New Orleans Pelicans: Did they make a Steven Adams-sized mistake?

Was acquiring Steven Adams the right move for the New Orleans Pelicans

A lot of things have happened in the past few days in the NBA and most of the movement has Oklahoma City Thunder general manager Sam Presti’s fingerprints all over it.

One of those things to happen was a move that sent Steven Adams to the New Orleans Pelicans according to The Athletic’s Shams Charania. ESPN’s Zach Lowe and Adrian Wojnarowski followed this up with reporting that Adams will sign a two-year, $35 million extension with his new team.

The deal was then technically added to the Jrue Holiday to Milwaukee deal, rerouting some of those assets in exchange for Adams, meaning OKC ends up with George Hill, Zylan Cheatham, Josh Gray, Darius Miller, Kenrich Williams, a 2023 second-round draft pick (via Washington), a 2024 second-round draft pick (via Charlotte) from New Orleans, and a protected 2023 first-round draft pick from Denver and generated a trade exception.

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The trade exception, worth $27.5 million, will be the largest one in NBA history according to ESPN’s Bobby Marks, meaning OKC gets another avenue to take on players and even more draft compensation if they want.

New Orleans were huge winners in the Jrue trade in my eyes as they not only got three future first-round picks and two future pick swaps from a team that could lose their best player in 12 months, but they also got Eric Bledsoe, a valuable starting point guard on a reasonable contract and George Hill, one of the finalists for the 2019-20 Sixth Man of the Year award (5th place) and league leader in 3-point percentage.

Ignoring all the minor pieces in the trade, New Orleans sent Hill and a protected 2023 first-rounder for a 27-year-old center who’s best and only position is at the five.

New Orleans has Zion Williamson who has been playing most of his minutes at the power forward slot but projects to be a fast center when the Pelicans want to win games.

In a very small sample size with Zion as the main big man, he has a +12.2 differential per 100 possessions when using Cleaning the Glass’ metrics, scoring 123 points per 100 possessions with a 60.2 percent effective field goal percentage and, frankly, bad defensive numbers.

Zion playing at the five also passes the eyeball test. With the way the league is going, moving away from two big men and the Warriors having so much success with the mobile, cerebral, and faster big man. It’s hard to copy the special player and system Golden State has, but Zion might be a generational talent who can change the game if he stays healthy.

Notice how I said “if” there? The Adams trade and extension doesn’t just lose them assets, it’s an opportunity cost.

After drafting Jaxson Hayes with the eighth pick in the 2019 draft, New Orleans has almost cemented themselves into the “Zion is a power forward” camp. There are just too many players in the depth chart to consistently get Zion playing at center.

If new head coach Stan Van Gundy wants to play Zion at the five on a nearly full-time basis, he’ll have to bench around $25 million of Adams and the development time of Hayes.

Now, there’s a counter here that the Pelicans weren’t a good defensive team (19th in the league per Cleaning the Glass) and Adams is a grown man who comes in, stands under the rim, and is a legit 7-footer.

Using the same metric from Cleaning the Glass, Adams forced opponents away from the rim with them taking 4.3 percent less in the area, good for the 94th percentile. However, when opponents did shoot in the paint with him there, he was almost a net neutral with the opponent’s effective field goal percentage (+0.2) and percentage of makes at the rim (+0.1) going up slightly.

If David Griffin and the Pelicans brass want to see their young core next to a traditional big man, then why not go with something a little more on the cheaper side?

Adams’ extension will pay him roughly $17.5 million for two seasons. Christian Wood, a guy who was on the Pels roster in 2018-19, is two years younger and has a more diverse offensive game just got three-years at $41 million from Houston. Mason Plumlee, a more limited player than Adams, just got three-years at $25 million. How steep is the drop-off between those two players and would you value that drop off at an $11 million a year drop? Maybe, maybe not.

Griffin clearly doesn’t see this as an issue with his time in Cleveland and now New Orleans showing he always values having a traditional center on the court. However, it’s one thing to build a team around LeBron James, a generational talent, and maybe even the GOAT (greatest of all-time) depending on who you ask.

We don’t know what Zion is yet since he has only appeared in 24 games plus the bubble, all while covered in bubble wrap as the team tries to stop him from stubbing his toe.

If we get to January and after a few fourth-quarter runs and success under their belt with New Orleans blowing teams out with a power forward/center tandem of Brandon Ingram and Zion, it could get a bit awkward considering how much the team has invested in that not being the case.