New Orleans Pelicans: Final Grades for Every Player in the Bubble

New Orleans Pelicans: Player Grades for the power forward and centers.

Power Forwards

Nicolo Melli’s disappointing play carried over to the bubble, where his poor shooting was a big part of the problem. When Melli is rolling, the Pelians’ offense is nearly unstoppable, as they have multiple guys who demand double teams and Melli is often left wide open. This was the case again in the eight-game bubble, but Melli couldn’t buy one. He bricked wide open shot after wide open shot, to the point that Gentry couldn’t really keep him in the game. At one point Zion Williamson had an easy kick-out to Melli, but hesitated for just a second, as Melli was so broke he didn’t want to waste the possession by giving him the ball.  It led to a low percentage shot for Zion, but you can hardly blame him for not having confidence that Melli would knock it down.

I don’t put this all on Melli, as he is often asked to do things he shouldn’t be doing, like trying to defend a center, but when your one job is to knock down shots and you don’t, that’s a problem. Hopefully the Pelicans will find another power forward to compete with Melli next season, which should light a fire under the Italian. I like Melli a lot and hope he can figure it out.

This might seem like a harsh grade for someone who pretty much scored a point a minute while he was on the floor and looked like an unstoppable force of nature at times.

But the best ability is availability and Zion simply wasn’t available.

It’s not his fault that there was a pandemic that shut down the season, nor that his family had an emergency that kept him away from the team, but Zion has to keep himself ready to play.

It’s concerning that his knees already bother him so much, that he seems a bit overweight and that a 20-year-old can’t play more than 15 minutes a game after missing two weeks.

Zion knows he needs to get in better shape, and said as much in a recent interview, so I am hopeful that this season was just an anomaly and that once things get back to “normal” we’ll see the real Zion.

There is so much to love about this young man and I just hope he can get himself in the type of shape he needs to be in to compete at a high level for an entire season.