After a questionable few months to start the season, the Charlotte Hornets and head coach Charles Lee is starting to earn the trust of fans, basketball personalities and his team.
Over the past few months, there’s been a lot of chatter about the relationship between LaMelo Ball and Charlotte Hornets head coach Charles Lee.
With the ups and downs that came with this season so far, many were speculating whether or not Ball got along with Lee.
It even amplified when Lee had Ball come off the bench in certain games.
There were no reports of real tension, just noise from the internet and TV panels.
In today’s hot-take culture, Gilbert Arenas laced into the organization and Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green even suggested the Hornets were tanking because Ball came off the bench.
A month later? The Hornets have had the top-ranking starting-five unit in the NBA and are making an aggressive playoff push.
But a coach needs to trust the process, not give into short-term optics.
After a November loss to the Toronto Raptors, on the back end of a back-to-back, where both Ball and Brandon Miller were given minutes restrictions, Lee was adamant he knew what he was doing.
“We’ll see how they recover after their first back-to-back in a while,” Lee said. “You just have to keep the process, the long-term vision, in mind even when you're in these moments.”
It was a calculated risk by a second-year head coach trying to revitalize an organization. And did it pay off, because it’s allowed Ball to do the thing he’s struggled with most: stay on the floor.
One of the biggest knocks on Ball’s game is his inability to be available to his team.
He played 75 games in his sophomore season, and during the three seasons after, played just 105 out of a possible 246 games because of injuries.
Thus far in the 2025-26 season, Ball has appeared in 48 games, which is more than any of the games he played in that previous stretch.
On the famous podcast, Club 520, hosted by former NBA veteran Jeff Teague, his co-host and brother Marquis Teague was emphatic that the Lee/Ball tandem was working with flying colors.
"He got what he needed, that coach was the best thing for him... Charles Lee, shoutout to him. Great decisions."
And just imagine. A month ago, this was a team that was supposedly tanking.
Funny how quickly the narrative changes.
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