FanHouse Hornets

Yeoman beat man Sam Amick of the Sacramento Bee reports the Kings are mulling a trade offer from the Hornets that would send high-priced center Emeka Okafor to Sacramento in exchange for roleplaying, aging forward Kenny Thomas. K-9 has looked spry in early action for the Kings, but his best attribute is his $8.7 million expiring contract. Okafor is on the books through the 2013-14 season.

New Orleans acquired Okafor this summer, committing a grip of cash long-term in the process. The Hornets sent Tyson Chandler -- an expensive center himself, but on a much shorter contract -- to Charlotte in the deal, which came several months after the Hornets tried to unload Chandler for a package of expiring contracts amid the throes of a playoff chase. Chandler, however, failed his physical with the Thunder, reversing the trade.

In other words, this trade would effectively finish the job of losing Chandler's contract, and would set the tone for continued salary cuts from New Orleans. Boo to all that.

Not the best night for the New Orleans Hornets. In the team's first game under new coach Jeff Bower, supernova point guard Chris Paul was ineffective and reportedly frosty through three quarters, before spraining his ankle and leaving the game, an eventual 86-78 loss to the Blazers. The New Orleans Times-Picayune reports that the ankle injury is severe enough to knock Paul out for up to two weeks.

Despite the Hornets' disappointing start, Paul has been the best player in the league statistically. Paul is averaging nearly 24 points and nine assists per game, and has shot 59 percent from the field and 65 percent from three. Rookie Darren Collison played the fourth quarter of Friday's game and is expected to start Saturday in Atlanta.

UPDATE: Yahoo! is reporting that Paul could be out of action for up to a month.

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Smartly, the Hornets braintrust offered up a player for the media horde at the press conference announcing the firing of Byron Scott and the ascension of Jeff Bower. It was David West, the All-Star power forward, who said generally negative things about recent times under Scott and who publicly placed some faith in Bower. Of course, the media (and fans) really only cared what superstar Chris Paul thought ... but Paul was otherwise tied up Thursday.

Eventually, John Reid of the New Orleans Times-Picayune found Paul and got his thoughts on the move. And you understand why the Hornets are glad Paul was unavailable, and he was not nearly as optimistic about the change as West.

Word leaked soon after Hornets coach Byron Scott's dismissal became known that New Orleans GM Jeff Bower would take the reins as head coach, with former Hornets disaster coach Tim Floyd coming back to assist him. At a press conference announcing the moves, Hornets exec Hugh Weber told reporters Bower does not have an interim tag on his title: he is the coach for this season.

Now who exactly is Jeff Bower, other than someone who looks more like a professional bowler than someone involved in basketball?

Flash forward seven months from now. Teams are rife with cap space, even under a substantially lowered cap. Friends of yours are all traveling to different teams, finding which team is the best fit financially, personally, and most importantly, in terms of playing for a contender. The world is their oyster. There is nothing but possibility and with the right decision, they'll walk away not only even more obscenely rich than they were before, but in a better situation to put the ring on their finger.

Meanwhile, you're staring at another two and a half seasons watching Peja Stojakovic and James Posey slowly turn into the bad guy from Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade after drinking from the wrong cup and being coached by the GM that shackled your team with huge contracts for mid-level players.

Welcome to the life of Chris Paul.

Had Byron Scott been fired last May instead of today, he'd certainly be in a better financial position, as Scott would have been highly sought-after by at least a few teams, Sacramento and Minnesota among them. As it stands, Scott has no contract for the 2010-11 season ... and few leads for decent gigs.

Not that either Sacramento or Minnesota are glamorous jobs, but they were rebuilding teams with low expectations, much like the Hornets were when Scott first came to New Orleans. This summer? I imagine the Nets job will be available, but that bridge has been ashes for ages. The Pacers and Grizzlies will be the other most likely openings, barring a surprise retirement from Jerry Sloan, Don Nelson or Larry Brown.

But there's one job Scott has always been tied to that could also become available and happens to be pretty plush: the one currently filled by Phil Jackson.

How good are the Phoenix Suns this season? It may be too early to tell, but they're at least good enough to get their latest opponent's head coach fired just nine games into the season.

Byron Scott has been relieved of his coaching duties and the team will make the formal announcement at a press conference later this afternoon. This comes in the wake of a disappointing 3-6 start to the season, and, most recently, a completely lackluster and discouraging performance against the Suns in a nationally televised blowout on Wednesday night.

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Every night there are some stupendous, silly, stupid, or downright outlandish individual lines from around the lig. Doing Lines lets you know which one tops the list.

The last time we got together, three different players scored 40 points or more on the same night. Well, maybe it's not as rare of an occurrence as we thought, since we were just a single point away from it happening again on Wednesday.

Chris Paul missed by one with 39, but Kobe Bryant and Dwyane Wade each delivered, with 41 and 40 respectively.

Chris Paul was dazzling on Wednesday against Dallas, in what really was a must-win for the Hornets if they were going to have any sort of confidence in their ability to play with the top teams as the season goes on. Paul dragged his team to a win with 39 points, on 14-for-23 shooting, including three of four from three-point land.

But as great as Paul was and as below average as Dallas was (Dirk Nowitzki was held to just 12 points on 4-of-15 shooting), if we're going to be honest, his Hornets were fairly fortunate to be able to pull this one out.

Chris Paul is the best point guard in the game today, and Rajon Rondo isn't too far behind at the position, probably in most people's top five. But besides being great at what they do, these guys have something else in common: they play the game with a noticeable chip on their shoulder.

So it shouldn't come as any surprise that when the two went head-to-head in Boston on Sunday, things got a little heated during the game, and words were exchanged on the court after the final buzzer had sounded.