{"id":167435,"date":"2025-09-25T05:28:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-25T05:28:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/167435\/"},"modified":"2025-09-25T05:28:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-25T05:28:07","slug":"ex-nba-star-doesnt-hold-back-on-zion-williamsons-viral-quote","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/167435\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex-NBA Star Doesn\u2019t Hold Back on Zion Williamson\u2019s Viral Quote"},"content":{"rendered":"

Tuesday was a big day for the New Orleans Pelicans. Zion Williamson<\/a> gladly showed off his \u201cnew look\u201d as the superstar forward has slimmed down.<\/p>\n

The former Duke superstar said all of the right things during his media day presser, revealing that his workouts went beyond the basketball court and the weight room to ensure he was getting into optimal shape. As a result, Zion feels like a top prospect once again.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe came up with a plan,\u201d Zion told reporters. <\/p>\n

\u201cFrom boxing to working out on the football field a lot. It’s just different, random workouts, and during that time frame last year, I really felt the shift in my body to where I was looking and going, \u2018Yo this feels good. This feels good.’ I haven’t felt like this since college, high school, just where I can walk in the gym and I’m like, \u2018I feel good.’\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Zion<\/p>\n

Sep 23, 2025; Metairie, LA, USA; New Orleans Pelicans forward Zion Williamson (1) takes part in media day at Ochsner Sports Performance Center. Mandatory Credit: Matthew Hinton-Imagn Images \/ Matthew Hinton-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

NBA fans ate it up. The former NBA All-Star Jeff Teague took a different route.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is probably the dumbest press conference I\u2019ve ever heard in my life,\u201d said the outspoken ex-guard<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cAll this stuff is because of you. You choose to eat, be out of shape, all of that. Now, all of a sudden, it\u2019s a contract year, probably, or he\u2019s looking for an extension. All of a sudden, he\u2019s in shape and they believe in him. Fool, they gave you a max deal. They\u2019ve been believed in you, but they had to put all those options on there because you didn\u2019t believe in you.\u201d<\/p>\n

Back in 2023, Williamson fired up the first season of a five-year deal. He\u2019s going to total $197.2 million through 2028. This season, the star forward will make $39.3 million. He\u2019ll exceed $40 million in each of the following two seasons. <\/p>\n

The Pelicans and the rest of the NBA have come to realize that Zion Williamson is one of the most dominant players at his position when he\u2019s on top of his game. Unfortunately, the former No. 1 pick has faced a ton of obstacles throughout his career.<\/p>\n

It took Zion five seasons to finally break through 65 games. After appearing in 70 games during the 2023-2024 season, he managed to be on the court for just 30 games last year. When healthy, Williamson averaged 24.6 points, 7.2 rebounds, and 5.3 assists. <\/p>\n

\"Zion<\/p>\n

Mar 19, 2025; Minneapolis, Minnesota, USA; New Orleans Pelicans forward Zion Williamson (1) drives to the basket past Minnesota Timberwolves center Naz Reid (11) in the second half at Target Center. Mandatory Credit: Jesse Johnson-Imagn Images \/ Jesse Johnson-Imagn Images<\/p>\n

It\u2019s simple\u2014the Pelicans need Zion on the court in order to have a chance. With him, they\u2019ve won over 50 percent of their games. Without him, they\u2019ve won under 40 percent. <\/p>\n

After making some big changes this offseason, the Pelicans will have a new-look roster surrounding Zion. As optimistic as the NBA world is for slim Zion, Jeff Teague won\u2019t be impressed until he sees the forward show some consistency. <\/p>\n

More Fastbreak on SI<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Tuesday was a big day for the New Orleans Pelicans. Zion Williamson gladly showed off his \u201cnew look\u201d…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":167436,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[557],"tags":[64,63,590,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-167435","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-nba","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-nba","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167435","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=167435"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/167435\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/167436"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=167435"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=167435"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=167435"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}