With the lost today and the infuriating turnovers and lack of defensive accountability the last redeming factor to watch games was to watch Zion get back into shape and possibly develop chemistry with BI. Outside of another alarming issue with this team which is effort accountability and a loser mentality that Zion displayed mirrored by his coach in today post game (mentioning the other team shot better and dismissing the lack of defensive effort) I'm concerned and confused by something else.
The most concerning and depressing nature of this whole NBA Bubble situation has been Zion spending months with access to a gym, being in the best shape in his life according to reports, and leaving the bubble for thirteen days and somehow returning into the worst shape we have seen him since a Pelican.
The mystery behind is condition is extremely strange because if reports are true, Zion possibly suffers from excessive weight gain issues and endurance/fluidity issues that can cause him to get out of shape QUICKLY. This is alarming because in the future if this continues, any nagging little injury can cause Zion to get into horrible shape quickly.
If thats not the case, this means we were lied to about his conditioning the whole time according to reports which I find hard to believe.
Moving forward Zion body naturally will gain more weight and muscle as it matures, but we will have to trust our staff and Aaron Nelson to develop a plan of action for one of the most unique bodies in history. As fans Zion is our franchise, so hopefully for future sake his underlying weight and conditioning issues will be figured out because Zion the Pelicans have currently is only 20 % of what he was in Duke.
And Duke Zion never returns, then we must all change our expectations for this franchise moving forward.