On the one hand, Zion Williamson just finished an encouraging season for the New Orleans Pelicans: He averaged 21 points, 3.2 assists and 5.7 rebounds in 29.7 minutes per game, and, crucially, he played in 62 games.
On the other, the Pelicans finished 26-56, though, as a result of the Derik Queen trade, they won’t be rewarded for this with a lottery pick in this year’s stacked draft. Complicating things further, Williamson and the 21-year-old Queen are an awkward fit. Neither is a floor spacer and neither is a rim protector. As skilled as they are, lineups featuring both of them were outscored by a Wizards-esque 11 points per 100 possessions. Coach James Borrego limited their minutes together down the stretch, with Queen moving to a reserve role in late February.
This set of circumstances puts Williamson and the team in a strange place. He has yet to turn 26, but if New Orleans is committed to building around its young(er) players, he’s in the way.
It’s fair, then, to wonder if the Pelicans might trade Williamson this offseason. According to Pelicans executive vice president Joe Dumars, though, that is not the plan.
“Listen, we have no intentions of doing that,” Dumars told reporters Tuesday. “We’re going into the offseason looking forward to Zion coming back next year and playing great again next year.”
Dumars said he was “really proud” of Williamson for the season he had. Specifically, he said he was proud that Williamson was available to play as often as he was. In 2024-25, Williamson appeared in only 30 games due to hamstring and back injuries. This was just the third time that he finished a season with 60-plus games played since being drafted No. 1 overall in 2019.
Williamson has two years remaining on his contract ($42.2M, $44.9M). This offseason, he will be eligible to sign an extension worth up to $177 million over three years. Given his injury history and how much New Orleans has invested in Queen, an extension seems highly unlikely. Williamson, however, said at his end-of-season press conference on Monday that he doesn’t want to go anywhere and has made that clear to the team.
“I would say they kind of understand that this is where I want to be,” Williamson told reporters. “New Orleans is home for me. I don’t say that because I’m sitting in front of these cameras or I’m talking to y’all. A lot of guys, when the offseason hits, a lot of guys leave the city. I live here. I stay here in the city. I go out, I do different things to try to get to know the city more. Like, this is home for me. I’ve been here since I was 19 years old.
“I do want to be here long-term. As far as extension talks, that’s not anything that can really be brought up at this moment. I think that’s more of a business side of it. If the team wants me here, then yeah, this is where I want to be. Like, this is home. So that’s as far as I can go on that matter.”
Asked about the fit between Williamson and Queen, Dumars more or less laughed off the concerns without addressing the specific strengths and weaknesses of the two players. “Just in general, the question in general, I always kind of chuckle when I hear people say, ‘Well, can they play together?'” Dumars said, citing how “people questioned (Jayson) Tatum and (Jaylen) Brown” and then made a reference to his own playing career.
“I was laughing this morning, like, I didn’t know if I could fit with Isiah (Thomas) or not, but I knew we both had great IQs and we’d figure it out,” Dumars said. “And sometimes you gotta let players figure it out. It can’t just be, ‘Well, they can’t play together.'”
In other news, Dumars confirmed that, while the Pelicans will conduct a coaching search, Borrego, who had the interim tag after replacing Willie Green in mid-November, will be in the running.
“No, we don’t have a list yet, in terms of ready to put it out publicly, anyway,” Dumars said. “But we’re having internal conversations. But definitely James is a candidate for this job permanently going forward.”
Beyond Borrego, Magic coach Jamahl Mosley and Bucks assistant coach Darvin Ham could be candidates, per HoopsHype’s Michael Scotto and The Stein Line’s Jake Fischer.
