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<\/a><\/p>\nAs you can see, the Queen-Williamson minutes have just not been great to date with a particular lowlight on defense. New Orleans will continue trying it and 674 minutes is still not a ton, but still, it\u2019s not a trend you like to see.<\/p>\n
Now, when you add Jeremiah Fears into the mix as well, how much can you make your ideal starting five of the three, plus Dejounte Murray and Trey Murphy, work? There\u2019s a lot of concerns across the board there, but it may not be a question we see answered clearly this year. At least based on early previews of New Orleans, it appears that Queen might be coming off the bench to start the season. Whether that is the right decision or not, I can\u2019t say for sure. Something interesting I found in my research for this article is that, of his 48 starts, Queen had a 15-33 record. Without him in the starting lineup, the Pelicans went 11-23. We\u2019ll simply need to see more information this next season to make a call. <\/p>\n
The big thing I want to see this year is what the Pelicans intend to do to play around Queen\u2019s weaknesses and use him effectively. We talked about the Zion concerns. Now, to remedy some of the issues around his defense, the Pelicans could try and run Queen with Yves Missi more to back him defensively around the paint. That\u2019s a unit you might plug Herb Jones into as well. Again though, spacing would remain a problem considering Queen\u2019s outside look is still very much a work in progress. He connected on just 26.1% of his threes in his rookie year, shooting an average of just 1.1 per contest and making 0.3. In any case, the Pelicans\u2019 coaching staff will have their hands full, tasked with better incorporating their young lottery pick into their system to get the most out of him. Still, without many true playmakers on the roster and little shooting, Queen\u2019s passing stands out to me as the way for him to get on the court. It\u2019s better effort and results on the defensive end that will help keep him there.<\/p>\n
In general, it\u2019s hard to make a call on what Derik Queen will truly be in his prime. And let\u2019s be clear: He will get better over time. I 100% buy improvements coming, and his highs have been high. At his best, Queen could be an Alperen Sengun-level player, which is to say a high-level starter despite flaws and questions with the fit. At his worst, though, there\u2019s a real chance he struggles to crack the rotation, never improves to where he needs to on defense, and ultimately remains a bench player. There are very low-probability, low-end outcomes where he falls out of the NBA if he struggles to score or can\u2019t stay in proper shape. <\/p>\n
For all of these reasons, Queen has become a really polarizing player in the fantasy community. Depending on who you ask in dynasty leagues, Queen is anywhere from a top 50-75 dynasty player with legitimate top 30 or higher upside, is out of the top 100 entirely with some skepticism, or someone you avoid like the plague. We estimate he\u2019s closer to a top 80-90 dynasty player, acknowledging that the fantasy game is a lot more enticing than his real-life play with a real shot of flying up boards if he becomes a better defender. Notably, ESPN and Yahoo are fairly split on him. Queen\u2019s ADP on Yahoo is 92nd overall, while ESPN has him at 139th. Basketball Monster\u2019s projections put him right outside the top 100, which feels more realistic based on the fact that he finished 139th overall in 2025-2026 in categories via BBM. <\/p>\n
Ultimately, Queen is a player you really have to balance the risk-reward ratio and decide where you feel comfortable with taking him. One thing is clear: If he improves on defense or begins to show some range this year, he will be a fast-rising asset as one of the big sophomore breakout candidates. If he doesn\u2019t, this will be a real test of your patience and how you assess his game and where the NBA is trending. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pelicans sophomore Derik Queen enters his second season as one of the more polarizing young players in fantasy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":357662,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[9,24,63,122,124,123],"class_list":["post-357661","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-queens","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-queens","tag-queens-headlines","tag-queens-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357661","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=357661"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/357661\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/357662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=357661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=357661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=357661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}