New Orleans Pelicans: What’s the deal with Zion Williamson?

The New Orleans Pelicans opened up the NBA’s restart against the Utah Jazz. In a game full of swings, the biggest story revolved around Zion Williamson.

For better or worse, one of the biggest on-court stories of this NBA season has revolved around Zion Williamson and his availability. The New Orleans Pelicans rookie was drafted with fanfare at a level we haven’t seen since perhaps LeBron James in 2003, and when he was able to play, he delivered.

However, thanks to a preseason injury he didn’t make his debut appearance until January, and he only played 19 games before the season’s coronavirus-induced suspension. The Pelicans had a +10.4 net rating when he was on the floor and turned their season around, pushing their way to threaten for the eighth and final playoff spot in the Western Conference.

That push certainly didn’t hurt when it came to the NBA’s decision to invite the 22 teams with the slimmest of chances to make the playoffs to the Orlando bubble. While it’s silly to suggest that the league designed this plan around getting eight more games of Zion Williamson, it was definitely not in the “cons” column.

Williamson left the bubble for eight days to handle a family emergency and then had to quarantine again for several days when he returned to Orlando to satisfy the NBA’s safety protocols. He cleared quarantine on Tuesday, giving him two days to decide whether he would play Thursday night against the Utah Jazz in the restart opener, and he was a gametime decision.

As it happened, it was decided that Zion would play, but it would be in short stints.

While no indication was given that he would have a strict minutes limit (or anything approaching a specific minutes limit), it appears that the Pelicans medical staff had one in mind, and he played 15 minutes in a game they lost by two points, and he was off the floor down the final stretch.

According to ESPN’s Andrew Lopez, head coach Alvin Gentry said the following after the game:

"“We wish we could have played Zion down the stretch. But he had used the minutes that had been given to us. That’s just the way it is. We weren’t going to stick him back out there. Our medical team said we played for us to play him.”"

Remember, while this is an unorthodox arrangement, these games matter now, and the New Orleans Pelicans are battling for a playoff spot.

Zion’s health is most important, more important than fighting for an eight-seed matchup of death against (probably) the Los Angeles Lakers. But we don’t know that it’s a health thing.

Regarding Zion’s perspective, Lopez said the following:

Zion Williamson was -16 in his 15 minutes. He didn’t look the best we’ve seen him, but he scored 13 points on 6-of-8 shooting. He’s also a player where past rust doesn’t necessarily mean that much. So he struggled early? He can still absolutely take over on the offensive end and the New Orleans Pelicans are a drastically better team with him than without him.

If some kind of firm minutes limit existed, why didn’t Gentry save some of those minutes for late in a game which was evidently going to be close? Was the limit applied during the game, leaving Gentry with no wiggle room?

It’s confusing, and while the most important thing is Zion’s health, it would be nice to get some clarity on why the Pelicans had one of their best players sitting on the bench in the waning moments of a game that they absolutely had to win.