3 Reasons you shouldn’t worry about the Pelicans rough preseason

3. Zion Williamson is healthy and looks good. 

It’s ironic that we are dealing with injury problems, and the one guy who has had the most injury issues over the last half-decade is healthy, but here we are (*knocks wood immediately*).

Zion Williamson played in all four preseason games, and he had some really promising glimpses during that span. Including a fabulous preseason finale where he tallied 16 points, five steals, three assists, three rebounds, and two blocks on 6-of-8 shooting in less than 16 minutes of action en route to the team’s only victory of the preseason.

Overall, in 19.4 minutes per game, Williamson averaged 12 PPG, 3.8 APG, 3.5 RPG, 1.3 SPG, and 0.5 BPG on 62.6% True Shooting (the league average was 58.1% in 2022-23). Williamson also displayed some nice synergy with our prized new rookie, Jordan Hawkins.

Throw the numbers out the window, though, because, as we said, preseason numbers shouldn’t matter! And no matter how rough some of the other parts might look, Williamson is so good on his lonesome that he raises the floor of this team immensely.

When he’s right (which he is right now), Williamson is one of the ten best offensive players on the planet. And as long as he’s leading our team, we’ll never be as bad as our Net Rating and record from the preseason might suggest.