Drac’s all time Hornets/Pels team

Sons,

It is with great humility and gratitude that I present to you this list, curated after much contemplation during a foggy stroll through Audubon Park this morning. As I walked, the sweet smell of magnolias mingled with the distant cries of a freight train, reminding me of simpler times when children waved from porches, and one could buy a loaf of Leidenheimer bread for a quarter. Indeed, those were days when honor and tradition still meant something in Louisiana.


Without further ado, my all time Hornets/Pels team:

PG: Dan Dickau: I still remember the first time I saw him play. It was 2004. My life was in shambles. The levees hadn’t yet broken, but my sobriety had. I was sitting in a bar on Magazine Street, clutching a High Life like it was communion wine, when there he was on the screen: the floppy-haired maestro of mediocrity. He had the gall, the audacity, to take the court as if he belonged. And for that, I loved him.

SG: Eric Gordon: It is with neither fondness nor forgiveness that I turn my attention to a figure as controversial in New Orleans as the potholes that dot our streets: Eric Gordon. A man whose tenure with the Pelicans was marked not by heroics or camaraderie, but by sighs so heavy they could bend the oaks on St. Charles Avenue.

Eric Gordon did not merely dislike New Orleans; he seemed to loathe it with the passion of a man forced to endure a lifetime of lukewarm gumbo and overpriced French Quarter cocktails. Friends, have you ever seen someone eat a po’ boy and look offended by its very existence? I haven’t, but I imagine Gordon’s disdain for our city’s basketball culture tasted much the same.

SF: Chris “Birdman” Anderson: When Birdman took the floor for the New Orleans Hornets, it was never basketball in the traditional sense. It was performance art. He didn’t block shots so much as swatted them with the righteous indignation of a man defending his last can of Natty Light. Rebounds were not gathered—they were claimed, as if by divine right.

I recall his tattoos, those swirling stories inked across his skin, each one more inscrutable than the last. Were they a roadmap to his soul? A grocery list written in code? Or simply an elaborate bet with a tattoo artist in the Bywater? We’ll never know. But what we do know is that Birdman belonged to no one and everyone all at once.

PF: Bonzi Wells: It is with equal parts admiration and bewilderment that I find myself reflecting on the chaotic, fleeting brilliance of Bonzi Wells, a man whose name alone feels like it was plucked from the pages of a noir novel. In New Orleans lore, his presence was as brief as a summer thunderstorm, but oh, what a storm it was.

Bonzi came to us in 2008, a midseason trade acquisition for Bobby Jackson—a trade that felt less like basketball strategy and more like swapping one wild card for another. At first glance, he did not seem to belong in New Orleans. He was too volatile, too mercurial, too… Bonzi. But New Orleans, a city that thrives on controlled chaos, took him in like a stray cat with an attitude problem.

Friends, Bonzi Wells was a contradiction wrapped in a headband. He had the body of a power forward but the soul of a shooting guard, and a game that veered wildly between brilliance and bewilderment. Watching Bonzi play was like drinking absinthe on an empty stomach: exhilarating, unpredictable, and often regrettable.

In his 22 games with the Hornets, Bonzi averaged a modest 8.8 points and 4.5 rebounds. But stats, my friends, do not tell the story. His game was defined by post-up moves that felt improvised, elbows thrown with the precision of a jazz drummer, and the occasional three-pointer that made you question reality itself.

C: Boogie Cousins: Boogie arrived in New Orleans with the kind of fanfare reserved for a Mardi Gras parade or an unexpected Saints playoff berth. A midseason trade in 2017 paired him with Anthony Davis, a partnership that felt less like basketball and more like a Greek tragedy waiting to unfold. Two transcendent talents—one a generational unicorn, the other a tempest in sneakers—joined forces in a city that thrives on the unpredictable.

Cousins’ game was mesmerizing. He could bulldoze defenders in the paint or step back and hit a three with the indifference of a man tossing beads from a float. Watching Boogie play was like watching someone walk a tightrope with a glass of whiskey in one hand and a lit cigar in the other: thrilling, reckless, and occasionally catastrophic.

But Boogie wasn’t just a basketball player. He was a personality. A force of nature who played with the kind of emotion that made every possession feel personal. Whether he was jawing at a referee, snarling at an opponent, or shrugging at a coach’s play call, Boogie was unapologetically himself.

And then, there was the Achilles injury—a cruel twist of fate that ended his 2017-18 season and, in many ways, his time in New Orleans. It happened in a nationally televised game against the Houston Rockets, mere moments after Boogie had recorded yet another ridiculous stat line. In a single instant, the hope of a Boogie-and-Brow playoff run evaporated, leaving fans clutching their Abitas and wondering what might have been.