Will the New Orleans Pelicans' trade for guard CJ McCollum be costly for their future?
At 21-32, merely a half-game ahead of the Portland Trail Blazers in the NBA Western Conference standings, the Pelicans were atypically aggressive at the trade deadline, while the Blazers were more conventional in trading away veteran players in the name of flexibility, draft picks and prospects.
Having surpassed Portland for the final spot in the Western Conference play-in, New Orleans surely sees an opportunity to make a run back to the playoffs for the first time since beating the Blazers in the 2018 first round. Under contract for the next two years, McCollum can help the Pelicans be more competitive whenever All-Star forward Zion Williamson returns to the court -- either this season or next.
Yet adding McCollum, 30, doesn't exactly square with New Orleans building around young stars Williamson (21) and Brandon Ingram (24) long term. Under contract for $33.3 million in 2022-23 and $35.8 million in 2023-24, McCollum will push the Pelicans close enough to the luxury tax to limit their flexibility. And unless they win the draft lottery, they'll no longer benefit from keeping this year's first-round pick if they miss the playoffs.
Was the trade worth it for New Orleans? And how does the package of players and picks Portland received set up the team to retool around star guard Damian Lillard? Let's take a look.
New Orleans Pelicans get: CJ McCollum, Larry Nance Jr., Tony Snell
Portland Trail Blazers get: Josh Hart, Tomas Satoransky, Nickeil Alexander-Walker, Didi Louzada, 2022 protected first-round pick, two second-round picks
Pelicans: C-
Dealing for McCollum is an acknowledgement that the Pelicans' plan to build their backcourt around recent first-round picks Alexander-Walker and Kira Lewis Jr. was a failure. In fairness, Lewis' season was cut short by an ACL tear, but Alexander-Walker had taken a step backward in his development during his third season, and Devonte' Graham hasn't proved to be an equal replacement for Lonzo Ball, who was traded to the Chicago Bulls last summer.
Enter McCollum, who should upgrade the position considerably. Even during a down season by his standards, McCollum is still creating shots at high volume (26% usage rate) with efficiency in the ballpark of league average (.532 true shooting percentage, a dramatic improvement over Alexander-Walker's .474 mark). McCollum is also a far better distributor, allowing him to serve as lead ball handler in the half court when he teams with Graham.
McCollum's addition should particularly help keep New Orleans afloat when Ingram is off the court. An above-average offense in Ingram's minutes, the Pelicans sink near the bottom of the league without him. Per Cleaning the Glass data, Pelican lineups without Ingram rank in the 11th percentile leaguewide in offensive rating. Staggering Ingram and McCollum should prevent things from getting that bad.
Looking down the road, McCollum should be a good fit offensively whenever Williamson returns. He's more than capable enough as a catch-and-shoot threat to space the floor for point Zion and could be employed in some of the two-man actions with Williamson that New Orleans utilized with J.J. Redick last season. Offensively, a starting five of Graham, McCollum, Ingram, Williamson and center Jonas Valanciunas would present a lot of challenges for opponents.
Alas, the Pelicans seem to have inherited some of the Blazers' defensive shortcomings. A backcourt of the 6-foot-1 Graham and 6-foot-3 McCollum will give up size on a nightly basis, while the departed Hart was a big factor in New Orleans getting competent on the defensive end of the court after a 1-12 start seemed to sink play-in hopes. The Pelicans have ranked 14th in defensive rating since then, per NBA Advanced Stats.
Perhaps the eventual middle ground is starting McCollum in the backcourt with second-round steal Herbert Jones, the team's best perimeter defender. Jones would offer opponents an opportunity to bring more help against New Orleans' three stars but has earned big minutes with his play. For now, he'll surely continue to start at forward with McCollum sliding into Hart's spot in the lineup.
Although McCollum is the centerpiece of the deal, the Pelicans also upgraded their depth by nabbing Nance as well. Pelicans coach Willie Green can use him in a variety of roles because of the positional flexibility he adds to a frontcourt group of Ingram, Jones and forward/center Jaxson Hayes that already provided plenty of it. It wouldn't be stunning to see Nance finish some games at center to better match up with small opponent lineups.
Getting Nance, who brought the Chicago Bulls a first-round pick from Portland in return last summer as part of a three-team deal, surely was a factor in New Orleans' willingness to give up a first-rounder in this deal. The Pelicans sent the lottery-protected portion of their 2022 first-round pick to Charlotte in the sign-and-trade for Graham.
Per ESPN's Andrew Lopez, New Orleans carved out a part of that window to send the pick to the Blazers this year. If the Pelicans lose in the play-in or miss it entirely, they'll keep the pick only if it's among the top four drawn in the lottery. If it lands between Nos. 5 and 14, it goes to Portland. If the Blazers don't get the pick this year, they'll get a first-rounder down the road.
Beyond the pick and players sent back, the other cost to New Orleans is adding salary. McCollum's $33.3 million 2022-23 salary is more than $15 million more than Hart and Alexander-Walker are set to make. If the Pelicans do enjoy lottery luck, adding a top-four pick would push them into the luxury tax, something they're unlikely to pay.
By 2023-24, when Zion could be starting a new contract, New Orleans will have work to do to dodge the tax if he extends or re-signs. The Pelicans have a variety of team options and contracts that are partially guaranteed or not guaranteed at all to help them in the process, but McCollum's salary will likely force New Orleans to shed talent over time rather than continue to add to the core.
Giving up so much for McCollum reflects tremendous internal pressure on the Pelicans to win now. The question that's difficult to answer from the outside is the source of that pressure. Is it because of Zion's impending extension talks and the ongoing scuttle he's frustrated with the New Orleans organization? If so, appeasing Williamson probably makes sense, albeit less clearly so due to his current injury.
Alternatively, if the pressure is primarily about executive vice president of basketball operations David Griffin needing his rebuilding process to show results, that's a concern. It would reflect a moral hazard in which Griffin doesn't know whether he'll be around to deal with the downside if the McCollum trade doesn't work out, leaving the franchise and its fans to sort out the wreckage.
For now, adding McCollum makes the Pelicans clear favorites to reach the play-in and gives them a real chance at making their way through the tournament and back into the playoffs. The long-term ramifications are tougher to predict.
Trail Blazers: A
Parting with McCollum is surely painful for the Blazers, who drafted him No. 10 out of Lehigh nine years ago and watched him grow into one of the league's best shooting guards alongside Lillard. The Lillard-McCollum backcourt delivered the greatest triumph in the past two decades of Portland basketball, with the Blazers advancing to the 2019 Western Conference finals behind McCollum's huge Game 7 on the road against the Denver Nuggets.
Yet the time had come to separate Lillard and McCollum. Nearing three years after that run, the Blazers have won just three more playoff games, let alone a series. Even if Portland kept this team together and brought Lillard back after the deadline, it wasn't a serious threat to pull off a playoff upset. Additionally, the emergence of Anfernee Simons gave the Blazers another 6-foot-3 combo guard they hope can play the McCollum role opposite Lillard down the road.
Flexibility and salary relief are the biggest benefits to this deal for Portland. McCollum is paid like an All-Star on his current contract extension, and getting to that level -- which he did reach in the first month of the 2020-21 season before an injury scuttled his chances of making the team for the first time -- are unlikely in his 30s. Frankly, McCollum should have held negative trade value because of his contract. Instead, the Blazers are getting considerable positive value in return.
Let's start with the draft pick. If New Orleans neither reaches the playoffs nor wins the lottery, it will almost certainly fall no lower than 11th in the draft, giving Portland potentially two of the top 11 picks. (Part of the benefit to the Blazers from moving players at the deadline is the opportunity to improve their own lottery-protected pick, which would be eighth entering the lottery if the season ended today.)
Portland hasn't enjoyed an infusion of young talent like that since drafting Lillard and McCollum in the lottery in back-to-back years. Admittedly, that's too high a bar to be realistic expectations for the Blazers' 2022 picks, but they represent an opportunity for the team to add to a young core that can grow as Lillard exits his prime.
Where Hart and Alexander-Walker fit remains to be seen. The figures for Portland's massive potential 2022 cap space don't include Hart, whose unorthodox contract means his 2022-23 salary is nonguaranteed through June 25. At $13 million, however, Hart should be a good value after emerging as a quality starter this season. If the Blazers determine another guard (albeit one who plays bigger than his listed 6-foot-5) isn't a fit with Lillard and Simons, Hart would surely have value to another team via trade.
Alexander-Walker is closer to a reclamation project three years after being the No. 17 pick. I'd love to see Alexander-Walker focus on developing his role-player skills rather than as a volume scorer. He hit 40% of his catch-and-shoot 3-point attempts as a rookie, per NBA Advanced Stats, but has dropped since then to 35% in 2020-21 and 32% this season. If Alexander-Walker doesn't develop, Portland can walk away after next season, the last on his rookie contract.
Between this deal and the one that sent Robert Covington and Norman Powell to the LA Clippers on Friday, the Blazers have been left with a transitional roster that remains guard-heavy. In addition to Alexander-Walker and Hart, the primary young player acquired in the Clippers deal (Keon Johnson) is also a guard. And Portland has guard Eric Bledsoe on a de facto expiring contract and guard Tomas Satoransky on a true one. It's possible one or both could be rerouted elsewhere before the deadline.
By the summer, however, the Blazers could be in position to make two lottery picks and have their choice between Hart and re-signing center Jusuf Nurkic (assuming he's not traded) or enough cap space to be players in free agency while re-signing Simons as a restricted free agent.
There's plenty more work to be done if Portland hopes to build a competitive team around Lillard in 2022-23 while developing young talent, but this trade is a step in the right direction.
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