Pelicans’ Brandon Ingram faces his toughest opponent: himself
David Schmidt
Published Apr 07, 2026
Brandon Ingram’s mind is racing.
Even as teammates and coaches compliment him at his locker on yet another strong individual performance, all he can think about is the fourth-quarter turnover that he’s sure cost his team the game.
A few minutes later, a media member speaks up while Ingram sits alone at a table in the news conference room. “What can the Pelicans do to get more out of your teammates to make your life less difficult?” Ingram ignores the premise. None of it matters, he says, unless he’s better.
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Ingram leaves the arena, his phone buzzing. Kind messages from friends and family roll in. About the progress he’s made. About how much he’s grown since his 2019 move to New Orleans. All are attempts to uplift him, and all of them fade away instantly as he remembers his miscues in the final minutes.
Ingram has often noticed how others can easily shift their focus on tough days and find something else in their lives to brighten their mood. He wishes it were that easy for him. He knows he won’t be right until he can get back on the court and make up for his errors. That’s how much the mistakes morph into negative thoughts and get stuck in his craw.
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He wants to let it all out but struggles to find the right way to release his angst. It’s easier to keep it bottled up. But the weight on his shoulders is becoming too much to bear alone.
Discussions of mental health and emotional stability weren’t a regular occurrence for Ingram when he was growing up in Kinston, N.C., a small, rugged town that has its fair share of hard-working people and a crime rate much higher than the national average. Mental and physical toughness were a requirement for survival, and Ingram knew others would take advantage of him if they sensed any sign of weakness.
Much of his perspective on the world comes from observing what his dad, Donald, went through, particularly some of the darker experiences of his life. One that sticks with Brandon to this day is witnessing his father’s struggles after losing a close friend due to a financial loan that was never repaid. Donald did everything he could to surround himself and his son with the right people, those who wouldn’t get caught up in the violence that plagued their community. Still, he could not protect Brandon from everything.
“Seeing some of the people I grew up with getting killed at a young age. Seeing my dad get betrayed just because he was a good person. I’ve seen the darker side of what people can do,” Brandon says. “It makes me a certain way. I see how there are times when I guard myself while others are more free.”
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Ingram knows he must pry himself open more, especially as his NBA status has risen. His phone is filled with quotes from self-help books and passages from the Bible that resonate with him. He’s prioritized praying more often during his downtime. At home, he regularly plays inspirational sermons from pastors via YouTube. T.D. Jakes is one of his favorites. “It always feels like he’s talking to me,” Ingram says. “It helps me keep going.”
His perspective also has shifted since he became a father four years ago. His son, Brenton, often sits courtside with Donald at Pelicans home games. Brandon wants to be present with him, physically and mentally.
Brandon Ingram and his son Brenton ❤️
— Jake Hardee (@pelicansbyjake) January 17, 2023
Ingram has accomplished a lot in his basketball career. He’s been an NBA All-Star. Won the Most Improved Player of the Year award. Elevated his game on the playoff stage. Garnered high praise from some of the best players in the game. Represented the U.S. in last summer’s FIBA World Cup. He’s been the most reliable figure in a Pelicans organization that’s been immersed in turmoil since his arrival four seasons ago.
But for Ingram to reach the heights of superstardom, cement his partnership with co-star Zion Williamson and lead a Pelicans franchise that has failed to gain any real traction for an extended period, the next stage of his growth has to come from within.
He must continue to combat the toughest opponent he’ll ever face: himself.
“All the external stuff — all the stuff you see on TV or on social media — some of it you start looking at and asking yourself, ‘Is it true? Am I not good enough?’” he admits. “I used to take it as I want to please everybody. Now, my focus is on asking myself if I’m doing the right things every day to make myself better. If things they’re saying are true, does it require me to go in the lab and change some things? Or is it just bulls—?”
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He added, “I’ve heard so much since I was younger that you’ve got to man up and you can’t show emotions. But I think people should know that it don’t have to be like that. There are still times when I carry myself like I’m emotionless. But there are times when you have to look yourself in the mirror and get it all out of your system.”
Brandon Ingram’s mind is racing again. It’s March 2019, and this time, he’s nowhere near a basketball court. Instead, he’s lying in a hospital bed, his third NBA season cut short after surgery to remove a blood clot in his right shoulder.
Doctors had already comforted Ingram that the procedure wasn’t life-threatening, but that didn’t stop him from dwelling on how it might affect his career. Will I ever be the same player? How long will it take me to get back? Is it possible I may never play again?
Going through that ordeal and dealing with those self-doubts opened up the possibility that he might need to take steps to address his mental health.
“It really made him appreciate life in a different way,” Donald says.
For most of Brandon’s life, basketball was his sanctuary whenever problems started piling up. He often questioned whether he was doing enough to reach his full potential. With basketball, he could channel his self-doubt and insatiable desire to be great in positive ways. Was he working hard enough on his craft? Was he taking the game seriously enough?
He spent countless hours in practice gyms from a young age, finding answers to those questions instead of more serious ones. He skipped his senior prom to train, laying out the cones himself in an empty gym as most of his peers had the time of their lives. For Ingram, this round ball and the two baskets on either side of the court were his life. That dedication drove him to become a five-star recruit, a Duke one-and-done and the second pick in the 2016 NBA Draft, by the league’s most glamorous franchise no less.
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During Ingram’s rookie year with the Los Angeles Lakers, his teammates knew he would struggle to get out of his own head if he got off to a bad start in games.
“If he missed two or three shots, he was done. We knew he was having a bad game,” says one former Laker, who agreed to talk to The Athletic on the condition of anonymity. “He’s one of those guys who wants to be great. He just needed to grow and really know who he was as a player.”
Ingram noticed how his play on the court was affecting his relationships with family and friends. He knew that needed to change.
“You can go an entire day and not feel good about anything you’re seeing or the family around you because you’re so worried about how this game made you feel,” Ingram says. “I don’t think I was living in reality.”
When the discovery of those blood clots cut short his third NBA season, Ingram lost his first love. He had to go elsewhere for answers. It was then he found himself unable to escape negative thoughts that he had bottled up his whole life, hoping they’d eventually go away.
“When you keep letting those feelings or those doubts build up, that’s when it starts to feel like you can’t escape it,” Ingram says.
Ingram knew his obsession with basketball needed to remain a core part of his identity. His new mission, fortified by his blood clot experience, was to keep the game in perspective and not allow his shortcomings on the court to affect his life.
It did not come easily, or quickly. In those immediate years after arriving in New Orleans following the surgery, Ingram still had moments when his self-doubt would spiral too far. He knew it was important to be critical of himself and find ways to improve, but he struggled to walk the line between healthy self-improvement and a constant pursuit of perfection. It held him back from seeing obvious issues right in front of him.
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“I would just look for the things I could control and literally just blame myself even if it wasn’t true,” Ingram says. “I thought that was the easiest way to handle things. But after a while, I used to let stuff sit for a long time. I used to let it sit until we played the next game.”
Behind closed doors, Ingram’s Pelicans teammates say he’s one of the biggest jokesters on the team. Now, he admits even that side of him can be a defense mechanism.
“It’s easier to laugh away your problems instead of really dealing with them,” he says.
Ingram admits he had a hard time in those first couple years in New Orleans finding the right conduit to communicate everything he’s going through. There were certain people who could relate to his family dynamics, but not as much to the basketball side, and vice versa. Franchise instability didn’t help — in Ingram’s five years with the Pelicans, the team has shuffled through three head coaches, along with several other changes among the coaching and performance staffs.
Ingram did try to express himself to teammates and other members of the organization. He started to come out of his shell, and his play improved. But when he didn’t receive the response he was seeking, Ingram would often dismiss the interaction. “They don’t understand me,” he’d think. “They can’t relate to where I am in life.” He shied away from uncomfortable conversations with teammates, coaches and relatives.
“I’m still not completely past that, to be honest,” Ingram says. “There are times when I don’t always feel like I have an outlet where I can talk to somebody and they understand where I’m coming from. It’s a battle to find that person you feel comfortable with and a person you can trust to talk about those things. It’s hard to find that, but you’ve got to find someone that can give you a real response. And it’s not just about being real. It’s about them telling you something that you can understand and apply to what you’re going through.”
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As Willie Green lies in bed one late fall evening, he hears his phone ping with a text message.
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He’d rather ignore it and escape the world for a few more moments. Amid a horrible start to his head coaching career, any moment of solace captured felt well-deserved.
But knowing his team’s predicament — a 3-16 record to begin the 2021-22 season — he wanted to be a source of comfort for whoever needed him, whenever they needed him.
Picking up the phone, he sees one of the last names he expected flashing across the screen. It is Ingram sending him a clip of a late fourth-quarter possession he wants to dissect together.
Green suddenly feels even greater relief than any more time on the pillow could’ve provided. Even as it seemed like the walls were caving in around him, his star forward — the one who so often carried every burden alone — apparently wants to stay in the fight with him.
To the outside world, New Orleans seemed on the verge of collapse. To Green, though, this is one of the first signs of a budding partnership, one that would become the driving force to digging their team out of its hole.
Green had arrived in New Orleans during a tumultuous point in Ingram’s career and the franchise’s history. The Pelicans forward was coming off his two best statistical seasons, and his connection to New Orleans was as strong as ever after he had signed a five-year, $158 million max contract in 2020.
While things looked good for Ingram on the surface, he was struggling with tremendous instability around him. The Pelicans fired longtime head coach Alvin Gentry after the 2020 COVID-19 bubble, a trying experience for all players and a particularly challenging one for the Pelicans due to questions about Williamson’s health and relationship with the organization. Veteran coach Stan Van Gundy arrived with much fanfare the following season but failed to establish a rapport with the players and suffered the same fate as Gentry less than a year later. Including Ingram’s final season with the Lakers, Green was set to be his fourth head coach in four seasons.
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“When a player deals with as much change as he dealt with early in his career, it can be damaging for your growth,” Green says.
To make matters worse, Williamson entered the 2021-22 season with a broken foot that would eventually cost him the entire season. With Williamson’s repeated injury issues and grumblings around the organization that he may be unhappy in New Orleans, the future of the Pelicans organization was a major question mark.
Green’s main priority was to stabilize an organization that was on the brink of disaster. To do so, he knew he needed to accomplish one thing that Van Gundy, in particular, could not. He needed to break through Ingram’s outer shell.
Green had heard stories about Ingram’s quiet manner. He knew getting Ingram to open up wouldn’t be easy, especially considering the upheaval Ingram experienced during his first two years in New Orleans. But the first-time head coach also understood that if he could break through with Ingram, the rest of the team would follow.
“I think those two really understand each other,” Donald says. “Out of all the coaches Brandon has worked with over the years, I think he’s connected to Willie in a different way.”
From the moment he was hired, Green implored Ingram to stay in touch with him, to voice his complaints when things weren’t progressing as he hoped. He remained in contact with Ingram through countless text messages and phone calls. Green knew Ingram wanted to be challenged to grow, so he pushed his new star verbally instead of letting those thoughts stay in Ingram’s own head.
“Sometimes that can be uncomfortable, but that’s what allowed our relationship to really grow,” Green says. “I was intentional about making sure we talked and we expressed what we want from each other.”
And instead of pulling back and succumbing to the urge to say, “Here we go again,” Ingram went all-in with his new coach.
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With Green as a guide, Ingram was committed to doing whatever it took to lift up a team that desperately needed a guiding light. Despite Williamson’s injury and the team’s start, the Pelicans rallied to earn a spot in the playoffs by beating the San Antonio Spurs and the LA Clippers in the Play-In Tournament. In the first postseason experience of his career, Ingram showed his newfound comfort on the big stage, averaging 27 points, 6.2 rebounds and 6.2 assists as his scrappy Pelicans squad pushed the top-seeded Phoenix Suns to six games in their first-round series before eventually bowing out.
Green tried to carry that momentum into his second season leading the Pelicans, but the team fell victim to the injury bug again. Ingram and Williamson missed a combined 90 games as the Pelicans squandered a 23-12 start before eventually losing at home to the Oklahoma City Thunder in the Play-In Tournament, ending their season.
“It’s not easy,” Ingram says of his ongoing mental health maintenance. “It’s still a battle every single day to listen to my body and my heart when they’re talking to me. My thing now is just trying to stay even”
Heading into their third and arguably most pivotal season together, Ingram and Green continue to face new obstacles. Ingram had a rough showing with Team USA over the summer, losing his starting spot during the FIBA World Cup. Green has been forced to deal with a number of injuries to key players, and questions about his overall coaching acumen have grown louder as New Orleans has stumbled through the preseason as the staff installs a new offense.
Reintegrating Williamson and keeping him healthy enough to build chemistry with Ingram is an ongoing challenge. The two cornerstones of the Pelicans’ franchise have played just 12 games together over the last two seasons and only 93 in total. Each has battled through extended injury absences that have stunted the Pelicans’ hopes of rising in the Western Conference hierarchy. Though some fans wonder which is the true face of the franchise, Green says both are committed to doing whatever it takes to get the most out of their marriage.
“The goal is for those guys to be great together. It doesn’t matter if people think this guy’s the leader or this guy’s the face. Are we better together? That’s the goal,” Green says. “They need each other. That’s the way we want to build. And I think they’re at the point where they don’t need the shine or the praise. They want to be great together.”
To get to where they want to be, amid the many storms swirling through the Pelicans’ entire organization, Green and Ingram know the foundation they’ve built will be essential to keeping the team united through adversity. And they both know that will require Ingram to do more than just improve his on-court skills.
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His mind is still racing, but Ingram has accepted that his goal shouldn’t be getting to the finish line as quickly as possible. It’s embracing everything that goes into the process along the way.
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(Top photo: Sean Gardner / Getty Images; Illustration by John Bradford / The Athletic)
