New Orleans Pelicans: Trading RFAs with the Atlanta Hawks

The New Orleans Pelicans can make this trade to receive a player that’ll fit their roster better going forward

As the New Orleans Pelicans are preparing for the 2020 NBA draft, I’ve been assessing the team’s biggest needs and evaluating the current roster. In my assessment, I’ve found the New Orleans Pelicans desperately need to add depth to their wings, and could benefit from adding a back-up point guard.

This is where I decided to make this situation interesting. When looking at the Pelicans, I think that ideally, they would benefit from adding a wing in the draft as well as one through free agency or trade. I also believe that this year’s draft is filled with guards that have tons of upside, which would make the incumbent back-up point guard, Frank Jackson expendable.

Since I know that the Pelicans have Jackson’s rights in Restricted Free Agency, I figured maybe I could poke around the league and see if another team could benefit from adding Jackson to their guard rotation while giving up an expendable wing.

Here’s what the trade I came up with:

A rare one-for-one deal with the Atlanta Hawks, this deal doesn’t quite put the Pelicans into contention but it does move the needle a tad. In this deal, the Pelicans would send Frank Jackson’s rights to Atlanta for the restricted free agent rights of DeAndre Bembry. You might be asking why both either team makes move? The short answer is because this move balances both teams’ rosters before the draft.

What’s the long answer? Let’s break that down now.