The Pelicans Case for Dell Demps

Very few General Managers in today’s NBA are as lucky as Dell Demps. A coin-flip with Cleveland won him the opportunity to draft Anthony Davis who is now 21, has the highest PER in NBA history, and could very well end his career as a top 10 player al time. That’s not an exaggeration, it’s an expectation. Writing about how good Davis is at this point isn’t exactly controversial, but what is controversial is the guy who won the coin-flip and drafted him.

In 2011 Chris Paul was leaving, and Dell Demps couldn’t do a thing about it. The Hornets weren’t going to get anyone revolutionary for him so the offer Demps accepted was Paul for Lamar Odom, Kevin Martin, Luis Scola and Goran Dragic as well a 1^st rounder.

Many people believe that the league vetoed this trade for the infamous “basketball reasons” but in fact David Stern stepped in and commandeered the Hornets front office. Technically, the league owned the team at the time. Stern didn’t like the Lakers offer, instead he accepted Eric Gordon, Chris Kaman, Al-Farouq Aminu and a 1^st rounder from the Clippers.

In case you’ve been on an island since then, it’s no secret Eric Gordon has struggled in the league and Demps has been ridiculed for the contract he gave him. In reality, Demps had no choice. Eric Gordon was 21 and he was averaging 22 points a game. Bill Simons couldn’t stop talking about how Kobe would eventually pass the torch to him. At the time Gordon was well worth the max, and every team in the league knew it.

In addition, Phoenix offered him the max first, and since they were able to predict Amar’e Stoudemire’s injury plagued future, them showing interest in Gordon suggested he was in reliable shape. Gordon was the only proven asset of the Chris Paul trade, losing him that summer would have been like Minnesota making the Kevin Love trade today and then waiving Andrew Wiggins shortly after.

Demps had to give Gordon that deal; passing on it would have shown complete dysfunction within the organization and would have likely cost him his job.

So let’s move past the Gordon contract. What I want to do now is discuss the moves Demps did in fact have a choice in making. He has been criticized mercilessly for the Jrue Holiday and Asik trades as well as the Tyreke contract. I want to play devil’s advocate, and discuss the pros and cons of what the Pelicans might have looked like if they had taken a more conservative approach to rebuilding.

Here’s our core at the start of the 2012/2013 season:

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PG: Grevis Vasquez

SG: Eric Gordon

SF: Al-Farouq Aminu

PF Anthony Davis

C Robin Lopez

6^th Ryan Anderson

7^th Austin Rivers

Not exactly the dream team and they finished far from the playoffs, obtaining the 6^th pick in the draft. Here’s were Dell decided to get spicy as he sacrificed picks and patience to take a more “win now” approach to rebuilding. He traded Nerlens Noel and his 2014 draft pick for Jrue Holiday.

A lot of people think we should have kept Noel; they liked the idea of having a Davis/Noel block party in the frontcourt. Truthfully we never had Noel. Prior to the draft we made it clear we were looking for a point guard. Michael Carter Williams and Trey Burke were the two names we considered but it came out that Burke was the clear favorite by draft night.

Philly called up the Pelicans and told them to draft Noel if he was available and then they could make a deal. If we decide to take a more conservative approach to rebuilding then we keep our 2014 pick and we draft Trey Burke. Since Demps was also criticized for the Tyreke contract, lets assume we don’t rush to do that as well.

Here’s our core for the 2013/2014 season:

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PG Grevis Vasquez

SG Eric Gordon

SF Al-Farouq Aminu

PF Anthony Davis

C Robin Lopez

6^th Ryan Anderson

7^th Trey Burke

What’s ironic is that the team probably would have won more games last season. Jrue played 34 games, Anderson was shut down for the year, and we ended up with Brian Roberts and Greg Stiemsma as long term starters. If we replace them with Grevis, Burke and Lopez we probably win 38-42 games as oppose to 34. It is then fair to assume we trade Lopez and Vasquez at the end of the season for a pair of 2^nd rounders. Since Rondo just went for a 1^st rounder we aren’t getting anywhere close to that with General Grevis.

Now we’ve reached the 2014 draft. We have our pick and since we won more games, let’s assume we have the 12^th pick instead of the 10^th. We know this summer our front office was looking for a center, but since we don’t want to make the Asik trade and we still have our first round pick let’s see who we might have drafted.

Jusuf Nurkic was taken at 16, he’s 6’11’’ and weighs in at 280 lbs. I’m certain if we still had our pick that Nurkic would have been our guy. The Pelicans also expressed interest in trading for a pick this summer in order to draft him so he is the logical conclusion.

Now at this point the Pelicans front office would have realized Davis is simply too good to tank with, and we would have had plenty of cap space. Our gaping hole would still have been at small forward, so lets see who was available. LeBron is going to Cleveland, Melo is going to New York with Chicago coming in as a close second.Parsons is still getting that ridiculous offer from the Mavericks since Dirk took a pay cut, Hayward is restricted so he’s staying in Utah, and we don’t have a great history with Trevor Ariza.

That leaves PJ Tucker, Luol Deng, and Shawn Marion as viable candidates. Deng got 20/2 from Miami, and we are a better team than them so lets just assume if we offer him 24/2 he then decides to come down to New Orleans for a couple years.

Here’s our core at the start of this season:

Nov 18, 2014; Sacramento, CA, USA; Sacramento Kings guard Ben McLemore (23) defends New Orleans Pelicans guard Eric Gordon (10) as forward Anthony Davis (23) looks to pass the ball during the first quarter at Sleep Train Arena. Mandatory Credit: Kelley L Cox-USA TODAY Sports

PG Trey Burke

SG Eric Gordon

SF Luol Deng

PF Anthony Davis

C Jusuf Nurkic

6^th Ryan Anderson

7^th Austin Rivers

We’ve been able to intelligently consider and predict what would have happened if Demps had taken a more conservative approach to building our roster. Let’s consider the pros and cons of the two possibilities.

Pros: The biggest pro here is that we would have had a lot more general flexibility as taking a slower approach would have netted us some security in terms of options. Eric Gordon went down this season and with all our picks intact and some extra second rounders it’s possible we make another trade for someone to fill in and replace him. We also don’t have as big of a hole at SF, and Deng’s defense would have been a nice compliment to Davis.

Cons:I think there are more cons here then pros. At this point we would have Trey Burke and Jusuf Nurkic as starting players. Burke is a nice young guard, but he probably will spend the majority of his career as a backup. Burke’s ceiling is Jameer Nelson and he is a below average distributor. Davis benefits significantly from being able to receive the ball from Jrue who is a fantastic and unselfish playmaker.

Burke is also a below average defender and anyone who watched last week’s Thunder game knows we were able to secure the win due to Jrue’s elite defensive effort on Russell Westbrook. Burke isn’t able to hang with the elite offensive point guards in the league and that would have been a huge disadvantage for the team going forward.

Nurkic is a very raw prospect and though he has a bight future as a low post scorer, he is a terrible rim protector and help defender. We know Davis has a tendency to be inconsistent on defense and he doesn’t like to bang down low or play too close to the rim. Asik is a master of both of those things, and you have to imagine Davis is able to flourish much more when he has Asik as a safety then he would if Nurkic was our last line of defense. Deng is clearly a huge upgrade at SF but if Eric Gordon is still out for this season and we don’t sign Tyreke then wouldn’t we have just had a hole at SG instead?

In the end Demps has given us a more competitive collection of players to surround Davis with then he could have if we played it slow. Tanking and banking on the draft has a very low success rate in recent NBA history, and the only team to succeed this way in the last half decade has been the Thunder.

Demps has given us a competitive team that wants to win now, and most importantly he has proved to Davis he is willing to get him the talent he needs as soon as possible. In the end, keeping our superstar happy is a much more important asset then a 1^st rounder.