I’ve wanted nothing more since 2019 than for Zion Williamson to succeed. All the hype surrounding Wembanyama, I found in Zion years ago. He was the answer to the question – what if you made a boulder insanely good at basketball. And I have watched him, for the past 4 years, crumble to meet any sort of expectation.
Full disclosure moment, I am fully lapsed on the NBA at this point. Before COVID, I would occasionally watch games and tried to keep up. I was even playing fantasy basketball up until 2016. But just like fantasy football, I am horrible and had to stop for a while because I try to be Billy Bean when I’m really Jack Easterby.
I love college basketball, and I watch it way more than the NBA. I went to a Rockets game last year and commented how I forgot what genuinely good players look like. Don’t get me wrong, playing D1 college ball makes you better than like 95 percent of the population. But there’s a reason UH is really good at offensive rebounds.
But this is all to say my reference for Zion is college. My love for Zion started at Duke when he played under American terrorist Coach K. And so that’s why I have my conundrum, because I want him so badly to succeed but I know he won’t.
Pelicans Zion Ate Duke Zion
Everyone and their alcoholic father who hates Lebron has spent years making the fat jokes. It is incredibly easy when Zion make himself a very easy target to see. I think it has become lowhanging fruit. But that won’t stop Stephen A. Smith and JJ Redick from absolutely smothering him.
The reason I gave the disclaimer about my NBA viewership above is because, even with only one season, I am incredibly more familiar with Duke Zion than Pelicans Zion. When I write this blog, the tangential looks I see of Zion in the NBA are always contrasted with the athlete I saw at Duke, who I was convinced would change basketball. He answers the question of what if a lineman was incredible at basketball. In a world where every one kind of looks the same, Zion was a new type of being (Draymond makes a case, but that doesn’t work for me, brother).
Zion at Duke was an absolute monster. And I don’t mean that only because he was a 280 pound who literally stuffed out passing lanes. He was everywhere on the court. Do you remember where you were when you first saw Zion block that three-pointer? Because I do (I was alone in my room).
But it wasn’t just his defense. He bullied the court. Zion would make 3’s and then rush in for an exceptional layup, just to then hit a windmill dunk and posterize some poor Hofstra kid. The entire game was a symphony of what modern basketball can be. It was Tchaikovsky using real cannons.
NBA Zion has been marred by injuries and poor play. It’s hard to fully blame him for his injuries, because I think that’s just the natural outcome of a guy his size playing basketball at a professional level. But he doesn’t make it easy on himself. Everyone saw the in-season tournament tweet, and I am still flabbergasted by the belly. He genuinely looks like a 40-year-old accountant playing at the local Y on a Thursday night.
I remember watching some of his play last year, and it was disheartening to see how much less involved he was. You could argue it’s because the NBA is a different beast; he is no longer able to stuff out ACC players focusing on fundamentals. But it was the lack of effort. He’s too busy watching the ball, which worked when he was at Duke. But now, he’s not able to just walk into a steal; he has to work for it. And I genuinely think that has broken his game. He was so used to physically dominating that he is now working from behind.
Sure, he can still put up some crazy offensive numbers, because he can bully his way into layups. But he doesn’t go for the 3 pointers as often, which made me love him. I loved watching him hit 3s at Duke, when he just wasn’t supposed to be doing that. He attempted 71 3’s at Duke and made 24. Zion’s first season in the NBA, he attempted only 14. It went up to the 30s the next season, but it has never reached the heights he did at Duke (and I’m talking about his jumping too; he doesn’t jump nearly as high).
Baby Mommas and Overindulgence
The most I really looked into Zion (other than for this) was last year during the Moriah Mills saga. I’ll be honest, that was one of my favorite days on twitter in a while. It was just purely ridiculous, watching a pornstar with the proportions of a badly edited Eastern European Instagram post try to take down a number one overall. Zion, as with his eating habits, put everything in his mouth that he could stomach.
I was going to write this Monday, but I think it is much better I wrote it today. Zion came back and dropped 36. He also did nothing else of note, only getting 5 rebounds, and one block. And then I go to ESPN to check on his season stats, and I see he’s questionable with an ankle sprain. Even when he shows sign of the Duke dominance, he is limited again by his lazy defense and body (which he is destroyed).
It’s not a good sign that the reports of the Pelicans being unhappy have started. That’s not coming from an anonymous source. That’s coming from an in-house decision that it’s time to force Zion’s hand. It won’t work though. The man seems immune to the pressures of society, as evidenced by his baby momma saga.
I want Zion to succeed really badly. Not only so I can say I was right and protect my ball knowledge (I have none), but because basketball is more fun to watch when Zion is good. But, and deep in my soul I know this to be true, that’s not going to happen.
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