November 4th - New Orleans Pelicans vs Atlanta Hawks - 4-1

He touched Trae’s hair. We should win this challenge but we wont

Offense is just dead. Ball is sticking, the threes are not going up, it looks awful.

A lot of questions for Willie after this one. JHawk is the only player that has shown consistency throughout. We can’t keep coming out THIS flat.

Compare the offense this game, or even the last 3 quarters of the OKC game, and ask yourself what's different.

Why does every pels coach do this? It makes no sense.

That one stretch gave Atlanta all the confidence in the world. Bad turnovers and sloppy defense gave it away. Secure the ball and get your shots off. We are still a bit off. Players didn’t look confident coming out of halftime and it showed. Too much hesitation

Pathetic stuff. Where's the fightback from OKC?

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Originally Posted by JJackisangry

That one stretch gave Atlanta all the confidence in the world. Bad turnovers and sloppy defense gave it away. Secure the ball and get your shots off. We are still a bit off. Players didn’t look confident coming out of halftime and it showed. Too much hesitation

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Bad turnovers, sloppy defense, and some lineups/rotations that looked like they came out of a random name generator.

I said I was weary of these lineups without Zion or BI on the floor for long stretches. It bit them in the arse tonight.

Young or Murray was always on the floor for Atlanta. Both damn near played 40 minutes (38 and 37). Why do our "stars" get this babyfied treatment even when healthy? Okay BI just coming off injury, but why does Zion only play 32 minutes??

Atlanta was just better. And this idea of Zion as a small ball 5 will never work. You need a defender there. Trade Larry and find one.

These dudes just really show lack of effort some nights. We desperately need Jose back. In the worst way. They need a guy that won?t just walk down the court. So the one thing we can take from the season so far is this team can?t beat anyone that can shoot.

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Originally Posted by Fedupfan

These dudes just really show lack of effort some nights. We desperately need Jose back. In the worst way. They need a guy that won?t just walk down the court. So the one thing we can take from the season so far is this team can?t beat anyone that can shoot.

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Way more than that, we need Trey.

Coaching needs to improve, culture needs to improve, everything needs to improve. It just needs to improve. No excuses for that 3rd quarter. If anything you should be fired up coming out of halftime in a close game. It’s not like we were up 20-30. I like our team and we have plenty of talent. I like the players. But there are too many nights where I am sighing to myself and saying this is pathetic.

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Originally Posted by Fedupfan

These dudes just really show lack of effort some nights. We desperately need Jose back. In the worst way. They need a guy that won?t just walk down the court. So the one thing we can take from the season so far is this team can?t beat anyone that can shoot.

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Way more than that, we need our 'one-trick-pony' to develop more tricks and play both ends of the court. Three defensive rebounds in 32 minutes is atrocious.

I know that Green is really personable and the players like him, but he's gotta be willing to just say some home truths. But then, in order to do that he'd need someone to tell him some first, and who's responsible for keeping him accountable?

Credit to JHawk though. A rookie shouldn’t put our players to shame. Guy is more than I’d hoped for from a hustle standpoint.

Jonas only 21 minutes against a team with Capela and Okungwu. His minute distribution continues to perplex. Make teams adjust to you for once.

I just want to know what the discipline is on this team.

If you do something wrong consistently, what happens?

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Originally Posted by As I See It

Way more than that, we need our 'one-trick-pony' to develop more tricks and play both ends of the court. Three defensive rebounds in 32 minutes is atrocious.

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Zion definitely needs to add more to his game. Whether it be rebounding, jumper floater etc. I feel like every time he seems to figure it out he gets hurt and it’s factory default again. He can do other things- he just doesn’t and that is part of the problem. He just doesn’t have the confidence to try them.

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Originally Posted by JJackisangry

Zion definitely needs to add more to his game. Whether it be rebounding, jumper floater etc. I feel like every time he seems to figure it out he gets hurt and it’s factory default again. He can do other things- he just doesn’t and that is part of the problem. He just doesn’t have the confidence to try them.

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I usually defend Zion a lot because I think he gets a lot of undue criticism.

Tonight, though, his defense was abominable. His scoring was fine. The fact that it's his offense that's under fire right now is baffling to me, it was fine - towards the end of the 3rd, it was the only thing we had that was working at all. My biggest critique on Zion's offense so far this year is actually scheme - we're posting him up a lot again, the same as we did to start last year, and it just isn't great. It didn't work well then, it isn't working well now. There's a reason that when he was moved into more of a slasher/cutter role in November 2022 it unlocked MVP impact.

His defense, by contrast, was awful. By and large I think a lot of of the talk about Zion's defense is vastly overstated but tonight he looked exactly the way his critics describe him on that end of the floor - outside of maybe 2 plays. Just disengaged, unenthusiastic, unobservant, uncaring. It was the worst I've seen his defense look for an extended stretch for a long time.

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Originally Posted by JJackisangry

Zion definitely needs to add more to his game. Whether it be rebounding, jumper floater etc. I feel like every time he seems to figure it out he gets hurt and it’s factory default again. He can do other things- he just doesn’t and that is part of the problem. He just doesn’t have the confidence to try them.

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He and BI need more minutes on the floor for starters. 30 minutes a game can't continue forever. They both should be at 35 each. Including staggers.

In the Philly game before he got the most mega hamstring injury in history, he used several floaters and short jumpers. Anybody that said all he does is layups, I called a casual over the summer. Now I look like a fool because it's gone again. He's just barreling into multiple defenders for every score and that also can't continue.

And again, lose this idea of Zion at 5.

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Originally Posted by Pelicanidae

I usually defend Zion a lot because I think he gets a lot of undue criticism.

Tonight, though, his defense was abominable. His scoring was fine. The fact that it's his offense that's under fire right now is baffling to me, it was fine - towards the end of the 3rd, it was the only thing we had that was working at all. My biggest critique on Zion's offense so far this year is actually scheme - we're posting him up a lot again, the same as we did to start last year, and it just isn't great. It didn't work well then, it isn't working well now. There's a reason that when he was moved into more of a slasher/cutter role in November 2022 it unlocked MVP impact.

His defense, by contrast, was awful. By and large I think a lot of of the talk about Zion's defense is vastly overstated but tonight he looked exactly the way his critics describe him on that end of the floor - outside of maybe 2 plays. Just disengaged, unenthusiastic, unobservant, uncaring. It was the worst I've seen his defense look for an extended stretch for a long time.

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The point still stands. He is a one dimensional scorer at this point and there will be lulls as a result. It isn’t all on him or his fault as he can still playmake, but there will be plenty of times where we are stagnant because Zion is driving into 5 players that collapse on him or hacking him at the rim. He needs to add a little extra just to make defenders respect him a bit more and seep just that little bit out of the paint.

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Originally Posted by luckyman

He and BI need more minutes on the floor for starters. 30 minutes a game can't continue forever. They both should be at 35 each. Including staggers.

In the Philly game before he got the most mega hamstring injury in history, he used several floaters and short jumpers. Anybody that said all he does is layups, I called a casual over the summer. Now I look like a fool because it's gone again. He's just barreling into multiple defenders for every score and that also can't continue.

And again, lose this idea of Zion at 5.

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I don’t know why he stops trying it. He is capable. He is skilled. I do wonder if the coaches have him playing a very specific role and it’s hurting his growth or something. It’s just weird that he isn’t doing those things every game.

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Originally Posted by JJackisangry

The point still stands. He is a one dimensional scorer at this points and there will be lulls as a result. It isn’t all on him or his fault as he can still playmake, but there will be plenty of times where we are stagnant because Zion is driving into 5 players that collapse on him or hacking him at the rim. He needs to add a little extra just to make defenders respect him a bit more and seep just that little bit out of the paint.

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Like I said, a lot of it is scheme. When he's being posted up and he turns over in the post and there's 3 guys on him, what do you expect from him? Luckyman mentioned that last year, when he was freed up to play more as a slasher, we were seeing a wider variety. We were seeing baby hooks and floaters and push shots - now we're expecting him to develop a turnaround fader out of nothing because he's being put in the post? Come on, that's silly.

He looks worse because he's being used worse and the spacing has been largely bad for him - there was actually a moment tonight where he was on the court with three shooters at once and that was the first time this year, I think.

The defense, however, has no such excuses - that's on him. He has to put that effort in. The criticism is often overstated on him defensively but tonight he deserves all of it, he was horrible.

Maybe it is entirely on Willie- maybe not. Point still stands. It’s bad coaching not to motivate players to expand their game. Maybe Zion is a little hesitant to show those things thus far. We need to see them at some point. He can’t be strictly a driver come playoff time. We will run into brick walls that even Zion can’t break through.

We gave up 19 offensive rebounds and lost another rebounding battle.....