PROOF OF CONCEPT: How Dejounte Murray’s Return Could IMPACT the New Orleans Pelicans’ Future
Dejounte Murray’s impending return signals a pivotal audition for the New Orleans Pelicans’ future. With guard play lacking and Murray’s trade value at stake, Jake Madison explores whether Murray can steady the rotation, boost clutch performance, and shape offseason decisions. Can Murray’s presence transform the lineup with Zion Williamson, Derrick Queen, and Trey Murphy III, or will New Orleans seek another solution at point guard?
Jake also tackles the NBA’s controversial anti-tanking proposals and what they mean for teams like the Pelicans, who once found hope in the lottery. Plus, local billionaire Todd Graves’ rumored interest in ownership gets a reality check—while the future of the Smoothie King Center and franchise stability come into focus. Don’t miss this all-encompassing look at the Pelicans’ evolving strategy on and off the court as the team prepares for a crucial stretch run.
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15 Comments
Mr. ErryDat'rr 👈🏾 Thanks Jake!! If he don't wanna b here, WE DON'T WANT him HERE!!! NOLA gon b ight, I promise!!!!
Six players on the injury report? They've been off nine damn days, what the hell??
you didn’t mention the pwhl’s approach to tanking, and i actually think it’s one of the more interesting real world solutions out there. once a team is mathematically eliminated, the rest of their games count toward draft order based on points earned after elimination. so instead of losing to improve lottery odds, eliminated teams are incentivized to win because post elimination wins improve draft position.
if you translated that to the nba, once a team is eliminated from the play in, their remaining wins could determine draft order among lottery teams. it flips the incentive structure completely. late season games would matter for bad teams instead of encouraging soft tanking.
there would be details to iron out like schedule imbalance, but at least philosophically it rewards competitive behavior instead of trying to out math tanking with lottery tweaks. curious what you think about something like that.
to answer your question: no. i dont ever want to root for my team to lose. there should always be something to play for. thats why i think the pwhl gold plan will work in the nba
Easy way to fix it make the draft flat no more lottery. No matter what NBA does want fix tanking, you can’t fix it. They need to do like the NFL either your team is bad or good that’s it. The lottery doesn’t really work to many times the worst teams drop while a team from 6 to 10 jump. no reason for 10 to 15 win team to be jumped by a team with 29 wins
I did have a thought while I was listening to your tanking discussion. At the end of the regular season, take the 14 lottery teams and seed them 1-14 in a single-elimination 'Lottery playoff'. It would be a total of 13 games. The NBA would love to have more games on TV during a dead sports period. The teams would be seeded top to bottom BY BEST RECORD, the top two teams with the best records would get a bye. Lottery position would then be set by the winner of the tournament, winner gets the #1 pick and so forth. This would eliminate the need for tanking and change the psychological motivation at the end of the season from losing to winning. Let me know what you think.
It's not tanking, it's scamming the customers.
If he doesn't want to be here then trade him. Millionaire cry babies.
This is one of the reasons why I stopped paying to attend NBA games. No fan wants to waste their money on teams tanking. The reason I kept going to Saints games was because they were still playing hard. If the Pelicans start tanking you’ll see a massive reduction in fan support
The only thing that can stop tanking is the worst teams send to the G league.
Every dayer comment
Everydayer!!
None of this addresses the real issue of tanking IMO. As a fan why would you buy tickets for a tanking team? It is theft to charge full price for tickets from a team that is intentionally trying to lose. 15:40
Hi jake
Jake good discussion! I think the league cares about tanking because of the gambling scandals. it's not about tanking on its face