{"id":41745,"date":"2021-08-06T09:00:07","date_gmt":"2021-08-06T13:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/?p=41745"},"modified":"2021-08-06T01:37:19","modified_gmt":"2021-08-06T05:37:19","slug":"new-orleans-pelicans-acquire-devonte-graham-in-sign-and-trade","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/2021\/08\/06\/new-orleans-pelicans-acquire-devonte-graham-in-sign-and-trade\/","title":{"rendered":"New Orleans Pelicans Acquire Devonte&#8217; Graham in Sign and Trade"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n<p>The New Orleans Pelicans acquired <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sports-reference.com\/cbb\/players\/devonte-graham-1.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Devonte&#8217; Graham<\/strong><\/a> via sign-and-trade with the Charlotte Hornets on Tuesday. Graham will head to New Orleans and the Hornets will receive<strong>\u00a0<\/strong>a 2022 lottery-protected first-round pick. Graham&#8217;s contract is for four years and $47 million, which could appear to be a bargain down the line.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Devonte&#8217; Graham Signs With the New Orleans Pelicans<\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>Over his three-year NBA career, Graham had grown into a spark plug for the Hornets off of the bench. He broke out during the 2019-20 season, averaging career-highs of 18.2 points and 7.5 assists per game. After being a finalist for the NBA&#8217;s Most Improved Player Award, Graham&#8217;s role regressed with the addition of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/international\/players\/lamelo-ball-1.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>LaMelo Ball<\/strong><\/a>. The former Kansas guard still managed to average 14.8 points and 5.4 assists off of the bench.<\/p>\r\n<p><blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\"><p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">The New Orleans Pelicans are landing Charlotte restricted free agent guard Devonte Graham on a four-year, $47M contract in a sign-and-trade deal, agents Ty Sullivan and Austin Brown of <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/CAA_Basketball?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">@CAA_Basketball<\/a> tell ESPN.<\/p>&mdash; Adrian Wojnarowski (@wojespn) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/wojespn\/status\/1422369148013879300?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">August 3, 2021<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-twitter wp-block-embed-twitter\"><\/figure>\r\n<p>With <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/b\/balllo01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Lonzo Ball<\/strong><\/a> on his way to Chicago, Graham could be walking into a starting role with the Pelicans. His breakout season gave us a glimpse of what he could do with starter&#8217;s minutes, averaging career-highs and supplying signature moments in both Madison Square Garden and the Barclays Center.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>He should slot right into the role as the Pelicans&#8217; third scoring option, and he fits head coach Alvin Gentry&#8217;s run-n-gun style of play. His shot-creating ability should mesh very well with new running mates <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/w\/willizi01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Zion Williamson<\/a><\/strong> and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.basketball-reference.com\/players\/i\/ingrabr01.html\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Brandon Ingram<\/strong><\/a>, giving the Pelicans a strong core for the future.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">What the Graham Signing Means for the Future<\/h2>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>Replacing Ball with Graham will have its pros and cons. Ball finally had the breakout season fans have been waiting for, as he emerged as a sniper and habitual triple-double threat. Graham won&#8217;t bring the same set of skills to the table, but he will come at significantly less of a fee.<\/p>\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n<p>Ball&#8217;s four-year, $85 million contract may have put the Pelicans in a compromising position after resigning Ingram last summer. Replacing Graham with Ball will allow New Orleans to maintain cap flexibility, and potentially lure a big fish prior to Willamson&#8217;s eventual max-extension. With Graham, the Pelicans may have got a bit more bang for their buck.<\/p>\r\n<p>Main Image:<\/p>\r\n<p><a id=\"h7_XI-8YQgtWeqvSJo0ZRQ\" class=\"gie-single\" style=\"color: #a7a7a7; text-decoration: none; font-weight: normal !important; border: none; display: inline-block;\" href=\"http:\/\/www.gettyimages.com\/detail\/1183582085\" target=\"_blank\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Embed from Getty Images<\/a><script>window.gie=window.gie||function(c){(gie.q=gie.q||[]).push(c)};gie(function(){gie.widgets.load({id:'h7_XI-8YQgtWeqvSJo0ZRQ',sig:'YC20koMRPO78SmYFEPD8CzsjEhmlTZnWzVQtofakYnE=',w:'594px',h:'396px',items:'1183582085',caption: true ,tld:'com',is360: false })});<\/script><script src='\/\/embed-cdn.gettyimages.com\/widgets.js' charset='utf-8' async><\/script><\/p>\r\n<!-- \/wp:post-content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The New Orleans Pelicans acquired Devonte&#8217; Graham via sign-and-trade with the Charlotte Hornets on Tuesday. Graham will head to New Orleans and the Hornets will receive\u00a0a 2022 lottery-protected first-round pick. Graham&#8217;s contract is for four years and $47 million, which could appear to be a bargain down the line. Devonte&#8217; Graham Signs With the New [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3920,"featured_media":41764,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","sfio_featured_image":false,"sfio_embed_code":"","_ef_editorial_meta_date_first-draft-date":"","_ef_editorial_meta_paragraph_assignment":"","_ef_editorial_meta_checkbox_needs-photo":"","_ef_editorial_meta_number_word-count":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[33,1608,62],"tags":[217,308,1380,4193,823,1684],"class_list":["post-41745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pelicans","category-basketball","category-nba","tag-alvin-gentry","tag-brandon-ingram","tag-devonte-graham","tag-hornets-featured","tag-lamelo-ball","tag-zion-williamson"],"modified_by":"Nicolette Rojo, Associate Editor","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3920"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41745"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41745\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41764"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lastwordonsports.com\/basketball\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}