Before the 2021-22 NBA season officially commenced, both the New Orleans Pelicans and Zion Williamson seemed to suggest that he would play this year.
With 61 games in the books, Williamson has yet to play a single second. All signs point to that continuing to be the case for the foreseeable future.
This week, ESPN NBA insider Brian Windhorst offered the most recent troubling Williamson-related update to hit the newswire in recent days.
“Obviously, we have not heard anything official from Zion in now almost two months,” he said.
“At the time, the timeline was 2-3 weeks. So, the Pelicans have taken great care and Zion Williamson’s camp has taken great care to not allow anything official out about his condition. But it is clear within the team that they do not expect him to return in the short term… it has not been a flow of good news.
“Zion was supposed to come back literally five months ago. So, this has been an unfortunate situation and really the question is, what can be done to make sure of his health both short term and long term? They are barreling toward trying to make the playoffs, but when they made the CJ trade they knew there was a good chance Zion was not going to be back this season. They just don’t know when he’s coming back.”
At this point, it’s just one issue after another with Williamson. Between his teammates making troubling confessions about him and the daily health complications — the hits never stop coming.
At this point, it looks like a strong possibility that Williamson is going to end up on another team sooner rather than later. The question now is whether he will play at all for New Orleans and allow the organization to gain some semblance of trade leverage.
As of right now — it doesn’t look like it.
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