The NBA, unlike the NFL, doesn’t give an award for Comeback Player of the Year.
If they did, Saddiq Bey would have to be among the front runners.
Bey missed the entire 2024-25 season while with the Washington Wizards. He was recovering from a torn ACL injury from the year before when he played for the Atlanta Hawks.
Fast forward to today and you can make a strong argument that Bey has been the Pelicans’ best player.
He's been consistently good and consistently reliable on both ends of the floor.
The latest example came Thursday night when he scored 42 points in the Pelicans’ 129-118 victory over the Utah Jazz at the Delta Center.
It was the second most points scored by a Pelicans’ player this season, only trailing the 44 points scored by Trey Murphy in a loss to the Milwaukee Bucks.
For Bey, it was a season-high and the second most points he’s ever scored. His career-high of 51 came four seasons ago when he was playing with the Detroit Pistons in the 2021-’22 season.
Bey also had seven assists and grabbed five rebounds as the Pelicans (18-42) won their third straight game. They’ll try to make it four in a row Saturday when they play the Jazz (18-41) again in the second game of this six-game road trip.
“I just came in and tried to play hard for my team, my guys,” Bey said. “I was just trying to be aggressive and take what the team gives me. My teammates did a great job of finding me. Coaches did a great job pf putting me in great positions.”
Bey shot 14 of 20 from the floor, including 5-of-9 on 3-pointers. He also knocked down all nine free throws.
Not bad for a player who was thought of as an afterthought in the CJ McCollum-Jordan Poole trade. He’s turned out to be the main guy in that deal.
“I didn’t envision this,” said Pelicans’ interim coach James Borrego. “But you learn. You don’t know what you have in house until you have them and you work with them. We’ve been working through this for a number of months now, but he showed evidence early on where he belongs and he keeps getting better and better at it.”
Bey wasn’t quite sure what his role would be when he arrived in New Orleans. But he knew he would be able to contribute.
“I always believe in myself,” he said in a January interview. “I didn’t know what the product was going to look like. I was just hoping and praying that I was able to get back in enough of a rhythm to show everyone what I can do. But I still have a ways to go.”
Bey ranks third on the team in scoring (17.2 points) and fourth in rebounding (5.8). His 66 points in the clutch (games decided by five points or fewer in the last five minutes) lead the team. Thursday’s game against the Jazz was almost a clutch game. Utah, which trailed by as many as 27 points, made a late run and cut it to a seven point game (125-118) late. But Bey answered with back-to-back layups to seal the win.
“He deserves the credit because he works on it every day,” Borrego said. “He does not take a day for granted. I think all of us should learn from Saddiq. He values every day. Every day he gets to walk into an NBA gym, he values it. And he treats it with great care and respect. … He’s really elevated this program.”
He has.
More than anyone expected.