Alonzo Mourning would have become the greatest player in Charlotte Hornets history — if he had only stuck around.

Mourning played his first three NBA seasons with Charlotte after the Hornets drafted him No. 2 overall in 1992. He quickly turned into an intimidating, 6-foot-10 star for a Charlotte team on the rise. His scowl could scare you. His dunks could dent the hardwood. But a salary dispute led to the Hornets trading Mourning in November 1995 to Miami, where he became an even bigger star, won an NBA title in 2006 and eventually made the Naismith Memorial Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility in 2014.

For his “Sports Legends of the Carolinas” interview, we met Mourning in Miami, where he still lives and works for the Miami Heat, now as the team’s vice president of player programs.

Mourning, 54, discussed his years in Charlotte in detail and said he wanted to stay in Charlotte badly enough that he would have given the Hornets a substantial financial discount if they would have valued him correctly and kept him.

“I’m going to be extremely transparent to everybody out there,” Mourning said at one point in our interview. “Listen, I was willing to take a lot less money than I received in Miami.”

Mourning also discussed his life-threatening kidney disease and subsequent transplant in 2003, as well as his memory of making the greatest shot in Charlotte Hornets history in 1993.

Sports Legends of the Carolinas is hosted by Scott Fowler. It's produced by Loumay Alesali, Jeff Siner and Kata Stevens. For lots more on the show, visit https://www.charlotteobserver.com/sportslegends.

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