January 13th - New Orleans Pelicans @ Pistons - 25-17

Gameday in Motor City ⚙️

🕕: 6:00pm CT
📺: Bally Sports NO
📻: @995WRNO#Pelicans | @SmoothieKing pic.twitter.com/eFOQQkx0rw

— New Orleans Pelicans (@PelicansNBA) January 13, 2023

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New Orleans second-year wing Herb Jones (right low back contusion) is listed as questionable on Thursday?s official injury list submitted to the NBA. Three Pelicans players remain out, including Brandon Ingram (left great toe contusion), E.J. Liddell (right knee ACL injury recovery) and Zion Williamson (right hamstring strain).

On the Detroit side, multiple rotation players have been out of the lineup recently. Top scorer and guard Cade Cunningham (shin) will not play for the rest of the season, while Marvin Bagley (hand) recently underwent surgery and will be sidelined for multiple weeks. Pistons frontcourt contributors Isaiah Stewart (shoulder) and Jalen Duren (ankle) did not play in Wednesday?s victory over Minnesota.

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R.I.P. B.I.

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Originally Posted by b_l_p

R.I.P. B.I.

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Damn, that toe thing must have really taken a turn for the worse. So young too.

need to pick up a win here!

This is one of the few wins i had for this team in the month of January..so basically a must win game to avoid falling too far

Did we really trade a 1st rd pick for devonte?

The refs bet the over on this game. Whistle, whistle, whistle…

The refs stop blowing their whistles, the game suddenly has some flow and we’re dominating.

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Originally Posted by PaKwAn

Did we really trade a 1st rd pick for devonte?

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pg was a glaring need at the time and he was the best we could get. be thankful we werent able to get kyle lowry like we wanted lol

I still think Cavs game 15 to 20 min.

whoa that was CRAZY! great 1 on 1 low post defense from Nance leads to maybe the best alley-oop of the season for the Pels. Great timing on the aggressive set up and Jaxson Hayes running the floor for a damn fine reverse finish.

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Originally Posted by hornetsrebirth

pg was a glaring need at the time and he was the best we could get. be thankful we werent able to get kyle lowry like we wanted lol

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He isn't even a pg though and might need another 1st rd pick to get rid of him lol. Yeah we dodged lowry although i think he kinda used us to leverage himself to the heat.

It's suddenly a ballgame after being up by double digits...

They have to stop the ball and not let Diallo go all the way to the hoop. He has done that at least 5 times its the only thing that consistently works for them

Glad they stuck with the Jonas play towards the end cause no one could match him. He was basically being guarded by sf's

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Originally Posted by PaKwAn

Glad they stuck with the Jonas play towards the end cause no one could match him. He was basically being guarded by sf's

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Jonas is a powerhouse on offense and defense

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Originally Posted by hornetsrebirth

Jonas is a powerhouse on offense and defense

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As long as he doesn't face Steven Adams lol

I'm a broken record...Devonte has got to go. Too small to defend most guards and provides zero offense...can't shoot. As much as I love Jackson's athletic ability, he's too inconsistent defensively and has very little of an offensive game other than the dunk. We need another shooter...someone who can get their own shot and knock down the 3. I think the only option is Buddy Hield for Graham and Jackson. We don't know how long BI will continue to be out and hamstrings are tricky injuries so who knows how long this will keep Zion down.

I never understand why when we have a clear size advantage, we don’t use Billy as the backup 5. The bench was missing a low post presence. I get Nance is a better defender, but we should be giving him more rest against teams like Detroit. Just my 2 cents

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Originally Posted by HorneyTexan

I'm a broken record...Devonte has got to go. Too small to defend most guards and provides zero offense...can't shoot. As much as I love Jackson's athletic ability, he's too inconsistent defensively and has very little of an offensive game other than the dunk. We need another shooter...someone who can get their own shot and knock down the 3. I think the only option is Buddy Hield for Graham and Jackson. We don't know how long BI will continue to be out and hamstrings are tricky injuries so who knows how long this will keep Zion down.

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Do you really think they would take Devonte Graham and Jaxson Hayes for Buddy Hield?

Maybe for the potential of Jaxson and I believe Buddy is in the final year of his current deal so why not get something. Maybe we'd have to throw in a draft pick?

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Originally Posted by HorneyTexan

Maybe for the potential of Jaxson and I believe Buddy is in the final year of his current deal so why not get something. Maybe we'd have to throw in a draft pick?

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Nope. 19.28M next season.

I appreciate this nice, boring habit of this year's Pelicans team, beating who they are supposed to beat and competing against teams to whom they are supposed to lose. That to me is the consistency we have always lacked. The defensive consistency is very good for our top 9 players. If we take two more steps we can be a championship team:
1) We get and stay healthy. Not exactly a NOLA Basketball strength, but it is possible....
2) The following players improve their night-to-night consistency on the offensive side by just 20-30%: BI, Herb, Jose and Larry. In my opinion Jonas, CJ, Naji and Zion are already where they need to be on that end, and Trey is trending that way rapidly. We can count on pretty consistent production when healthy and we need it from them. Those 9 players make up one of the most flexible playoff rosters I can imagine. If Billy, Kira, Jaxson and Devonte can improve their games (mostly on defense) that is just a bonus for depth.