Coby White doesn’t sound like a player preparing for a soft landing in Charlotte.
The Hornets moved on from LaMelo Ball and Miles Bridges this offseason, but White said the group around him looks good enough to make noise anyway. Acquired by Charlotte before last season’s trade deadline and then re-signed this summer to a three-year, $74 million deal, White said several teammates are already in town getting work in together.
“I think we’ve got a really, really good team,” White said, via Roderick Boone of The Charlotte Observer. “We’ve got a lot of really, really good players.”
Among the names White mentioned were newcomers Grayson Allen and Dorian Finney-Smith, along with the team’s rookies. He said the Hornets have a real chance to catch people off guard if the work is there to match the talent.
“We’ve got a chance to be a really good team and surprise a lot of people, but we’ve got to put the work in,” White said.
Charlotte is still carrying the weight of a long dry spell - 10 straight seasons without a playoff berth, the NBA’s longest active drought. Even so, the front office did add veteran pieces after dealing Ball and Bridges, bringing back Naz Reid, Allen, Royce O’Neale and draft assets in those moves.
White singled out Allen in particular, praising the kind of winning impact he’s brought to previous teams. He also said Allen’s value goes well beyond the three-point line.
“The one thing I’ve always noticed about G.A. is his ability to impact winning,” White said.
White added that Allen’s ballhandling, playmaking and touch around the rim don’t always get enough attention.
Elsewhere on the free-agent front, Garrison Mathews is heading overseas for the next chapter of his career. He confirmed to Charles Pulliam of The Williamson Herald that he’s joining Olimpia Milano in Italy for the upcoming season.
“I’m excited about the opportunity,” Mathews said. “I didn’t think I’d ever play (overseas), but I got a couple calls with some great offers that were too hard to pass up.”
Mathews, 29, has played in 329 NBA games with the Wizards, Rockets, Hawks and Pacers, averaging 6.4 points and shooting 38.2 percent from deep. His latest NBA stop came with Indiana last season.
He’s not shutting the door on the league, either.
“My ultimate goal is to have a good year and then hopefully get an opportunity to come back to play,” he said.
In New York, the Knicks are still shopping for a third center. According to Ian Begley of SNY, the team has been in touch with several free-agent big men, but no clear front-runner has emerged.
Begley noted that if the Knicks were ready to give one of those players a guaranteed contract, they probably would have already done it. Instead, the likelier path is bringing a few centers to training camp on non-guaranteed deals and letting the competition sort out the final roster spot.
For now, New York seems comfortable letting the situation develop on its own.
In Other News...
Hornets Young Core Just Got A Ranking Fans Will Debate
ESPNs latest under-25 ranking gave the Hornets another snapshot of how quickly their young core is rising, with forwards Brandon Miller and Kon Knueppel both landing on the list. Miller was Charlottes leading scorer last season, while Knueppel arrives with real buzz after a rookie year in which he poured in 273 three-pointers and led the league from deep.
The placement figures to spark plenty of debate in Charlotte, especially with the Hornets coming off a noticeable step forward and now heading into a season without LaMelo Ball and Miles Bridges after offseason trades. Millers standing on the national list will draw its own attention, but Knueppels arrival near the top only adds to the sense that the Hornets are trying to build something young, dangerous and still a little unfinished. [Read more 🡒]
Hornets Rookie Could Force Jeff Petersons First Real Lineup Decision
The Hornets spent much of the offseason reshaping the back line of their roster, and Hannes Steinbach has quickly emerged as one of the more interesting names to watch in that mix. The rookies scoring touch and energetic style have given Charlotte another option at center, enough to make the conversation around the position feel less settled than it did when Moussa Diabat was handling a bigger share of the load.
For Jeff Peterson, that creates the kind of first real lineup decision front offices and coaches talk about in theory but rarely have to make this quickly. Diabat still brings value, and a move to the bench would not mean he is suddenly out of the picture, but Steinbachs rise could force Charlotte to decide what it wants the middle of the court to look like as the 2026-27 season opens, especially with major early trades looking unlikely. [Read more 🡒]