CBS sports gives the Pelicans a C+ for the Ingram trade

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The asset return here is flimsy. As we covered above, the pick New Orleans is getting doesn't look great on paper, and it carries a top-four protection, which limits the upside for the Pelicans even if things do go south in Indiana. New Orleans also has to take on the contract of Kelly Olynyk here. That's around $13.4 million for next season for a declining big man. In a perfect world, the Pelicans only would have taken on expiring money, though the thought of giving Zion Williamson a shooting big man does make plenty of sense for next season.

But ultimately, the Pelicans knew that the Ingram-Williamson fit did not work. Williamson is at his best as an offensive hub. He needs the ball in his hands, and when he doesn't have it, the ball handlers that do need to be ready to get it to him at a moment's notice. That just isn't Ingram. He wants to pound the rock and create his own shots, not build a two-man game designed to generate layups and dunks for a teammate.

New Orleans has done well over the past few years to surround Williamson with such teammates outside of Ingram. Trey Murphy, Herb Jones, C.J. McCollum and Jose Alvarado all make sense there. Ingram did not, and New Orleans even tried to replace his shotmaking with Dejounte Murray over the summer (though an Achilles injury has messed with those plans). Murphy, in particular, has grown into a budding star of late, and the Pelicans needed to clear a long-term slot in their starting lineup for him. It was time for the two sides to part.

From that perspective, this trade is better than letting Ingram walk for nothing. They could have potentially worked with him on a sign-and-trade over the summer. But if nobody was interested in paying more than this during the season, what was going to change in July? It just seems as though the league places a far lower valuation on Ingram today than it once did.

That's what stings here for the Pelicans. At one time, Ingram looked like a potential superstar. It wasn't long ago that the Nets had Kevin Durant on the trading block and critics debated whether or not the Pelicans should make Ingram available. His value has declined pretty precipitously, but not in a way the Pelicans could have reasonably predicted. He didn't get worse. The financial rules changed, and that forced teams to reconsider what they found important.

So the return is disappointing on paper, but in ways that make sense. It's the sort of move the Pelicans had to make even if they aren't especially happy with what they got back. If they can just get Williamson back on the court for a sustained period, they still do have a group of players around him that can win. There's still work to do, but this was a necessary step in the right direction.

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