Can We Actually Move Away from Zion after 2024-2025 Season?

Remainder of his contract is now non-guaranteed?

Source: wwltv.com

https://www.wwltv.com/article/sports...1-ffb5db7360c4

That’s probably what they would prefer to do if it came to it. Especially, so they can sign Trey

Why would you just cut him? That seems ridiculous at this point. It's fine as a fallback plan in case of catastrophe, but we're pretty far away from that.

They won't. They would only do that if he suffers a major injury.

They are better off trading him for scraps than waive him for nothing (which will never happen).

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Originally Posted by donato

Why would you just cut him? That seems ridiculous at this point. It's fine as a fallback plan in case of catastrophe, but we're pretty far away from that.

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It is a great clause in case he suffers a catastrophic injury, but we are obviously not going to cut him just to save money.

Yeah they aren’t going to cut him at all. Lol. That shouldn’t even be the question.

This is why I, and many others, have said that Zion's contract isn't a huge deal. He's not going to be the limiting factor in future money management. Either he's playing well, and then he's worth paying, or he's not and his contract is easily manageable.

The team isn't going to cut him. Thus far this season he's been healthy, the team is winning games, etc. They won't cut him and they shouldn't cut him.

It's non-story. People have been reporting that Zion's contract has these kinds of insurances built into it for literally years.

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Originally Posted by Pelicanidae

This is why I, and many others, have said that Zion's contract isn't a huge deal. He's not going to be the limiting factor in future money management. Either he's playing well, and then he's worth paying, or he's not and his contract is easily manageable.

The team isn't going to cut him. Thus far this season he's been healthy, the team is winning games, etc. They won't cut him and they shouldn't cut him.

It's non-story. People have been reporting that Zion's contract has these kinds of insurances built into it for literally years.

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Which makes it comical that this guy literally fumbled his own bag. It not being guaranteed probably makes him much more tradeable. Someone will take a flyer and if don’t work then they can cut bait.

Zion is not the problem. When you have this many stars and this much depth in the team, the coaching is clearly the problem. I would love Zion to expand his game and add to his reportoire to avoid getting cheesed out of the game, but we tend to just take him out when that is happening anyways. And we still flop. Massive questions have to be asked of Willy. For instance, why is Hawkins all of a sudden disappearing from the team? In a team that?s biggest need is shooters, and he is a high volume good clip guy, why is he being factored out? Defense is important, but you know what is infinitely more important in the regular season? OFFENSE. Not going stale. Bad possessions turn into bad defense. If you make your buckets, you put that much more pressure on the other team to keep up. You also allow yourselves to enter into half court defense. When we have bad possessions, there tends to be poor defense. Go figure. Willy is absolutely blowing it. There are no ifs ands or buts about it. Everyone is healthy. Let?s get on track.

This just shows me how the New Orleans local media are three steps behind in reporting sports. WWL-TV.com and Nola.com are breaking this as a "STOP THE PRESSES" story, when most of the educated basketball minds that post on this forum state it's a non-story.

You would thing journalists who are paid for their work would at least do some research.

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Originally Posted by davehornet

This just shows me how the New Orleans local media are three steps behind in reporting sports. WWL-TV.com and Nola.com are breaking this as a "STOP THE PRESSES" story, when most of the educated basketball minds that post on this forum state it's a non-story.

You would thing journalists who are paid for their work would at least do some research.

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Makes me think the timing is for a reason. All of us already knew he had clauses, but now they want to bring it to the center of attention.

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Originally Posted by JJackisangry

Zion is not the problem. When you have this many stars and this much depth in the team, the coaching is clearly the problem. I would love Zion to expand his game and add to his reportoire to avoid getting cheesed out of the game, but we tend to just take him out when that is happening anyways. And we still flop. Massive questions have to be asked of Willy. For instance, why is Hawkins all of a sudden disappearing from the team? In a team that?s biggest need is shooters, and he is a high volume good clip guy, why is he being factored out? Defense is important, but you know what is infinitely more important in the regular season? OFFENSE. Not going stale. Bad possessions turn into bad defense. If you make your buckets, you put that much more pressure on the other team to keep up. You also allow yourselves to enter into half court defense. When we have bad possessions, there tends to be poor defense. Go figure. Willy is absolutely blowing it. There are no ifs ands or buts about it. Everyone is healthy. Let?s get on track.

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Well I can’t disagree at all. Willie is just not head coach material.

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Originally Posted by JJackisangry

Zion is not the problem. When you have this many stars and this much depth in the team, the coaching is clearly the problem. I would love Zion to expand his game and add to his reportoire to avoid getting cheesed out of the game, but we tend to just take him out when that is happening anyways. And we still flop. Massive questions have to be asked of Willy. For instance, why is Hawkins all of a sudden disappearing from the team? In a team that?s biggest need is shooters, and he is a high volume good clip guy, why is he being factored out? Defense is important, but you know what is infinitely more important in the regular season? OFFENSE. Not going stale. Bad possessions turn into bad defense. If you make your buckets, you put that much more pressure on the other team to keep up. You also allow yourselves to enter into half court defense. When we have bad possessions, there tends to be poor defense. Go figure. Willy is absolutely blowing it. There are no ifs ands or buts about it. Everyone is healthy. Let?s get on track.

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Agreed. We wanted to put shooters around Zion, but he and Trey/Hawkins hardly play together.

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Originally Posted by PELICANSFAN

Agreed. We wanted to put shooters around Zion, but he and Trey/Hawkins hardly play together.

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Trey plays fewer of his minutes with Zion than with any other rotation player. That's not speculation or eye test, it is literally facts.

A huge portion of having Zion is surrounding him with shooters on offense and letting that offense go nuclear. Willie Green actually subs Zion our for Trey, rather than playing them together. Most of Trey's lineups are him as the only shooter - occasionally he'll be on the court with CJ. Meanwhile, instead of pairing Zion with Trey, Zion gets played with Dyson, Herb, Naji, and Zeller and asked to create offense from a lineup that is exclusively designed to defend, that opponents don't have to care about.

It's an appalling coaching system on offense. The team has enough depth and talent that we're winning games anyway, but the offense is almost designed to hamstring its most efficient players. Imagine what it could be if Green actually coached the team he has instead of coaching the team he wished he had.

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Originally Posted by JJackisangry

Zion is not the problem. When you have this many stars and this much depth in the team, the coaching is clearly the problem. I would love Zion to expand his game and add to his reportoire to avoid getting cheesed out of the game, but we tend to just take him out when that is happening anyways. And we still flop. Massive questions have to be asked of Willy. For instance, why is Hawkins all of a sudden disappearing from the team? In a team that?s biggest need is shooters, and he is a high volume good clip guy, why is he being factored out? Defense is important, but you know what is infinitely more important in the regular season? OFFENSE. Not going stale. Bad possessions turn into bad defense. If you make your buckets, you put that much more pressure on the other team to keep up. You also allow yourselves to enter into half court defense. When we have bad possessions, there tends to be poor defense. Go figure. Willy is absolutely blowing it. There are no ifs ands or buts about it. Everyone is healthy. Let?s get on track.

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And with Hawk , he got a decent bit of playing time and looked pretty good. So WG pretty much benches him for the ridiculous in season crap and has not given him hardly any playing time stunting his development and now he off course. It's time to sack WG and go with Borrego
Plus the lack of development in Z is atrocious, He has not developed a short jumper or any other weapons in his bag

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Originally Posted by djrnno

And with Hawk , he got a decent bit of playing time and looked pretty good. So WG pretty much benches him for the ridiculous in season crap and has not given him hardly any playing time stunting his development and now he off course. It's time to sack WG and go with Borrego
Plus the lack of development in Z is atrocious, He has not developed a short jumper or any other weapons in his bag

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The thing about Hawkins is that he is, far and away, without any close second, the worst defender on the Pelicans. Eye test bares it out (he competes, but is ineffective) and the advanced stats make it abundantly clear.

To a defensively minded coach like Green, that's basically admitting you're unplayable.

A better coach would realise that actually, Hawkins worked well in multi-shooter lineups specifically because the scoring was so good that it meant we basically never had to defend in transition, and playing in the half-court was easier on him. Those lineups were some of our most impactful early in the season, when Hawkins was getting minutes with Matt Ryan and Jonas.

But that's a better coach. We don't have that. We got Green.

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Originally Posted by Pelicanidae

The thing about Hawkins is that he is, far and away, without any close second, the worst defender on the Pelicans. Eye test bares it out (he competes, but is ineffective) and the advanced stats make it abundantly clear.

To a defensively minded coach like Green, that's basically admitting you're unplayable.

A better coach would realise that actually, Hawkins worked well in multi-shooter lineups specifically because the scoring was so good that it meant we basically never had to defend in transition, and playing in the half-court was easier on him. Those lineups were some of our most impactful early in the season, when Hawkins was getting minutes with Matt Ryan and Jonas.

But that's a better coach. We don't have that. We got Green.

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Dude could you imagine if they just surrounded Jonas, BI, and Zion with shooters at all times. Defense wouldn’t need to be needed at all. Lol. I honestly think Jonas can get his own bucket as easy as any one of them. He has become an offensive nightmare for any one who guards him.

[QUOTE=Pelicanidae;1604190]The thing about Hawkins is that he is, far and away, without any close second, the worst defender on the Pelicans. Eye test bares it out (he competes, but is ineffective) and the advanced stats make it abundantly clear.

To a defensively minded coach like Green, that's basically admitting you're unplayable.

A better coach would realise that actually, Hawkins worked well in multi-shooter lineups specifically because the scoring was so good that it meant we basically never had to defend in transition, and playing in the half-court was easier on him. Those lineups were some of our most impactful early in the season, when Hawkins was getting minutes with Matt Ryan and Jonas.

But that's a better coach. We don't have that. We got Green.[/

If Willy and Dennis Allen were the same color I'd feel like they were the same person. Both are weak milquetoast coaches that are in over their heads

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Originally Posted by Fedupfan

Dude could you imagine if they just surrounded Jonas, BI, and Zion with shooters at all times. Defense wouldn’t need to be needed at all. Lol. I honestly think Jonas can get his own bucket as easy as any one of them. He has become an offensive nightmare for any one who guards him.

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It's why I support benching Herb for Trey.

Not because I dislike Herb. He's fantastic.

But I think the starting lineup is fatally lacking in shooting, and it's stifling everyone. Nothing on Herb, everything to do with lineup construction.

Edit: Just saw these numbers which I think add some context to my point.

Pels current starters are a +5.7 in the first half of games. -16.8 in the second half.

Why? Outscored opponents by 169 points total in first halves. Outscored by opponents by 113 points in the second half. From top 5 in the first 24 minutes to bottom 5 in the second.

Simply put: teams lose because we have more talent than them until they adjust at halftime to the fact that our starting lineup can't shoot. So they come out in the second half, don't bother defending the perimeter (note, this is often when CJ starts hitting shots) but defend the paint, our offense dies because we have no spacing and they go on a run. We lose 3rd quarters a lot, as we all know.

Need more offense. More spacing. More shooting. Start Trey.

Does the non-guarantee extend to the next team if he's traded?

Z lost his guaranteed because he didn't feel like himself. Thats hilarious . He's done this to himself.

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Originally Posted by Pierre Pelican

Z lost his guaranteed because he didn't feel like himself. Thats hilarious . He's done this to himself.

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He lost nothing because they're not going to waive him. The benefit of the flexibility in the contract is in case of a serious, career-altering injury, not just for missing games in general.

Sacrificing offense to try and build a defensive identity is not the play. We are in cap hell soon. We likely will not have a better roster soon. It is the regular season. Not the postseason. As long as we stay steady offensively, we will be okay. There is no reason Hawkins can’t see minutes off the bench against subs. There is no reason not to pair Zion and shooters on the floor. Willie will run the team into the ground if he doesn’t wise up.

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Originally Posted by JJackisangry

Sacrificing offense to try and build a defensive identity is not the play. We are in cap hell soon. We likely will not have a better roster soon. It is the regular season. Not the postseason. As long as we stay steady offensively, we will be okay. There is no reason Hawkins can’t see minutes off the bench against subs. There is no reason not to pair Zion and shooters on the floor. Willie will run the team into the ground if he doesn’t wise up.

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100% agree.

The fact is, offense is defense to a large extent. You can get away with a mediocre lineup defensively if the offense is so potent that you never have to play in transition. That's one of the reason that Zion-led lineups have historically been a plus defensively: not because Zion is some core defensive piece (he's not) but because under SVG and during last year's Point Zion games, the offense was so flames that every defensive possession was played in the half-court and that covers for a lot of issues.

You need some defense. You're not going to win games reliably with 0 defense. But top 5 offense, top 15 defense is a lot better than top 5 defense, top 15 offense.

I'd take paolo banchero in a straight up trade.

Or Adebayo.