The best player in franchise history. For some organizations, the answer to that is pretty well-understand. For instance, I’m sure 99.999% of Chicago Bulls fans would tell you that their franchise’s best player was none other than Michael Jordan.
However, for other teams, that question is more open for interpretation. If you asked Los Angeles Lakers fans, a massive debate would surely ensue – one that features names like Kobe Bryant, Magic Johnson, and Kareem Abdul Jabbar (to name a few).
As it stands, the New Orleans Pelicans fall under the latter category. There is no slam dunk/surefire answer to the question of ‘who is the best player in franchise history?’
So, as we often like to do here with these types of questions, we turned to a good ole’ fashion Twitter poll (follow us @PelicanDebrief) to help us gain some clarity.
The candidates on our poll were Chris Paul – The Point God, who owns most of the records in franchise history. Anthony Davis – the human fly-swatter who owns almost all the other records that don’t already belong to Paul. Zion Williamson – the prodigy, who hasn’t been able to stay healthy yet, but when he is healthy, arguably possesses as much (if not more) talent than anyone in Pelicans/Hornets’ history. And Baron Davis – the two-way guard that everyone forgets got MVP votes as a member of the New Orleans Hornets.
Now that we know who fans had to choose from let’s take a look at the results:
Who is the best Pelicans/Hornets player of all-time?
— Pelican Debrief (@PelicanDebrief) August 4, 2023
And the winner, by a pretty convincing margin, is Paul. Of the 68 votes we received, 50 went to The Point God. It looks like the answer to our original question may have been more universally understood than we initially thought.
Anyway, in other news, it is surprising (especially given all the recent trade rumors and controversy surrounding him) that Williamson received more votes than Anthony Davis. It really felt like, if he wasn’t in first place, Anthony Davis was a lock to finish second in this poll.
It is also kind of surprising that Williamson got more votes than Baron Davis. Although, it is likely that younger fans have forgotten/never experienced how good Baron Davis was during his heyday.