, Mark Williams has the highest standing reach at 9’9” in the draft combine in the last 20 years… besides Tacko Fall (Wemby was not measured at the draft). So this is not some Giannis-sized athlete out there.

Clearly, things are going well in spurts for Mark. What about in the aggregate?

Over the entire season, the team is not doing great with him on the floor compared to off the floor, if you look at the season as a whole on a site like Cleaning the Glass. But in the games since he’s been playing over 20 mpg (like I mentioned, since Christmas), the team is a net -25 overall in those games, and he is +3 on the floor. In Basketball-Reference’s BPM, Williams is above Domantas Sabonis, Karl-Anthony Towns, Alperen Sengun, and Anthony Davis. Can you say All-Star?!

Just kidding, but Charlotte fans must be happy to see him delivering on the promises made during the draft cycle, despite him not even playing a season’s worth of games yet. Time will tell with injuries, but for now, they (and fantasy managers of Mark, which includes me) can be excited.

A Random FTI for Trade Season

NOTE: Reminder that FTI stands for Fun Trade Idea.

I know it’s not fully-prudent to go all-in around a team that may be destined for at-best the second round of the playoffs, but I think that this is a difficult opportunity to pass up. The Kings NEED a capital-S shooter (which Keegan Murray and Kevin Huerter were supposed to be), and more quality size on the wing around Sabonis and Fox. Perhaps it’s too rich. But light the beam, baby.