slicedbread2 wrote:Zion needed a Gary Payton/Moses Malone type of personality to go after him and chew him out. I'll never forget the story of Moses chewing out Barkley and reducing him to tears by calling him a fat ass straight to his face and over the course of his rookie year got Barkley to go down from 300 to 250 pounds. Shawn Kemp apparently was worried about Payton chewing him out and the glove was known for his mouth and would've had a field day roasting him. It's no coincidence once Kemp left Seattle it all went downhill.
May have helped if there was a star level player that he legitimately looked up to willing to ride him and pressure him, anything less than that probably wouldn't have helped though.
It's pathetic that Zion's conditioning makes Charles Barkley look like Karl Malone out there. Pelicans should've taken off the kiddie gloves and demanded he get his crap together and if he didn't you fine the hell out of him for not holding his end of the bargain. The fact that people got fired b/c of him is disgusting but sadly I don't think it'll get through to him. If NOLA is smart, don't extend him and make him earn the next deal as it's proven he can't stay healthy and can't be bothered to show up to camp in shape.
Think you're vastly miscalculating the balance of power between a potential superstar and a struggling franchise that can't get anyone to stay there.
Either way, what has happened hasn't been great, but trying to be a hard ass and fine him and bully him probably wouldn't be a long term solution.