The Pelicans are eliminated from playoff contention
The Pelicans best record can be is 34-48 while the Warriors worst record can be 34-48 but the Warriors have the hth so the Pelican can’t pass them.
Pelicans boutta be the only team eliminated from the playoffs in March still playing their full rotation every night trying to win just because of Joe Dumars lmao
There is no reason not to play Zion, Murray, Trey, Herb, Bey, etc there is no reason not to try to play competitive games. Literally.
This team is young and solid on paper. Giving them as many opportunities to find a winning culture as you can is valuable.
Yeah theyre 6-4 in their past ten with wins and close losses against good teams. Trying to win now is good for development and if queen/fears take a leap next year they could easily aim for the higher playins. West too loaded for top 6 to be realistic tho, especially if cooper/kyrie are a 45 win pair next year
We were in the exact same position in 2021, we even had a shot to keep our pick. We didn’t hardcore tank and we were world champs the next season (bev)
I mean, those minutes are coming at the expense of your rookies. If the FO plans to focus on the Zion/Dejounte core next year then I get it, but then the question becomes what you’re doing with your two lottery picks
If anything playing in competitive games with more talent and expectation of level of play around them has benefited them. Fears especially is playing his best basketball of the season. Queen hit a rookie wall months ago, he’s starting to get over it.
There is a reason. They completely cut the rookies minutes to go balls to the wall with the starters. They can’t all play at the same time lol and why would you be risking injury prone vets when you have rookies who should get the minutes anyways?
Fears and Queen are both getting FIVE less minutes a game than they were earlier in the season, they are still playing 20mpg, and instead of blow outs they are playing in competitive games.
Playing your younger players more for development. Playing competitively now means nothing other than playing for the pride of the pick you give up being worse.
I would be trying to get the younger players as many real NBA minutes as possible and not caring about where the pick ends up.
This is exactly what the NBA wants from bad teams in March. Maybe more teams should trade their FRP lol
This ties into one of the more interesting anti-taking proposals. Basically that if you own your own draft pick it’s automatically sent to the end of the first round.
Makes it so there’s no incentive to actively try to lose and bad teams would trade picks amongst themselves to try to retain value.
The thing is that pick is gone no matter what at this point. They might as well just play their young guys for experience at this point. That’ll help Atlanta indirectly by maybe 2 percent but that’s not really a big deal since they aren’t in the same conference.
Usually I would agree to play the young guys more, but since Murray is coming back from injury, I think they want to see their team with a proper PG
I know this is meant be criticism, but in actuality roster health has greatly improved with Dumars’ arrival.
It took a minute for it to happen, but this is the easily the healthiest any New Orleans roster has been since like 2008.
But even if they had their pick, Borrego is still auditioning for the HC role.
If you guys had this healthy roster I very much think you’d be fighting for a Play-In spot. You just got healthy to late
That’s what makes this last stretch both infuriating and encouraging. But the flip side is that other teams (LAC, GSW) aren’t getting any younger either.
That and also we started Kevon Looney for like 10 games lol
Yo, look, as a pels fan who hates himself for it, we’ve been playing well lately. We gave the Cavs a good game a few days ago too. We aren’t good, but we at least are somewhat competitive now against decent teams. That’s absolutely not how it was earlier this year .
Since I can’t quit the team since I’m weak, I’ve got to take some positives into next year, given our…. Situation.
We have absolutely gotten better, our rookies are promising and so are missi and karlo.
Just let me enjoy the fact that we are taking good teams down to the end of the 4th even though I’m super confident we won’t win. We don’t have a Brunson or harden or Mitchell. Those dudes can take over. So, I have to find positives somewhere.
Let us pels fans live in peace, since our ownership and gm, torment us, I beg of you, other nba team fans, be kind to us. We have shown lots of improvement and I’m proud of that, and our head coach has made us better too. Just not being embarrassed of the product on the floor is a win for me.
Right? You don’t just shut everything down in March and expect it to work next season
Finally remembered there ain’t no pick to tank for
Joe Dumars was a heckuva leader on the court. In the exec suite, not looking too promising.
Nah Kings exist
Ngl, I forgot about Zion until watching this game. Good to see him out there though.
Should finish with the second most games of his career
Beautiful to hear.
he has to in order to secure the big bag
*biggie bag
As soon as he does he’s going back to them street clothes and hoes
+15 tonight in a close loss
He played well fr. And honestly he always plays us well. Big body
Brother I’ll do you one better I forgot about the Pelicans for like a month until I saw this thread
They played the Cavs a few days ago brother
I’ve been knee deep in March madness tbh I’ve not gotten to catch a ton of NBA recently . Along with Invincible Season 4 and One Piece LA dropping something had to give in terms of watch time for lmao
Another year, Another “Zion not playing a playoff game” year.
They can’t hurt us anymore.
They benched Fears and Queen and slashed their minutes in half just to delay this post by 3 games
Yeah they pulled Fears tonight in like a 5 point game when it felt like he was shredding us. Felt like what a tanking team would do except that’s obviously not the case here
Accidental tanking without a pick lol
Even Clyde was confused by that! This Pels team put up a great fight and really out hustled us. I’m excited to see them next season.
Nah we did it to fuck your draft position. That’s way funnier.
8th and 9th is equal to a 6th lottery pick in standings. Fortune will favor the bold
8th is about where I expected the Pels pick to be anyway once the teams below Pels started tanking their ass off and losing like 19 of the 20 games they’ve last played. The Bulls and Bucks are stupidly gonna keep attempting to win games too
I love that the optics of that draft position is motivating the pelicans org so much haha. I’d be rooting for us to fuck over the spurs draft position too.
Unfortunately for Dumars that pick will never be un-fucked enough for the trade to ever be anything other than a resounding F
I mean if it’s like the 10th pick then it’s not too bad lol
It would still be a #10 and #23 pick for #13.
I mean Milwaukee is making it competitive for whose pick we will actually get so it might not be our draft position you are fucking with
Fears and Queen have gotten meaningful minutes in competitive games and they look better for it
Their minutes went from like 25-30 to 20-25. They’re just not starting anymore. People just making shit up now?
I just want to thank the Pelicans for trading the Pacers back their pick for absolutely no good reason at all
Based off the season’s start, they still lasted way longer than expected.
But it’s good to see a healthy roster for once.
The end of the Jordan Poole era
Cherish the memory
Don’t worry the Hawks will pick another Risacher
no one in this draft is as underhyped as a prospect as risacher is. risacher would be like the 10th pick in this draft
This draft is so good I don’t think he’d even got 10th. Prob 15 and on
that’s silly. there is 0 draft in modern history where at the time of the draft a #1 pick wouldn’t be in the lottery in a different draft. even anthony bennett would sneak in the lottery of any draft
Yes, but they didn’t have to pick Risacher, Sarr was the best player, they just talked themselves into it
We didn’t talk ourselves out of it, his agent talked us out of it by telling us “DO NOT DRAFT HIM” and refusing to let us work him out.
We were just dumb enough to listen.
Nah they were heavily scouting Risacher, our FO literally went out an watched him play overseas, we barely peeked behind the curtain on Sarr, the intrigue was never there and the minute he said “I’m not going to workout” we were out on him.
They heavily scouted Risacher when Sarr’s reps made it clear they didn’t want him going to the Hawks, including not letting him work out for us.
The final two were then Risacher and Reed Shepard. Who they really liked but were concerned about his fit with Trae.
They flew overseas to watch Risacher, we didn’t hear anything from Sarr’s camp until the combine, we were super interested in Risacher before Sarr declined workouts.
Hawks got the first pick on May 12, in the days after that reports stated Sarr’s camp was being “selective” with workouts (that’s the window where it became clear there might be issues with Sarr/Hawks), May 16 the Hawks fly to France to see Risacher.
After Sarr’s camp became distant, they turned their full attention to Risacher and others. Maybe they still take Risacher, but we’ll never know because Sarr’s agent did not want him here
I don’t get that. Teams having their *own* pick (no trades/swaps) land at #1 after a season with fewer than 50 losses is/was insanely rare. Off the top of my head, it’s 1993 Magic, 2008 Bulls, 2019 Pelicans, 2024 Hawks, and then the 2025 Mavericks.
Nuh uh
Nah we got a new front office in place, also in that draft it was a toss up with no clear number one pick. This draft is so good and there’s a pretty clear lineup of guys.
(Also if a player’s agent tells them not to draft him, I don’t think they will listen like they did with Sarr. Which was dumb. Our new GM don’t play)
I pray Onsi does not pick the American Risacher (Nate Ament)
at least they’ll have a good lottery position in such a deep draft!
Oh wait…. Lmao
They almost beat the knicks tonight
Please commit fully to tanking
Sincerely,
Atlanta
Pelican fans have a lot to look forward too. Zion was healthy for a good chunk and the team was fun. Think they can make some noise next season
They had a good run, but all dynasties must come to an end
A full season of Zion btw
The ghost of Zion*
Zion 7 years in the league 0 playoff starts. Unreal
Got knick fans in team sub saying this was a great win because the pelicans are a really good team.
They’re 13-12 in their last 25. They’ve been playing decent ball recently.
Well they Def better than the last couple of Rosters we’ve narrowly beaten.
Pelicans been duke it out with some Great teams since Murray returned 🤷🏾♂️We just got a 1pt win against the fucking nets.So,This was an indeed a great win.
Pels are confusing because they have good players but not enough to really be out of the play in. Their winning is driven by their vets but Zion and Dejounte both have limited value. Their rookies this year are not the most solid pieces to anchor yourself to as well. I can certainly see a world where they pivot out of their predicament by trading Zion, Dejounte and maybe even Jones but they also can’t draft a player this year and if they initiate a tank for next year, you’re facing what’s expected to be two weak drafts. Dumars and Weaver don’t inspire confidence either.
Queen is really good but it’s tough to have given up this year’s pick for him and end up in the lottery again
I was listening to the Knicks broadcast and they mentioned them being 3-22 to start the season. Seems impossible to make a good play in run when you start out that way. If everyone stays healthy, I see them going the way of the Hornets next year. A lot of their recent losses were close games, not blowouts.
Such a weird roster. They have talent but it just doesn’t work. Like the pieces are there but they’ve put together a unit that somehow undermine each other’s skillsets. I’ll never get how Troy Weaver and Joe Dumars got another Front Office gig.
at least they got healthy.
maybe they make a hornets ish leap next year. who knows.
It’s insane to me that Zion was one of the most hyped prospects in years, was seen as the next LeBron, and was a guy teams tanked for shamelessly and yet he still has not played in a single playoff game.
h2h not hth
Nooo
FADE EM
good game