New Orleans Pelicans: Why Kristaps Porzingis is not the answer

The New Orleans Pelicans definitely need a roster shake up and an injection of talent.

If you have been watching these NBA Playoffs, then you might have noticed that the Pelicans are pretty far from being one of the elite teams. They need a couple more players to put around Zion Williamson and Brandon Ingram and will look to the draft, free agency and trades to find them.

This is why it is not surprising that the Kristaps Porzingis rumors started to fly after it was reported that he is unhappy with his role in Dallas.

On paper, there might be a match, as Porzingis is the type of floor spacing big that theoretically would work well with Zion Williamson.

But games aren’t played on paper, and there are a whole lot of reasons that Porzingis is not a good fit on the New Orleans Pelicans.

New Orleans Pelicans: Porzingis is not a good fit with Zion Williamson

If this report is true and Porzingis is unhappy with his sidekick role in Dallas, how is he going to cope in New Orleans?

The Mavericks only have one ball-dominant player in Luka Doncic, whose 36 percent usage rate was the second-highest in the NBA.

The New Orleans Pelicans have two guys in Zion (28.7) and Ingram (27.9) who are also going to have the ball in their hands a lot. If the Unicorn is not happy with Doncic, he’ll be even less so as a third banana who stands in the corner and waits to shoot 3-pointers, which is exactly what he’d be.

The Pelicans need to put defensive minded 3-and-D types around Zion Williamson, and though Porzingis might help with the shot blocking, he is not a great defender and will be unhappy with an even lesser role in New Orleans.