Gee Balance/The Who Dat Daily.com

New Orleans Pelicans Contributor

New Orleans, La- The New Orleans Pelicans have agreed to trade Allstar forward Anthony Davis to the Los Angeles Lakers for Brandon Ingram, Lonzo Ball, Jason Hart and three first round draft picks. The deal was announced by ESPN’s Adrian Wojnarowski saturday afternoon via twitter. The Pelicans VP of Basketball Ops David Griffin set a timetable of wanting a deal in place by the weekend so the team can utilize the draft assets to build moving forward.

The Boston Celtics were also in the running for Davis but wouldn’t add promising forward Jayson Tatum in the deal. The Lakers capture Davis and pair him with Lebron, something they have being trying to accomplish since earlier this year.

The Lakers besides sending Ingram, Hart, Ball in the deal managed to keep forward Kyle Kuzma but fork over three first round draft picks including the 4th overall in this years draft. The Pelicans are obviously going to select phenom Zion Williamson in next thursday’s draft now have an clear idea on how the new team will look.

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The projected starting lineup for the Pelicans will be:

PG- Lonzo Ball

SG- Jrue Holiday

SF- Brandon Ingram

PF- Zion Williamson

C- Jahlil Okafor Or 4th overall pick C Jaxson Hayes Or Free-Agent

With the trade New Orleans solves two starting spot issues with Ball and Ingram while providing a quality back-up for Holiday (Jason Hart). The Draft also will be used to solve depth issues for New Orleans and they have room for a max contract. The only question remains for me is “Why didn’t the Pelicans add forward Solomon Hill in the deal?” It would have been advantageous for New Orleans to do away with the $12 million owed to Hill, of course it’s still early and maybe that info hasn’t been released.

The trade also places undersized guard E’twaun Moore’s position with the team in question. Moore makes $8 million a year and guard Jason Hart acquired in today’s trade plays the same position.

Ingram provides the Pelicans they’re best small forward since perhaps since Jamal Mashburn or Trevor Ariza when healthy.

The talk is the Pelicans are looking to move the 4th overall pick in the draft for a larger haul so there’s still a lot of wheeling and dealing left to do.

The chapter is finally closed on Anthony Davis being a Pelican and finally we can move into the new era of Zion Williamson in The Big Easy. Thank You AD for all the great times and we wish luck with your new team (just not against the Pels).

https://youtu.be/dh5VhB4HUCI