The New Orleans Pelicans are sitting at the bottom of the NBA standings with a 10-36 record - the worst in the league. And in a season where being bad can pay off with a shot at a potential franchise-changer in the draft, that record would typically come with a silver lining: a 14% chance at the No. 1 overall pick and over a 50% shot at landing in the top four.
Only problem? That pick’s not theirs anymore.
Thanks to a draft-day trade last summer, that golden lottery ticket now belongs to the Atlanta Hawks.
Let’s rewind. The Pelicans, eager to move up from No. 23 to No. 13 in the 2025 NBA Draft, sent Atlanta an unprotected 2026 first-round pick to make it happen.
The move netted them Derik Queen, and to be fair, Queen has looked every bit the part of a standout rookie so far. But even with Queen’s early promise, there’s no getting around the fact that this trade now looks like a massive overpay - especially with the Pelicans collapsing in the standings.
That 14% shot at a top pick - potentially Kansas’ Darryn Peterson or BYU’s AJ Dybantsa - is now Atlanta’s to dream about. And if the ping pong balls fall their way, we could be talking about a franchise-altering prospect going to the Hawks, all because New Orleans gambled and lost on timing.
It also raises some uncomfortable questions for other teams that were picking ahead of No. 13 in that draft. The Portland Trail Blazers, for example, held the No. 11 pick. If New Orleans was willing to give up an unprotected future first to move up two spots, why didn’t Portland make that deal instead?
Now, we don’t know whether New Orleans offered that same package to anyone else. Maybe the Hawks were the only team in the mix. But if the Pelicans were that high on Queen - high enough to give up a potentially elite future asset - it’s fair to wonder why they didn’t try to climb even higher to secure him and reduce the risk of losing him to another team.
That hypothetical opens up a whole different conversation. If Portland had made that deal, maybe they’d be the ones sitting on a potential top-four pick in a loaded 2026 draft. Instead, they took Yang Hansen at No. 11 - a player who, at the time, was widely projected as a second-rounder.
Now, it’s early, and Hansen still has time to grow. But the contrast is stark.
On one side, you’ve got a coin-flip chance at a top-four pick in a class that could feature Peterson, Dybantsa, or Duke’s Cameron Boozer. On the other, you’ve got a developmental project who’s struggled out of the gate.
To be clear, this isn’t a knock on Portland’s front office. We don’t know if New Orleans ever offered them that deal.
And in fairness, Portland did turn the No. 11 pick into Hansen and a 2028 first-rounder from Orlando by trading back with Memphis. That’s not nothing - but that Orlando pick is projected to land in the mid-to-late first round, a far cry from the potential top-tier talent Atlanta could walk away with.
As for New Orleans, the optics of the deal get worse by the day. Even with Queen showing real promise, the Pelicans are spiraling, and the pick they gave up is gaining value with every loss. It’s the kind of misstep that can set a franchise back years - not because they missed on the player they drafted, but because the cost of acquiring him may have been far too steep.
And if Atlanta ends up walking away with a cornerstone player in June? That trade could go down as one of the most lopsided deals in recent memory.