There is something awkward about how veterans Nic Batum and Michael Kidd-Gilchrist now do or don't fit with the Charlotte Hornets.
I sensed that for weeks, and the way coach James Borrego answered a question last week, before the team left on a four-game, late-season road trip, reinforced that impression.
"Where they fit in the rotation, I don't know," Borrego said when I asked about those two in the remaining eight games.
Borrego went on to say Batum and Kidd-Gilchrist are professional and will stay ready. I'm sure they will. However, that doesn't mitigate that they represent a fortune on next season's payroll, and in the case of Batum, the season after that.
Borrego and his boss, general manager Mitch Kupchak, inherited Kidd-Gilchrist's contract, which pays him $13 million next season and Batum's, which guarantees about $52 million over the next two seasons. Kidd-Gilchrist was the No. 2 overall pick in 2012. Batum signed the largest contract in Charlotte sports history _ $120 million over five years _ in the summer of 2016.
The contracts for those two came on the watch of Kupchak's predecessor, Rich Cho. Kupchak and Borrego were hired over the past year as agents of change, and the recent youth movement in the rotation demonstrates that.
Change can be expensive and fractious. I suspect that's how this could end up.
Before training camp began, Borrego asked Kidd-Gilchrist to be a non-starter for the first time in his NBA career and to shift primary positions from small forward to power forward. Kidd-Gichrist embraced that role, and for a while, it worked with him as sixth-man. But then, in early March, Borrego stopped playing Kidd-Gilchrist at all. That lasted three games.
I asked Kidd-Gilchrist back then how he was handling it: "I'm taking this game by game, but it's really tough," he said.
Since then, Kidd-Gilchrist has played a small role _ never more than 16 minutes in a game _ then suffered the third concussion of his NBA career. I thought that might end his season, but he was cleared medically before Tuesday's game against the San Antonio Spurs.
He didn't play.
Batum was a starter this season until he was replaced by Dwayne Bacon on March 21 against the Minnesota Timberwolves. Beating the Timberwolves started a season-best four-game winning streak. Batum missed the next three games with an illness.
Second-year pro Bacon is performing well, as is rookie Miles Bridges, who has started for more than a month. No one argues with the results.
But it's still awkward that players signed to be foundation pieces are so extraneous.
"I talked to J.B. (Borrego) about it. I'm all for the team," Batum said. "If I start, if I come off the bench, if I play 40 minutes, if I play 10 minutes, it doesn't matter. If we win, that's what matters to me."
That's a good attitude, but this is still about cost-effectiveness. Batum's and Kidd-Gilchrist's salaries combined next season are close to $40 million. If those two hardly ever play in 2019-20, it's bad business, even if the Hornets end up in a rebuild.
Technically, Kidd-Gilchrist can opt out of his contract after this season, but I doubt that happens; I don't see another team paying him $13 million next season, so why hit free agency before he must? I do think it's possible another team would accept Kidd-Gilchrist's salary as part of a trade package, but that would entail the Hornets giving up an asset as an inducement.
Batum's contract is more problematic. No player in the NBA is "untradeable," but $25.5 million next season and $27 million the following season is way out of line with what another team could expect form Batum's performance.
It's likely the Hornets will have to ride this out, and that makes it Borrego's problem. The good news: If Batum has a strength right now, it's versatility. At 6-foot-8, he can play shooting guard, small forward and some power forward. Making him a utility player might be the best option because you have to make him something.
Otherwise, he becomes a profoundly expensive barnacle. That's more than awkward, it's wasteful.
