Sometimes there are bad breaks here or that can make a season come up short of expectations. Then there the kinds breaks that leave nothing but little pieces.
The New Orleans Pelicans are way beyond all of that, hopes shattered by a 1-11 start and now staggering to the finish line of a season that has been smashed by injury and disappointment.
It was a cruel irony that on the night of a rare win Monday over the New York Knicks, the Pelicans (27-47) were officially eliminated from playoff contention. And, it was sadly fitting that it came with two more injuries. First, forward Alonzo Gee hobbled off the floor in the third quarter. Then, point guard Jrue Holiday caught an inadvertent elbow from Kristaps Porzingis in the final minute and suffered a right inferior orbital wall fracture. Both players are now out for the rest of the season.
All-Star forward Anthony Davis has already been shut down for the season and will require surgery on his left knee. Tyreke Evans (right knee), Quincy Pondexter (left knee), Eric Gordon (broken right ring finger) and Bryce Dejean-Jones also had their seasons ended early and hit the operating table. Backup point guard Norris Cole is listed as day-to-day with a lower back injury, but has missed 12 consecutive games. Ryan Anderson is out with a sports hernia.
Coach Alvin Gentry has used 37 different lineups and the Pelicans rank second in the league in the number of player-games lost this season due to injury.
“I am going to send out an all-points bulletin to anybody in the French Quarter; we need a voodoo doctor or something here,” Gentry cracked with a touch of gallows humor. “We’ve got to find the bones under this place (Smoothie King Center) or do something because this becoming comical.
‘”I think you’ve got to laugh at it. I don’t know what more you can do. We now have over one hundred points a game sitting out so if you we score seven the next game, just understand that.”
To think that barely 11 months ago, the Pelicans were coming off a playoff appearance that brought praise and admiration despite New Orleans being swept in the first round by the eventual-champion Golden State Warriors. Golden State coach Steve Kerr left New Orleans on the night of the clincher saying he was glad that he wouldn’t have to see Davis until the start of the next season. Stephen Curry was more succinct in his description of Davis: “That’s a bad boy!”
Indeed, Davis had averaged 31.5 points and 11 rebounds in the series, putting him on a list with only Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wilt Chamberlain and Bob McAdoo in NBA history in cracking the 30-10 barrier in the first round playoff games of his career.
The flight trajectory of the Pelicans was headed up. Then coach Monty Williams was suddenly fired and replaced by Gentry. Whatever momentum existed went up in smoke as injuries began to stack up halfway through training camp.
There were reports from some corners that some Pelicans players are not happy with the training staff, but that was angrily shot down by Gentry. Still, Davis has missed at least 14 games due to injury in each of his first four seasons and there are lingering concerns.
Gentry chalks it up to being one of those years, but the fact is the Pelicans have been hamstrung by injuries since 2011-12 as at least one member of the starting lineup has missed at least half a season each year due to injury.
It may be called the Big Easy, but even the loyal fans in New Orleans are worked up over the move to replace Williams with Gentry and the roster decisions by general manager Dell Demps that seem to have the team running in circles. They are tired of injuries, inconsistency and excuses that have failed to build a rising playoff team around the their budding star Davis.
Preaching patience when Davis was a 19-year-old rookie (and the No. 1 overall pick) in 2012-13 was fine then. He’s 23 now and is moving into the prime of his career. Not even a year after Davis signed his five-year, $145-million contract extension, the Pelicans have many issues to resolve.
Tops on the list is center Omer Asik, who signed a five-year, $58-million deal last summer, then went out and flopped so gloriously for a second straight season.
That’s just the start. Anderson is a free agent this summer and there’s a good chance he’ll get an offer beyond what the Pelicans want or can afford to pay. They also passed up a chance to move him for an asset at the February trade deadline.
There’s also the disjointed mess in the backcourt, where Evans has $11 million left on his contract next season, but may not fit with the up-tempo style Gentry favors. Gordon, who was the key figure in the 2011 deal that shipped out Chris Paul, might have had the high point of his Pelicans stay when he scored 20 points and hit the game-winning shot on his first night with the team. Since then, he’s missed 173 games with an assortment of injuries. Holiday had already missed 98 games during his three seasons in New Orleans before the latest injury. Together, they’ve been a threesome that, even during the rare healthy stretches, just does not seem to fit together.
Bad breaks are one thing. Broken plans and promises are quite another and the Pelicans need more than spells from a voodoo doctor to fix them.
Fran Blinebury has covered the NBA since 1977. You can e-mail him here and follow him on Twitter.
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