The New Orleans Hornets losing on Monday to Washington coupled with the San Antonio knocking off Atlanta sent the Hornets into second place in the Southwest Division despite leading the way in the division and the Western Conference for most of the first half of the season. The revival of the Hornets has been one of the great stories of the NBA season, but sadly the recent three-game skid may be an ominous sign of how the rest of the year will play out.

The Hornets currently own a 37-18 record, which in the very tightly-packed top half of the Western Conference is only good enough for the No. 5 seed at present. The good news is that the Hornets are just two games behind the Los Angeles Lakers for the best record in the Western Conference but the bad news is that New Orleans is just four and a half games ahead of Denver, who currently sits outside of the playoff picture.

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New Orleans won nine straight games in January to ascend to the top of the Western Conference, but since that streak the Hornets are 5-6 straight-up and 3-8 against the spread. Perhaps in response to the struggling play and in part as a reaction to some of the other big moves made by the elite Western Conference teams New Orleans decided to go forward with a trade of its own before the deadline. It certainly was not a headline stealing deal but in a same-division swap the Hornets sent Bobby Jackson, Adam Haluska, and Marcus Vinicius to the Houston Rockets for Bonzi Wells and Mike James. The deal makes sense on paper giving the Hornets greater depth with two veteran players but the early results have not been promising.

Mike James could not have been thrilled with the deal and it has to be questioned how he will respond to the situation and fit in with his new teammates. After the 2006 season in Toronto, James was quoted as saying “Houston is my first choice, seriously, Houston is home. My wife is from Houston. We just bought our house in Houston. I want to go home,” speaking of his desire to return to the Rockets, where the well-traveled guard finished the 2004-05 season. James ended up in Minnesota last season and the results were disastrous. Although he had a limited role with the Rockets this season, he may not be able to help much in New Orleans unless his playing time increases and his attitude is team-oriented.

Bonzi Wells was a solid contributor for the Rockets but he may not get the same type of minutes that he received in Houston. He was expendable for Houston with the solid contributions of rookies Carl Landry and Luis Scola. New Orleans needed to add to its bench depth but the Hornets lineup will still remain reliant on the starters. Four of the five starters for New Orleans average over 33 minutes per game and unless the Hornets plan to cast Morris Peterson to the bench there won’t be a lot of opportunities for James and Wells. Even though neither started in Houston it remains to be seen if they will be comfortable with the situation now on a new and very young team. Rasual Butler and Jannero Pargo have also seen more time in recent weeks and they may get more opportunities in the new roster if James and Wells do not fit in quickly. James and Wells combined for 19 points total in the first two games with the Hornets, both losses, and Bobby Jackson’s contributions on both sides of the floor may have been overlooked.

Eventually the trade should pay off for New Orleans but it could take some time, and unfortunately in the West there is not much margin for error. The Hornets have compiled a great record but it has occurred against the 28th ranked schedule in the league according to the Sagarin ratings. The schedule will be getting tougher in the coming weeks. New Orleans has nine of the next 13 games at home but seven of the home games are against teams that would make the playoffs today. The Hornets must close the season playing 10 of the final 14 on the road, making for a very difficult finish.

New Orleans is 18-10 at home this season, a good record to be sure, but compared with what the elite teams do at home it shows that New Orleans is probably not quite ready to take the next step. New Orleans is 1-4 ATS in the past five home games and giving away games at home shows the inexperience of the Hornets. Consider that San Antonio is 23-5, Utah is 24-3, Dallas is 24-3, Phoenix is 21-8, and Los Angeles is 19-7, meaning it is going to be very tough to keep pace in this conference without dominating at home. New Orleans actually only owns four wins at home this season against teams that would make the playoffs right now and some very tough games are coming up. The Hornets have delivered excellent play on the road with wins at Houston, Phoenix and San Antonio this season but the late-season road trips will be challenging.

It would be disappointing to see it happen given how exciting of a team the Hornets can be to watch and how great it has been to see the revival of the franchise, but the Hornets are far from a lock for the playoffs at this point in the season. Houston was dealt a major blow with the injury to Yao Ming but along with the Rockets, the Hornets have to be considered as one of the teams with a risk of falling out of the playoffs. Golden State and Denver still have a lot of work to do but both of those teams have historically been excellent second-half teams in recent seasons. It could be a wild finish for the Hornets and the rest of the Western Conference. The Wells/James trade may be one that is looked back on as a turning point for the worse even though the correlation may not be direct.