So many things can happen but I firmly believe you need a great GM.

OKC was dealt a death blow when KD left. At that time he was a top 5 talent. OKC got 0 picks and 0 trade value out of him - he just walked away. Thats a crapload of value you can’t get back.

So the GM knew the fanbase was devastated and being so new he knew this was a delicate time long term. Move all the rest of your good players (to start over) and fans may leave in droves and assume NBA is rigged for big market cities.

So what Presti did was talk Russ into coming back and cementing his OKC legacy. And they had a press conference at the arena and fans filled it up. And Russ said he was staying - it was that moment he’ll always be held in high regard here, no matter what he does elsewhere. Him staying and then winning MVP was a “recovery” year - mostly for the fans sake. He took them to playoffs with a very raw team. Sabonis was a rookie. Dipo was oft injured. Adams was still learning.

Then Presti decided to give it one more try and brought in PG and Melo. After failing to get to finals - the biggest thing it did was tell newish OKC fans there was no path to a title by basically filling potholes year after year. And at that point the fans knew it too.

So what he did was started to make trades to get back value for all these players. He traded PG to LAC and got SGA and a crapload of picks. Traded Russ for picks and most had said Russ contract made him untradeable. Traded Sabonis and Adams and Dipo and so on. And for the most part they appeased fans who knew the only way up was down first.

So to NOP - you are in that Russ after KD phase. Can you make enough moves while keeping current good players and get them over the hump? If not then you have to maximize trade value of top players to load up for the rebuild. And find your long term coach who will grow with the new players.

The challenge with rebuilds is if your GM misses on some key top drafts - that can ruin the rebuild and you get stuck in no mans land. Too good to draft high and too bad to go far. When Presti drafted Holmgren and he was hurt for the season - so many pundits said how bad that draft pick was. But it turned out great just a year later.

I contend Zion is a great player if surrounded by some good talent. I think you can build around him - but it will take going all in and spending into tax cap and lux tax. You can be over 3 of 4 years before it gets very punitive so you have 4 years to go all in and spend and surround him with talent. If your GM (and owners) will not let you go into tax then it will be hard to get over the top.

I personally think Presti is great with drafts and acquiring picks and whenever he leaves OKC we’ll never have anyone as good again. He’s made some mistakes in the first empire building (the KD/Russ/Harden era) but my guess is he learned better for this second try.

The key is identifying when you need to rebuild before your star players have any decline. You want to maximize their trade value as there’s always a team thats “one player away” and will trade the farm to get him.

Rebuilds are never assured and have many roadblocks. The big market teams can reload because they have the big money owners who will buy their rings - look at GS and all the punitive tax they are paying but their owner doesn't care he got his titles. Smaller market teams have to be precise in their moves and one or two wrong can set them back years.

Your team will have a lot of thinking to do off season.