Josh Hart will be a restricted free agent this summer and the New Orleans Pelicans would do well to keep him.
came up huge in the New Orleans Pelicans’ 124-129 win over the Utah Jazz, putting up 13 points and seven rebounds off the bench. Utah’s second unit rightfully got the buzz headed into Monday night’s game, but it was Hart who led the New Orleans Pelicans’ bench. The Pels’ own Swiss Army knife made multiple decisive plays and once again demonstrated why he is such a useful player for Stan Van Gundy.
As we’ve outlined on here before, Hart is a restricted free agent this upcoming offseason. That means that the former Villanova Wildcat could leave the New Orleans Pelicans in the summer should any team around the league offer him a mouthwatering deal that New Orleans isn’t willing to match. Ultimately, however,
over where Hart ends up next season. Hart was traded to the Jazz from the Los Angeles Lakers in the deal that led to Anthony Davis wearing the Angeleno purple-and-gold. After a solid first season with the Pelicans, he and the team failed to agree on a contract extension. This year, Hart has further consolidated himself as a vital cog for New Orleans and would surely be a coveted role player for NBA teams with playoff or championship aspirations. On paper, it might seem like Hart is having a worse season than his first in the Big Easy. His points per game, three-point percentage and attempts, steals, and blocks are all down. Although numbers are very useful in basketball, they often don’t tell the entire story or provide enough context. Hart has been excellent,
rotating into the Pelicans’ frontcourt as a small ball four
and regularly providing defensive nous, effort, and versatility. But because Hart is so handy on defense, his offensive contribution can go unmentioned at times. After a blowout win over the Houston Rockets in which Hart had 20 points and 17 boards,
I wrote that steadiness is the name of the game for him
. You know what you’re going to get from Hart on most nights and those types of offensive outbursts are outliers for him. However, there’s real value in knowing your role and not playing outside your skills. Often, that’s what differentiates guys who are late draft picks and stick around in the league from guys who are late draft picks and wrongly think they deserve a bigger piece of the pie. Hart embodies the former case; barring injury, he will have a very long career in the NBA. Today, I want to take a look at something that Hart has been increasingly doing as of late. Even though he is a finished product in terms of role, that doesn’t mean that the Pels’ ultimate utility player cannot add new arrows to his quiver. For Hart, this means his aggressive takes to the basket in transition.
New Orleans Pelicans: Josh Hart’s most underrated skill
https://videos.nba.com/nba/pbp/media/2021/03/01/0022000533/127/ecc016cf-53ad-b0c8-e92d-2e40e4cd88db_1280x720.mp4 Over the last month or so, it seems like Van Gundy has given Hart the green light to push the ball up the floor off of opponents’ misses. Hart is rapidly becoming a legitimate grab-and-go threat, as you can see in the clip above. Everything start with his rebounding. Hart is an elite rebounder at his position, snatching down over seven boards per game. He is third in rebounds per game among bench players, trailing only Enes Kanter and Jarrett Allen while being ahead of Dwight Howard. In case you didn’t notice, those three are all centers while Hart is 6-foot-5.
Since Hart is already likely to come up with the ball, then it’s just a matter of pushing the pace and not giving the opposition time to reset their half-court defense. The Pels have been criticized at times this season for grinding things to a halt too much, especially after the breakneck pace of last season under Alvin Gentry. Hart is a big fan of that little goofy step he does right when he enters the paint. He’s more of a straight line driver, but this tiny change of direction tends to completely disorientate his defenders as Hart brings the ball across his body on the hop and then finishes. https://videos.nba.com/nba/pbp/media/2021/02/25/0022000503/141/e053a192-7af5-33bf-ed8f-7faf2dafb529_1280x720.mp4 Hart has been incredibly aggressive as of late. He is putting pressure on the opponent’s rim basically whenever he can, finding spaces in the other team’s defense and racing downhill to exploit them.
New Orleans Pelicans: Josh Hart is not really a shooting guard
Over his last five games, Hart is scoring about 10 points per night despite his three-point shooting having gone ice cold. That points average is actually above his season average, demonstrating that he has been effective on offense no matter what. I think Hart is often miscast as a player. Most websites or even NBA broadcasts still have him listed as a guard, but he doesn’t play like one at all. He isn’t a true 3-and-D wing either. Hart can clearly defend at a high level and make the three ball, but his percentages have never been elite (35 percent in his four NBA seasons) and he isn’t a high volume shooter from beyond the arc. Rather, I like to think of Hart as a plug-and-play guy. He can slide up and down positions at will and doesn’t need any plays called for him. If there’s playmakers around him, as is the case in New Orleans, he will make the best of the shots he gets. If he isn’t getting any shots, then Hart has no problem being productive in whichever way he can.