Can Zion still be the franchise player we expected him to be? 👀 | NBA Today

Can Zion still be the franchise player we expected him to be? 👀 | NBA Today

July has come and gone and even though summer is in full swing, we got some great highlights this month. So, let’s do a little top of the top, the best of the month. We’re going to start with top summer league here. Yuki Kawamura with a little steel. Hey, and then the no look dime. Okay. Hey, hey, never give up on the play. And I mean, he’s like 5’7 too, right? You taller. And then Jay Clawson chase down rejection. And then of course Johnny Fury with the eight. You got to watch the look at his TV. That was I could never dunk of the summer. Let’s go to the top WNBA moments in July. Sabrina threatening the name of the Stewie. A little hesitation there. She gets back soon here. But then did y’all see this? Rakia Jackson with the circus shot gamewinning buzzer beater against the Liberty. You saw the rim though. You’ll see her look back. She sees it. Your star didn’t just throw it up there. And then some top summer vacation moments. Luca Dy knocks this one down. Lowcal dancing. We’re expecting him in Los Angeles in the next couple of days. John Morant with the crazy little self lob here. Show the other one in China. All right. Why? That’s when you know you have a you run into the the post in the back. And how about a Klay Thompson? We have more highlights of him later. Different types. But best summer ever. 72 straight threes here. Goodness. Shoot or shoot. Play. Let me know when we going fishing on the boat. Yeah. Just a Let’s revisit.com’s post free agency power rankings. Right. These are the teams maybe we’ve seen some great moments this summer, but these are the teams that our experts say had the bottom five summers here. The Pelicans coming in at 26, the Hornets, the Nets, the Wizards, and the Utah Jazz. After New Orleans went 21 and 61 last season, ESPN sports book has the Pelicans win total at 30 and a half this season. So, we have two people on our panel who feel very strongly about one of these bottom five teams. One panelist in fact had a 27 minute solo monologue on 27 minutes. Yeah, 27 minutes. No commercial breaks. That would be one. Mr. Kendrick Perkins. What direction, sir, are the Pelicans going? They’re trending upwards. I I could see them mimicking what the Detroit Pistons did last season. A lot of people been critical of the Pelicans, whether it was because of the draft and they traded away next year’s pick, but this roster is loaded with talent. Derek Queen, I know he’s going to be coming back off of injury. Probably won’t see him probably till midseason, but he’s going to be special. The kid fears that they drafted. He’s elite. And again, they have elite wings on the perimeter that could play both ways. Garrick Queen just might be the most skilled player come out to come out of this draft. Zion Williamson, we we heard the stories about him this off season. He cleaned house. I talked to his agent, the great the great uh uh Duffy and he told me that Zion is on the right path and he’s on Zion Hills like a pair of church socks to make sure that he goes in the right direction and do what he needs to do to be available and play highlevel basketball. I’m all in with the Pelicans. You know who else is on Zion Hills? Joe Dumars. It’s not every day in summer league that you see a GM sitting next to a star player during an entire game. And and from what I’m hearing from Joe, he’s been really, really impressed with Zion. When Zion plays, and I know people are going to say that when he plays, they win. They’re a problem when he plays. Trey is a problem from outside. Herb is a great one of the best defenders in the league. Dejonte Murray when he comes back. The Pelicans will be a problem. And I think 26 is is really disrespectful. Look, I’m really high on Trey Murphy. I’m really high on Herb Jones. Deonte Murray, though, he’s going to be out at least half the season, right? He tore his Achilles last January. I I don’t disagree that Zion I love watching Zion play. When he is out there and when he is healthy, I I think that he is excellent. I’m struggling to go with you on this one, Perk. in a crowded Western Conference, seeing them being a team like maybe they’re competing for the 910. I might be wrong, Aman. It seems like this go this team will go as Zion goes and we’ve said that a lot the last couple of years. Without a doubt, I think that Zion being healthy is exciting for any franchise, uh, like they were saying, when he does play and he is available, they do do better in the winning department. I I I can’t lie about that. Um, but having him at that size and seeing him healthy all the time is going to be a problem. That’s the same thing I’m seeing when I see the young guy Queen. Uh, I see that same body type. It scares me when I look at the league because I look at the league now and I see that everybody is in that form of we can run, we can stay up and down the floor, but we are very, very skilled. So, you saying the New Orleans cuisine is a problem? I love New Orleans. I resemble that. That’s when I I don’t know if it’s boiled oysters. Rosters aren’t finalized. However, the Clippers projected 11 man rotation will have an average age of 33.4 years on opening night. It’s worth mentioning, you’re wondering where that stacks up. The oldest team in NBA history weighted by playing time was the 20201 Utah Jazz. That was at 32.6 years old. So those Jazz, they did win 53 games, but you remember they ran out of steam in the first round of the playoffs. Perk, with age comes experience. It comes wisdom. Aging like fine wine is a saying for a reason. But ultimately, is this going to help the Clippers to have this seasoning, let’s call it, or hurt them this season when they’re trying to compete in a crowded West? Six years ago, I probably would be all in on the Clippers back when they had the term vets matter. Vets don’t matter anymore because these young boys around the league, their opponents, it’s the Oklahoma City Thunder, the Houston Rockets, the Detroit Pistons, whoever, they don’t give a damn. They don’t respect the older guys and they shouldn’t. They’re going to go at them. And again, my issue with the Clippers is not only just their health, but their age when it come time. Kenna James Harden, Kenna Bradley, Bill, Kenna Kawhi Leonard, slide those puppies on the perimeter and get stops in an elite conference where you have so many dynamic players. Anthony Edwards, John Morant, Zion, SGA, the list goes on. So, it’s going to hurt them in my opinion when it comes down when it matters the most. So, I’m not in on the Clippers. The age is just too old. Vets don’t matter no more. I don’t know about saying best don’t matter out loud per but I hear you a lot when you say that that I’m impressed with it when it’s written down on paper but like me and you know per when you talk about going into the playoffs and making a long stretch uh making sure that you guys are in a position to win uh late in the season. Can you get those guys to all be healthy, all be on one accord toward the end? I think that’s been the uh the problem with them in the last couple of years wherever they’re at with their respective teams. But I think to have them all together and to get too excited about it when we know what it’s about and being healthy and everybody is it take a little bit of luck. But now you’re doing it with a guy that’s 40. I can’t get too excited. I’m I’m always going to be happy to watch Chris Paul play basketball though. I will say this. I covered that game seven between the Clippers and the Nuggets and where James Harden really just ran out of gas. And when you have all these older guys, they’re gonna make it so they don’t have to play that many minutes. Like James Harden was a first was a AllNBA player last year. He played so many minutes and he ran out of gas in that game in that game seven. He’s not going to have to do that this year because he got Chris Paul on the team. He’s got Bradley Beal on the team. I think you know they’re they’re they’re old but they’re all in great shape and they’re just they can lean on each other. Because I know that for somebody to be able to get into their rhythm, they need the ball. So it’s like sharing the sugar, I understand as far as health goes, but my concern is rhythm. And seeing a guy like James Harden, he needs the ball to get cooking. True. That’s the James that we all know and love. We want him to have the ball. Exactly. So it’s like with with certain things like that, Chris Paul ball dominant. Uh, when you have guys like that, not having them be able to dominate the ball scares me when it talks about being their benefit. Hey, Aaliyah said age ain’t nothing but a number. I’m more worried about them being hurt than their age, right? That that’s what I’m worried about.

On NBA Today, Kendrick Perkins, Iman Shumpert, Marc J. Spears and Ramona Shelburne join Malika Andrews to discuss the expectations for the New Orleans Pelicans and the Los Angeles Clippers next season.

0:00 Top of the Top
2:11 Pelicans expectations
5:25 Clippers expectations

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