The 2025 NBA Draft is officially over. After months of waiting, the New Orleans Pelicans and their fans finally know the payload they received for enduring one of the bleakest seasons in franchise history, in which the team went just 21-61 amid a slew of injuries that took out practically the entire core roster.
Despite their 27th-place finish in the standings, New Orleans didn't come away with a top-four pick. Instead, they were vaulted by three different teams and pushed down to seven. That left newly minted President of Basketball Operations Joe Dumars with a tough task: appeasing a hungry and desperate fanbase that was expecting a star from a top-heavy class.
In the end, the Pelicans came away with three rookies: point guard Jeremiah Fears out of Oklahoma, big man Derik Queen from Maryland, and former Georgetown Hoyas wing Micah Peavy. At seven, they fell just out of range to grab one of the blue-chip prospects that many analysts expect to have All-Star careers. But that didn't stop Dumars from swinging for the fences. In fact, it may have led him to trade the 23rd-overall pick (Asa Newell from Georgia) and their 2026 unprotected first-round pick along with a possible swap with the Milwaukee Bucks to the Atlanta Hawks for Derik Queen.
Pelicans' trade up for Derik Queen has been heavily criticized
On draft day, I was a big fan of the aggression New Orleans showed in trading up for a prospect they deemed worthy, even though I'm not the biggest Derik Queen guy. After a bit of introspection, I ended up giving the pick a C grade, because of my concerns about Queen, but also because the realization set in that Joe Dumars and the Pelicans are not only betting on themselves next season, but also the Milwaukee Bucks.
Normally, counting on a Giannis Antetokounmpo-led team to not end up in the high lottery is a pretty safe gamble. However, the Bucks will be without Damian Lillard for possibly the entire season, have an especially shallow roster, and don't have many avenues to upgrade their personnel for next year.
Even in an expectedly weak Eastern Conference, any sort of semi-serious injury to the Greek Freak could send the Bucks to the lottery for the 2026 draft, which is expected to have several heavy hitters, including AJ Dybantsa, Darryn Peterson, and Cameron Boozer.
That risk has been the main critique of the Pelicans' risky trade to acquire Derik Queen. According to The Athletic's John Hollinger, one rival executive texted him the following message in response to a congratulations on a good draft from Hollinger:
"Thanks, but I’d rather be the team that traded Derik Queen for AJ Dybantsa."
Hollinger also stated that some other front office members told him that New Orleans could have potentially moved into the top five for the same package — although if that sentiment was a more definitive guarantee from someone actually in the top five, he probably would have said that.
Still, there's a big gap between five and 13, and it seems that the Pelicans could have used that same package to move up higher. Hollinger himself was also highly critical of the move:
"The Pels also could have just offered a different pick, perhaps coming to Atlanta, dangling a lightly protected future pick like a normal team, probably in 2028 or 2030.
Instead, they recklessly chased a guy who wasn’t good enough for them to take at seven, but still somehow warranted sending out both the 23rd pick and a likely future lottery pick to take at 13. In doing so, by the way, New Orleans took its ability to tank next season off the table … bold stuff from a team that won 21 games a year ago and, though not without talent, still looks like a complete mess."
If Derik Queen turns out to be an All-Star, or if neither the Pelicans nor the Bucks finish in the lottery next year, all of this criticism will be moot. That's the bet that Joe Dumars and New Orleans made. A lot of what Hollinger and other detractors of the trade are claiming is hypothetical. We'll see what Derik Queen and the Pelicans can do in reality.