Meet The NBA’s 3 DIRECTIONLESS Franchises…

Meet The NBA’s 3 DIRECTIONLESS Franchises…

In the NBA and honestly all of professional sports, it’s very important to understand what your team’s realistic goals are and where you currently stand in regards to the process towards achieving them. Teams that rush the process typically end up maxing out at mediocrity and disappointment. Teams that sit back too long are the ones that miss their chance to emerge. And some teams find a way to balance patience and aggressiveness to strike while the iron is hot and make the moves that complement each other along the way, creating a legit championship contender. Then at the very bottom, there are teams that just have no idea what they’re trying to do or how to get there and continue to throw stuff at the wall to see what sticks. And that brings us to today’s video. Today we will be discussing the three NBA teams that currently seem completely directionless with no real path to success anywhere in sight at the moment with those teams being the New Orleans Pelicans, the Sacramento Kings, and the Brooklyn Nets. We’ll be going over why they are the way that they are, what got them to this point, and what exactly their options are to try to dig themselves out of this endless pit of quicksand. Before we start though, it turns out a good amount of you watching right now aren’t even subscribed to the channel. So, if you enjoy the content, consider hitting the subscribe button, as not only does it help out a ton, but it also very much appreciate it. Now, with that being said, let’s begin. The first of these three teams we’ll be discussing today is the New Orleans Pelicans. And at this point, I don’t even think they know what direction they’re going. This is a team that has been intentionally making moves year after year, trying to catch up to the ones at the top. and every move just seems to set them back further and further. Last season, the Pelicans finished in 14th place in the Western Conference, but due to the amount of injuries that their key contributors suffered last year and all of the time that those guys missed, people were more understanding and willing to still buy into them for a bounceback. Coming into this season, there was a lot of writing on the wall about it being make or break for the future of a lot of their core players. And with the team coming out of the gate somehow looking even worse, currently sitting in dead last in the Western Conference standings, we’ve probably reached the boiling point for this group receiving any benefit of the doubt. Their quest began in 2019 when they were awarded the number one pick in the draft with a prospect by the name of Zion Williamson coming in with as much hype as any prospect has received this decade. Zion was a freak athlete at Duke who had an unbelievable combination of size, strength, speed, playmaking talent, and explosiveness, and was a walking highlight reel at Duke. There was good reason to view him as the pillar of the Pelican’s future when they drafted him. And pretty much every move since then has been done to try to put the right pieces around him. But the issue is that Zion hasn’t been on the court nearly enough to build any synergy with these pieces. He has only played over half of the games in a season twice in his seven-year career so far. And once again, five games into the current season, Williamson is out injured again. When he’s been able to be healthy and available, he has put up some monster production and even has two All-Star nominations on his resume because he is truly one of the best players in the league. But you just cannot win anything significant with him as your best player because he’s hardly ever available to be their best player. I’m not going to lie, he seems kind of unfocused lately. But speaking of staying focused lately, I’ll be honest, it’s been getting tough to stay mentally sharp and ready to go every day. So, I’ve been taking something new to keep me sharp and focused. So, I’ve been taking MH01 every single morning. Two capsules every morning to keep me sharp, focused, and feeling good. So, again, with just two of these little capsules here every day, you’re actually going to be able to keep that brain of yours focused and energized jitter-free. And now that it’s a part of my daily routine, it’s fitting in seamlessly. If any of you are like me and find yourself getting anxious and stressed out here and there, the brain and focus formula helps with that as well. It helps to keep my mind calm and at ease without the typical drowsiness that you may associate with those feelings, too. The best part is how easy it is to stay consistent with it. I don’t have to overthink it. Two capsules with my morning coffee and I’m set for the day. It becomes one of those small daily habits that makes everything else just run smoother. If this sounds like something that can help you too, then click the link in the description or scan the QR code that you see on your screen now to get 25% off your first order and free shipping on your first month for US customer. Once again, thank you to MH01 for sponsoring the video. Now, let’s get back to the topic at hand. Other moves that have clearly backfired on this team include acquiring Deontay Murray after his rough tenure in Atlanta. And surprise, surprise, the player who went to an Atlanta Hawks team fresh off of a conference finals appearance only to fail to win a single playoff series with them also has not been able to elevate the Pelicans. Last season was arguably the worst year of Murray’s career since he’s been a starting point guard. He openly spoke about how much he has hated his time in New Orleans, speaking on how poorly they are run and even behind the scenes stuff with the training staff and things of that nature. And he is still out injured right now. They did make two selections in the lottery of this year’s draft, bringing in Jeremiah Fears and Derek Queen, who both have a lot of intriguing talent on the offensive end of the ball to tap into. But even in the acquisition of those guys, some of this team’s mismanagement and careless motives are prevalent. In order to draft Derek Queen, the Pelicans traded up on draft night with the Atlanta Hawks, and the pick that they gave to Atlanta is their first round selection for this year. So, you see where I’m going with this. The Pelicans being so terrible once again, this year is looking likely to finish near the bottom of the standings. And there’s a real possibility that they just gave up the number one overall pick in a stacked 2026 draft to take Derek Queen, who, if we’re being honest, will never be able to live up to the hype of that price tag. Queen is a highly skilled big man who can be a go-to option in an offense down the line as he continues to develop, but he has very glaring issues on the defensive side of the ball. and prioritizing him over a pick that could end up being Darren Peterson, AJ Debonsa, or Cam Boozer is going to continue to be a bad look all year long, especially if they stay near the bottom of the standings. So, where do they go from here? Well, they have a lot of pieces they’re going to need to offload in order to begin another rebuild with players like Zion Williamson, Trey Murphy, and Herb Jones all being players that could realistically fetch a worthwhile return in a trade. But they don’t have the cornerstone piece to build around in a rebuild yet. It’s going to be many years before we see the Pelicans rise to relevancy again because in the NBA, you need a true superstar caliber talent to take you to the top. And unfortunately, Zion Williamson was unable to become that for them and they just gave away the pick that could have gotten them that which set their plans back immensely and left them without any real direction in the process. Now, on to the next directionless franchise we will be discussing today. Let’s dive into the Sacramento Kings. The Kings have arguably been the NBA’s worstrun franchise over the last 20 years. But in 2023, there was a brief glimmer of hope that they were finally starting to write the ship. That year, we got to see the first full season of the De’arren Fox and Damonte Sabonis Partnership. And pretty much instantly, it bore pretty fruitful results with those two leading the Kings to the number one ranked offense in the NBA that season. And not only that, but they actually broke the NBA record at the time for having the best team offensive rating in league history. Of course, that record has been broken several times over the next few years, but at the time, obviously, that was very meaningful. They played fast and they could utilize De’aran Fox’s speed in transition. They had shooters everywhere in the rotation. And when the game slowed down, Sabonis was at the hub of their attack, bullying teams inside. and once again finding the open shooters when the defense caved in on him. They broke their 16-year long playoff drought by finishing as the three seed in the West, too. But it all proved to be fool’s gold. They ended up getting eliminated by the Golden State Warriors in the first round of the playoffs that year. And now, three years later, they have yet to return to the playoffs a single time. That high-powered, fast-paced offense has gotten slower and slower. Frustrations arose. Names have come and gone, and now we’re looking at a team desperately clinging to what once looked like it could have been, but the product they’re putting out on the floor is nothing but selfishness and empty statistics without a lick of defense being played. De’aran Fox is gone now, and now headlining their offense is the duo of Zack Lavine and Demar De Rozan, who were previously teammates in Chicago and failed to win a single playoff series together there. So, the Kings for some reason saw that and said they wanted a slice of that painfully mediocre pie themselves. The Kings are currently 3 and seven, tied for the second worst record in the Western Conference with the 23rd ranked offense and the 27th ranked defense. The frustrating part about Sacramento is that when De’aran Fox requested a trade last season, that was the moment everyone knew that the Kings were not going to be able to accomplish anything significant with this core. And instead of taking that as a sign to start fresh and prioritize a movement towards youth and rebuilding, they doubled down on bringing in ball dominant score first pieces that don’t fit together, hoping big names in talent alone could figure it out. On paper, guys like Deontis, Zack Lavine, Demard Rozen, Dennis Schroeder, Russell Westbrook, and Malik Monk are all good players that can help a team to an extent in certain roles, but together they form a clashing of skill sets, a lack of synergy, and an inability to stop a nosebleleed on the defensive end. According to recent reports, the team does seem to finally be getting to the point where they are ready to wave the white flag and surrender to a sell-off at the trade deadline. But this is the type of action that was needed months, if not years ago. Luckily for them, they do own all of their own first round picks over the next few years. So undergoing a rebuild could still prove to be beneficial with them already sitting near the bottom of the standings and a strong 2026 draft class waiting for them. But at the moment, nothing about this roster insinuates that they’re trying to do anything but win under the delusion of competitiveness. And the longer they continue down this route, the more likely it will be that they land in the realm of purgatory. Not good enough to make the playoffs, but not bad enough to land one of those top picks to get themselves a starcur talent in this year’s draft that would be able to turn the franchise around. This has been the trend in Sacramento for two decades now. And unfortunately, it doesn’t look like that spell is being broken anytime soon. And finally, the last directionless franchise we will be delving into is of course the Brooklyn Nets. The Nets at the very least have the right idea. Their execution of it has just been pretty bad. Brooklyn is full steam ahead towards tanking right now and they’re tied for having the worst record in the NBA at the moment with one total win through 10 games, playing no defense whatsoever, ranking dead last on that end of the floor. They’ve got a lot of young talent to begin this process with, and they just made five selections in the first round of this year’s draft, which you would think would be the perfect way to kickstart a rebuild. But I’m sorry, I just don’t think they made the most of that opportunity. With those five selections, they took three point guards who all have suspect jumpers. And quite frankly, none of them are really quality shot creators on the ball either. Jaor Deman has shot the ball decently so far, but he also got off to a hot start at the beginning of his college season last year before he ended the year shooting 27% from three. So there’s very much reason to be wary there. One of the other selections was Drake Powell, a high energy defensive wing who has already got nagging injury struggles. And lastly, they took Danny Wolf, a center who couldn’t defend at the college level and so far hasn’t even been able to see the floor for meaningful minutes at the NBA level. None of those five players are the type of guys that you look at as pieces to build around for a tanking team. And it’s not even unreasonable to doubt whether due to clashing skill sets, they’d all be able to progress together on the same team without getting in each other’s ways. Not only that, but when a team is rebuilding without any clear-cut high-end talent, you usually see them playing those rookies big minutes, letting them make mistakes so that they can learn from it and get experience under their belt, especially when they are motivated to lose the games in the short term. The Nets, however, aren’t even doing that. None of the five players that they drafted in the first round are even playing more than 20 minutes per game, with the team’s more experienced players still taking top priority. Not only that, but said quote unquote more experienced players happened to include two of the biggest ball hogs in the entire NBA in Cam Thomas and Michael Porter Jr., who individually have some of the worst shot selection there is. and together you get a brand of basketball more reminiscent of an LA Fitness pickup run than an NBA level scheme. Those two hate to pass the basketball and honestly I think it’s gross malpractice for the Nets front office to intentionally team them up knowing that they actively harm the growth of all the younger guys around them. It’s possible they look to trade them in the coming months because I really don’t think they view either player as a long-term part of their plans. Otherwise, they would have offered Cam Thomas a contract extension this summer. Instead, they paid Thomas a one-year deal to retain him before he hits unrestricted free agency next summer, where he will likely leave for no return. Looking to trade him now is better than nothing, sure, but a score first player with bad shot selection and mediocre efficiency who really struggles on defense and is on an expiring contract is not going to attract many offers worth anything significant. And the same can be said about Michael Porter Jr. except the reasoning for him is that he’s owed $40 million next season and nobody is going to want to give up a meaningful asset to bring in one of the worst contracts in the league. All of this misfortune and questionable decision-making by the front office can actually be salvaged if the team lands a top three pick in this year’s draft. And so far it is looking like there’s a good chance of that happening. But as we just saw with the lottery, it can be incredibly random. And being the worst team in the NBA does not guarantee you anything. Just ask the Utah Jazz and the Washington Wizards, who finished in last place in their respective conferences last season, and neither of them even landed a top three pick. Darren Peterson, AJ Deansa, and Cam Boozer represent a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. But if the pingpong balls don’t go their way, then they’re going to be trapped at the bottom for a long time. And with that being said, that’s all I have for you today. Make sure to like the video, subscribe to the channel, and comment down below what you think about these three teams and where they should go from here. Thanks for watching and I’ll see you all next

Go to https://srtr.me/HoopsRef or scan the QR code on the screen right now to get 25% off your first order and free shipping on your first month for US customers.

In this video we discuss the three NBA teams that, at the moment, seem completely directionless without any true path to contention or successful rebuilding with those teams being the New Orleans Pelicans, the Sacramento Kings, and the Brooklyn Nets

Join My Raptive Community! – https://community.raptive.com/c/hoopsreference/

BUSINESS – hoopsreference@gmail.com

SUPPORT ON PATREON – https://www.patreon.com/hoopsreference

SEATGEEK CODE: hoopsreference ($20 off your first purchase at seatgeek.com)

FOLLOW ON TWITTER – https://twitter.com/HoopsReference

FOLLOW ON INSTAGRAM – https://www.instagram.com/jdhoopsrefererence

Welcome to the Hoops Reference YouTube Channel! Subscribe for all things NBA content! Multiple new video every week. Leave a like if you enjoyed what you saw! Thanks for watching!

#nba #basketball

1:26 New Orleans Pelicans
3:30-5:03 Ad
7:45 Sacramento Kings
11:45 Brooklyn Nets