Season Wrap: The 2025-26 New Orleans Pelicans

  • By Keston Paul

    Last Updated on May 5, 2026 10:20 pm by Keston Paul | Published: May 5, 2026

    The Pelicans were as “ethically bad” (full disclosure, I do not like that term) as you could get, considering they did not own their first-round pick. However, it did allow us to have some fun rostering their players in March, since other already-bad teams leaned into tanking for draft position, but the Pelicans emphasized chemistry-building between their core players instead, putting some wins on the board at the end.

    How’d It Go?

    We have to go back to the 2025 offseason to really paint the picture of a somewhat catastrophic season on paper.

    There was the trade that gave the Pacers back their 2026 first-round pick during the Finals, but that can be forgiven since they could not have predicted Tyrese Haliburton tearing his Achilles in Game 7.

    Then, they traded CJ McCollum for Jordan Poole and Saddiq Bey with some other moving parts.

    However, the Pelicans trading the No. 23 pick in the 2025 NBA Draft and their own unprotected 2026 first-round pick to get Derik Queen at No. 13 was a controversial move at the time, and with hindsight, it definitely was not great since they became a lottery team.

    The Pelicans finished this season with the seventh-best odds for the No. 1 pick, except, that pick is owed to the Hawks, unprotected.

    The Pelicans spent a large portion of the season near the very bottom of the standings, so it “could have been worse,” but given the fact that the 2026 draft class is viewed as generational, their bad 2025-26 campaign began last offseason with their moves and having a top-9 pick in the upcoming draft could be valuable for anyone — worse yet, if the Pelicans’ pick jumps up in the lottery.

    The Saddiq Bey acquisition was a success, while the Jordan Poole acquisition was not. Zion Williamson strung together a career-best 35 consecutive games played at one point — but he had contract incentives to do his best to stay on the court. Dejounte Murray looked solid-to-good after his return from the Achilles injury. Rookies Queen and Jeremiah Fears flashed some bright spots, but the coaching situation was a mess, which we will discuss next.

    Coaching

    Willie Green, who had been the Pelicans’ head coach since 2021-22, was fired after a bad start. One of the other issues was prioritizing veterans like Kevon Looney and DeAndre Jordan ahead of Derik Queen and Yves Missi, as well as Jordan Poole over Jeremiah Fears, to some degree. To be fair to Green, the Pelicans not having control of their first-round pick did mean that they had to win and technically “did not have room for development,” but then at the same time, they had to ensure that those young players got adequate reps to improve due to the investment — especially in Queen. He was pretty much stuck between a rock and a hard place, as the saying goes.

    Green finished his Pelicans career with a 150-190 record (.441) across 340 games in five seasons.

    James Borrego became the interim head coach, immediately giving Queen a lot more playing time. However, by the end of the season, Yves Missi appeared to be ahead of Queen in the pecking order and we even got a couple of random Jordan-starting-over-the-young-players moments once again. Queen has obvious offensive talent, but defensive shortcomings, which both coaches clearly thought detracted from winning at times.

    The Pelicans finished the season with a 26-56 record (24-46 or .343 under Borrego) with an overall offensive rating of 113.3 (20th) and defensive rating of 117.6 (23rd) for a net rating of minus-4.4 (21st). After the All-Star break, when they had Dejounte Murray for 14 of their 26 games, they had a 115.2 offensive rating (16th), a 116.8 defensive rating (19th) and a minus-1.6 net rating (20th) with an 11-15 record.

    The Pelicans will be searching for their next full-time head coach this offseason, but there is always a chance that Borrego is given the job. Personally, I would be surprised if the Pelicans do not go with the route that has given many teams success recently, that is, a young coach with fresh and modern ideas.

    The Players

    Trey Murphy III
    SF, New Orleans Pelicans
    SeasonTeamGPGSMPG FGMFGAFG% FTMFTAFT% 3PTM3PTA3PT% PTSREBAST STLBLKTO
    25-26 NO 66 66 35.5 7.5 15.9 47.0 3.3 3.7 88.6 3.2 8.6 37.9 21.5 5.7 3.8 1.5 0.4 1.8
    24-25 NO 53 51 35.0 7.2 15.8 45.4 3.8 4.3 88.7 3.0 8.3 36.1 21.2 5.1 3.5 1.1 0.7 1.9
    23-24 NO 57 23 29.6 4.8 10.9 44.3 2.2 2.6 81.5 3.0 7.8 38.0 14.8 4.9 2.2 0.9 0.5 0.6

    ADP: 42.6/64.1 (Yahoo/ESPN) | Total Value: 19/18 (8/9-cat) | Per-Game Value: 20/11 (8/9-cat)

    Murphy was a first-round producer thanks to new highs of 21.5 points, 3.2 triples, 5.7 rebounds, 3.8 assists and 1.5 steals.

    Murphy’s 66 games were the second-most of his career and it is notable that in terms of efficiency, his FG% (.479) was his second-best despite the extra offensive volume he was tasked with in a career-high 35.5 MPG. Murphy only averaging 1.8 turnovers boosts his 9-cat appeal as his allure is being a player with a couple of major strengths and no true weaknesses. There were some brief cold periods for Murphy, but it was a fairly steady season from start to finish for the fifth-year wing.

    Zion Williamson
    PF, New Orleans Pelicans
    SeasonTeamGPGSMPG FGMFGAFG% FTMFTAFT% 3PTM3PTA3PT% PTSREBAST STLBLKTO
    25-26 NO 62 55 29.7 7.8 13.0 60.0 5.4 7.5 71.6 0.0 0.1 25.0 21.0 5.7 3.2 1.0 0.5 2.0
    24-25 NO 30 30 28.6 9.6 16.9 56.7 5.3 8.0 65.6 0.1 0.4 23.1 24.6 7.2 5.3 1.2 0.9 3.0
    23-24 NO 70 70 31.5 8.9 15.6 57.0 5.0 7.1 70.2 0.1 0.3 33.3 22.9 5.8 5.0 1.1 0.7 2.8

    ADP: 41.8/33.4 (Yahoo/ESPN) | Total Value: 100/111 (8/9-cat) | Per-Game Value: 104/119 (8/9-cat)

    Zion Williamson played the second-most games (62) of his career in 2025-26 while converting a career-best 71.6 percent of his free throws. Still, due to his high free-throw volume, he was ranked No. 57 per game in a free-throw punt.

    His stats don’t really stand out on paper compared to the rest of his career, as they don’t scream “peak Zion,” but he did play a career-long 35 consecutive games from December 14 to February 28. Williamson notably had thresholds to hit to earn his money for the 2026-27 season, gaining a bit more at 41 games, 51 games and then 61 games; he will then have full guarantees if he meets “weight conditions” on July 15, per Keith Smith of Spotrac.

    In terms of further motivations, Williamson will have to perform well to get a “big-money deal” in the 2027 offseason, so maybe we get another 60-plus game season if we’re lucky. Fantasy-wise, however, his production from a broader perspective seems to have stagnated, aside from the improved but still bad free-throw impact.

    Dejounte Murray
    SG, New Orleans Pelicans
    SeasonTeamGPGSMPG FGMFGAFG% FTMFTAFT% 3PTM3PTA3PT% PTSREBAST STLBLKTO
    25-26 NO 14 14 27.8 6.3 13.0 48.4 2.8 3.2 86.7 1.4 4.4 30.6 16.7 5.4 6.4 1.6 0.2 3.4
    24-25 NO 31 31 32.6 6.3 15.9 39.3 3.3 4.0 82.3 1.7 5.6 29.9 17.5 6.5 7.4 2.0 0.4 3.4
    23-24 ATL 78 78 35.7 8.6 18.8 45.9 2.7 3.4 79.4 2.6 7.1 36.3 22.5 5.3 6.4 1.4 0.3 2.6

    ADP: None/None (Yahoo/ESPN) | Total Value: 352/362 (8/9-cat) | Per-Game Value: 37/63 (8/9-cat)

    Murray averaged 27.8 MPG, producing 16.7 points (.484 FG%, .867 FT%), 1.4 triples, 5.4 rebounds, 6.4 assists, 1.4 steals, 0.2 blocks and 3.4 turnovers. This was his first season playing below 30.0 MPG since 2019-20, but that wasn’t a surprise. While Murray shot a putrid 30.6 percent from three, his FG% was actually the best of his career, albeit in a small sample size. Being 13 months removed from a horrendous injury when he returned, that is a massive accomplishment. All-around, it seemed to be business as usual for Murray, and he can likely go back to being a top-50 fantasy asset at a minimum next season, especially for 8-cat settings — that is, assuming his environment does not change drastically. That is on a per-game basis, to be clear, as Murray might retain some lingering calf and ankle issues like we see for some players after an Achilles rupture. For me personally, I think I would find it difficult to actually draft him in that range, knowing that. Hopefully, his ADP comes in lower.

    Saddiq Bey
    PF, New Orleans Pelicans
    SeasonTeamGPGSMPG FGMFGAFG% FTMFTAFT% 3PTM3PTA3PT% PTSREBAST STLBLKTO
    25-26 NO 72 64 31.2 6.1 13.4 45.1 3.4 4.1 84.1 2.1 5.7 36.7 17.7 5.6 2.5 0.9 0.1 0.9
    24-25 WAS 0 0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0 0.0
    23-24 ATL 63 51 32.7 4.6 11.1 41.6 2.7 3.2 83.7 1.8 5.7 31.6 13.7 6.5 1.5 0.8 0.2 0.9

    ADP: None/None (Yahoo/ESPN) | Total Value: 79/59 (8/9-cat) | Per-Game Value: 116/85 (8/9-cat)

    This is just a sneak peek of the Season Wrap. The entire roster is covered, as well as the Fantasy Star, Letdown, One to Watch and One Burning Question for this team.ย You’ll need to have an Ethos 360, All-Sport or NBA FantasyPass membership. Click here to learn more and sign up!ย Premium Access Required

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    May 5, 2026, 10:20 pm