NBA
League sources say that Pelicans two-time all-star Zion Williamson is ‘not close’ to a return after a major setback in mid February
Zach Wolpin is an NBA and NFL expert who's been betting on the league for over three years now. Wolpin has been a fan of the NBA and has been watching for a decade and a half. He covers the latest news and stories surrounding the league daily. His passion in life is watching sports and being able to share that through his sports writing. He has written about the NBA and other sports leagues through various media outlets over the years like Sir Charles In Charge, G-Men HQ, and TAP into South Plainfield. Before he became an NBA News Writer, Wolpin attended Montclair State University where he graduated in 2021. He studied Sports Media and Writing while in school.
All posts by Zach WolpinUpdated08 Mar 2023
Zion Williamson has had more than a rough start to his NBA career and injuries have held him back from his true potential. He’s in his fourth season with the Pelicans and has played in just 114 career games. This season he’s appeared in only 29 games and league sources had a brutal injury update for the 22 year old. ESPN insider Brian Windhorst reported that Zion is ‘not close’ to a return after a major setback he suffered in mid February.
Two months ago the Pelicans were a top two teams in the Western Conference with a 24-14 record. After a loss in their last game to the Kings they are 31-34 so far this season and are in danger of missing the playoffs completely. Injuries to their top players like Zion Williamson and Brandon Ingram have derailed the season.
The pelicans have 17 games left in the regular season to try and make the play-in tournament at the worst. Louisiana Sports Betting sites have the Pelicans at (+10000) to win the Finals this season.
Zion Williamson is ‘not close’ to returning, per @WindhorstESPN
“I think his setback was significant”
(h/t @TopBallCoverage ) pic.twitter.com/0HXyTXEE7m
— NBACentral (@TheDunkCentral) March 8, 2023
What does the future hold for Zion Williamson who’s career is being derailed by injuries
The injury history for Zion started right at the beginning of his NBA career. He missed he first three months of his rookie season in 2019-20 and played a total of 24 games that season. A knee injury left him out the first 44 games of his NBA career. Not the ideal start.
His best season as a pro so far came in the 2020-21 season where he played in 61 games and earned his first ever all-star selection. Williamson averaged (27.0) points, (7.2) rebounds, and (3.7) assists per game. However, he would then miss the entire 2021-22 season due to a major foot injury.
Rumors about Williamson’s weight correlating with his injuries were brought up and that caused a stir in the NBA community. Credit to Zion he did come into this season looking much healthier then he did in the past. Despite that he’s only played in 29 games this season and has had a nagging hamstring injury that’s keeping him off the court.
The saying goes, “the best ability is availability”, and that is something that Williamson has not had a lot of in his career. His (25.8) points per game cannot be overlooked, but Williamson has just haj just had some bad injury luck early in his career.
