The Charlotte Hornets released their preseason schedule on Monday to remind us just how long we have to wait before basketball starts happening again.

The schedule:

• Tuesday October 6th at 7:00pm vs the Brooklyn Nets
• Sunday October 11th at 7:00pm vs the Milwaukee Bucks
• Wednesday October 14th at 7:30pm at the Boston Celtics
• Friday October 16th at 8:00pm at the Memphis Grizzlies

It’s a preseason schedule so it ultimately means very little, and there’s not much reason to do too deep a dive into it. The one thing I found mildly interesting is that if it were a real schedule, it’d be very easy. The Celtics are the only team of the four that are expected to be even remotely competitive; the other three are all in the bottom five in NBA title odds. If I was going to spin that to be a good thing, it would theoretically be easier for the Hornets to get into a rhythm against teams they should be better than. But that’s kind of grasping at straws.

The one other thing I did notice was the cadence of the games. There’s a five day gap between the first two, then three days, then two days. I feel like that’s intentional. The organization is clearly deliberate about everything they do, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they made every effort to do a gradual ramp down of rest days to not overwhelm the boys.

The regular season should be out somewhat soon with opening night likely to fall on October 20th. The Hornets don’t have the pull to get one of those games, so they’ll probably tip off their season on Wednesday, October 21st.