This 2024-25 NBA season has been a cursed one for the New Orleans Pelicans. It appears that the team's desire to incorporate the city's voodoo culture into the organization's branding has reaped bad juju on the franchise.
The Pelicans began their campaign with legitimate title hopes after getting a career year from Zion in 2023-24 and adding an All-Star by trading for Dejounte Murray at the top of the offseason. Before the season even began, though, things started to fall apart in New Orleans. Trey Murphy III would go down with a strained hamstring on the first day of training camp. By the time he was able to make his way back onto the court, the Pelicans were 3-7 and several other core members of the team had landed on the injury report.
Now, all of those lofty aspirations from the summer have completely evaporated and the organization is now looking at a potential teardown. TMIII has done his part since returning, leaving it all on the floor in an effort to keep the Pelicans a respectable product on the court. He's exceeded his expectations, but the team hasn't followed suit. Frankly, Trey Murphy III's play is deserving of Most Improved Player buzz, but New Orleans's struggles as a team have kept him out of the conversation.
Trey Murphy III is the NBA's Most Improved Player this season
When Trey Murphy III came back from his hamstring injury, he was nearly the last man standing of the Pelicans' core, save for Brandon Ingram. Zion Williamson, Dejounte Murray, CJ McCollum, and Herb Jones had all gotten injured, leaving just Murphy and Ingram to try to keep the team afloat after a disastrous start to the season.
I surmised that TMIII would step up and cash in on his star potential to help the Pelicans tread water until the cavalry arrived. That wasn't the case. Absent from training camp and preseason, Murphy III had to ramp up in-season after a long furlough due to injury, and it showed in his play. He did pick up some of the offensive slack with all of the Pelicans' top scorers on the sidelines, but he struggled heavily with his efficiency.
In his first nine games of the season, he averaged 17.3 points but did so on just 39 percent shooting from the field and 31 percent marks from deep. Since then, though, he's been on a tear. Even the returns of Murray, McCollum, Jones, and Zion couldn't slow down his meteoric ascension.
In his last 16 games, he's putting up 23.8 points, 4.7 rebounds, and 3.1 assists while slashing 49/38/96. He's now up to 21.5 points, 4.8 rebounds and 2.8 assists per game on 45 percent shooting from the field and 36 percent from beyond the arc on the season.
That's nearly a seven-point jump from his scoring output from last season on improved efficiency. And yet, Trey Murphy III is nowhere to be found on the NBA's Most Improved Player betting odds.
TMIII isn't simply producing more due to increased opportunities either. Sure, earlier in the year he was suddenly in a larger role than anticipated, but he's now sharing the floor with multiple high-level scorers and is still putting up huge numbers. He's also shown significant growth outside of the box score.
In previous years, Murphy III was basically a 6'9 3-point specialist. This season, he's showcased a new ability to create his own offense off of the bounce. He's even parlayed his improved on-ball skills into developments as a playmaker, as his current mark of 2.8 assists per game would be a career-high.
By every defining measure, Trey Murphy III has been one of the NBA's most improved players this season. He might not be available for MIP on any sportsbooks yet, but it'd be wise to jump on his odds as soon as possible.