Everything looks easy for Nicolas Batum.
It isn't.
The breezy Charlotte Hornets forward from Lisieux, France is enjoying a breakout year in which his game has looked more versatile and effective than ever. Everything about his game is fluid and smooth. He's slim and impossibly long, with a reported 7-4 wingspan. He's always been the kind of player that lights up scouting reports due to his combination of size, length and skill. He can handle, he can shoot, he can drive and finish, he can pass and defend. Batum may not be the top tier star of a team, but he is certainly a guy you want playing on the wing for your team.
The Blazers -- facing the mass exodus of their playoff contender when LaMarcus Aldridge bolted for the silver and black while Wesley Matthews and Robin Lopez went in search of greener pastures -- elected to trade Batum to Charlotte this summer for Gerald Henderson and talented prospect Noah Vonleh. Charlotte's idea was to provide another playmaker next to Kemba Walker, and to help redistribute the offense to the perimeter in the wake of the NBA's 3-point and spacing revolution. It was a risk that many didn't believe would pan out, given Batum's inconsistency.
Instead, Batum and the Hornets exploded out of the gate behind their revamped offense. Batum has eight games with 20 or more points, and has finished in single figures just seven times this season, with two of those coming in the past two games as he gets healthy after a painful sprained toe injury.
Batum's versatility has never been more apparent than this season, averaging 15.7 points, 6.4 rebounds and 5.4 assists per game, while shooting 36 percent from 3-point range. His shot was something of a divisive topic, after he struggled for most of last season amid injuries and a general malaise that frustrated Blazers fans. Instead, Batum seems to have rediscovered himself, and the Hornets have gone from 30th in 3-point percentage all the way to 18th, while increasing their volume to a huge degree.
"That's the thing our team tried to improve in the offseason," Batum says. "We brought in all those guys who can shoot on the outside. Me, Jeremy Lamb, getting Kemba [Walker] better opportunities. That's been one of the struggles for this team the last four years. We really trust each other. We move the ball very well, and that creates confidence. I try and create for the other guys because we have so many guys who can shoot."
In particular, Batum has become exceptionally dangerous off the ball with Walker and Jeremy Lin creating. Batum is in the 80th percentile coming off screens, as a spot-up shooter, and on handoffs, which are exceptionally difficult shots. Teams are using dribble hand-offs (DHO's as Michael Malone informed me they're called) more and more this season. It's at its base a "bad" shot, in that the shooter has to rise and fire quickly often if the screener's man jumps out to deter the drive, and is shooting over his own screener. "You're basically facing two bigs and then your own man closing," Batum told me.
Batum, again, makes it look easy.
It looks easy ... but it's not.
"It's not easy," Batum says, shaking his head with a smile. "That's not an easy shot. You have to work on it a lot. I improved on it a lot this summer, but it's difficult, with a big blocking your view. I've got two big guys almost guarding me, and Jimmy [Butler]'s not a bad defender either. That may be the toughest one I made this year."
Batum's versatility is crucial in those situations because if Gibson tries to focus on the shot, Batum can get around him and get to the lane, and then the defense is scrambling.
None of this makes Batum LeBron James or any of the top creating wings in this league. However, what it does do is make him extremely valuable in today's NBA. You don't just need shooters anymore. You need forwards who can force doubles and mismatches, and then exploit them with playmaking and be able to shoot. Batum can do all of that, which means you can add him to just about any team and they're instantly going to improve. There has never been a better time in the NBA to have a player like Nicolas Batum, based on the style of play.
Did I mention Batum's set to be a free agent this summer?
That's the rub of the Charlotte success story in that they gave up two assets to get Batum, but he could be gone in a few months in free agency. You can hear Raja Bell nearly have a coronary heart attack in the video above when the idea of Batum as a max player is mentioned, and for good reason. But bear in mind that value assessment. It's not just about the value of Batum compared to other players in terms of talent, but what he'll do for that specific team.
Charlotte desperately needs shooters on the wing, with Michael Kidd-Gilchrist locked in long term, but lacking a consistent scoring mode from the outside, and with Walker still struggling to remain efficient for long stretches. Batum's value to the Hornets, in particular, is exceptionally high based on what they gave up for him and their need to retain just his type of player.
But then you consider teams that will be on the market this summer, with all that cap space due to the influx of the new TV media deal that has the cap rising to nearly $90 million this summer. Say Harrison Barnes receives a max offer from some team. Barnes' ability to play smallball four for the Warriors is pivotal, but it's hard to envision a scenario where Batum wouldn't help the Warriors in terms of the overall way that they play. The list goes on and on.
For his part, predictably, Batum is staying "focused on this season," as every free agent says.
Batum does show a bit of the wry French humor when I ask him about it, however. I asked Batum if he planned to play for the French national team his summer, and he replied with a tepid "normally," which is understandable given how free agency has to be a player's focus first and foremost. Then later I ask him about how ridiculous it is that players are expected to have their free agency figured out six months before the decision is to be made. After all, who knows what could happen between now and then.
"Exactly," Batum says, completely straight-faced. It's a bit like being asked about playing in the Olympics. It's in seven months. That's my French team, but I can't think about it yet."
OK, well played, Nic.
Interestingly, Batum says that the exciting part about free agency isn't the options or the chance to improve his net worth, but how free agency acts as kind of an evaluation tool for your worth in the league.
"Free agency is always exciting for an NBA player's career," Batum says, "and you can see where you are, and where you stand among the other players. It's an opportunity to judge yourself against the other players, and what you're worth in this league."
That's why his value is dependent on the way the league is being played and the time he's hitting the market is so fascinating.
But for now, he's helped put the Hornets in the thick of the playoff race in the East, and despite a December slump that culminated in a brutal January West Coast road trip with several key players on the shelf with injuries, Charlotte's long-term prospects this season remain good. There's a core there, with Steve Clifford's coaching, and the kind of versatile talent they have when Al Jefferson is back healthy, to suggest they have a run in them, even in the surprisingly tough East.
I asked Batum if during this tough stretch it's difficult to gain perspective due to the constant one-after-another nature of the NBA schedule, with few breaks for big-picture evaluation of teams.
"When you're winning, you don't think about it. You just go through the motion. But when you're losing, you think 'Where are we? Why are we doing bad the last couple of games?' We have a good team, so we're very connected. We're going to be OK."
Beyond all these challenges, the schedule, the tougher Eastern Conference, the injuries the Hornets have dealt with and the distraction of free agency, there have been bigger things on Batum's mind. The terrorist attacks over the past year in France have kept his mind close to home, with his people. He and the other French players wore "Je Suis Charlie" warm-up shirts after the massacre at Charlie Hebdo last spring, and they all tried to weather the emotional storm of the Paris shootings in November.
Batum says with the anniversary of the Charlie attacks this month, it was difficult not being with his people.
"It is difficult not being part of this reunion, because when I watch the news and I see these images of the people of France, I want to be there to show my support, too. I can't because I'm here, but I want to go there and be with the people, to show my support and even if I'm miles away from there, I feel like 'We are French.'
As with all things, Batum manages this and just like his graceful gait, everything for him seems to be a casual drift, but the reality is much more difficult, yet through it all, Batum and the Hornets seem headed in a positive, if uncertain direction.
It ain't easy being Batum, but it sure seems fun.
AFTER THE BUZZER:
1. Batum on why Spain and France have such a bitter rivalry in international basketball:
"We've been the best two teams in Europe over the past five years. Every time we play against each other, it's a big game. We respect each other a lot. It's not like we don't like each other. Any time we play there's so much respect, it becomes intense. The worst loss I've had with the French team was against Spain. The best win I've had with the national team was against Spain."
(Note: This is hard to believe given the bad blood between the two teams, but the perspective is interesting.)
2. Batum on Charlotte's defense, which fell off a cliff in December:
"We just need one game to get back to what we were doing. Just one game." That was interesting from the perspective of how we think of shooting as a rhythm concept, but never defense.
3. Who's the toughest defender in the league right now, for Batum?
"Kawhi (Leonard). He's physical and he's very, very smart. He never fouls. He's physical, but he never fouls."
4. I knew that Batum grew up in Normandy, France, in a small town, but could not remember how to pronounce his commune (Lisieux). I kept referencing "where you grew up, that village..." hoping Batum would help me out with the pronunciation. Nope.
5. Batum's favorite off-season activity is travelling. He's been to over 40 countries by his estimate. When asked the region of the world he most likes to visit, he cited Africa, which he believes is "the most beautiful continent on Earth." His father is from Cameroon, and he visited South Africa this summer for an NBA event with Masai Ujiri for the first time, which seems to have really touched him.
6. Batum started playing basketball when he was three years old, he says. His only other favorite sports are tennis and futbol (soccer). Batum attends the US Open every year and could "watch tennis all day long, from morning until night."
I asked him how good he is at tennis, thinking that with his wingspan and quick feet he'd be insane.
"I suck," Batum said, laughing while covering his mouth.
"I can't move! I have the footwork, but just... I'm not good."
7. Batum agreed with my assessment based on what has been said by Ray Allen, Steve Kerr, and others in "The Art of a Beautiful Game" by Chris Ballard, that shooting, truly great shooting, is a gift you're born with. Batum put it well.
"I think you have a base that you can build on," he said. "Some guys have it. Steph has it (giggle). Klay Thompson has it. Ray Allen has it. Steve Nash, all those guys they have it. Some guys became shooters. I think all the great shooters in NBA history have a base that they're born with and they build on it."
8. Batum was also only the second player I've ever spoken with to say that it's more difficult to shoot over a shorter defender who is right up underneath him, vs. a longer defender that is closing out on him. Shane Battier is the only other shooter I've spoken with to agree.
9. I asked Batum about the differences in Charlotte and Portland. I mentioned that I imagined they seem very similar, except that Portland is, well, weirder.
"That's why I love that place. It's so weird, it's so unique, that's why I love it. The weather is different. For the first time in my NBA career, I spent my birthday wearing shorts. They're not like like big cities, that's why I like it."
