Worrisome or Expected Struggles for Jeremiah Fear and Derik Queen for Pelicans in Summer League

Worrisome or Expected Struggles for Jeremiah Fear and Derik Queen for Pelicans in Summer League

We’re through two summer league games and I’ll tell you what’s concerning and what’s normal for the Pelicans and their rookies Jeremiah Fears and Derek Queen so far. It’s the Monday episode of Locked on Pelicans. Let’s go. You are Locked On Pelicans, your daily New Orleans Pelicans podcast, part of the Locked On Network. your team every day. Welcome to another edition of Locked On Pelicans, the daily podcast covering your favorite team, the New Orleans Pelicans at NBA. Part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day, available wherever you get your podcast and available on YouTube. I’m your host, Pelicans Insider, credential member of the media, JakeMadison, Nola Jake on Twitter. Here with y’all on this Monday. We got five shows this week for you. We got a lot to cover with more summer league games. Herb Jones signing an extension. We’ll get into that in a day or so. I want to get into the coaching staff as well. Uh there’s still a lot to talk about with the Pelicans and I’m excited to do it right here on the Locked On Pelicans podcast. Today’s episode of Locked On Pelicans is brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers can get $150 in bonus bets when your first $5 bet wins. And of course, thank you for making Locked On Pelicans your first listen today and every day. We’re here Monday through Friday, the number one Pelicans podcast covering everything you want to know about this Pelicans team. So, please subscribe wherever you get your podcast and join over 11,000 Pelicans fans on YouTube as well. And become every day. That means you listen Monday through Friday to the Locked On Pelicans podcast. And don’t forget, you can also watch us on the GF Coast Sports and Entertainment Network every weekday at 10:30 a.m. So, the Pelicans had their second Summer League game on Saturday over the weekend, and that was a weird game to be honest. And we’ll get into the general stuff around summer league, but what I want to look at through two summer league games, what’s actually concerning, and what’s just like normal summer league stuff. and we’ll look at it through Jeremiah fears first, then we’ll look at Derek Queen, and then we’ll get into some more general summer league stuff with what we’re seeing from this team as well. So, we got a lot to cover here today’s episode of Locked On Pelicans. So, let’s do it. You know, losing to the Los Angeles Lakers 9481, a game where the Pelicans did not have a single assist in the second half. They had six assists overall in this game. Just like I said, a really strange odd game here, but it’s summer league and winning and losing doesn’t actually matter when it comes to anything here. But you might see six assists, not in the second half, and you go, “Didn’t they just draft a point guard? Did that point guard have any assists in this game, Jeremiah Fears?” And the answer to that is no. And you might think that that is concerning. And on one hand, yeah, maybe. But on another hand, I’m I’m not overly concerned about what you’re seeing from the team right now or from Jeremiah Fears right now. And in fact, I think he’s showing off the type of NBA skills that you want to see. You know, last week, the week before, I talked about kind of the one, you know, stat for him. It was 51.8, something like that, 53.8 about his free throw rate of playing downhill, getting to the line, going to the rim, but just playing downhill in general is something that this team needed. And even in this game where he shot five of 21, one of seven from three for just 15 points on zero assists, right? Four of five from the free throw line. He’s showing off that skill right now. You know what you’re seeing from him? And this is why when I look at five of 21, is that a concern? Is the one of seven from three a concern? Not really. Those shots will fall eventually. Even Cooper Flag in his debut game had a terrible shooting game for the Dallas Mavericks and he still showed off kind of the skills, the talent that you thought was going to make him a very good player in this league. So Jeremiah Fierce is kind of doing the same thing even if the shots aren’t exactly falling. So you know, if we look at that debut for Cooper Flag, you’re like, “Yeah, it’s not bad. It looks pretty good.” I’m going to say the same thing for Jeremiah Fears here. getting downhill relentlessly attacking is what he’s supposed to be doing right now. This Pelicans team is not running a structured offense. You don’t really have time to do that sort of thing, right? They’re playing just a lot of one-on-one isolation and maybe something will happen from it. It’s freelance basketball. It’s like pickup games at the Y or something like that, right? You’re not going to have chemistry with those people. You’re just kind of showing up and doing the best that you can. That’s kind of what’s going on here. That’s in general how summer league is. But the fact that he can still get downhill and look, he missed a ton of shots at the rim, right? When you take out the three-point attempts, he was four for 14 and most of those coming, you know, at the rim misses. The fact that he’s finding space, filing creases, cracks in the defense to play downhill and attack the rim is highly encouraging. He’s struggling with some of the physicality of the NBA. He’s struggling to finish through contact a little bit, but here’s the thing, that can all come with time. All of the stuff that he’s lacking right now is not one of those things that can’t improve and can’t get better. And that’s what’s so encouraging about him. He was a good finisher in college. He’ll be a good finisher at the NBA level with just a little bit of time. What is it going to be this year? Maybe not. That’s a concern for this coming season because the Pelicans kind of need to be good and if he’s going to take a little bit, you know, a year to kind of develop some of those skills, which is not which is normal, right, for a rookie. That’s not like a knock on him. Just probably means the Pelgans aren’t going to be great. And well, with no draft pick next year, that’s not an ideal situation to be in. So, there’s that. But the fact that he’s getting downhill is good. And it’s even more impressive that he’s getting shots up even if he’s missing. When you look at the spacing, like it’s garbage out there. It’s garbage for most teams in summer league. Like the paint gets really mucked up in summer league. You know, they’d rather just take away that and just let guys shoot. It’s fine by them. That’s kind of what opponents do here. But the fact that it’s mucked up means he’s finding those creases. He’s getting shot attempts up. He’s going to be able to do that at the NBA level. Will the shots get blocked? Maybe. Will there be a level of physicality that he needs to kind of put on some strength and go through? Yeah. But the fact that he can find those creases, you know, it’s not like the court’s spaced and it’s easy for him to do it. You know, it’s not like they’re necessarily even throwing like two guys on him. It’s just they’re kind of clogging the paint down low and he’s still finding the room to be able to get shot attempts up. That’s actually a good thing. Think about him playing alongside Zion Williamson. It could be similar to that. Zion’s going to draw that attention. He’s playing down low. They’re worried about Fierce driving. They’re worried about Zion driving. You’re going to need to find those creases. And Jeremiah Fears is showing you exactly that. The defense, we’ll see if he ever ends up as a good defender. you’re kind of I think hoping for just above average would be fine from him, you know, on the high end. Average is fine. He’ll he can get there eventually. I’m not going to judge a rookie on summer league defense unless you’re a big man that’s supposed to be blocking shots. So, the fact that the spacing is bad, there’s no coherent offense that they’re running and it’s just kind of Jeremiah Fear’s doing his thing. That’s pretty good. And when the shots not falling, it’s easy for him maybe to be like, I’m going to shoot more from outside or I’m going to do something differently. But no, he’s shown the zero fears and still playing downhill and doing what you want to see him do, what makes him a very good basketball player. And so seeing him be able to get those shot attempts up and constantly put pressure on a defense, that’s what he’s supposed to be doing, that’s what he’s doing in summer league. So when I look at, you know, his performances here, yeah, you’d like him to make shots, but that can come with time. The finishing will get better with time. I’m not seeing anything that makes me concerned about him. You’re looking for just kind of NBA stuff right now and he’s showing NBA stuff. Yeah, it’s a make or miss league at times and we hope that he’ll start making those shots, but he’s a rookie. You’re not expecting him to come down and be a knockdown lock down shooter like that. That will eventually get there. Just might not come next season to be able to really help the team into the playoffs, but maybe it does too. It’s summer league. It’s been two games. You don’t want to read too much into it. He’s not showing a lack of effort or anything like that. I don’t think his basketball IQ has looked bad at all here. He’s trying to make passes when he can. It’s just this is a mess of a team in summer league and yeah, it’s not the normal Pelicans. So, what do you expect? So, I’m not concerned with anything I’ve really seen from Jeremiah Fears. When it comes to Derk Queen, that’s a slightly different story. And I want to get into that coming up here next in today’s episode of Lockdown Pilgrims. You’re getting the full Derek Queen experience. And I’ll explain what I mean by that. That’s coming up here next in today’s episode. Today’s episode of Locked on Pelicans brought to you by Hungry Route. Let’s be honest, meal planning and grocery shopping can be overwhelming. So, between busy schedules, picky eaters, trying to eat healthy, it’s a lot. And that’s why I love Hungry Root. They take the stress out of planning by filling your cart with your personalized groceries and meal options based on what you like and what you need. Hungry Root uses their smart cart technology to recommend groceries, recipes, and even supplements tailored to your preferences. So whether you’re dairyf free, gluten-free, focused on gut health, or just trying to eat better, Hungry Roots got you covered. I took their quiz and right away Hungry Roots started recommending meals and snacks that I actually want. 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And if you’re an everydayer, let me know in the comments down below. For your second listen, look, if you want to know more about just summer league in general, we got the Locked On NBA game night podcast for you. I’m on there every Friday. We were recapping Cooper Flag summer league debut. We got Pelicans talk on there as well. You always want to know about the other rookies lighting it up in summer league or not lighting it up in summer league. Locked on NBA game night. You can find it on the locked on NBA YouTube page or wherever you listen to podcast part of the locked on podcast network. Your team every day. So we just talked about Jeremiah fears in summer league. Like what’s what should we be concerned about? What should we not be concerned about? Right now there’s not much that I’m actually concerned about when it comes to Jeremiah fears. He’s showing the skills you want to see from him, even if the results aren’t there. Process over results. And he’s doing the process thing right. He’s getting downhill. He’s attacking. Derrick Queen’s a little bit of a different story. There’s been a lot to like from Derrick Queen. There really has anyone and I talked about this last week. We’re doing this hyperbolic, it’s the worst summer league perform. Like, get get out of here. I wanted to swear right there. We don’t do that on the show. And so, I I hate that, right? You know, two double doubles. I don’t I don’t think double doubles are a good stat, you know, almost anyone can kind of do that at the NBA at this point. So, you know, with enough minutes. So, I I’m not looking at that right. You know, I think if you’re kind of pointing to that, you’re looking at the wrong things when it comes to him. You know, on the positive side of what there is a lot to like about Derek Queen is the skill that he shows. The passing is definitely there. You’re seeing the skilled big man that he can be. That step back three he hit in the first game. You’re seeing him show off a little bit of range. You’re seeing him get to the line as well, which is what you want to see. You’re seeing some of the passing. I think it was four assists in the first game, just one in this game, but no one was assisting in this game. And he cut down on the turnovers tremendously. So did Jeremiah Fierce. That’s an improvement. That’s playing a little bit more under control, which both Fears and Queen weren’t quite doing in game one. and Queen still kind of trying to figure out what his role is going to be offensively, you know, and how he kind of fits in really started to get in much more of a groove in this one. And the fact was, hey, I’m not scoring in terms of my shooting. Let me get fouled and go to the line and he made four of six from the free throw line. All that not bad in my opinion here. So, you’ve seen some very good things from him. The defensive rebounding has also been pretty solid as well in this game. He had a defensive rebounding rate of when he was on the court of he was grabbed 22.2% of all available defensive boards when he was on the court. That’s a pretty good number for him. He’s slightly undersized. If he can get around 22 to 25, I’d be thrilled with that from him. That’s a mark of a a good defensive rebounder. Not elite, but a good a good one. You know, in this game, he had 10 defensive boards, three offensive boards. That’s actually encouraging. The defensive rebounding that you are seeing from him is something the Pelicans need. As a team, they couldn’t do much in that regard. They gave up far too many offensive rebounds in, you know, again, it’s summer league. We’re not going to read too much into it here, but he did a pretty good job of at least limiting as much damage when he was on the court as possible. So, I liked what you saw from him there. and they were limiting those second chance point opportunities for the Los Angeles Lakers who only had eight in this game while the Pelicans had 20 themselves. So, you’re seeing some pretty good things from this group and what they’re trying to do when it comes to that. And I think Derrick Queen on the defensive rebounding, not bad. You need me to do a little bit more there. You know, combined between Derek Queen and Mei, you’re your starting front line essentially. You only had 17 defensive rebounds. You’d like that to be a little bit higher if you can get there. But overall in the minutes that they’re playing, these numbers are fine. And Queen is showing off that he can be a good rebounder. You know, you’re seeing the skilled offense as well from him too. Is he a shot blocker? Like no. You know, and I don’t know if he’s Queen’s ever going to be that, but Mei at least said three blocks in this game. You know, for Derek Queen, where the bigger concern comes in is not the missing shots or anything like that. Again, it’s that comes with time. His issues are some of the effort things. And this is what I mean by the full Derek Queen experience. If you liked him coming into the draft, you saw a very skilled offensive big man that can be an offensive hub, that can be a good defensive rebounder, and has potential range to shoot the three and space the court. If you didn’t like him, it was you saw a guy that you felt was out of shape, someone that didn’t try hard enough, didn’t care on the defensive side of the ball, and offensively isn’t as involved unless he has the ball in his hands. You’re still seeing all of those things. When you watch summer league, either good or bad, you’re there’s like a level of confirmation bias going on with it. If you didn’t like Queen going into the draft, you look at this and you’re like, I freaking hate this dude. If you really liked Queen going into the draft, you feel pretty good overall about it because, you know, the highs of his game are really, really high. But look, the defensive effort isn’t great. At least Fears is trying on defense and you can’t really say the same for Derek Queen. There were a couple of also defensive rebounding attempts that he should have gotten where he just didn’t try hard on boxing guys out or wasn’t even looking to really kind of hustle for the ball and go up for it. So, there were a couple times where he got outrebounded by guys that shouldn’t have outrebounded him. That’s that’s a Derek Queen thing, right? You know, that’s not a coaching thing. You know, the hustle on defense, the hustle to get back after a missed shot is not, you know, a coaching thing. We look at the Jeremiah Fear stuff, all that can be improved upon with coaching and development from others. You know, the stuff we look at with Derrick Queen, that’s a Derrick Queen thing. And that’s where he just needs to decide this is what I’m going to do. This is how I’m going to be committed to this franchise. It’s a similar problem to what we’ve seen with Zion Williams. the highs are very very high, but the lows are very low because at times they just kind of check out. You know, offensively, if Queen doesn’t have the ball in his hands, he does not look to be the most engaged person out there on the court. I don’t love that. You know, is I don’t I’m not going to rip him much for that or read too much. I’m not going to rip him at all for anything here, but you know, in in terms of the offense, there’s no cohesive game plan out there. He’s just trying to find where he needs to go. Does he lack some feel for the game in that? Maybe. But overall, you see that, you know, he’s got high basketball IQ. It just needs a little bit of time to figure this out in continuity and chemistry with some of his teammates. And that is certainly lacking right now. But all that again can grow with time. It’s the hustle, the effort, the drive. Those are things you’re looking for. You can miss all the shots you want, but if you’re trying hard, you’re going to get a big pass from NBA fans, from Pelicans fans. That’s not something that Queen is doing right now. That’s the biggest concern. You know, do it goes back a little bit to like Jackson Hayes, right? Hayes would have a terrible game and he’s immediately posting on Instagram after the game. And that doesn’t really bother me a ton, right? Like, you know, it’s your life. Like when you’re not in a game, I don’t I don’t care what you do truthfully for the most part. Not always. It just depends. But do you you know, Jackson Hayes, it was like, do you want to be an NBA player or do you just want to look like you’re an NBA player? You get what I’m saying? Like, do you want to post on social media, look at this dunk that I had when like you went one of seven or do you want to work on it so you don’t go one of seven? Do you want to do the work or do you just want to kind of look good? Look, you see this in kind of podcasters and people on social media, right? I I don’t mean this is I’m not literally calling anyone out. There’s people who can grind and do the work or people who just want to talk on Twitter and get followers because it boosts their ego. You know, it doesn’t it’s not necessarily just basketball. It’s kind of everything here. Similar thing applies to NBA players. Do you do you want to be a great NBA player? You just want to do be a dude who gets paid for a little bit, is in the league for a while, amasses a big following, and then you can kind of go and do whatever. Or do you want to hustle and work hard every single day? That’s what Dererick Queen is going to need to decide. Look, I don’t doubt that he wants to be as successful of an NBA player as possible. I think it they all come into the league at least wanting that. That might change over time. And I think Derrick Queen probably wants that. You know, with Zion Williamson, the question is, are you gonna be willing to do the work? We don’t we don’t know the answer for Derrick Queen yet, right? Like, truthfully, we don’t, you know, they go from playing in the tournament or or a long college basketball season to draft prep, which is very different than playing in real games. So, getting out there even in your first or second game, you can be like, “Wait, what? This is I haven’t played it in a minute. This is a lot.” You know, again, Cooper Flag struggled. Cooper Flag then lit it up in his second game. But you get the point that I’m trying to make. That’s a factor at play here, too. You know, everyone who wants to label Derrick Queen lazy at Busel, it’s way too early for that. We don’t know if he doesn’t want to be great. You know, I think he’s doing his best just to acclimate. And they go from being drafted to being in New Orleans to immediately in Vegas. Like, that’s a lot on some of these guys. And the people who have been in the NBA who kind of know what your routine is going to be. Eve Mei, Antonio Reeves, Lester Kenyonz. We’ll talk about them a little bit more in the next segment. They have a leg up on that sort of stuff. They’ve gone through that before. It’s why someone like Cadet Homegrren in his second year or third year even can really start to make an impact after missing his rookie year because you know what? At least that dude then all of a sudden kind of traveled with the team, understands the routine, understands the eating habits and that kind of stuff. That’s going to take a minute for Queen to kind of get into the the swing up. That’s why I’m concerned about what we’re seeing, but I don’t think it I think it’s too early to label it anything more than just, yeah, he’s young and he’s brand new to all of this. That’s being optimistic about it, admittedly here, and that stuff needs to change. You can still put maximum effort in a game. Do that and then get the other things in line and it’ll come and he’ll be a fine NBA player. So, coming up next, let’s look at a few other things here. I want to mention that that zero assists in the second half. Not concerning, but also kind of concerning. Let’s talk about it. That’s coming up here next in today’s episode of Locked On Pelicans. Today’s episode of Locked On Pelicans is brought to you by FanDuel. Summer sports are in full swing. So whether you’re all about baseball under the lights, golf on the greens, or high stakes soccer action, FanDuel is the best way to make every game more exciting. 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So please subscribe wherever you get your podcast and join over 11,000 Pelicans fans on YouTube as well. And become an everydayer. That means you listen Monday through Friday to the Locked On Pelicans podcast and join us on the Gulf Coast Sports and Entertainment Network. For your second listen, it’s Locked On Saints with Ross Jackson. It’s going to be like training camp and all that before you even know it here. The Saints are about to be in full swing. So, make sure you are listening to Locked On Saints. Ross Jackson’s going to make sense of everything when it comes to the black and gold part of the Locked On podcast. Network your team every day. So, zero assists in the second half of the Pelicans lost to the Los Angeles Lakers. It’s not great, but it again, I’m not overly worried about it. This is a lot of freelance chaotic basketball. Guys were missing shots. It’s just kind of how it’s going to go. The Pelicans as a whole in this game shot 33.8%. Like, that’s not good. You know, if guys aren’t making shots, you can’t get assists. And that was a big part of the problem, right? Chase Hunter 16.7%. He was one of six. Trey Alexander, one of five. Antonio Reeves, who’s played well, six of 13. So that’s not as bad, right? But Derek Queen going, you know, 12, sorry, four for 12. Lester Kenonas going three of of nine, but three of six from deep. That’s good. Those numbers aren’t pretty. So you you can’t get assists if that’s going to be the case. And I think right now the Pelicans are just having these guys like do their things, and that’s just how it is. So overall, I’m not really worried about it. Mei has looked good enough, you know, I don’t think he looks good enough where you don’t need to play him in summer league. I think he needs to keep going. The goal for second year guys, even third year guys, is they play so well that you’re like, “Cool, shut him down. We don’t need to see him after one or two games, just like the Dallas Mavericks shutting Cooper Flag down.” Lester Kenyonz, I think, has shown enough that you’re like, “I we don’t need to see him anymore.” You know, Antonio Reeves has played well. He was the leading scorer for the Pelicans in this game at 20 points. You know, he got to the line a lot. I liked him playing downhill and being aggressive like Jeremiah Fears. Three steals for him in this game as well. six of 13 from the field, one of two from three, but he was like, “You know what? I’m just going to attack.” And the Pelicans as a whole were just relentlessly attacking the rim, particularly in the second half of the game. I think that’s kind of what the coaches obviously wanted them to be doing. So, sure, that’ll work. I, you know, I liked what we’ve seen overall from some of these guys. I think Kenyonz and Antonio Reeves are going to probably be battling it out for that final spot on this roster. That’s what I would be looking at as it stands when it comes to it right now. That might change with a trade or other things, but there’s one open roster spot. You know, they waved Antonio Reeves. It was smart. You did not need to have his contract guaranteed just yet. But then summer league, he looks pretty good, but he should look good in summer league. He’s got an NBA year of experience where he was playing at times significant minutes for the Pelicans. He should look like this. That doesn’t mean that, you know, he’s necessarily should be on the roster. I think it’s still a little bit up in the air. exactly what they want to do or how they want to approach things. But overall, I think I’ve been slightly encouraged from what we’ve seen from him. Ken Jonas does look like a good three-point shooter as well. I’ve been impressed with the stroke. You’re seeing him make threes. They’re going to need that because as we’ve seen from this and probably what’s going to be in the regular season for New Orleans, the paint’s going to be a little bit messy. You need guys that are going to come in and knock down shots. And how many shooters would you say are on the Pelicans right now? They’re definitely lacking in that area. Shooting’s not the beall endall like it was a couple years ago, but it’s still vitally important. We want to see the Pelicans take more threes than they’ve been taking. So, there’s that. But I think those are the two guys that you’re really looking at. Trey Alexander with a rough game. The shooting was not there. Just no one could finish. Just missing shots at the rim. Don’t care. You know, the the Lakers have a lot of length. So does Minnesota like they played in the first game. that, you know, the length clearly bothered Jeremiah Fears and some of the other players on this team. It’s not always going to be like that, you know, especially when you’re running weird summer league lineups and things. So, overall, not not too concerned with what we’re seeing from the New Orleans Pelicans in summer league because it doesn’t really mean much of anything. So, I’m not going to jump to conclusions. I’m concerned about some things I’m seeing with Dererick Queen, but I think that with time those concerns can be alleviated because we’re on the outside looking in and maybe he is going hard in practice every day and if he’s doing that, the other stuff will come. Let me know what you think about the summer league performances so far in the comments down below on YouTube. So, that’s going to do it for this episode of Locked On Pelicans be coming every day. Listen Monday through Friday to the Locked On Pelicans show here or join us on the GF Coast Sports and Entertainment Network for our shows there. We’ll be covering all the other Summer League games. Next game, I want to say is on Tuesday for the New Orleans Pelicans and then I think they play on Thursday after that. Is that correct? They get a couple of days here. I forget the exact days on when everything is. Um but we’ll be covering it all here on the Oh, they play on Tuesday and Wednesday. So, we’ll cover those. Tomorrow’s show. We’ll look at the coaching staff of things. And I’ll see y’all next time.

Jake Madison breaks down the New Orleans Pelicans’ mixed Summer League showing, highlighting Jeremiah Fears’ relentless attacking style and Derik Queen’s offensive prowess. The discussion covers Queen’s defensive concerns, potential roster battles, and how these performances might reshape the Pelicans’ strategy moving forward.

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FANDUEL DISCLAIMER: 21+ in select states. First online real money wager only. Bonus issued as nonwithdrawable free bets that expires in 14 days. Restrictions apply. See terms at sportsbook.fanduel.com. Gambling Problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER or visit FanDuel.com/RG (CO, IA, MD, MI, NJ, PA, IL, VA, WV), 1-800-NEXT-STEP or text NEXTSTEP to 53342 (AZ), 1-888-789-7777 or visit ccpg.org/chat (CT), 1-800-9-WITH-IT (IN), 1-800-522-4700 (WY, KS) or visit ksgamblinghelp.com (KS), 1-877-770-STOP (LA), 1-877-8-HOPENY or text HOPENY (467369) (NY), TN REDLINE 1-800-889-9789 (TN)