Dear Zion,
A giant picture of you dunking a basketball hangs on the wall of the parking garage right across the street from the Smoothie King Center.
The words plastered beside that image say this: “The bounce is back.”
But the bounce isn’t back.
It hasn’t been back since Jan. 2 when you injured your hamstring in Philadelphia. It’s an injury that changed the course of the New Orleans Pelicans’ season, the latest of several injuries and the reason for this letter written with some input from some of your more veteran teammates.
But first, I’ll start with a quote from the late Notorious B.I.G. since I know how inspirational his music has been to you.
“And everything you get, you got to work hard for it,” Biggie rapped in the song “The What.”
And next, some words of wisdom from Garrett Temple, your oldest teammate and a seasoned veteran who has been in the NBA since 2009.
“Consistency is one thing that separates the elite players from the guys who are just good,” Temple said. “At 22, the sky is the limit for that guy. Obviously, we’ve seen what he can do while he’s on the court. The biggest thing is just about staying on the court.”
Maybe it’s just been four years of tough luck.
But more likely, there is even more you can do to help avoid the injuries. Or at least more you can do to speed up the rehab process when the injuries do happen. You hired a personal chef last offseason and the results were noticeable when you arrived at media day in the fall. But even that isn't enough. It will take even more to silence the noise that has surrounded your first four NBA seasons.
The noise includes numbers that get discussed way more than that impressive 25.8 points on 60.5% shooting stat line you’ve averaged since being drafted with the first overall pick in 2019. You've played in just 114 games in four seasons, the equivalent of one full season and some change. Only 29 of those games were played this season, a big reason the Pelicans and their fan base are spending this weekend talking about what this season could have been instead of watching the team play in the first round of the NBA playoffs.
And no, this season was not all on you. Brandon Ingram missed 37 games. Willie Green started 19 different lineups, which averages out to be almost a different lineup every four games. It’s hard for the Pelicans or any NBA team to win having to trot out that many different starting fives.
“You envision our season as two seasons,” David Griffin, the Pelicans executive vice president, said Friday. “One, we were healthy. And one, we weren’t.”
Injuries happen. They are part of the game. Nobody plans to get hurt. And there is no doubt you would have much rather been on the court thrilling the crowd instead of cheering on your teammates.
It was frustrating for you.
It also was frustrating for the fanbase, many of whom were salivating at the thought of what this season could have been after watching in December when you put the Pelicans on your broad shoulders and carried them right to the top of the Western Conference standings. At the time, the Pelicans looked poised to finish toward the top of the conference, which would have allowed them to host the first game of a first-round playoff series for the first time since 2008 and for just the second time in franchise history. Instead, the Pelicans settled for a second straight No. 9 finish in the Western Conference standings before losing in the play-in tournament to the Oklahoma City Thunder on Wednesday night
It was frustrating for teammates such as CJ McCollum, who is missing the playoffs for the first time in his NBA career. He played just 10 games this season with you and Ingram.
“We have to be available,” McCollum said. “We have to do what we need to do off the court in terms of preparation. In terms of getting treatment. In terms of getting the right type of sleep. The right hydration. The right diet. Everything has to matter to us.”
McCollum didn’t stop there.
“This is a job that is a performance-driven job,” McCollum said. “… Consistently doing the small stuff, I think, will be very important for us. Especially the younger guys. Understanding you have to get a routine that is consistent and builds consistent success. I would say that’s the first thing we need to do as a team.”
McCollum didn’t mention you specifically, but everybody knows the success of the franchise starts and ends with your availability. You showed in December that you were indeed one of the most unstoppable players in the league, the reason you were selected to the NBA All-Star Game for the second time.
The fans who think the Pelicans should move on from you couldn’t have been watching you in December. And remember, those will be the same fans chanting “MVP” for you next season if you pick up where you left off before the latest injury.
That’s assuming that the words on that banner eventually come true and the bounce indeed is back. That will all depend on you as you try to handle the LeBron-like expectations placed on you while you were still a teenager.
Your teammates never have had to deal with those type of expectations.
“I haven't been a superstar since high school,” Larry Nance Jr. said. “People don't know my name in Paris, all over the world. I don't have my own shoe. I'm not being discussed like that, so I don't understand what he's going through. No one can hope to understand.
"But you've gotta be able to find someone that you can confide in and trust and talk to and deal with. And I think (assistant coach Teresa) Weatherspoon has been great for him in that manner. But there’s a lot that comes with it. Heavy is the head that wears the crown, right?”
Temple, who entered the league when you were a 9-year-old kid, offers this advice.
“Just to stay with it,” he said. “The contract extension (last July) shows that the team believes in you. That helps a person be persistent when you have a team behind you. You have a city that’s behind you. It gives you more of a will to continue to grind and get through it. Taking care of your body. Eating as well as you can. Exercising exactly how you should. Getting the people around you, your physical therapist and all your people, in line during the offseason. Just being consistent.”
These are all things you've no doubt heard thousands of times in the past four years. Now it's time to heed all of the advice.
You owe it to your teammates who are counting on you.
You owe it to your fans who are buying season tickets mainly to see you.
But most importantly, you owe it to yourself, as you reminded us Tuesday.
“I just want to play basketball. I want to hoop,” you said. “I want to play the game I love. But the reality of it is, if I’m checking my phone or watching TV, I can’t really escape what the world thinks and what people’s opinions are.”
It is up to you to change the narrative.
And remember the words of Biggie:
"Everything you get, you got to work hard for it."