The entire New Orleans Pelicans roster recently got together in California for a voluntary minicamp and series of workouts. Everyone was there — Zion Williamson, just-acquired Dejonte Murray, CJ McCollum — except for two players. One was new center Daniel Theis, who just finished playing for Germany in the Paris Olympics and took some time off.
The other was Brandon Ingram.
That according to William Guillory at The Athletic, who noted in past years Ingram was one of the organizers of the workout. No official reason was given, but his absence speaks to the murky situation of Ingram’s future in New Orleans as he heads into the final year of his contract. The Pelicans don’t want to pay Ingram the max contract extension he is seeking, but efforts to trade him — ideally for a center — found little to no interest in the marketplace, as Guillory explains.
But with Williamson, Murray, and McCollum already on lucrative contracts for at least the next two seasons and 24-year-old wing Trey Murphy now eligible to sign a large extension of his own, the Pelicans have little interest in also supplying Ingram a four-year maximum extension worth a projected $207.8 million…
Meanwhile, it seems clear the trade market has dried up and there’s not much of a chance Ingram will be dealt before the start of the regular season… Given the circumstances, the Pelicans are prepared to enter the season with this exact roster and see how Williamson, Ingram, Murray, McCollum, Murphy and Herb Jones can all fit together.
All of that makes the Pelicans an interesting team to watch this season — the talent is there, but how do all the pieces fit together?
Ingram’s trade market is quiet for two reasons. One is something we have written about before and what Guillory mentions: it’s not just the Pelicans that don’t want to pay Ingram max money next season. Ingram may not like it, but he is viewed much the same way as the Bulls‘ Zach LaVine, as an All-Star level scorer but not someone who does enough else to win. In the new financial world of tax aprons in the NBA, teams will be more cautious about who gets a max or near max contract, and there is not a contending or high-level playoff team looking to pay him that much beyond this season (and the price to rent him for a season is too high).
The other reason Ingram’s trade market is low is the lottery-bound teams that could use Ingram as a floor raiser don’t want that floor raised too much heading into a couple of very deep drafts over the next two years. Even with the league’s flattened lottery odds, these teams are not looking to be too good.
Ingram may be understandably frustrated, but he’s heading into this season a Pelican. Whether that changes will be one of the stories to watch this season.