Jeremiah Fears-Derik Queen Duo Could Be a Major Defensive Problem for Pelicans

The New Orleans Pelicans have to find a solution for their leaky defense when their two star rookies are on the floor.

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The 2025-26 season is already a lost cause for the New Orleans Pelicans. It's clear that the franchise needs to shift its focus to the future rather than chasing wins this season. This means that evaluating the roster and determining what this team needs going forward will be a top priority in the final three quarters of the season.

The Pelicans' future will be centered around Jeremiah Fears and Derik Queen. To create the best roster possible around those two, the Pelicans need to figure out their strengths and weaknesses. While the duo's offensive ceiling is high, there are significant defensive concerns. With both rookies on the floor, the Pelicans have a 126.3 defensive rating, which would make them the worst defense in the league by a significant margin, per Cleaning the Glass.

The reason for that is the lack of size and physicality. Fears is unable to provide much resistance on the perimeter, and Queen is undersized at center. He lacks the rim protection chops, and the Pelicans allow 71.5% shooting at the rim with those two on the floor. They let opposing offenses get to the rim at ease as teams take 37.8% of their shots at the rim per Cleaning the Glass, which would also rank as the second-worst mark in the league. They also allow a 31.6% offensive rebounding rate, a significantly higher rate than the league average of 29.2%.

What Pelicans Need to Surround Fears & Queen With Is Obvious

The Pelicans can't stop penetration on the perimeter, can't protect the rim, and can't end possessions with a rebound. This explains their disastrous defense in recent weeks under James Borrego. It also demonstrates what the Pelicans need as they look to build this team for the future: more size and defense.

Fears will be the point guard of the future for the franchise. Whether Queen is better suited to play power forward or center, however, will be a fascinating question. As of now, he doesn't have the defensive chops to play center, so he needs to play next to another big. But Queen doesn't shoot the ball well enough to play the four offensively. So, until he becomes a true floor-spacer on offense, the Pelicans should make it a top priority to find a rim-protecting center who can shoot the ball.

That is obviously easier said than done. Those types of centers are hard to find, and the Pelicans have failed to find one in the Zion Williamson era. If they can't find a center that checks all the boxes, the Pelicans should try to find one that can be a defensive anchor and rebound the ball. With Queen's offensive development, he can hopefully make it work with little space offensively.

It's very early to write Fears and Queen off as defensive negatives. There is plenty of time for both lottery picks to get significantly better defensively. Until then, however, the Pelicans need to make things easier for them by surrounding them with as much size and physicality as possible.