Are the New Orleans Pelicans heading in the wrong direction?

After Monty Williams was fired at the conclusion of last season’s playoff series against the Golden State Warriors, the New Orleans Pelicans hired offensive guru Alvin Gentry to near unanimous praise, but maybe, just maybe, that wasn’t the right idea.

The New Orleans Pelicans are a team built to run. Jrue Holiday is capable of threading picture perfect passes through multiple defenders to Anthony Davis for highlight reel slam dunks, Tyreke Evans can run (and outrun) the best of them in the open floor and Ryan Anderson and Eric Gordon can trail and make defenses pay for forgetting about them behind the line. The Pelicans are built to run, or so they say.

Per NBA.com stats, the three best months for the New Orleans Pelicans in regards to net rating have been December, January and April, and those three months also happen to represent the slowest paces the Pelicans have played at all season. Pushing the pace, in general, has hurt the team’s performance on both the offensive and defensive side of the ball. January, representing the third slowest pace of the season, is the only month in the entire season with a positive net rating, and it featured the highest offensive rating and lowest defensive rating (lower is better for this statistic).

When looking a little deeper, the idea that pushing the pace may not be the ticket to success makes sense from a personnel perspective as well. Tyreke Evans, for example, has the physical ability to push the ball up and down the court, but he seems much more comfortable operating in a slower system. His lack of confidence operating in a blazing offense was on full display this season, and many fans and writers wrote him off as simply an ineffective basketball player after his numerous (and sometimes hysterical) failures. In reality, Evans was actually fairly effective this season when allowed to operate in the role he is comfortable in.

Ryan Anderson, another player often pointed to as someone who should thrive in an up-tempo system, showed this season that he is much more comfortable operating in the post rather than streaking up and down the floor. When called upon to get a basket, the Pelicans were able to rely on him throughout the season to create for himself in the high post. On top of the misconception of how some players fit, some players that were question marks as to whether or not they could operate in the new scheme have been an unmitigated disaster.

Omer Asik was supposed to be the next Andrew Bogut for the Pelicans; instead, he has played 800 less minutes than last season and been entirely ineffective for the vast majority of those minutes. Last season, Asik was an effective defender, but the pace of the game has negated his strengths and amplified his weaknesses. Unable to do much on offense besides clean up misses and score off of putbacks, he is often trailing too far and left on the perimeter to force the Pelicans into playing four on five offense. As a result of his ineffectiveness, Alvin Gentry has turned Omer Asik into one of the highest paid bench players in the NBA.

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Not coincidentally, the only month that saw Omer Asik make a positive impact on the floor was December, the same month that represents the Pelicans’ slowest pace of the season. At the time (I wrote about his December and January performances for Pelican Debrief in this article), it was apparent to everyone that Asik was playing some of the best basketball of his life, and the Pelicans looked to be turning around their floundering season. Instead, a few more injuries occurred, the pace kicked back up and the Pelicans went right back to losing the vast majority of their games.

But, of course, the topic of discussion must center around Anthony Davis, by far the best player on the team. What works best for him? The conventional wisdom would tell one that Davis would be more effective taking advantage of his immense athletic ability in the open floor where he can burst around (or through) defenders for easy dunks. When the half court is required, it should be the goal to get Davis the ball on the perimeter so he has the space to operate. The problem is that the Pelicans did those things, and Davis was substantially less effective this season than he was last season.

Next: Jaylen Brown draft profile

Obviously, injuries completely derailed this season, and it is entirely possible that this team will perfect Alvin Gentry’s system next season and take the league by storm. However, it is undeniable that a handful of key contributors (and, really the whole team) played more effective basketball this year when the pace slowed down. After making the playoffs last season, missing the postseason in such spectacular fashion has to be seen as a setback, and all possibilities as to why it all came crashing down need to be examined.