The confusingly-named Nickeil Alexander-Walker (fun fact: the first draft of this video called him “Alexander Nickeil-Walker” because I’m a dumb-butt) did not have a great start to his rookie season. In the much-vaunted opening-night matchup between the Pelicans and Warriors which was ruined by the knees of Zion Williamson, Alexander-Walker went 1-of-10 from the field. In front of all those national TV viewers, he just sucked. He was chucking up whatever shot he wanted. He took eight threes in twelve minutes.
He followed that game up with shooting performances of 2-of-9 and 1-of-4. The bricking continued. Everybody was getting reminded of that time Jamal Murray missed the first seventeen shots of his career. But NAW never stopped shooting.
By the way, NAW is my new nickname for Alexander-Walker. Maybe I’ll start calling him “Hell NAW”.
Anyway, the Pelicans were blown out of this one by the third quarter, so Hell NAW got the chance to redeem himself. And he responded with by far the best game of his rookie year up to this point, scoring fifteen points on eleven shots while dishing out nine dimes, many of them to fellow rookie Jaxson Hayes. He even established a rookie lob connection on an alley-oop to Hayes. Hell NAW’s shooting percentages are still sub-30% on the season, squarely in the range where if he shoots and makes it, the opposing defender says “hell naw”, but there is now evidence that Hell NAW can be an effective scorer and distributor. So that can ease the pain of Pelicans fans who just wish that Zion’s knee ligaments were made out of something stronger than damp toilet paper.