After the trades of co-captain Gerald Wallace and Nazr Mohammed yesterday, and the requisite waiving of Sherron Collins, Dominic McGuire and Derrick Brown, the Charlotte Bobcats entered tonight’s game against the Sacramento Kings with eight players in uniform. Stephen Jackson, DJ Augustin and Gerald Henderson made sure that wasn’t a problem.

Dr E. over at Bobcats Baseline has an excellent writeup showing how Gerald Henderson has progressed since Larry Brown was fired and replaced by Paul Silas.

Here’s a great example from the January 18th win over the Bulls.  Watch the whole highlight package and note how many times Derrick Rose abuses DJ Augustin. With the Bulls down one with a chance to win at the end, Silas inserts Henderson in the game specifically to check Rose.  Watch Henderson hound Rose on the last play, forcing him out into taking a fading, off-balance, 22-footer that he misses.  Aren’t many people can do this to Derrick Rose:

With the trade deadline approaching, Rumors are running wild. Here are a few interesting ones that you can rattle around your head.

• Gerald Wallace to Houston via SBN
• Vince Carter (half man – half washed up) to the Bobcats
• Bobcats are looking to get away from their financial commitments to Boris Diaw and Stephen Jackson via SI.com
• Ron Artest for either Stephen Jackson or Gerald Wallace via LA Times thanks but NO thanks.

With all of the rumors that are bound to be bounced around over the next few days, be sure to stay tuned to our trade discussion board to get up to the second updates on any potential deals that may be happening in Bobcats-Land.

The Bobcats played the first quarter with a sense of intensity their fans had been hoping to see. They matched the Hawks to end the first quarter with a 27-27 tie. The second quarter saw the “Hyde” versus the Dr. Jekyll of the first. The Hawks scored 18 unanswered points before the ‘Cats managed to score from two DJ Augustine free throws. The Bobcats made some solid defensive stops but the Hawks took a half-time lead, 52-39, into the break. The first half was won by the Hawks but the second half, and game, was owned by the ‘Cats.

Pathetic. Poor. Unbecoming. Deplorable. Inferior. Feeble. Miserable. Wretched. Those are some words to describe the New Jersey Nets performance tonight. And they won. So what words describe the Bobcats, who never led? There are none, other than “not again.” For a team trying to make the playoffs, games like tonight cannot happen.

Bobcats vs. Pacers:”Slip Sliding Away” – Bobcats Lose 104-103

I’m not going to bore any reader with negative adjectives describing how poorly the Bobcats played the first three quarters of this game. The ‘Cats did not look like the team that upset the Eastern Conference-leading Boston Celtics  just two nights ago, and they certainly did not look like they were playing a team coming into a back-to-back game after losing to Miami. Representative of that poor play was the under-the-basket-point-blank-shot miss by Gerald Henderson at the end of the third quarter.
The Bobcats started the game scoring the first eight points. Then the Bobcats transition defense decided to disappear for the remainder of the first half. This led to a ten point, 58-48, Pacer half-time lead. Both the Pacers and Bobcats share Head Coaching changes this year. Both teams know their fan base hungers for a play-off appearance, and both teams knew they were facing what is probably their main rival for the eighth and final seed in the Eastern Conference.

Paul Silas debating with a referee in the loss to Miami.

The Miami Heat won a close game last night in Orlando, in which their Captain, Dwayne Wade, suffered a back injury when fouled by Dwight Howard. It wasn’t certain if he’d play as close as an hour before game time. So what’d he do? Oh, nothing, just post his first triple double since 2006. Naturally.