Pelicans F Brandon Ingram Wins 2019-20 Kia Most Improved Player Award

In Brandon Ingram’s dimly lit living room, where he just so happened to seclude himself in to answer another regulatory conference call with New Orleans Pelicans Team Governor Gayle Benson, Ingram posed in his regular, demure-yet-professional affect display, awaiting some further news about his franchise going forward.

Things are rather quiet, for all we know, in the life of the first-year Pelican. All situated from his return to his home (that he would probably admit isn’t all that accommodated in) in New Orleans from the Orlando bubble, his conference call to discuss other politics and business you and I would be a fly on the wall to listen in on didn’t quite go the exact way he envisioned.

It’s a different year for everyone. The onsetting of the COVID-19 pandemic has put everything on standby, and some best-laid plans have gone awry for even the most prepared and calculated. But that’s been another curve and bend along the winding road that is Ingram’s career, and not to be too cliche’, life as a whole.

From mountainous highs of getting ACC Rookie of the Year honors and AP All-American votes, and being the second overall pick four years ago to the lowly depths of being faced with the realities of career-threatening ailments like his Deep Vein Thrombosis (DVT) sustained last year that ended his tenure in Los Angeles all while having to re-shift his focus to acclimating to a new city and new culture after being a piece shipped away in last summer’s blockbuster Anthony Davis-to-LA trade, it’s never been a straight and narrow path for the 22-year-old.

An unpredictable fortune had been bestowed upon his destiny in the NBA as if he’d gotten a bad palm reading from an unqualified fortune teller. But you can’t chalk the evening of August 31 up on the board of negative unpredictables, per Ingram’s initial surprise when some new “board members” arrived on last night’s zoom call.

Mrs. Benson went on to introduce some guests of hers into their zoom call, which just so happened to be Brandon’s family members in Donald (father), Joann (mother), and Brittany Ingram (older sister).

He wasn’t the quickest to display his jubilation when he saw three of the most important people in his life but ultimately cracked that usually dour poker face he’s known to show just about all the time, turning it into a front-facing-camera-indirect smile once they made the announcement that Ingram was to be given the 2019-20 Kia Most Improved Player award with claps of pride and approval reverberating through his phone screen.

“We wanted you to know how proud we are,” father Donald Ingram said. “You worked hard, extremely hard, to achieve this honor. It’s been a pleasure watching you make it to the All-Star game and become the most-improved player in the NBA. From us to you, congratulations. We just want you to know that we love you.”

The former pride of North Carolina when it comes to hoops was humble in his acceptance of the award, thanking Benson and the entire Pelicans organization for the honor.

Later on, In a zoom call with myself and other journalists, Pelicans Vice President of Player Operations helped to induct Ingram into an elite class of award winners that include MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo, world champion Pascal Siakam, and All-Stars in Paul George and Victor Oladipo. This time, Ingram took the press conference to the passenger seat of his car, again in seclusion from outside distractions.

Ingram would then go on to give his honest and succinct statement about winning his first-ever Kia NBA award:

“I just want to thank God for the ability to be on this basketball floor every single day and every single night,” Ingram said. And for me to be healthy, I always just think back to the first day I got drafted and how much growth that I have had and also the growth that I needed to get to the player that I want to be.”

Ingram continued in his speech, saying “From day 1, coming to New Orleans, they came with open arms, and asked me me many questions with how I could be comfortable with new coaches around, giving me the freedom and opportunity to be myself on and off the basketball floor. And everything was pretty easy with the transition from LA,” Ingram confessed.

“I got to put in the work every night. I had guys around me that wanted to work just as hard as me. My teammates kept me encouraged every single day and they definitely helped me get in this position right now and I definitely thank my teammates all, my coaches and everybody that was around me to make sure that I’m putting my best foot forward every single day.” 

And surely, what a transition it was, in more ways than one. Ingram mentioned in a Q&A segment some information about his motivations when having one of those unpredictable life obstacles of a major move from that of a large market like Los Angeles to a rather smaller one in the Big Easy.

“It gave me lessons and things to motivate myself, and they told me that when you put in the work — you put in whatever it is, you’ll get something out of it,” Ingram said when asked of the mental adjustments he needed to make when he was in LA, as well as to the mentality he had when he was traded to the Pelicans this past off-season.

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“The change of scenery was great. Coming from [Los Angeles], there a bunch of distractions,” Ingram explained. “You can get kinda spoiled in the sense of everything that’s around LA and you never really know what’s going on until you’re out of it. Me going back and forth to the gym, me getting something to eat and going back home, whatever it was, it just took me out of focus [in Los Angeles] and away from where I needed to be,” Ingram said.

“Even sometimes, I realized even more how I could’ve been watching film and studying the little details of things. The move to N.O. definitely helped me see things more clearly.” He also confessed that he was still motivated to as ever to be the best teammate and player he could be. “I’m still motivated to keep it going,” Ingram said.

Coming from playing in such a media-saturated environment like Los Angeles, and for a rebuilding Lakers team from 2016-2019, Ingram’s offensive role and the confidence the organization had in him to produce was perhaps the biggest change by the time he got to New Orleans. Averaging 15.5 points per game with splits of .456/.338/.659 in his first three seasons, Ingram found new life as the Pels’ star wing, who former coach Alvin Gentry put in the spotlight right away.

In a new system that had a bunch of space to operate in, Ingram vastly improved his scoring numbers from those measly 15 points that you’d expect from a young player to put up when they’re two-to-three years in the league, and bumped them up to an astounding 23.8 points per game with splits of .463/.391/.859.

More importantly, once the numbers started to rise, so did the overall win percentage for his team. As Ingram only won 26 games his rookie season, 35 games in his sophomore season, and 37 wins in a year where the Lakers were marred by a litany of injuries to stars like LeBron James and Lonzo Ball, B.I. nearly willed his Pelicans to the playoffs in his first year, winning 30 games while getting the invite to the Orlando bubble to finish their regular season, where he would securely confirm himself to be the Most Improved Player with his averages of 19.8 points per game in the abbreviated season.

Ashley Landis/AP

His scoring numbers were noticeably shortened due to his lack of touches in LA, albeit when there were other primary scorers for the Lakers like D’Angelo Russell, Josh Hart, Lonzo Ball, LeBron James and Kyle Kuzma throughout the years. Ingram’s averaged 11.8 shots attempts per game left over from his Laker days saw a significant boost in his first year in New Orleans, as the Kinston, North Carolina substantially bumped up his amount of shot attempts in his first year as a Pelican (17.8 shots per game).

In the award ceremony, Pelicans Vice President of Basketball Operations David Griffin then went on to address the media and his first-time All Star with his own kind remarks, citing his passion for wanting to be the hardest worker on the team and the leading-by-example guy both the inexperienced and grizzled vets looked to as a muse for high achievement.

“Brandon, we’ve talked a lot about this, even in the bubble, we talked about the likelihood that this would happen for you. We were really excited as an organization but what’s really important to me about this is the work rate that brought this about,” Griffin said.

“This isn’t something where B.I. just showed up at the gym. We’ve talked a lot about this. He’s — he did two-a-days every practice day this year. He’s one of the only young players I’ve ever had to beg to work less. He pushes himself to incredible lengths to get better, and he loves the game, he has passion for the game in a way that very, very few players do, that certainly players his age rarely have,” the Pels’ VP continued.

“The work rate, the attention to detail, and just the love and joy of playing with his teammates that Brandon has. Brandon, I’m going to embarrass you for just one minute here — when B.I. first got on campus in New Orleans in September, he was with some of the player development coaches and he told the coaches ‘I believe I have greatness in me, and I want you to do anything you can to drag it out of me. Dog, cuss me out, work me too hard, do whatever you gotta do, but I want to be great.’ And he dedicated himself to that in a way that I can’t ever say I’ve ever really seen a player do, and certainly not at his age.”

Griffin concluded, “And so it’s our honor as a franchise to be represented by a human being that loves this the way Brandon does and frankly, loves the community of New Orleans and communities from Kinston the way he does. This is as much about the human Brandon is as much as he is the basketball player. I’m just honored to be a part of that.”

Ingram further attested to that desire to be great, and went into detail about where that need to succeed and be great comes from.

“First, i think it starts from, seeing my Mom and Dad work every single day to make sure everything was straight,” Ingram confessed. “I think they put me first before anything, whether they had it or not. I’ve seen my Dad get like two hours of sleep each day, just waking up, going to work and then coming back home, taking a shower and then going to the gym, maybe to referee some nights, but it was hard to make sure the family was straight. My mom had worked at her job for about 35 years so to see her put that dedication in and stick to what she was doing definitely was a skill to me.”

And in further discussing his work ethic, he also went into detail about the DVT he had last season, and how its ability in cutting his previous season short put things into perspective.

“It made me want to not take things for granted,” Ingram said. “I know that it wasn’t an injury that would’ve taken me out for long but I knew it was something that woke me up, and it was something I needed to tell me to take advantage of everything while I have it.”

And in earning such an accolade, Ingram mentioned how special it was to get this high regard for the effort and contributions to his new team in his first year and hearing his parents announce him getting the award, saying that seeing his support system in his family and his teammates like Lonzo Ball and Josh Hart (who were there in the initial zoom meeting with Gayle Benson when Ingram was presented with the award) was something he’d never forget, due to all the hours he put in.

“They’ve been there every step of the way,” Ingram added. “I can call each one of those guys and they’d be there for me. Just to have those guys tell me that stuff was definitely special.”

As for the immediate future in New Orleans for both he and the Pelicans, it’s evident and clear as day he’s set to be a pillar for a new age of Pelicans basketball with the likes of Zion Williamson, Lonzo Ball, and the rest of the Pels’ young and inquisitive core, never mind the impending oncoming of a new coach with a new scheme and looming talks of Ingram’s designation as an unrestricted free agent (UFA) once this season ends.

“[My contract] is something that we’ve discussed and that we’ll continue to discuss,” B.I. briefly said, shutting down any advanced about contractual inquiries. “All we care about now is winning basketball games and I think we have young guys that’s learning how to play the game, and in trying to find what they do on a basketball court, we also have to figure out a way that we can get wins in those games.

Ingram went on, “We have to make sure those guys aren’t going through that stress and that guys are able to do what they want on a basketball floor so we can all mesh for each other. Whatever coach just wants to come in and win and get the best out of us and whatever way it is in a winning fashion, that’s really all it is at this point.”

There’s no doubt about the type of player and leader Brandon Ingram wants to be. And more importantly, as per his numbers, the major improvement he made didn’t have anything to do with his numbers, but more of getting his voice to be more resounding in the locker rooms as the number one guy. And in New Orleans’ pursuit of a playoff spot and a title in the next coming years, those leadership qualities are going to be paramount, at least in the eyes of the MIP.

“This year I had was the year of the most fun playing basketball the way that I wanted to play. Having an opportunity to be in the gym with my teammates who love to do the same thing that I love to do, seeing some of the same guys come back to the gym all the time always asking, asking and asking for advice on the basketball floor so they can get better in their game for our team.”

For Ingram, that was the most enjoyable moment for him. He went on to say that he didn’t think he had have a favorite stat or anything that made him the happiest or motivated him the most. His chemistry, and long-lasting impact to those within the Pels’ locker room — whether they be coaches, teammates or other personnel just as locked in as he is — was his biggest takeaway for his first year in New Orleans.

“For the type of player I want to be, I want to be well rounded all across the board. But what stuck out to me the most was just how much fun I had with my teammates and seeing the attitudes that they had going into the gym every single day.”

Photo by Chris Graythen/Getty Images