National Basketball Association

Pelican Debrief Podcast: New Orleans Pelicans lose Jrue Holiday due to family illness

Published Jun. 30, 2017 6:28 p.m. ET

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Just when it seemed the New Orleans Pelicans would finally get the elusive season where nearly the entire team is available on opening night, an announcement about Jrue Holiday came out on Sunday to shake things up.

Let’s start this off with one important thought: The New Orleans Pelicans are one heck of an organization. Jrue Holiday ‘s wife and Olympic gold medal winner, Lauren Holiday, has been diagnosed with a benign brain tumor, but she cannot be operated on until their first child has been born. In a show of class, the organization has agreed to give Holiday an open ended leave of absence to take care of his family.

To talk a little bit about this situation and how the Pelicans can survive without their second best player, Brendon Kleen (@BrendonKleen14) joined Nathan Heck (@NathanHeck22) in this week’s edition of the Pelican Debrief Podcast.

The pair discussed how the team can cling to competitiveness with their current roster, and both of the participants agreed the team could do much worse than a trio of E’Twaun Moore, Langston Galloway and Tim Frazier holding down the lead guard spot. Remember the discussion about Lance Stephenson last week? Brendon and Nathan both agree that workout makes a lot more sense now.

You can find the Pelican Debrief Podcast on iTunes here.

Without much else going on at the tail end of August/beginning of September, the Holiday situation was the topic of discussion throughout.

As always, thank you for listening to the Pelican Debrief Podcast. If you have any topics that you would like us to discuss or questions for us to ponder, please let us know by contacting us on Twitter. Be on the lookout for new series from Pelican Debrief over the next few weeks including Pelicans Rank, best moments in franchise history and worst moments in franchise history.