Welcome Tidjane Salaun: The French Connection Part 8

Hornets Talk
22

that dude is tough and leader.

23

If he drops to 42, and Klintman is off the board, I’d be ok. But I don’t know he provides us much. I don’t think highly of him as a first rounder (or in general), but mostly thought it was a hilarious overreach that draft media ever claimed he was lottery quality.

1 Like
25

The reason I personally think that we didn’t trade down is because Portland probably wasn’t offering much and I think Spurs had planned to take our guy, which meant he wouldn’t have been there at 9 if we had traded with Grizzlies.

1 Like
26

A lot of people upset right now, but if he hits them we’ll be seeing some banners in the spectrum center

27

Klintman is definitely interesting to me

1 Like
28

Apparently he did workout with the hornets

1 Like
29

The level of confusion is remarkable.

I like the promise of Salaun and Nnaji bringing a ton of energy to the court at some point down the road

30

zero lift on the jump shot. he is a long way to go. that is a set shot at this point

31

I’ll do what I can to try and help this kid develop into something for the Hornets by saying
 He’s gonna be a bust
 at best a Noah Vonleh type career ahead. Now everyone cross their fingers that that works.

Having gotten that out of the way
 I think my concern is that this confirms the “lean years” comments from Coach LEEan. Some of us maybe felt IF Melo, Mark and others could stay healthy along with Miller and a #6 draft pick that could contribute within the next couple years, maybe a FA addition or two etc., add in a quality coach/staff and new attitude that we could maybe push for a playoff spot within the next couple seasons.This pick makes people feel like the timeline just adjusted way further out which is probably another part of why it’s not very popular.

32

I am proud of us as a fan body though. We have been kicked in the nuts so many times that exactly zero of us are even expecting a positive outcome here. I remember years past where biz was going to challenge dwight howard for center supremacy, ajinica was going to dominant the entire league inside and out, vonleh was a version of chris bosh. Then we all looked at next crop of would be raw prospects with healthy optimism. Now we all know deep down, it just was a wasted pick.

Good job guys. At least we have developed.

1 Like
33

I must admit I’m disappointed by the pick, obviously we don’t know what happened about trading up or down but know body was biting.

I’m hopeful he’ll develop under Lee but i kinda wanted someone just to come in off the bench and show us something with maybe 15 minutes a night, but i suppose we won’t really see Tidjiane till into the new year or next year apart from the summer league.

34

Can we have Djurisic in the 2nd please

35

Getting ready to watch this. Overall team highlights from Salaun’s best game statistically in the playoffs last season. He’s easy to track with the bright lime(?) shoes.

36

Salaun’s second playoff game. General team highlights. He did some nice things.

Edit: I’ve been on a huge French Hip Hop(mostly 90s) binge in the last few months. I’d love to go shoot around at the Paris Pigalle court. I probably shouldn’t read into that.

37

Well let’s hope he’s better than Kai jones

38

Tidjane was really the perfect pick for this new Hornets ownership/management group. Salaun is a 3-4 year project, which is what they want. Because if they had taken a guy like clingan or Knecht, and they didn’t work out for some reason-it would’ve been obvious within that first year. That’s not good press for a new owner/GM. So why not draft a guy that will take a few years to develop, and can’t give you bad press the first here or two since he won’t really even play.

39

Well, the counterpoint is that you used a first rounder for someone who isn’t ready to play pro basketball (if that’s the case) so I’m not sure that’s a better strategy.

1 Like
40

He actually played a full pro season :thinking: (even playing at european level with consistent minutes)

This is no NBA, but why would he be less ready then other 1st rounders playing in college?

1 Like
41

I’m hoping he gets real minutes by mid season. I can’t imagine we drafted a guy at 7m per year to either play in Greensboro full time or just watch, unless he’s a defensive liability and gives no effort. The latter seems far from reality for Salaun.

42

Fair, and I should have said NBA.

I was just responding to the suggestion that the ownership intentionally picked someone years away from playing to avoid criticism of the pick. That doesn’t make sense to me.

Do you think he’s ready to make contributions next season?