This mock draft strictly focuses on the best prospect each team can draft when thinking about how a new player would look in that setting. Read more »
New Orleans Pelicans Analysis
Post-Lottery 2025 NBA Mock Draft: Best Fits For The First 14 Picks
Ten-Year NBA Net Rating Rankings (Infographics For All 30 Teams)
The Thunder finished the 24-25 season with the best Net Rating in the NBA, ahead of the Cavaliers who jumped from 13th a season ago. Read more »
Zion Williamson: Basketball's Oldest Young Man
Zion Williamson is at once one of the most visibly under-seasoned souls in the league and one of its most beleaguered Read more »
Dark Twisted Fantasy Report: Hawks And Pelicans After Big Trade
When you play fantasy basketball, you start to look at NBA statistics differently, and seemingly inert numbers start to take on much louder character. Read more »
The Realest: Brandon Ingram And The New Orleans Pelicans
In his current state, Brandon Ingram exists within the uncanny valley of near-stardom, his almost-greatness becoming a form of badness. Read more »
The Pelicans, On Their Way To A Winning Hand
In a league that's increasingly a poker game featuring a deck with more poisoned cards than useful ones, the Pelicans boast one of the more potent long-term hands. Read more »
The Era Of Easy Max Contracts Is Over
A very good but not great player like Zach LaVine comfortably got a max contract in 2022. With a new CBA, a similarly stationed player in Brandon Ingram almost certainly won't receive one in this climate. Read more »
Ten-Year NBA Net Rating Rankings (Infographics For All 30 Teams)
The Celtics finished in the top spot in Net Rating for the second straight season, while the Thunder jumped up from 28th to 14th to second. Read more »
The Pelicans Are In Unfamiliar, Promising Territory
Zion Williamson is still 23, but he is now a layup artist, getting on the scoreboard in decidedly less pyrotechnic ways than before. He's stayed healthy this season and the Pelicans figure to enter the playoffs more formidable than ever. Read more »
Zion Is Still Here
You don't have to squint too much to see how, through all the deflated hype and underwhelming results, Zion Williamson remains indomitable enough pull his team through the postseason. Read more »
Waiting For Zion
How does one project the Pelicans season with any sense of certainty? They are either a team with one of the brightest futures in the league or a team bound to be mired in mediocrity, taunted by unfulfilled hope and the too-frequent absence of its best player and cornerstone. Read more »
NBA's Top Wing Trios Ranked
We've ranked every team's wing corps from 1 to 30 based on the top three wings' production, upside and versatility. Read more »
Zion And Ja's Murky Crossroads
Despite all the instant glory, there is a stressful cloud of beleaguerment around both Zion Williamson and Ja Morant. It has been a while since fresh superstars stumbled in this way. Read more »
Ten-Year NBA Net Rating Rankings (Infographics For All 30 Teams)
The Celtics finished first in Net Rating ahead of the Cavaliers, who jumped up from 13th last season and 28th as recently as 2021. Read more »
Can The Suns Stop The Pelicans From History?
The No. 9 seed Pelicans, largely microwaved at the end of the season through trades and rapid youth project improvements, wouldn't be here without the new format, but now they look like a team that should've belonged in it all along. Read more »
Ten-Year NBA Net Rating Rankings (Infographics For All 30 Teams)
The Suns jumped from 30th in the NBA in Net Rating in 17-18 to 29th to 18th in 19-20 to third last season and first in 21-22. Read more »
The Sheer Lovability Of Jose Alvarado
Jose Alvarado's measurable impact on the floor may be only marginally positive for the Pelicans, but his presence signifies something more important, which is that good, unexpected basketball things can actually happen in New Orleans. Read more »
The NBA's Bigfoot
Zion Williamson came into the league a physical freak that college players couldn't handle and almost immediately it became apparent that 30-year-old pros didn't know what to do with him either. And now he's something between a myth and a punchline. Read more »
Ten-Year NBA Net Rating Rankings (Infographics For All 30 Teams)
The Jazz jumped from ninth in Net Rating last season to first in 20-21. Read more »
The NBA's New Play-In Class Structure, And Who's Feeling It
The eight-team play-in zone is all of the following: extra competitive padding, extra competitive pressure, confusing, ephemeral, purgatorial, and a new benchmark for ascendancy. Read more »
New Orleans Pelicans Analysis RSS Feed