The New Orleans Pelicans will finish up what has been an extremely disappointing season on Wednesday night. The Pelicans made the playoffs as the eighth seed in the Western Conference last season and were expected to take a step forward this season but instead have taken a step back. At best New Orleans will finish 20 games below .500.
Injuries played an enormous role in the disappointing season for the Pelicans, and because of that they are, and should be, optimistic about next season. Several of their players had season ending injuries, so the key will be to get them healthy before the 2016-17 season.
Jrue Holiday is a player that has had massive injury issues throughout his career, but for the most part they have been to his legs. This year his season was ended when he suffered an orbital wall fracture in a game at the end of March. That injury caused Holiday to undergo surgery which was deemed successful.
The former UCLA Bruin, he is expected to need six to eight weeks to recover from the surgery. That timetable should allow him to be 100 percent for the Pelicans when next season starts. While it's never a good thing for a player to have a season-ending injury, Pelicans fans are likely relieved it's not a re-occurrence of his leg issues.
Holiday played in 65 games for the Pelicans this season, the most he has played in three years, and he had himself quite a good year. The 25-year-old point guard spent most of his time coming off the bench, but that didn't affect his production as he averaged 16.8 points, six assists and three ebounds per game while shooting 44 percent from the floor.
Next season will be a big one for Holiday as it will be the last season of his contract with the Pelicans. He is scheduled to make more than $11 million per year but could earn himself even more money the following offseason with a good and healthy 2016-17 campaign. Holiday was supposedly on the trading block around the deadline earlier this year, but teams did not want to give up anything for him because they were "petrified" of his leg issues. If Holiday could put together a second straight season without leg issues it will increase his value and will likely help the Pelicans reach the goals they had set for themselves this season.
