The Charlotte Hornets are the previous Charlotte Bobcats, the Bobcats have been using the name of the Bobcats at the beginning of the league, on May 21, 2014, the Bobcats officially changed their name to the Charlotte Hornets, this team is the youngest team in the league, joined the NBA family in 2004, although the history of the Bobcats is not as thick as other teams, but because of his particularity and basketball god Michael Jordan settled in the Bobcats, this team is still a very interesting team.

Speaking of the history of the Bobcats, we must start from 2002, this year, Charlotte's local team Hornets moved to New Orleans, but the NBA league promised to give Charlotte fans a new team, the NBA did not let the Charlottes wait too long, two years later, a new team, the Charlotte Bobcats successfully reorganized, becoming the 30th and last team in the league.

The ownership of the team was auctioned publicly, and the final winner was Robert Johnson, the founder of the American Black Entertainment Television Station, Johnson began to solicit team names from the whole society after buying the team, although the Charlotte Dinosaurs and Charlotte Birds topped the audition, but Johnson still insisted on naming the team with his favorite Charlotte Bobcats (I always wanted to know that since the team name was decided by Johnson, then what else did you ask the whole society for the team name, it looked like the real thing).

First of all, let's understand what a bobcat is.

The lynx, the scientific name of the lynx, is a small feline, similar in appearance to the domestic cat, but the size is two circles larger, especially the limbs are very thick compared to the domestic cat, the claws are sharp, the lynx inhabits the low latitudes covered with ice and snow, the lynx is a particularly intelligent and capable carnivorous animal, they mainly feed on a variety of rabbits, rodents, and sometimes kill musk deer, spores and other large herbivores, at the same time they will climb trees, attack birds, and more incredible is that they can swim, Occasionally, they will kill fish in their hands and add a fishy smell, and in the harsh winter, the bobcat will find a place to refrigerate the food they can't eat enough to use for their next meal. Charlottes came up with such a name because they wanted their team to be like the Bobcats, smart, calm, alert, and not afraid of strong opponents.

Before talking about the history of the Bobcats, let's first understand the city of Charlotte, why does the NBA league value the fans here so much, so much value Charlotte?

Charlotte is the largest city in North Carolina in the southeast of the country, machinery agriculture is very developed, the representative industry is the cotton textile industry, in addition to the financial industry is also very good, is the second largest bank distribution center in the United States, here is a beautiful environment, the four seasons are distinct, with the nickname of "green city", the University of North Carolina at Charlotte is one of the ten branches of the NCAA Evergreen University of North Carolina, North Carolina State University is very familiar to everyone, Michael Jordan, James Worthy, Vince Carter, Rashid Wallace, Antoine Jamison, Jerry Starkerhouse, Raymond Felton and other stars are all from North Carolina, in addition, Duke University, which is a rival in the NCAA and North Carolina, is also located in North Carolina, Duke Production, must be a boutique This is true, famous stars such as Grant Hill, Elton Brand, Lore Deng, Carlos Boozer, Kerry Margetty, Kyrie Irving, Sean Battier, Christian Leitner, Shafrick Randolph, JJ Redick, etc. are all from the school, based on the above conditions, it can be said that North Carolina has a very strong basketball foundation, the distribution of NBA teams is usually one state, set up in the most prosperous city in the state, North Carolina, which has contributed so many stars to the NBA, does not have a regular NBA team, which is a bit too much to say.

As a newcomer to the league, the NBA has also given the Bobcats a lot of preferential policies, the most famous is the "expanded draft", the other 29 teams in the league have only 8 players protected by the team, and the rest of the players are randomly selected by the Bobcats, and the selected players must go to Charlotte, and the total salary of these players must exceed the 2004-2005 team salary threshold but not more than two-thirds of the salary cap, and they also receive the top five draft picks in 2004 and 2005 for free.

Compared with the latter policy, the previous expansion draft is basically like chicken ribs, the ninth person of the team is basically about ten minutes per game, the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth people are the standard water cooler administrators, so this policy determines that the Bobcats will not get any decent star players in the expansion draft, they can only develop from the direction of potential stocks, it turns out that they still have some gains, this harvest, refers to the fourth-year rookie Gerard Wallace, Wallace was the No. 25 rookie in the first round in 2001, and he played for the Kings for the first three years, Wallace was only 19 years old in his first season, and he was the youngest player on the court in the Kings. Because Wallace averaged only 2.0 points and 2.0 rebounds per game last season, he had the potential, but he did not convert it into instant power, after coming to the Bobcats, Wallace transformed gorgeously and became a representative of the all-round forward in the league, in the 2004-2005 season, he averaged 11.1 points, 5.5 rebounds, 2.0 assists, 1.7 steals and 1.3 blocks per game on behalf of the Bobcats, showing a very versatile skill, behind this data, in fact, it also concealed Wallace's excellent defensive ability, and finally Wallace After several years of development, he eventually became the representative of the league's No. 3 position, and became the first All-Star in the history of the Bobcats, became a veritable "Elvis Presley".

In addition to Gerard Wallace, Primoz Brehawk is also one of the team's big discoveries, Breehawk is 218 cm tall, four-time center, before the Bobcats' expansion draft, Breehawk played for the Pacers, averaging only 1.6 points and 0.8 rebounds per game, and after coming to the Bobcats, the bird became a phoenix, averaging 13.0 points and 7.4 rebounds per game, shooting 51.2%!

Blevin Knight, a short point guard who is only 178 centimeters tall selected from the Bucks, also lived up to the high expectations of the Bobcats. Knight, who averaged 5.9 points and 4.7 assists per game last season, played the peak performance of his career in his first season with the Bobcats, averaging 10.1 points, 9.0 assists, 2.6 rebounds and 2.0 steals per game, of which the average assists per game ranked second only to Steve Nash that year.

Jason Cappano, the outside shooter who played with the Cavaliers, actually didn't want to be let go by the team, although he didn't play much time in his rookie season, but he was good enough, shooting 47.7% of his three-point shots, but Cleveland had a lot of excellent players that year, LeBron James, Carlos Boozer, Ricky Davis, Zajunas Ilgoskas, Eric Williams, Kevin Ollie, and Desaguena Diogu are all within the team's future map. The Cavaliers had to let Capono go to Charlotte, and in his first year with the Bobcats, Capono became the team's bench killer, averaging 8.5 points per game on 41.2 percent three-point shooting.

The Bobcats originally drafted Brandon Hunter from the Celtics, but the Magic immediately traded with the Bobcats in exchange for defensive stalwart Keith Bogans, who averaged 9.6 points and 3.1 rebounds per game in his second season.

Jason Hart, a fourth-year guard selected from the Spurs, has become an indispensable player for the Bobcats off the bench, averaging 9.5 points and 5.0 assists per game.

On July 14, 2004, the Clippers sent third-year center Ilvin Eli and three-point shooter Eddie House to the Bobcats in exchange for a second-round draft pick.

On June 25, 2004, the NBA draft was held at Madison Square Garden in New York, USA, and the Bobcats, who had the second pick in the first round, chose Emeka Okafor, a talented center from the University of Connecticut, Okafor has a very thick body and amazing strength, which makes him good enough to play well on the defensive end, but the height of 208 cm is Okafor's disadvantage, and Okafor lacks enthusiasm on the offensive end, and his poor free-throw level led to a lack of confidence on the offensive end.

In this year's NBA draft, in addition to Okafor, the Bobcats also selected Bernard Robinson from the University of Michigan with the 15th pick in the second round, but unfortunately, Robinson was reimbursed for the season due to a left foot injury after only 32 games of the season, averaging only 3.0 points, 1.5 rebounds and 1.0 assists per game.

In the new season, Bernie Bicoststaff became the team's first head coach, he is the father of the current Rockets coach Bigstaff Jr. (who has been laid off at the time of writing), and is also the legendary coach with the highest winning percentage in the history of the Lakers, and Emeka Okafor became the first core player of the Bobcats in the team, on November 4, 2004, the Bobcats played at home against the visiting Washington Wizards, which was the first game in the history of the Bobcats, in which Primoz Blazech scored the first point in team history for the Bobcats, and finally the Bobcats 96: 103 unfortunately lost, although the home loss, but the Bobcats still showed a good ability to fight as a team, the whole game six scored double-doubles, Okafor scored a team-high 19 points and 10 rebounds on 5-of-9 shooting, Blazek scored 15 points and 9 rebounds, Gerald Wallace played like "SHIT" in the first game of the Bobcats, only 4 of 12 shots from the field to score 11 points, 4 rebounds and 3 assists, and there were as many as 7 turnovers!

Two days later, the Bobcats played the visiting Orlando Magic at home, a battle between Dwight Howard and Emeka Okafor, who had the upper hand and the Bobcats beat the Magic 111-100 to claim their first win in franchise history. Howard had five points, 12 rebounds and three blocks on 2-of-5 shooting, while Okafor had 12 points, 14 rebounds and two blocks on 5-of-14 shooting, Blazek had a great performance with 20 points and 10 rebounds on 9-of-14 shooting, Gerald Wallace improved his performance with 18 points, 10 rebounds and 3 assists on 6-of-14 shooting, Jason Hart had 14 points and 11 assists, and veteran Steve Smith also scored 14 points.

The Bobcats officially began their NBA campaign.