Player Grades: New Orleans Pelicans lose an ugly one to Dallas Mavericks

69. Final. 91. 79. 81

C+. I commented during the game on Twitter that Frazier competes just about as hard as you can as an undersized defender at the point of attack. Like his undersized peers (Isaiah Thomas, Ty Lawson, etc), he uses awareness and strength to offset an inability to contest every shot or fight through every screen. That was important in keeping the game close throughout. Pair defensive effort with a nice third quarter making plays on offense, and Frazier was a net positive until the fourth quarter, when his return to the lineup corresponded with a dastardly downturn.. PG. New Orleans Pelicans. TIM FRAZIER

E’TWAUN MOORE. C-. Still not sure why this is the guy to get the short hand of the rotation stick. When things get stagnant, Moore is more than capable of keeping the ball in his hands and making things happen. So far for the Pelicans though, Moore’s ceiling has been about 25 minutes and 15 points. Instead of mixing things up with Anthony Brown and Buddy Hield, why not get a complete picture of what you have in E’Twaun Moore? 0 points and 3 assists in 22 minutes is a rough night for Moore, made worse by Gentry’s indecision in the rotation.. SG. New Orleans Pelicans

C. Hey, hey! A decent performance, for once. Facing a Mavericks team content to battle throughout the game with small, versatile lineups, Hill become indispensable for Alvin Gentry. Hill was able to keep Dallas star scorer Harrison Barnes in check for most of the contest, and made a three in the fourth quarter to keep things close. However, rebounding was one of the biggest problems tonight, and Hill did little to remedy that. Only four boards for a guy who played the majority of his minutes at power forward is abysmal. He has to improve on the glass to warrant legitimate minutes once Dante Cunningham returns.. SF/PF. New Orleans Pelicans. SOLOMON HILL

PF/C. New Orleans Pelicans. ANTHONY DAVIS. A. Another night, another wasted Anthony Davis performance. To go along with typically efficient and smooth scoring numbers, Davis buckled down defending the paint in the second half, playing at center for the majority of those minutes. He notched one block and two steals, but legitimately affected shot after shot in the third and fourth quarters, to no avail. Yuck.

INC. Not much to say here. Even facing a nice matchup in Andrew Bogut, Alvin Gentry instead preferred Davis matching up with Bogut during his minutes, so that Davis could sag off and prowl for shot deflections. It worked alright, but Asik should be playing more than seven minutes on a night where the Pelicans are out-rebounded by an injured Mavericks team.. C. New Orleans Pelicans. OMER ASIK

New Orleans Pelicans. JRUE HOLIDAY. B. For Holiday, it was one of those NBA nights where guys seem off and ineffective, only to post a decent statistical night in the end. As the game ended, my only memories of Holiday from the contest were a rough second quarter and two big fourth quarter threes. In actuality, he scored 17 points on 14 shots and made 3/4 three-pointers. If not for Holiday’s play-making and shooting, this one could have been a lot uglier.. G

PF/C. New Orleans Pelicans. TERRENCE JONES. D. A real rough one for Jones, who should see a decent amount of blame for tonight’s loss. He should work his way into more than 13 minutes against a favorable all-small Mavs rotation. The athletic, physical style that Jones has worked for the Pelicans this season would have been nice against a stagnant Mavericks offense. However, he struggled to find a groove, and looked stymied more often than not against Harrison Barnes, Dwight Powell, and others.

C-. Langston Galloway has been the kind of player to steady the Pelicans offense with hot shooting when it falls into ruts like tonight’s. That was not the case tonight, as Galloway shot only 2/6 and missed both of his threes. There were positive notes on defense, as Galloway helped control Seth Curry and Deron Williams, who combined for only 19 points on 7/18 shooting. Inconsistency plagues all Pelican souls.. PG/SG. New Orleans Pelicans. LANGSTON GALLOWAY

New Orleans Pelicans. ALEXIS AJINCA. D. Desperation, wrong or right, led to Alexis Ajinca’s return to the lineup for a few minutes in the second quarter. Ajinca continues to get chances to muck things up against smaller opposing bigs, and rarely takes advantage of those opportunities. Against Dwight Powell tonight, Ajinca bricked three shots and failed to affect the game.. PF/C

BUDDY HIELD. C. I like that Buddy got real minutes in the most competitive parts of a real NBA game. That was good, but his performance was not quite good. Every time it appears Buddy is getting into rhythm, he misses ugly on a nice look. That occurred in the second quarter, as Hield got to the line in transition before front-rimming a pull-up three on the next possession.. SG. New Orleans Pelicans

C. Can’t blame Brown for coming out of the gates aggressively in the third quarter after Gentry put him on the court with the starters. He would finish the night with only three missed threes and a couple rebounds to his stat line, solidifying his place as merely an infusion of shooting for this Pelicans team.. SG/SF. New Orleans Pelicans. ANTHONY BROWN