The New Orleans Pelicans have officially entered into a new era. When they sent Brandon Ingram to the Toronto Raptors ahead of the 2024-25 NBA trade deadline, it marked the close of a nearly six-year saga that saw this team repeatedly fail to get over the hump with its previous star pairing of BI with franchise cornerstone Zion Williamson.
Earlier this year, there was a lot of speculation about how drastically the Pelicans would blow up their roster. After losing their entire season due to a slew of injuries early in the campaign, the franchise's future went completely into flux, with rumors leaking that even Zion may have been on the chopping block.
Ultimately, New Orleans had a relatively mild showing at the trade deadline, only making one other deal aside from the Ingram swap. This gives an indication that the team isn't quite ready to give up on building around Zion. Since they elected to trade BI for veteran contracts, salary relief, and draft capital instead of an equal talent, the Pelicans will need to find a new star running mate for Zion. Thankfully, they already have one in-house.
Trey Murphy III passes Brandon Ingram on Pelicans' all-time 3-pointers made list
The New Orleans Pelicans always planned on trading Brandon Ingram this season. It was clear after five years together that his pairing with Zion Williamson was suboptimal, to say the least. Between his imperfect fit with the Pelicans' face of the franchise and his lofty contract demands that New Orleans was unwilling to meet, Ingram knew he was playing on borrowed time in the Bayou.
For weeks leading up to the trade deadline, it appeared that this season might not have a very active trade market. This opened the door to the possibility that BI could be re-signed to a short-term deal so the Pelicans could move him in a later season for a better package. Of course, the trade market turned out to be incredibly fertile this year, but New Orleans was probably also more motivated to trade Ingram because of Trey Murphy III's ascension.
This season, TMIII is averaging 22.6 points on 47.2 percent shooting from the field and 38.7 percent marks from beyond the arc. Each of those numbers comes incredibly close to eclipsing Ingram's highs with the Pelicans. Not only is Murphy replicating BI's production this year, but he's also a far better fit next to Zion on paper.
He's cashing nearly 39 percent of his triples this year while maintaining an aggressive volume with 8.5 attempts per game. Ingram's career-high in 3-point attempts is only 6.4, his current mark this season. Before this year, his top mark was just 6.2, from his very first campaign in New Orleans. That's why on Monday night against the Oklahoma City Thunder, Murphy III was able to surpass Ingram on the Pelicans' all-time 3-pointers made list, tacking on four more triples to a running total of now 564. He's done so in just 6,312 minutes, while Ingram tallied 10,302 minutes.
Trey Murphy III passing Ingram on the Pelicans' all-time 3-pointers made list is both a perfect encapsulation of the passing of the torch to TMIII as Zion's new number two and a showcase for why he'll be a much better Robin for Zion's Batman.