The Golden State Warriors comfortably beat the New Orleans Pelicans, 124-106, at the Smoothie King Center. The Pelicans were once again playing without their generational star, Zion Williamson.
A couple of days before this game, head coach Willie Green was fired by the Pelicans after they started the season with a six-game losing streak and a 2-10 record. Former Hornets head coach and the Pelicans’ assistant coach James Borrego was promoted to head coach.
All of this happened while Williamson was struggling to be the star he wanted to be, and reports suggest his accountability was reportedly an issue under the former head coach Willie Green.
The reports claim that some members of the Pelicans’ franchise were dissatisfied with how Green was treating Williamson, as he was not developing like he should’ve. Especially someone in Williamson’s position- extremely naturally gifted and having a skillset that is unique in the league.
Williamson’s lack of development and consistency was a massive reason behind the New Orleans Pelicans’ mediocre performances over the last few seasons. His lack of production was instrumental in pushing out Willie Green from the head coaching position, despite Green’s splendid bond with the Pelicans’ owner, Gayle Benson.
Benson was the one who showed trust in Green, even when the Pelicans’ former executive, David Griffin, wanted him fired in the middle of last season. Instead, Griffin was asked to exit, and Joe Dumars took up the position of Executive Vice President of Basketball Operations.
Dumars gave Green a chance. But nothing came out of it. They did not improve. The fans were getting frustrated to the point where they stopped showing up for games. Once it started affecting the big money, Dumars stepped in and called it.
Firing Green was not the only issue on their hands. They also have to fix the locker room situation because if other players did not feel that Green was keeping Williamson accountable enough, there’s going to be serious tension between teammates.
With that, they also need to take a call about Williamson. No matter how many chances he’s been given, he’s just unable to stay healthy and consistently participate in games. He’s been able to play three out of the last 10 games the Pelicans have played.
In the five games he’s played this season, he’s averaged 22.8 points, 6.8 rebounds, and 4.6 assists, shooting 48.7% from the field. But he was also the number one overall pick, an extremely hyped up player coming into the league, so the bar is really, really high for him, whether he wants to accept it or not.
Fans and his teammates expect elite consistency from him, not just flashes. If he were a bench player, he might’ve been able to get away with poor conditioning. But he’s the face of the franchise, or at least they wanted him to be.
And he’s not been able to live up to that standard. He might be saying the right things, but that isn’t translating to his game and his conditioning.
Now that there’s a coaching change, and Borrego gets to try his way of developing Williamson, maybe we’ll see a spark of change in him. But most likely, Williamson is too set in his ways to change anything now. Early reports from his career have indicated that even Green and others in New Orleans tried to make him see how he’s missing out on a special career because of his conditioning. He could not be bothered about it.
So one could argue that just like they did with Green, the Pelicans need to move on from Williamson. They tried their best to make it work, but it doesn’t look like things are moving in the direction required from his end.
