David Griffin discusses Brandon Ingram's status with Pelicans

After playing in New Orleans for the past five seasons, Brandon Ingram wants to continue his NBA career in the Crescent City. Meanwhile, the Pelicans want Ingram to remain in their uniform. David Griffin reiterated that notion in a recent interview with NBA Sirius XM Radio in Las Vegas, after expressing the same message on June 26, the first night of the NBA draft.

“We’ve been really clear, we’d prefer Brandon stay with us,” the Pelicans’ executive vice president of basketball operations said on Sirius XM this weekend. “And Brandon has been pretty clear, he prefers to stay with us.”

Ingram’s name has come up in trade rumors this summer, partly due to him having just one year remaining on his contract. With few top NBA players actually reaching free agency in the 2020s – Paul George was a relatively rare exception this summer, leaving the Clippers to sign with Philadelphia – many agree to early extensions, which can complicate a specific player’s future. Griffin indicated that the league’s new more restrictive Collective Bargaining Agreement is making decisions more complicated for teams than they may have been in the past.

“There is a financial reality to this,” Griffin said of Ingram’s status. “And where I think we can go in terms of keeping this group together, might not be as far as he and his agency would like us to be able to go. So for now, we’re going to play it out. I think we’re committed to each other and committed to seeing if this team can work in a way that makes sense.”

New Orleans acquired point guard Dejounte Murray in a June 28 trade with Atlanta, a deal that became official when the NBA’s moratorium ended July 6. The Murray addition gives the Pelicans six players on The Ringer’s top 100 list (Ingram, Murray, Zion Williamson, CJ McCollum, Herb Jones, Trey Murphy), tied for the most of any squad in the NBA with Boston, Minnesota and New York. Teams adjusting to the new CBA are already in the process of learning how some of its restrictions can impact roster flexibility and what’s possible during the offseason.

“I think what happens is… when you don’t have to pay (talented players, then teams) want all of them,” Griffin told Sirius XM. “When you actually have to hand them $50 million a year, mechanically it gets complicated. One of the things that’s fascinating about this new CBA is the teams that benefit the most from a player like a Brandon Ingram, mechanically this CBA doesn’t allow most of them to make a trade. This is the first market and the first year you’re ever going to see that. There are a lot of guys who are mechanically incapable of being traded. (With) Brandon, fortunately we have no real desire to trade, so it doesn’t matter, but I think at the end of the day, that’s something that’s going to be more common.”

Since coming to the Gulf Coast in the 2019 trade with the Lakers that sent Anthony Davis to the West Coast, Ingram has already vaulted to No. 5 on the Pelicans’ all-time scoring list (6,617 points, behind only Davis, David West, Chris Paul and Jrue Holiday). He made his first NBA All-Star appearance with New Orleans in 2020, and helped lead the Pelicans to the playoffs twice over the past three seasons.

“Brandon wants to stay here,” Griffin said after Round 1 of the NBA draft. “He believes in what we’re building, and that’s meaningful to him. It’s meaningful to his agent. At the same time, there is a financial reality that we all deal with. We’re excited about Brandon and know he’s excited about us. Usually those things yield good results one way or the other.”