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    Michael Jordan to Sell Majority Stake in Charlotte Hornets

    Jordan, the former star of the Chicago Bulls, purchased the team in 2010.Michael Jordan, the owner of the Charlotte Hornets and one of the most storied athletes in sports history, has agreed to sell his majority share in the team to a group led by Gabe Plotkin and Rick Schnall, two private equity investors.The team was valued at $3 billion, according to a person familiar with the details of the agreement but not authorized to discuss them publicly. The team, in its announcement of the sale, did not disclose what percentage of his stake Jordan would sell, but said he would remain a minority investor. Jordan, a North Carolina native, first purchased the team in 2010 for $275 million, when the team was known as the Bobcats.The acquiring group also includes the country music star Eric Church and the rapper J. Cole, both of whom are from North Carolina.Jordan won six championships with the Chicago Bulls in the 1990s and is considered by many to be the greatest basketball player ever. More

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    N.B.A. Suspends Miles Bridges for 30 Games for Domestic Violence

    Bridges pleaded no contest to felony domestic violence in November. He was accused of assaulting the mother of his children.Miles Bridges, the N.B.A. forward who pleaded no contest to felony domestic violence in the fall, has been suspended for 30 games, the league announced on Friday. Bridges, 25, had played for the Charlotte Hornets for four seasons before he was accused of assaulting his girlfriend in front of their children last June. He was not under contract during the 2022-23 regular season and did not appear in any games.Prosecutors initially charged him with several counts of felony domestic violence and child abuse, though they did not name the victims. The N.B.A. said it would conduct its own inquiry.The league said it had consulted domestic violence experts, interviewed witnesses and the people involved and reviewed materials as part of its investigation. It has been almost 10 months since Bridges was arrested, and more than five months since he was sentenced. Mike Bass, an N.B.A. spokesman, said the league “took the time necessary” to ensure that the investigation was “comprehensive.”Bridges was arrested in Los Angeles on June 29. Around that time, Mychelle Johnson, a former college basketball player who has two children with Bridges, posted photos on Instagram showing what appeared to be bruising and other injuries on her body. She did not mention Bridges, and the post was subsequently deleted. The Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office, in a news release, accused Bridges of causing “great bodily injury.” After pleading no contest to one count of felony domestic violence in November, Bridges was sentenced to probation and 100 hours of community service and ordered to attend counseling and parenting classes. The sentence also included a 10-year restraining order for the victim and weekly drug tests for Bridges.Bridges was a rising star before his arrest, which came on the eve of free agency. He was a restricted free agent projected to receive a maximum contract from Charlotte worth around $173 million. The Hornets had made a qualifying offer to Bridges the day before his arrest. If he has not signed it, and the team has not withdrawn it, he remains a restricted free agent. Charlotte did not answer a question from The New York Times about Bridges’s contract status, but said in a statement that the “investigation and ruling were the expected next steps in the process” and the team would not comment further at this time. Klutch, the agency that represents Bridges, did not respond to a request for comment.The N.B.A. is crediting Bridges for 20 games of his suspension because he did not play this season. Bridges attended a Hornets game against the Lakers in Los Angeles in December, which would not have been allowed if he had been suspended. In February, Bridges told The Associated Press during a Michigan State men’s basketball game that he might return to the N.B.A. in March.The N.B.A.’s collective bargaining agreement stipulates that a conviction is not required for a violation of the league’s domestic violence policy. It empowers Commissioner Adam Silver, based on the finding of the investigation, to “fine, suspend, or dismiss and disqualify” a player “from any further association with the N.B.A.” for violating the policy.There were several notable suspensions in the N.B.A. this season.In September, the Boston Celtics suspended Coach Ime Udoka for the season for violating team policy by having a relationship with a subordinate, according two people who were not authorized to discuss the punishment publicly. They then fired him in February, according to a person who was not authorized to comment publicly.In November, the Nets suspended guard Kyrie Irving indefinitely after he shared an antisemitic film on Twitter and repeatedly refused to disavow antisemitism. He missed eight games. He was later traded to the Dallas Mavericks after negotiations over a contract extension broke down.Last month, the N.B.A. suspended Memphis Grizzlies guard Ja Morant for eight games after he brandished a gun in an Instagram Live video after a game against the Denver Nuggets. More

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    How Is Nikola Jokic This Good Again?

    With his seamless passing and box-score-busting offense, Jokic, the superstar Denver Nuggets center, is showing why his coach calls him a “generational talent.”DENVER — Nikola Jokic didn’t look like himself in some ways. He was missing layups and had been called for a technical foul. He made silly turnovers, was late on several defensive rotations and tallied just two assists in the first half.But by the time that game against the Charlotte Hornets was over, Jokic had amassed an eye-popping stat line: 40 points, 27 rebounds and 10 assists. It was the first time a player had compiled at least 35 points, 25 rebounds and 10 assists since Wilt Chamberlain did so in 1968. Jokic set a Denver Nuggets record by grabbing 20 rebounds in the first half alone, amid all of his miscues.That’s the level Jokic is at nowadays: Even his off games are record-breaking.“I didn’t know it was a 40, 27 and 10 night,” Nuggets Coach Michael Malone said after the game Sunday. “But I knew that he was having just another Nikola Jokic stellar performance.”The next game was Tuesday night against the Memphis Grizzlies, the only team standing between the Nuggets and the best record in the Western Conference. Jokic meticulously dismantled Memphis by tossing out 13 assists, feeding his teammates as if he were Mary Poppins among birds, as part of a triple-double in a 14-point win.The almost routine dominance of Jokic — Malone called him “a generational talent” — is bolstering his case to become the first N.B.A. player to win three straight Most Valuable Player Awards since Larry Bird, who won from 1984 to 1986 with the Boston Celtics. The only other players to do so were Wilt Chamberlain (1966 to 1968 with the 76ers) and Bill Russell (1961 to 1963 with Boston).But it’s not just awards that set Jokic apart from other stars.Some players seem to defy the laws of physics with their athleticism. Jokic is not fast. His vertical is more of a horizontal. He isn’t particularly muscular and often looks winded, with his shoulders sagging. When he shoots 3-pointers, he slowly winds up and casually flicks his wrist, as if basketball is interrupting his day.Yet Jokic, 27, makes flashy passes look effortless and punishes opponents with brute force at the basket. Alex English, a Hall of Famer who won a scoring title for the Nuggets in 1983, said Jokic makes it seem like he “doesn’t have to work so hard.”“His footwork is just unbelievable,” English said. “Guys, they don’t know what he’s going to do because he’s got such great footwork. He is just the total package.”Early in the third quarter against Memphis on Tuesday, Jokic caught the ball near the perimeter, instantly tossed the ball between his legs without looking and found a cutting Bruce Brown for a dunk, drawing oohs and aahs from the crowd. That was the amuse-bouche for minutes later, when he coolly tossed a blind over-the-head pass from the low post to Aaron Gordon for another dunk.“You just have to be ready for the ball, no matter where you are or where he is on the court because he can find you,” Zeke Nnaji, a third-year reserve forward for the Nuggets, said in the locker room on Sunday.When Jokic is on the court, the Nuggets’ offense is on par with the league’s best teams. When he sits, it is the worst, a remarkable swing. This year, teammates like Gordon, Brown and guard Kentavious Caldwell-Pope are having great years, in part because of the open shots Jokic has created. In the case of Brown, roughly half his shots have been “open” or “wide open,” according to the league’s tracking numbers. Last year, when Brown was with the Nets, that number was only 38.3 percent.One of the most effective plays the Nuggets run involves Jokic catching the ball around the free-throw line, leaving the entire court at his disposal. If a double team comes, Jokic casually finds shooters or cutters. If he is single-covered, Jokic simply backs down the defender or shoots over him. He doesn’t move quickly. He gets to where he needs to go, or makes sure the ball does.Jokic, for the third straight season, is leading the league in multiple advanced statistical categories, in large part because of his ruthless efficiency. He’s averaging 24.7 points a game, and his true shooting percentage (a measure of scoring efficiency that factors in free throws) — is 68.8 percent. No one has ever averaged 20 points per game with at least 69 percent true shooting for a season. (During the 1981-82 season, Artis Gilmore averaged 18.5 points a game on 70.2 percent true shooting.)And Jokic does have shortcomings: He’s not a strong defender, even though he’s the only center in the league’s top 20 in steals. Opposing teams with quick guards often look to attack him when he’s on defense. In the two games this week, Hornets and Grizzlies guards sought Jokic out in transition and stepped right around him for easy layups.Quick guards, like Charlotte’s Terry Rozier, center, often can zip past Jokic.Isaiah J. Downing/USA Today Sports, via ReutersHis matchup against Memphis guard Ja Morant on Tuesday was a battle in contrasts. Morant is a high-flying speedster who seems to have an internal joystick set to turbo at all times. Jokic, listed at 6-foot-11, has nine dunks on the year. Morant, at 6-foot-2, has 19. Though the Grizzlies lost, Morant’s output was certainly that of a superstar — 35 points and 10 assists — and he, like Jokic, could be in the conversation for the M.V.P. Award.Several players have won twice in a row, including Milwaukee’s Giannis Antetokounmpo immediately before Jokic. But few have won the following year, even if, like Jokic, they continued to play well. Michael Wilbon, the ESPN broadcaster and longtime M.V.P. voter, said that voter fatigue is “probably” a real factor in voting, though “not consciously.”“You just start to examine your own judgment and you’re saying, ‘Wait a minute, is this person so dominant that he should be installed in this position in a league that has great stars every year?’” Wilbon said.Whether Jokic wins again or not is almost besides the point. He is one of the best shows to watch — not just in the N.B.A., but in all of professional sports. Even though he’s won individual honors, he does not seem to get the attention that other top stars get. Maybe it’s because he plays in a smaller market like Denver. Maybe it’s because he doesn’t do many commercials and isn’t active on social media. Maybe it’s because he hasn’t won a championship.But this month will mark only the third time in Jokic’s eight-year career that the N.B.A. will showcase the Nuggets on Christmas, a day the league typically reserves for the league’s marquee players. Last year, despite Jokic being the reigning M.V.P., the league snubbed the Nuggets when deciding the holiday’s schedule.That’s on the league for depriving viewers of a unicorn: a slow-footed, lumbering big man who manages to awe on a nightly basis in a way no one of his size and physique has before dribbling a basketball. More

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    Paul Silas, NBA Defensive Star and Head Coach, Dies at 79

    Known for his rebounding, he spent 16 seasons as a player, most notably with the Celtics. He was also LeBron James’s first coach as a pro.Paul Silas, a rebounding and defensive pillar on three N.B.A. championship teams, who went on to a coaching career that included presiding over LeBron James’s professional debut with the Cleveland Cavaliers, died on Saturday at his home in Denver, N.C., outside Charlotte. He was 79.The cause was cardiac arrest, his daughter Paula Silas-Guy said.Silas was known for his tactical approach to rebounding, especially on offense. A robust 6-foot-7-inch forward, he studied the arc and spin of his teammates’ shots to compensate for his lack of vertical skills.“I used to tell him that you couldn’t slip a sheet of paper under his feet but he was still an incredible rebounder,” Lenny Wilkens, a teammate with the St. Louis Hawks when Silas entered the N.B.A. in 1964, said in an interview for this obituary earlier this year. “Once he was in position, you just couldn’t move him.”Silas played for five N.B.A. franchises, the last of which was the Seattle SuperSonics, where he was reunited with Wilkens, who coached the team, and became a valuable role player during a 1978-79 championship season.Silas shoots against the Houston Rockets in 1975. He enjoyed his most prominent role playing for the Celtics, where he formed a rugged frontcourt tandem with Dave Cowens.Dick Raphael/NBAE, via Getty ImagesBut it was with the Boston Celtics, after five years with the Hawks and three in Phoenix, that Silas enjoyed the most prominent of his 16 playing seasons. Acquired in 1972 from the Suns by the Celtics’ patriarch Red Auerbach in a trade for the negotiating rights to Charlie Scott, Silas formed a rugged frontcourt tandem with Dave Cowens, a 6-foot-9 center.Auerbach pursued Silas after he had his best overall statistical season, averaging 17.5 points and 11.9 rebounds. “The main reason that Red wanted Silas was to deal with Dave DeBusschere, who had been wearing them out,” said Bob Ryan, who covered the Celtics for The Boston Globe, referring to the rival Knicks’ star forward.Cowens and Silas quickly cultivated an on-court chemistry, with Cowens’s ability to shoot from the perimeter leaving the interior open for Silas to outmuscle opponents around the basket, where he also had a deft tiptoe push shot.“Me and Dave began to just wear teams out,” Silas told the sports digital publication Grantland in 2014. “I mean wear them out.”Coached by Tom Heinsohn, the Celtics occasionally deployed Silas as a starter and in the role made famous by his teammate John Havlicek, as the first sub off the bench, or sixth man.In the 1974 playoffs, they avenged a 1973 defeat to the Knicks in the Eastern Conference finals, then outlasted the Kareem Abdul-Jabbar-led Milwaukee Bucks in the league finals, winning the last game on the road.With a core of Cowens, Havlicek, Jo Jo White, Silas and Scott, whose rights were reacquired by Auerbach in 1975, the Celtics also won the 1976 title, defeating Phoenix in six games.Auerbach then made what The Globe’s Ryan called “his greatest blunder,” trading Silas to the Denver Nuggets after a salary dispute. Aligned with Larry Fleisher, the sport’s most powerful agent and executive director of the N.B.A. Players’ Association, Silas insisted on being paid like the Celtics’ stars — especially the team’s white stars.With Fleisher’s help and some locker room sleuthing, Silas found N.B.A. team salary lists and discovered that Black players tended to be paid less than white players of similar, and sometimes inferior, ability.In negotiations, Auerbach would tell players, “I’m giving you this, don’t you tell anyone else,” according to Don Chaney, another Black Celtic who left the team in 1975 for more money in the rival American Basketball Association.“No one ever talked until Silas arrived,” Chaney said in 1991. “He started going around asking guys, ‘What are you making?’”Silas’s departure triggered a late 1970s Celtics decline and upset Cowens enough to prompt him to take a two-month sabbatical at the start of the 1976-77 season.“We’d just won a championship in ’76, so it’s like, why screw around with a good thing?” Cowens said in the 2014 Grantland article. “I was a little bit upset at everybody. I was upset at Paul, and I was upset at the Celtics for allowing that to happen.”Silas in 1977 playing with the Denver Nuggets.Focus on Sport/Getty ImagesSilas admitted to some regret about leaving the Celtics when his playing time in Denver diminished. He welcomed the reunion with Wilkens, the star guard who in St. Louis had encouraged the young Silas to shed 30 pounds, to an eventual playing weight of 220.“I would make him play me one-on-one,” Wilkens said. “Paul liked to eat, and I’d tell him, ‘You’ll never be able to guard me unless you get on that diet,’ which he did.”Paul Theron Silas was born on July 12, 1943, in Prescott, Ark., and at age 8 moved to Oakland, Calif., with his parents, Leon and Clara, and two brothers. His father worked as a railroad porter. In Oakland, the family initially shared a home with Silas’s cousins, three of whom grew up to form the rhythm & blues group the Pointer Sisters.Silas sang with his cousins in the school choir but spent most of his free time at West Oakland’s DeFremery Park, watching and idolizing Bill Russell, the future Celtics great, dominate the competition. At McClymonds High School, where Russell had played nearly a decade earlier, Silas led the varsity to a 68-0 record over three seasons, earning a scholarship to Creighton University. His brother, William, accompanied him to Omaha, Neb., but died of cardiac arrest while Silas was in school.As a junior, Silas led the nation in rebounding, averaging 20.6 per game. He was the 12th pick, or third of the second round, by St. Louis in the 1964 N.B.A. draft.After Silas’s N.B.A. playing career — during which he averaged 9.4 points and 9.9 rebounds a game, played in two All-Star games and was twice voted first-team All-Defense — he had a long run as an assistant and head coach.Having come of age during the N.B.A.’s rough-and-tumble foundational era made him a logical choice in 2003 to mentor the 19-year-old LeBron James in Cleveland as James, from nearby Akron, Ohio, made the leap from high school prodigy to the pros.In the carnival atmosphere that greeted James, Silas became a tough-love enforcer, barring James’s vast entourage from practices and notifying official sellers of Cavs merchandise that people other than the rookie phenom played for the team.“Once LeBron sets foot out here, he’s got to come with it like everybody else,” Silas told The New York Times in 2003.In 2005, when the Cavaliers lost nine of 12 games, Silas was fired, even though he and James had seemed to form a strong bond, The Times reported.“I loved Paul Silas a lot — he gave me a chance to showcase my talent early,” James told The Times. “Coach was always upbeat, even after a loss.”Silas in 1999 while coaching the Charlotte Hornets to a 49-33 record.Sporting News, via Getty ImagesThe best of Silas’s 12 head-coaching seasons was in 1999-2000 in Charlotte, where Silas directed the Hornets to a 49-33 record. The season was marred by the death of Bobby Phills, one of the team’s best players, in a car crash that involved a teammate, David Wesley. Both were reportedly speeding in their Porsches near the team’s arena.“The guys look at me as a father figure,” Silas, then 56, said as the Hornets mourned Phills while moving forward with their season, which ended with a first-round playoff defeat.Silas, who in interviews expressed regret over not having a close relationship with his father, helped launch his son Stephen’s coaching career, adding him to his Charlotte staff in 2000. Stephen Silas became head coach of the Houston Rockets in 2020.In addition to Stephen and Paula, Silas is survived by his wife, Carolyn (Kemp) Silas, whom he married in 1966; a stepdaughter, Donna Turner, from Ms. Silas’s first marriage;three grandchildren; and two stepgrandchildren.Silas embraced the reputation that had earned him his job mentoring James: that he was a resilient, cool-tempered paternalistic figure.“You can’t play this game mad — your own game just falls apart,” Silas told The Globe’s sports columnist Leigh Montville in 1972. “I play fierce but I never play mad. There’s a difference.”Alex Traub contributed reporting. More

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    Charlotte Hornets’ Miles Bridges Pleads No Contest in Domestic Violence Case

    Bridges, who played for the Charlotte Hornets last season, was accused of assaulting his girlfriend in front of their two children in June.Miles Bridges, who played for the Charlotte Hornets last season, pleaded no contest to one felony domestic violence charge of injuring a child’s parent, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office said Thursday. He will be placed on three years’ probation but will avoid jail time as part of a plea agreement.“We believe this resolution was the best avenue to hold Mr. Bridges accountable for his conduct,” the prosecutor’s office said in a statement. “We also understand through the victim’s representatives that the victim wanted an expedited resolution of the case. The victim and her representatives were consulted about the proposed resolution and agreed with the outcome of the case.”A lawyer for Bridges did not immediately respond to a request for comment.The charge stemmed from an incident in late June, when Bridges, 24, was accused of assaulting his girlfriend in front of their two children. Bridges was arrested on June 29 and released on $130,000 bond.Days after Bridges’s arrest, Mychelle Johnson, a former college basketball player who has two children with Bridges, posted multiple photos on Instagram displaying apparent bruising and other marks on her body. She did not mention Bridges, and the post was later deleted.Bridges faced multiple felony charges of domestic violence and child abuse, and prosecutors accused him of causing “great bodily injury on the domestic violence victim.” Prosecutors have not named the victims in the case.“Domestic violence creates physical, mental and emotional trauma that has a lasting impact on survivors,” George Gascón, the Los Angeles County district attorney, said in a statement in July. “Children who witness family violence are especially vulnerable and the impact on them is immeasurable. Mr. Bridges will be held accountable for his actions and our Bureau of Victim Services will support the survivors through this difficult process.”In addition to probation, Bridges was ordered to undergo a year of domestic violence counseling and, separately, parenting classes and to provide 100 hours of community service. The sentence also includes a 10-year restraining order for the domestic violence victim, weekly drug tests, and restitution for the victim that will be determined at a hearing in January, according to the district attorney’s office.Bridges had spent the past four years in the N.B.A. with the Hornets. His arrest came one day before the start of the free agency period, when he was projected to be signed to a maximum contract worth around $173 million, according to multiple news media reports. Bridges, currently unsigned, had been a restricted free agent, meaning the Hornets had the right to match other teams’ offers for Bridges. The Hornets gave Bridges a qualifying offer before his arrest, but he has not accepted it. It is not clear whether the team still plans to sign him; the Hornets did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Bridges’s contract status, but they released a statement.“We are aware of today’s developments regarding Miles Bridges’s legal situation,” the team said in a statement. “We will continue to gather information before determining any potential next steps. Until then, we will have no additional comments.”Under the league’s collective bargaining agreement, Commissioner Adam Silver is able to place a player on administrative leave while the league investigates domestic violence accusations. If the league determines that the domestic violence policy has been violated, the N.B.A. may “fine, suspend, or dismiss and disqualify” a player, according to the agreement.The N.B.A. did not immediately respond to a request for comment. More

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    NBA Season Preview: The Nets and the Lakers Are the Wild Cards

    Even for a league used to drama and headlines, the N.B.A. had a dizzying off-season.There were trade requests (Kevin Durant) and trade rumors (Russell Westbrook); injuries (Chet Holmgren) and returns (Zion Williamson). The power structure of the Western Conference could be upended by the return of Kawhi Leonard with the Clippers; the power structure of the East is again unclear.And a series of scandals at Boston, Phoenix and Golden State could have lasting implications for the league.In short: A lot is going on.Headline More

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    Charlotte Hornets’ Miles Bridges Faces Felony Domestic Violence Charges

    Bridges, a Charlotte Hornets free agent, was accused of assaulting his girlfriend in front of their two children. He was arrested in Los Angeles last month.Miles Bridges, a Charlotte Hornets free agent, will be arraigned Wednesday on felony charges of domestic violence and child abuse, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office announced Tuesday. Bridges, 24, faces one count of injuring a child’s parent and two counts of child abuse.In a news release from the district attorney’s office, Bridges was accused of assaulting his girlfriend in front of their two children in late June. Bridges was arrested on June 29 and released on $130,000 bond.The news release did not name any of the victims. Days after Bridges was arrested, Mychelle Johnson, a former college basketball player who has two children with Bridges, posted several photos on Instagram that appeared to show bruising and other injuries throughout her body. She did not name Bridges in her post and has since deleted it.Bridges is accused of causing “great bodily injury on the domestic violence victim,” according to the news release.“Domestic violence creates physical, mental and emotional trauma that has a lasting impact on survivors,” George Gascón, the Los Angeles County district attorney, said in a statement. “Children who witness family violence are especially vulnerable and the impact on them is immeasurable. Mr. Bridges will be held accountable for his actions and our Bureau of Victim Services will support the survivors through this difficult process.”Bridges is a restricted free agent who just finished his fourth year in the N.B.A., all with the Hornets. Klutch Sports Group, the agency that represents Bridges, did not respond to a request for comment after the arrest and could not immediately be reached for comment on Tuesday. The Hornets, in a statement, called the charges “very serious” but declined to comment further because it was a “legal matter.” A spokesman for the N.B.A. said the league was “investigating the allegations.”The N.B.A.’s collective bargaining agreement with its players’ union states that a conviction is not required for a violation of the league’s domestic violence policy. The agreement empowers the league to place a player on administrative leave while it investigates domestic violence accusations. The commissioner may, depending on the finding of the investigation, “fine, suspend, or dismiss and disqualify” a player “from any further association with the N.B.A.” for violating the policy.Bridges has been considered a rising star. Last season, he averaged 20.2 points, 7 rebounds and 3.8 assists per game — all career highs. His arrest came one day before the start of free agency negotiations and one day after the Hornets had extended him a qualifying offer, which allows the team to match any other offers he receives. He had been expected to command a maximum contract of around $173 million for five years, according to multiple media reports. A spokesman for the team said on Tuesday that the qualifying offer had not been rescinded. More

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    LaMelo Ball Powers a Surging Charlotte Hornets

    Seeking the team’s first playoff appearance since 2016, Charlotte has gone all-in on a guard who can thrill and frustrate on any given play. It’s working so far.BOSTON — The carnival ride known as LaMelo Ball was slowing to a merciful crawl with 7.3 seconds left on Wednesday when a teammate informed him that he was painfully close to his fourth career triple-double.Ball is the hyperactive force who powers the Charlotte Hornets, and as soon as he learned that he needed one more rebound — just one more! — he cranked up the engine, chased down the final errant shot that the Celtics had tossed up and left for the visiting locker room with his stat sheet officially stuffed.Was that last rebound gratuitous? Sure. Was it really necessary for Ball, by his own admission, to box out his own teammates in pursuit of it? Of course not. Was it a fitting postscript to another entertaining evening courtesy of Ball and the rest of the Hornets, the Eastern Conference’s resident fun bunch? Absolutely.“I enjoy the process with these guys,” James Borrego, the Hornets’ coach, said after his team’s 111-102 victory over the Celtics. “They drive me crazy, and they’re going to put a lot of grays on me. But this is why we do it — just to see that growth.”Many teams in the East have muddled through the first half of the season with mediocre records, a development diplomatically known as parity. The Hornets, though, who are eyeing their first playoff appearance since 2016, are finding some momentum. They share they ball. They run the court. They are learning to defend. They play with style.“Everybody’s playing free,” Ball said.And there is little question that Ball, the N.B.A.’s reigning rookie of the year, is the fresh face of the franchise, and has so much room to grow. That might be the scary part. On Wednesday, he collected 15 points, 10 rebounds, 10 assists and 8 turnovers. It was impossible to know, or even predict, what he would do next. He was not dull.“When Melo’s got the ball, you always got to be looking,” said the Hornets’ Terry Rozier, who had a game-high 28 points, “because if you ain’t looking, he’ll throw it off your head.”In just his second season, Ball is one of the rare players who is impossible to miss, a magnet for attention all the way down to his toes. Against the Celtics, he broke out fluorescent footwear — a green sneaker on his left foot, a pink one on his right — with a design inspired by the animated television series, “Rick and Morty.”And, of course, there was his colorful brand of basketball from the start. He blew past the Celtics’ Dennis Schroder for a layup. He curled a bounce pass through a maze of arms to Mason Plumlee for an uncontested dunk. He elevated for some sort of highly inventive (and arguably ill-advised) 360-degree floater and drew contact, sinking both free throws.The game was only minutes old, and the ball seemed liquid coming off his hands. It was Ball at his mesmerizing best.The Hornets, led by players like Ball, Miles Bridges and Terry Rozier, are 25-20 this season. Winslow Townson/Associated PressThe problem with Ball’s liquid basketball is that even he sometimes has difficulty controlling it. So there he was, heaving a pass the length of the court and out of bounds. And moving his pivot foot for a travel. And dragging a defender to the court after trying an errant 3-pointer. And dribbling the ball off his foot several ZIP codes from the basket.“I have to live with some of that,” Borrego said, adding: “I’ve got to let him be Melo and be creative and live in that improv world. But there’s also got to be some awareness from him, as well: ‘OK, I just tried it. It didn’t work out. Be solid now.’ ”As for Ball, he assessed the turnovers as correctable.“Just little missed passes,” he said. “Not like legit turnovers where you get ripped full-court.”The N.B.A. is populated by some very talented young point guards, a list headlined by two 22-year-olds: Luka Doncic of the Dallas Mavericks and Ja Morant of the Memphis Grizzlies. Doncic is already a two-time All-Star, and Morant has edged his way into the conversation as an outside candidate for the N.B.A.’s Most Valuable Player Award.Even so, acclimating to the league’s nightly grind is a process for even the most precocious players, and Ball, 20, is no exception. Before the start of training camp, Borrego identified a few points of emphasis for Ball. Borrego wanted his point guard to improve as a leader, to approach his job as a professional every day. He wanted him to improve as a game manager, to understand time and situation. He also wanted him to improve as a defender, to anticipate rather than react.Ball can sometimes be chaotic, but Coach James Borrego enjoys the complete package. “I have to live with some of that,” Borrego said, adding: “I’ve got to let him be Melo and be creative.”Paul Rutherford/USA Today Sports, via ReutersBall’s jump shot remains a work in progress — he was 5 of 15 from the field against the Celtics, and he has not made more than half his shots in any of his last eight games — though his 3-point shooting has improved since last season. As for the turnovers? Well, Ball has worked to cut down on those, too, a difficult task considering how much he has the ball in his hands.In a way, the Celtics should have been prepared for the Hornets’ up-tempo style, having recently played two other teams — the Chicago Bulls and the New Orleans Pelicans — who rank among the league leaders in fast-break scoring. But the Hornets “take it to another level,” Celtics Coach Ime Udoka said.On Wednesday, Ball was at the center of it all. In the third quarter, he found Rozier for back-to-back 3-pointers — the second after Ball rebounded his own miss and spotted Rozier behind the arc. Later, with just over two minutes remaining in the game, Ball sank a 3-pointer of his own to essentially seal the win.Before their game against the Oklahoma City Thunder on Friday, the Hornets have won six of their last seven to improve their record to 25-20. Ball said he had outsize goals, which include “trying to change the culture, bring winning here.”Fun nights? A playoff push? Everything, including one more rebound, seems within reach. More