Last week, FiveThirtyEightSports, a polling aggregation site created by Nate Silver, released new predictions for the majority of the players in the NBA. Their algorithm, known as CARMELO, matches each player to ones in history based on a variety of similarities in skill sets, vitals, athleticism and production. Based on the careers of these historically-matched players, the algorithm makes forecasts about the current crop in the NBA.
With this data, 538 calculates the plus-minus of each player and then deduces their contributions to their team based on the expected amount of playing time. CARMELO believes that the Pelicans will finish the upcoming season with a 46-36 record, not a world-beating level but does believe the team is headed in the right direction.