Author: Kevin Lipe

Don’t ask me to explain what happened Wednesday night at FedExForum, because I don’t think I can, not really. The Grizzlies got beaten—badly—by the Toronto Raptors at home, and they did so without putting up much of a fight in the final frame. In so doing, they managed to fall to 3-5 on the year the night before they load up and head out West for a four-game-in-six-night road trip that sees them taking on the Lakers, Kings, Clippers, and Warriors before returning home to play the Spurs (again) a week from Friday.

This has the potential to go very badly.

Rudy Gay came back for the first time since the trade that sent him northward last January, and even though he was booed by about 35% of the people in the building when the Raptors’ starting lineup was announced—which I thought was in pretty poor taste, if I’m honest, even though I guess I understand the motivations behind it—and then he and his Toronto Raptors, who I’d like to point out aren’t a very good basketball team once you get past their starting five, and who are typically an incredibly poor jump-shooting team, proceeded to kick the crap out of the Grizzlies for 48 minutes.

The Grizzlies tied the game at 70 in the third quarter on a brilliant run of steals and transition baskets, mostly sparked by Mike Conley (also known as “The Only Grizzly Who Is Playing Well”), but over the last 20 or so minutes, the Grizzlies again got outscored 33-17 and the whole thing went up in flames.

After the game, Dave Joerger didn’t say anything that made me feel especially hopeful, and none of the players sounded like they had any clue why they’d just gone out and gotten housed by Tyler Hansbrough and company. And it made me want to, you know, rend my garments and rub ashes on myself Old Testament style.

It’s not time to panic yet, but it’s creeping in around the edges, the signs and signifiers of what we’re all hoping isn’t a lost season. I’ll have more on this, to be certain, once I’m not completely slammed. But, for now, just try to carry on about your everyday business and keep the howling fantods of lottery picks and empty FedExForums and burning John Hollinger effigies in the streets at the periphery.

The Real Lineup Problem

I’ll just put it bluntly: the Grizzlies cannot survive this season if they start playing a short, eight-man playoff rotation in November. That approach may win them games in November, but it (1) won’t win them games through the winter when guys start getting fatigued and it (2) will render the starters—three of whom are in their 30’s—so worn down by the wear-and-tear of fighting through the regular season at 36 to 40 minutes a night that they can’t keep playing at the same high level through the playoffs.

So, part of the Grizzlies’ issues are related to rotations—Mike Miller is playing far too many minutes, and Ed Davis and Quincy Pondexter are playing so poorly that they’ve had their minutes limited, and while Nick Calathes has played well at backup point guard in the absence of Jerryd Bayless, who is clearly much more comfortable off the ball than he is at the backup spot, Bayless’ scoring punch off the bench (when his shot is falling) has been sorely missed as well. But to insist that the shortened rotation is the one that Dave Joerger needs to go with is to miss the point of having a deeper bench: to prevent the starters from being worn out by the time the playoffs roll around.

The other issue is that the Grizzlies’ starters haven’t been good. Or, more precisely, Tayshaun Prince’s game has been limited by the illness he suffered during the preseason that kept him from practicing and playing, and Marc Gasol has looked halfway interested in the Grizzlies’ losses, while Zach Randolph has played well on offense and mostly gotten abused on defense and Tony Allen keeps on Tony Allen’ing. The starting lineup just isn’t working right now, for whatever reason. The starters + Koufos, Calathes, and Miller rotation that beat Golden State by so many points is just not going to be tenable over the course of the season.

So Joerger has lineup problems, but they’re not the lineup problems that Twitter is worried about. The problem with the lineups so far has been that the players in them are mostly not playing well.

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Z-Bo to the Lakers?

Sam Smith of Bulls.com had an interesting post that was linked to by SB Nation’s Grizzly Bear Blues yesterday rounding up players who seem likely to be traded early on this season.

Smith suggested that the Lakers are looking to get rid of Pau Gasol, who enters free agency at the end of this season, and that the Grizzlies might be a willing trade partner—sending Zach Randolph to Los Angeles in exchange for a homecoming to Memphis (and Mike Miller) for the elder Gasol. Gasol is on the books for $19 million this year, but only this year, while Randolph has a $16.9 million player option for next year.

Randolph has made some noise recently that he’d be willing to take a longer term deal for less money, without explicity saying as much, but it remains to be seen how that situation will play out. The Grizzlies can’t afford for Randolph to pick up that option. By the same token, the Lakers have nothing but cap room for next year (cap room and Steve Nash). Would they be willing to pay $17 million for one year of Zach Randolph? Would returning to Memphis and playing alongside Marc be a pick-me-up for Pau? How would Memphis fans react to such a deal?

I don’t think that particular deal is very likely, but it’s certainly an interesting hypothetical. I expect the Z-Bo trade rumor mill to start heating up as we get into the long NBA winter. It’s clear that the Grizzlies have to do something, and trading Randolph before he picks up his option is probably the most obvious something available to them.

Game Notes: Grizzlies vs. Raptors

Tonight, the Toronto Raptors are playing in Memphis for the first time since the trade last season that sent Rudy Gay northward in exchange for Ed Davis, Tayshaun Prince, and Austin Daye (well, really Davis and Jose Calderon, who was then sent to Detroit in exchange for Prince and Daye). And that means one thing: the return of Rudy Gay to FedExForum for the first time since the trade.

It’ll be interesting to see how the fans react to Gay’s return. Lots of Grizzlies fans loved Gay while he was here, but just as many had grown frustrated with his lack of development and his poor shooting by the time he was dealt to Toronto. Obviously, last season was a tough one for Gay, but when he got to Toronto, some of his comments didn’t exactly do anything to endear him to Memphis fans—he lashed out at the Grizzlies organization a little bit, and the Lionel Hollins Rally crowd seemed to take Gay’s words to heart. So as he returns tonight, my predictions is that it’s going to be an interesting mix of cheers and boos.

I can’t continue writing this preview without pointing out that in the Raptors’ most recent game—a 2OT loss to the Houston Rockets—Gay shot 11 for 37 from the field for 29 points. As in, he attempted thirty-seven field goals. And made eleven of them. Gay did that and still didn’t finish with the worst shooting percentage among Raptors starters, though—that honor goes to the 6-25 (for 24% true shooting) DeMar DeRozan. I don’t even know what else to say about that stat line. 11-37 from the field. Can you imagine what Lionel Hollins would have done if Rudy Gay had done that for the Grizzlies last year? John Hollinger probably would have lit himself on fire in the FedExForum parking garage.

At any rate, just because he’s continuing to take shot after shot after shot and making about 30% of them doesn’t mean that Rudy Gay doesn’t pose a problem for the Grizzlies defensively. I’m sure years of practices and playing together has the Grizzlies somewhat prepared to deal with Gay’s game, but he’s still an extremely athletic forward who can get to the rim at will—and that seems to be the Grizzlies’ Kryptonite so far this season. If Gay decides to go to the rim whenever possible (and doesn’t it seem like we’ve all been reading that exact phrase for years?) he’s going to cause problems for the Grizzlies’ still-bad defense. But will he? Has he ever?

No matter what happens, the Grizzlies need to win tonight. If they get caught up in the “Return of Rudy Gay” hype and it takes them off their game—what little game they have to be on these days—it’s going to be trouble, because Toronto is a good team this year despite the issues with offensive efficiency. Kyle Lowry has been a Griz-Killer ever since he was kicked to the curb in favor of Mike Conley, so now the Raptors have two guys who want to beat the Grizzlies. I don’t know if Ed Davis has any desire to be a Raps-Killer, but he’s not going to do it in his currently-limited rotation minutes anyway.

The Grizzlies, no matter what happens with Rudy, whether he’s booed or welcomed, whether he scores 40 or takes 40 bad shots, need to come out just as focused as they did against Golden State and protect their home court.

Not much went well for the Grizzlies, who fell to 3-4 Monday night on the road against the still-undefeated Indiana Pacers. The Pacers, after coming up one game short of the NBA Finals last year, are on a mission to win home court advantage this year, and they’ve gotten off to a white-hot start, and at this point they’re the only team left in the league that has yet to lose.

The Grizzlies got off to a slow start, trailing 23-16 after the first quarter, and they never really got back into it from there. They only outscored the Pacers in the 4th quarter, and that was only by one point. Really, nothing went according to plan for the Grizzlies.

Game Notes

   • Injuries came into play tonight: Jerryd Bayless did not dress for the second straight game after injuring his knee against the New Orleans Pelicans. Quincy Pondexter left the game after taking a nasty elbow from, well, Ed Davis, and X-rays on his face later revealed that he had a broken nose. It remains to be seen how much time Pondexter will miss, if any—Pondexter seemed to be back in the rotation after only playing limited minutes against the Warriors on Saturday night.

   • The Pacers, honestly, are a better version of the Grizzlies. Roy Hibbert is in the top tier of NBA centers, and the Pacers have much more talent on the wings than the Grizzlies do at this point, especially offensively. George Hill gave Mike Conley all kinds of problems tonight, but what really killed the Grizzlies was the play of Lance Stephenson, who notched his first NBA triple-double, and Paul George. Until the Grizzlies are able to supplement their inside play and stifling defense with more offensive firepower—time will tell whether the addition of Mike Miller was enough to improve spacing for this year’s Grizzlies, but early signs point to “ehhhh”—they’re going to look like a scrappier, underdog version of this Pacers team.

   • The interior defense problems popped back up tonight, with the Pacers’ guards and forwards able to slash through the heart of the Grizzlies’ defense at will. At least twice, Paul George drove straight through a crowd of four Grizzlies players to get a layup. That’s just not going to cut it. Sure, the Pacers are good, but the Grizzlies have to tighten that up.

   • I’m still not panicking. I think we are starting to see what’s worth worrying about, though. Joerger beat a good team by shortening the rotation and then went right back to “play everybody” mode tonight in Indiana, except for Jon Leuer, even though Leuer had been playing really well. I don’t understand how it takes this long to see that the all-bench-players lineups aren’t able to do anything productive and that there’s no shame in always having a starter on the floor. Just because the team can go 12 deep doesn’t mean that (1) that has to happen every night and (2) you need to just sub the whole team out hockey-style. It’s early, but the shorter rotation worked wonders on Saturday night.

   • Ed Davis, on the whole, was more good than bad against a very good team. In 17 minutes he had 5 points, 7 rebounds, and 2 blocks, and while he had his moments—trying to dunk on Roy Hibbert was a bad decision—I thought he handled himself pretty well. Mild praise, I know, but Davis seems to be becoming a bit of a punching bag among Griz fans (Grizz fans? I know we’re having a “One Z or Two” debate in the Grizzlies universe right now…) and I want to point out that he wasn’t bad against Indiana.

That’s all I got. The Grizzlies lost on the road to a better team that was executing much better and looked much more confident in their identity. I wouldn’t be shocked to see the Pacers in the Finals. I’m glad that’s the only place in the playoffs the Grizzlies could possibly have to play them.

UPDATE: The original version of this post mentioned Danny Granger in the Pacers’ wing rotation like he’d played tonight… which didn’t happen. Granger hasn’t played a game yet this season. To be honest, I don’t remember who I was thinking about when I typed “Danny Granger” instead, or whether I was thinking about this Granger update, so I just deleted that sentence. Blogging is a tough business, y’all. That said, whenever they do get Granger back, the Pacers are going to be even better.

6:10pm, Pregame Down in the bowels of FedExForum eating chicken tenders and fries that I assume were leftovers from the Tigers game the night before, calculating how much barbecue sauce would make the startlingly pale fries taste OK, the mood was one of muted anxiety. The conversations ran along lines of “what happens if they don’t get it together?” and “how bad will it get over the next couple of weeks if the Warriors win by 25?” and even the most optimistic observers couched everything with “If they do _____” or “If they can only get it together.” The sixth game of the season, and already a fanbase on the edge, and a growing sense among the media that this particular team, this front office, is perfectly willing to blow the whole thing up if they continue to flounder into December, into January.

Peter Edmiston had us go around the table and make predictions, winner and point spread. Warriors by 18, Warriors by single digits, Grizzlies by 5, Warriors by 10. The conversation was quiet, a little apprehensive. Even the folks with nothing at stake knew the game was important as a statement, as a correction, a return to the mean.

12:00, 1Q The Grizzlies win the tip, and Zach Randolph scores a bucket isolated on David Lee. Randolph seems to have a list of players he keeps in his head (or maybe in his locker) and whenever he comes up against a player on his list, it’s like he makes it a point to embarrass that player. Blake Griffin. Kevin Love. Kendrick Perkins (although usually Marc Gasol seems to handle that). David Lee is on the list, and Lee would have his hands full with Randolph for the whole game.

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10:04, 1Q Andre Igoudala makes a three-pointer over Tayshaun Prince, and all I can think about is how much I wanted the Grizzlies to make a trade with the 76ers that sent Rudy Gay to Philly in exchange for Igoudala. I think his skillset—good at defense, and occasinoally a hot long-range shooter who can also slash to the basket—is what Gay’s should be but isn’t, and his abilities would have meshed well with this Grizzlies roster. But alas, obviously that wasn’t meant to be. Seeing him making those shots recalled all those Trade Machine sessions, though.

7:46, 1Q Marc Gasol makes a jumper, turns around, and as he jogs back down the court to play defense he shakes his head like he’s clearing out cobwebs, and then he crosses himself. Gasol’s poor play early was a major factor in the Grizzlies 2-3 start, and his lack of rotation and communication on defense had many wondering what was wrong with him. One prevailing thought is that he managed to fatigue himself playing Eurobasket without actually improving his conditioning any. Whatever the case, the relief on his face, the way he only crosses himself ever so often, signaled that even if Gasol wasn’t back to 100% Gasol status, he was headed there.

1:55, 1Q The Grizzlies go with a Calathes-Miller-Prince-Randolph-Koufos lineup, one which (sometimes with Gasol in the place of Randolph) would have a huge impact on the game. Joerger shortened the rotation mightily for this one, with Jerryd Bayless out with a knee injury, and Quincy Pondexter and Ed Davis barely seeing the floor.

:01.9, 1Q Marreese Speights, former Grizzly, starter in the place of Zach Randolph while he was out with a knee injury during the 2012 lockout season, is not very good at defense. Tony Allen apparently enjoyed reminding him of this:

Zbo taking Mo Speights to school and Tony Allen yelling 'just like practice!'
— Ronald Tillery (@CAGrizBeat) November 10, 2013

The Grizzlies lead 32-29 after the first quarter, and the Warriors have turned the ball over 6 times while the Grizzlies have turned it over once. To everyone in attendance, this feels like the key statistic of the game.

7:05, 2Q The Warriors are forced to bring back Andrew Bogut for Marreese Speights, since Speights and The Corpse of Jermaine O’Neal have been getting abused inside, first by Randolph and Koufos and then by Gasol and Koufos. The Warriors clearly don’t have the bigs to defend Memphis effectively when the Grizzlies have the post game working. The post game was working Saturday night for the first time all season. Entry passes were being made; Gasol, Randolph, and Koufos were able to get to the rim seemingly at will; everything felt right with the universe.

3:36, 2Q Z-Bo loses his headband while fighting with David Lee—and winning—for a rebound. Tony Allen picks the headband up off the floor, creeps up behind Z-Bo, and sticks it to the back of his neck. I’m not sure how many people in the building even noticed this, but I took it as a sign: a sign that the Grizzlies were playing within themselves, staying relaxed, comfortable. It was these little goofy touches—Tony Allen jumping up off the bench and wagging his finger Dikembe Mutombo-style when Koufos blocked a shot, Z-Bo mean-mugging his way back up the court after taking it to Draymond Green—that felt like the Grizzlies were being themselves, something they hadn’t been at all through the first five games.

1:16, 2Q Quincy Pondexter enters the game. Pondexter, let’s be honest, was pretty terrible through the first five games, managing to rack up a +/- of -21 in 17 minutes against the Pelicans somehow. Pondexter playing out the end of the half while Randolph turned the ball over and let the Warriors get a 3-pointer from Steph Curry at the end of the half. The Grizzlies led 54-50 going into the break, and everyone in the building felt like we’d witnessed a miracle: we’d seen the return of the Memphis Grizzlies from the brink. Of course, it wasn’t really ever that serious, and it’s still only November, but the way the Grizzlies came out and played on Saturday night sent a clear message: they’re going to be fine, even if they have some kinks to work out.

9:38, 3Q The Warriors take the lead for the final time on a Klay Thompson 3-pointer. From here on out, the Grizzlies asserted their will offensively and managed to score 36 in the quarter. The Warriors scored 27, which is a lot for the traditional Griz defense to allow, but Golden State had no answer whatsoever for the Grizzlies’ bludgeoning inside game, especially the shortened frontcourt rotation of Zach Randolph, Marc Gasol, and Kosta Koufos. One gets the sense that this is closer to how the Grizzlies will roll in the playoffs, and it’s a trio that doesn’t promise to be easy for anyone to stop.

:27.7, 3Q Nick Calathes does this:

Calathes was, to me, a revelation against the Warriors. His defense wasn’t as much of a problem against Golden State as it will be on other nights against other offenses because his length allowed him to stay on Curry. But his passing—his passing. Sometimes he whips one across the court without looking and it ends up in the expensive seats, but other times he does stuff like this:

…and you wonder why this guy isn’t the backup point guard more often. To my eyes, it’s clear that Jerryd Bayless is more comfortable and more effective—and less of a liability—at the 2 spot, and having Calathes, who can orchestrate the offense and seems especially adept at hitting a wide-open Mike Miller in the corner from the opposite side of the lane, making plays makes the Grizzlies’ second unit much less predictable and a much different look for defenses than Jerryd Bayless who, love him or hate him, just isn’t as good as a primary ball handler as he is as a 2-guard.

Of course, Calathes comes with some baggage. He turns the ball over too much. He can’t really shoot, although he has a mostly-serviceable floater. But I think what he adds to the team—that court vision and playmaking ability—makes up for it. Shooting can be taught. Calathes’ natural gifts are harder to come by. I think he earned more burn Saturday night. We’ll see if the coaching staff agrees.

8:59, 4Q David Lee fouls out, and it’s clear to everyone in attendance that this game is over. The Warriors, in the “grit and grind era,” just haven’t really been able to beat the Grizzlies—it’s a bad matchup. They don’t have enough solid interior defenders to keep up with the Grizzlies’ post-oriented offense, and the Griz defense is one of the few in the league equipped to slow the normally white-hot Curry and Thompson (especially considering the Grizzlies aren’t especially good at limiting 3-point opportunities). This game was never really in doubt by halfway through the third quarter.

It’s clear that the Grizzlies aren’t perfectly “fixed.” Joerger said as much in the postgame, noting that the Griz are neither as bad as the panicky elements of Grizz Nation said they were after the Pelicans game nor as good as others may be tempted to argue after Saturday night’s big win. They’re very much a work in progress—any team with a new coach and several new players is at this point in the season. But now they’re .500, and they’re starting to look like themselves.

We still don’t know what the end of the season holds for this team, but we do know that they’re working out the kinks still. Rotations and lineups will evolve, relationships will change, offensive schemes will transmogrify over time, but what we saw on Saturday night was definitive proof that there’s no need to run around calling for Robert Pera’s head on a pike, or wishing for the immediate reinstatement of Lionel Hollins as head coach.

Grit and Grind isn’t dead, but it never really was, even though this year’s model of Memphis Grizzlies squad is still unfinished. Saturday night was a welcome reminder that they still retain those essential qualities that made us fall in love with this Grizzlies team to begin with.

I think you’re probably as tired of reading “What’s Wrong With The Grizzlies?” pieces as I am of writing them, and we’re only five games into the season. So I’m not going to write another one of those, because I’ve done it twice now.

The more irrational members of the Grizzlies’ fanbase are in full-on panic mode, and though I don’t really subscribe to that ethic, it’s easy to understand what’s motivating some of the panic. This is a team that started 12-2 last year (even though they went on to play exactly .500 through December and January after the hot start), that blew up opposing teams with defense and effort and barely scoring enough points to beat the other guys, and that made the Western Conference Finals thanks to a combination of intensity and toughness and Kendrick Perkins’ all-around awfulness.

The Grizzlies, at their current level of play, are 2-3 right now. The Warriors come into town 4-2, fresh off a loss last night in San Antonio. The wins have come over the Lakers, the Kings, the 76ers, and the Timberwolves, and the losses have come on the road against the Clippers and the aforementioned Spurs. Historically (as in, over the last two or three seasons), the Grizzlies have had the Warriors’ number, but these circumstances would appear to be a little different.

If the Grizzlies can come out tonight and play the style of defense for which they’ve become known around the league—anchored by Marc Gasol’s brilliance and Tony Allen executing his role as the Lord of Basketball Chaos—they should be able to at least slow down the scoring attack of Steph Curry and Klay Thompson.

Golden State’s addition of Andre Igoudala (who I wanted to trade Rudy Gay for for a long time) gives them help on the defensive end that can occasionally get hot from three himself. Andrew Bogut is healthy for the first time I can remember, and is playing very well. Somehow, the ghost of Jermaine O’Neal is also on this team, presumably because the Warriors offered more money than the Crypt Keeper. They’re a good team, a team that historically has struggled on defense whose defensive rating—93.6 points allowed per 100 possessions—is good for 2nd in the league at the moment.

It’s going to go one of two ways:

Scenario One: The Grizzlies, embarrassed by being booed off the court Wednesday and bolstered by two days of good practice and home cooking and finally snapped out of whatever torpor they’ve been in since the Raptors preseason game, come out and play their brand of defense and stop taking stupid 20-foot jumpers on offense. Mike Miller does not play 25 minutes and thus does not negatively impact the defense by being played too much. Z-Bo is so happy about Zach Jr., who was born during Wednesday’s Pelicans game, that be clobbers David Lee so badly that Lee immediately retires from basketball, scoring 40 points in the process.

Scenario Two: The Grizzlies come out and play crappy defense again. Marc Gasol wanders around the lane, not defending well and not facilitating on offense in a smart way. Mike Miller plays 30 minutes and Andre Igoudala schools him on both ends of the floor. The poor offensive play allows Steph Curry and Klay Thompson to get out in transition early and often, and the Grizzlies get run out of their own building, losing by 40 points.

Those are exaggerated, of course—Lee might wait a week before retiring—but you catch my drift. If we see “the old Grizzlies” tonight, the Griz are going to make a big step towards getting back on track sooner rather than later, and the fans who think the whole thing is doomed will probably start to calm down. If we see the team that we’ve seen in the last five games, and, importantly, if some of those lineups stay the same, playing every guy on the roster except the racing-to-the-hospital Z-Bo ten minutes or more, the Warriors are going to win, and then the Grizzlies go into a road game in Indiana Monday 2-4, probably return home to play Rudy Gay and the improved Raptors on Wednesday and either come back to 3-4 or fall to 2-5, and then…

…they head off on the dreaded November West Coast Road Trip of Death that always seems to put the Grizzlies in a hole to start every season. If the Grizzlies can’t get it together tonight—and, hoenstly, one game is a pretty quick turnaround and I’m not sure it’s reasonable to expect them to fix everything in two days’ time—it’s going to get worse before it gets better.

Strap in, folks. Tonight’s a big one.

Instead of trying to craft a narrative about how it’s either (a.) time to panic or (b.) not time to panic, I’m going to list all of the things that went horribly wrong for the Grizzlies in their 99–84 loss to the New Orleans Pelicans on Wednesday night. The Grizzlies came out and played such a flat, uninspired 35-or-so minutes of basketball that it’s hard for me to imagine a way to convey it on the page. Those of you who were in attendance—and, don’t forget, many in attendance started booing when the Griz were down 22 points at the end of the third quarter, and rightfully so—will understand.

1.

Marc Gasol was a complete, total disaster tonight. In 30 minutes of play, he managed to secure 1 rebound, and that’s not even the worst thing he did. On multiple occasions, Gasol was one-on-one against Greg Stiemsma—GREG STIEMSMA—within seven feet of the basket, did a move to get by him, which is easy because IT’S GREG FREAKING STIEMSMA and he’s Marc Gasol, and once he was by his man and completely unguarded three feet from the basket, he… froze, and passed it back out to somebody on the perimeter. One time such a pass landed in the hands of Tony Allen, who was wide open from three, who promptly fired one, which (as is typical) missed and was rebounded by the Pelicans.

I don’t know what’s wrong with Gasol, but he looked like he’d rather be back in Eurobasket tonight than competing in an NBA game. He wasn’t making good decisions on offense—which is very unusual for him—and he wasn’t playing well on defense at all, whether it was against Anthony Davis, which is understandable, or against Greg Stiemsma, which is roughly equivalent to guarding a cardboard cutout of my dad. ^[1] If Gasol doesn’t get his head right, and it hasn’t really been right yet this season, the Grizzlies are going to get worse before they get better. No two ways about it.

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Also, speaking of Eurobasket, does no one remember the year that Pau Gasol broke his foot playing for Spain and ruined an entire season of Grizzlies basketball^[2]? Would that not be one of the worst things that could happen to this Grizzlies team? Why risk it?

2.

The Grizzlies have now played five games, and they’ve had five games in which the starters came out and looked like they weren’t expending any effort. I usually hate it when people accuse pro athletes of not caring, or of not playing hard, or not trying, but the demeanor of the Grizzlies’ starters—excluding Mike Conley^[3], who has been brilliant among a sea of scrubs—has been somewhere between “My Bloody Valentine on stage” and “Lindsay Lohan pretending to pay attention at a probation hearing.”

They look like they can’t be bothered. And they’re playing like it, too. All the while trying to do things they shouldn’t be doing, pass it places they shouldn’t be passing, foul when they shouldn’t foul, and just generally play sloppy, poorly executed basketball. Basketball that will not get you anywhere in the NBA, especially not when everyone in the West improved and is coming for your playoff spot. They’re not playing like they realize it—or, worse, they’re playing like they realize that and are already tired.

3.

Jerryd Bayless went down with a right knee sprain.

4.

It was a great night for Zach Randolph—he left the game after playing 8 minutes because his fiancée was giving birth to his son—but his absence meant that the Grizzlies had no one to rebound. Tony Allen and Ed Davis tied for most offensive rebounds of any Grizzlies player, and both of them had… wait for it… TWO. This Grizzlies roster is built around scoring off of rebounds and generating turnovers. Whatever they’re trying to do right now is not working, and they’re not doing what they’re good at.

5.

Turnovers. Tired of talking about this one, but until the Grizzlies figure out how to stop coughing up the ball, I’m going to have to talk about it. The Grizzlies had 8 turnovers in the first quarter, which is ridiculous. They had 11 at the half, 14 after three, and ended with 18. But eight, in the first quarter. This starting lineup has completely forgotten how to take care of the ball, and it’s baffling. And infuriating.

6.

I love Quincy Pondexter, and I’m not a huge believer in the +/- stat, but Pondexter was –22 in 17 minutes tonight. He was not good. He was not mediocre. He was not “a little off.” He was bad on both ends of the floor. I’m not sure what’s happened to Pondexter’s game so far this season to radically alter his offensive skill set from what was so helpful to the Grizzlies last year, but he hasn’t looked right all season, and tonight was the worst we’ve seen out of him in a long time. Here’s hoping Q can get back to his floor-spacing, hustle-playin’ ways some time soon and stop overthinking everything he does. We need that QPon back. The current version isn’t helping, contract extension and all.

7.

At some point, the lineups are going to have to change. Some of the groups that saw the floor tonight did nothing but get scored on and turn over the ball.

8.

Mike Miller cannot play 23 minutes in mostly garbage time ever again. He just can’t. Again: why take the risk?

I don’t care what he feels like, or how much Joerger trusts him, or how much he says he’s up for it—past is prologue. Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Dude gets hurt a lot. Stop pretending he’s 24 years old again just because he’s back in Memphis.

If he’s found a Fountain of Youth with Mississippi River water in it, it’s probably full of petrochemicals and catfish droppings anyway.

Conclusions

I’m done. I want to go to bed and try to sleep off whatever the awful side effects of sitting through that Grizzlies game are. It was like sitting and watching a meth lab burn to the ground: nobody wins. If the Grizzlies can’t figure out a way to play with intensity and effort and actually execute—especially on defense, something this team is supposed to be good at—they’re going to lose to the Warriors by 40 points on Saturday, and then they’re going to go to Indiana on Monday and get their brains beaten in by the Pacers, who are on fire right now. It’s going to be ugly.

Here’s hoping the Griz can see past the end of the bloodied nose given to them by the Pelicans tonight and understand that they have to play better—that whatever they’re doing right now is not working and they’re lucky they’re not 0–5 to start the season. At some point soon I’ll take a look at the positives of the season so far, assuming I can find any. Gotta balance out all of this negativity somehow. But for tonight, I’m wallowing in it, because the Grizzlies earned it. They played like they didn’t care, and they got embarrassed for it. I can only hope they’re as bothered by it as the fanbase is.

The Grizzlies look to maintain their undefeated record at home tonight when the newly-christened New Orleans Pelicans (née Hornets) come to town tonight for what is already the third divisional game the Grizzlies have played in the young season so far. The Pelicans come into town 1–3, with losses to the Pacers, Magic, and Suns, and a win in New Orleans over the Bobcats.

World-beaters they aren’t, but the Pelicans do have one weapon which could prove effective against the Grizzlies’ porous interior defense: Mr. Unibrow himself, Anthony Davis. In his second year in the league, Davis is so far averaging 22 points and 12 rebounds a game, and his length and athleticism around the rim make him a force to be reckoned with even given his relative lack of experience. The Grizzlies have struggled to stop guards from penetrating the paint so far this year, and they’ve also let opposing bigs do more damage than is usual for a Memphis Grizzlies defense. If they’re not focused on containing Davis—and all the while keeping the Pelicans’ guards away from the rim, because, after all, this is a team that features Jrue Holiday (acquired from Philadelphia in a draft-day trade for Nerlens Noel), Eric Gordon, and Tyreke Evans.

The Pelicans aren’t a great team yet, but they’re making moves in the right direction, trying to build a contending team in a division seemingly full of them. The Grizzlies shouldn’t have much trouble with them, but then, they shouldn’t have had much trouble with the Boston Celtics on Monday night either, and that game was far closer than either team probably expected it to be.

It remains to be seen how long it’s going to take the Grizzlies to get their act together on both ends of the court. Monday night against Boston, it seemed like the whole team was settling. Someone on Twitter—I can’t remember who or I’d just embed the tweet (UPDATE: it was Peter Edmiston)—said that the game resembled a 1/16 matchup in the NCAA tournament, where the top-seeded team didn’t even bother to prepare for the game. That’s how it felt. I won’t say that the Grizzlies weren’t playing hard, but it’s indisputable that their execution wasn’t what it should have been. If it hadn’t been for Jerryd Bayless’ 4th quarter explosion, the game could have ended in a manner that was… much less pleasing to the Griz faithful, a fanbase which already feels a little more panicked than they should be after four games.

I’m going to keep repeating the “It’s early in the season” mantra for a while. I don’t know that anything that happens in October or November is really indicative of the true character of a team. After all, the 76ers are 3–1 and have beaten the Bulls and the Heat. Things aren’t settled yet in the NBA. While every game counts, every game is not the final word in how good or bad a team is, and it’s still early enough that I’m not going to be seriously concerned about the direction in which the Grizzlies are headed until they make it out of what looks to be a tough November schedule.

Speaking of which: the Grizzlies are at home tonight against the Pelicans, they’re at home against Warriors on Saturday, and then five of the six games after that are on the road for the classic Grizzlies Early Season West Coast Road Trip (hey, remember the time Allen Iverson went on one of those and didn’t come back?). After a Monday in Indiana and a Wednesday home game against the Raptors—and the newly eyesight-adjusted Rudy Gay’s first chance to, well, see the Memphis crowd—it’s four games in six days, including facing the Clippers in L.A. on a SEGABABA^[1], which is as tough of a draw as it gets in the Fall 2013 NBA. This week of home games is important for the Grizzlies because they’re going to be pushing a giant boulder up a hill for much of the next two weeks, and establishing their identity in the current home stand would go a long way toward making that less of a death march.

It should be a good game tonight. The Grizzlies and the Pelicornets always seem to play each other well, regardless of how good or bad either team is, and I expect tonight’s game to be no exception, especially given the Grizzlies’ peculiarly inchoate nature at the moment. I just hate that I won’t get another look at Kelly Olynyk’s Mike-Miller-rivaling hair.

The Grizzlies lost on the road in Dallas Saturday night, dropping to 1–2 on the year. Tonight they’re back home to face the Boston Celtics. What’s working for the Grizzlies so far, and what’s not?

First things first: the reason the Grizzlies have gotten off to a 1–2 start is not that Dave Joerger’s “new offense” is terrible and doesn’t work. Are the Grizzlies’ offensive difficulties related to the transition to a different offensive mindset? Sure. But their offensive difficulties aren’t the real problem so far: the bigger problem at this point—the reason the Grizzlies’ opponents in all three games so far have scored 100 points—is the defense.

In all three of the Grizzlies’ games so far, the two losses on the road at San Antonio and Dallas and the overtime win at home against Detroit, the Grizzlies’ interior defense has been slow to rotate and has let opposing guards drive to the rim pretty much at will. Lockdown perimeter defense has come and gone—usually when the Grizzlies have found themselves in a hole (as has happened in all three games played so far) they’ve been able to dig themselves back out by tightening up and generating turnovers—but even when the perimeter is secure, the path to the basket appears to be far too open for opposing guards.

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I would assume that there’s correlation (if not causation) between the Grizzlies’ defensive ratings (points allowed per 100 possessions) in the last three games—104.8 against the Spurs, 106.3 against the Pistons, and 116.9 against the Mavericks—and the Grizzlies’ newfound pace. Last season, the Grizzlies were 30th out of 30 teams in the league in pace[1] at 88.4. So far this season, they’re 18th out of 30 with a pace of 94.6. That’s a noticeable jump, and it’s happening mostly with the same group of players. The faster pace is probably at least partly to blame for some of the Grizzlies’ problems so far, and one gets the feeling that Joerger would like to play even faster if the players on the roster would allow for it.

On the other end, things aren’t as simple as “Joerger’s offense sucks.” That’s a cop-out this early in the season, and it’s not paying attention to what’s really going on. The Grizzlies struggles in the three games so far, to my eyes,come down to three specific things:

Turnovers. This is fairly obvious. It’s only three games into the season, but so far the Grizzlies have been turning the ball over an average of 17 times per game. Last year’s average was 14. But especially in the last two games, it seems like the Grizzlies have gotten themselves where they’re down by single digits, they’re not getting stops on the other end of the floor, and then they turn the ball over on consecutive offensive possessions and thus never close the gap with their opponent—or at the very least, they make that gap harder to bridge. Playing from behind is bad enough. Playing from behind and then giving the ball away on multiple consecutive trips down the floor is worse. The Grizzlies are going to have to do a better job of taking care of the basketball than they’ve done so far. It feels like some of the turnovers are coming from bad passes—guys are unsure of where their teammates are going to be (because they’re unfamiliar with the sets being run) and they’re also unsure of which teammate they’re going to be passing to, making it much easier for opposing defenders to jump those passes and generate transition baskets. One hopes that will tighten up as the Grizzlies get more comfortable with each other (several new bench players, after all) and more comfortable with the new sets.

Shot selection. I think newly-contract-extended Quincy Pondexter is maybe the most guilty of this one, what with his newfound allergy to taking open three-pointers even though he’s the best three point shooter on the team not named Miller. I think this baffling phenomenon was best explained yesterday on Twitter by Matt Hrdlicka of Grizzly Bear Blues:

6 min mark 3rd quarter sums up the Grizz season so far. After battling for OREB off missed FT, Grizz turn it over to DAL. MEM recovers…
— Matt Hrdlicka (@theRealHrdlicka) November 3, 2013

… to capture missed layup. JB sprints the ball upcourt, passes to QPon wide open on the wing… who then pumpfakes 3 to take 2 dribbles…
— Matt Hrdlicka (@theRealHrdlicka) November 3, 2013

… but DAL defense recovers and QPon is forced to pass back to JB for a semi-contested 3 in nearly same spot.
— Matt Hrdlicka (@theRealHrdlicka) November 3, 2013

Players are being drilled to attack basket, but often an open 3 from an above average shooter is the best shot you're getting.
— Matt Hrdlicka (@theRealHrdlicka) November 3, 2013

I think, ultimately, that this is a comfort-level thing. These Grizzlies are still playing completely inside their heads and haven’t progressed to the point where they don’t have to think about every move they’re making on the court yet. Until they’re not second-guessing every move that they make—which, with the implementation of any new offensive philosophy is something that’s going to take a little bit of time—they’re going to be taking shots that maybe they shouldn’t be taking. And when they’re taking bad shots, it’s going to (1) lead to more turnovers and (2) have a direct effect on the next thing that’s going on:

Defensive efficiency. Last year, the Grizzlies—through their slow, methodical, play with which they simply pummeled opponents into eventual submission—finished 1st in the league in points allowed (89.3 points per game) and 2nd in the league in defensive rating (100.3 points allowed per 100 possessions). The extremely high level of defensive play, coupled with the fact that the Grizzlies did everything they could to, well, grind opponents to a halt and limit the number of possessions, meant that the Grizzlies were an elite defensive team, able to make pretty much anybody look like a lottery team on any given night.

That simply isn’t the case this year, and it’s related to pace, but it’s also related to the bad shooting and turnovers, which are in turn related to the poor decision making going on. When you take a bad shot early in the clock and aren’t able to secure an offensive rebound, or when you simply turn the ball over on a bad pass, you’re creating transition opportunities for the other team, and you’re giving them easier baskets than they’d be getting otherwise. The Grizzlies discomfort in general is messing with their defense—and since the defense isn’t the all-suffocating airborne toxic event it was last year, the Grizzlies are falling behind and having to play catch-up, which leads to a sense of pressure and a desire to play for the quick score, which means bad shot selection and more turnovers, which leads to falling further behind, which leads to more bad decision making and more easy baskets for the opponent…

You see where I’m going with all of this. The problems the Grizzlies are up against right now aren’t related to the offensive system in and of itself—they’re related to the team’s overall discomfort with the new style of play, and that new style of play is going to take a while before it’s not new anymore. But the offensive system really isn’t all that different from the old one. It’s just sped up, and refocused around the Marc Gasol/Mike Conley pick and roll as a starting point instead of “try to post up and then pass out to the wing if that doesn’t work.” It’s about trying to run the offense in a way that spaces the floor better so that the Grizzlies’ dominant post play can be more efficient and more effective, not “going away from what works.”

It’s only three games into this season. I’m not about to say that there’s no reason to be concerned—of course there is. We have no idea how long this transition is going to take, how well the roster as currently assembled is going to adjust to the tweaks to the Grizzlies’ offensive system, how many games it’s going to cost the Grizzlies and how that’s going to affect the Western Conference playoff standings, which will probably be tighter than Fat Elvis’ jumpsuit. There’s plenty of room for the whole thing to go pear-shaped during this transitional period. But these guys are good basketball players. My gut feeling right now is that whatever roughness we’re currently seeing is temporary—it’s not going to be this way all year. The question now is when are they going to start getting it together?

Celtics as learning experience

Tonight would be a good night to batten down the hatches and beat the crap out of a team that’s not very good (winless, actually) and who just played a road game last night in Detroit (which they lost by 10 points). This year’s model of the Boston Celtics is “in a rebuilding year,” to put it nicely. Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett are gone now, and Rajon Rondo is still out, and Jeff Green and Avery Bradley and the Nets’ sloppy seconds just aren’t going to get very far this year, even in the Eastern Conference.

Taking care of business at home tonight against a bad team could give the Grizzlies a little bit of the breathing room and momentum they need headed into the other two home games this week against the Pelicans (yes, I typed “Hornets” the first time) on Wednesday and the Warriors on Saturday. Those games are practically guaranteed to be much more important at the end of the year than this one. The pressure is off (other than the pressure the Grizzlies are no doubt placing on themselves not to fall to 1–3 on the year) and the opponent is pretty bad, so tonight’s contest against the Celtics should (I say should) be a fairly straightforward win.

A win, and a chance to work out some of the kinks in the negative feedback loop that’s currently giving the Grizzlies so many problems. Here’s hoping they can work out some of that bad mojo tonight.

Back to the Grind

It wasn’t pretty, but then, what ever is with these Memphis Grizzlies? When is it ever easy, and when does it ever look good when it happens? The Grizzlies got their first win of the young season tonight in their first home game, and they did it in typical Grizzlies fashion: they had to grind out a win even though nothing was going their way.

First things first: the Detroit Pistons are much better than they were last year. Andre Drummond and Greg Monroe are a brutal post duo to face off against (sound familiar?) and the addition of Josh Smith at the small forward spot in the place of our mutual friend Tayshaun Prince (not to mention swapping Brandon Jennings for Brandon Knight at the post, although Jennings was injured and out of action tonight) has made this a much better team than they were last year. Kentavious Caldwell-Pope (who I’ll refer to as KCP from here on out to avoid having to type that again) is a rookie guard out of Georgia with a lot of promise, and along with Rodney Stuckey the two of them gave the Grizzlies’ guards a great deal of trouble tonight off the bench.

A lot of things went wrong for the Grizzlies tonight against the Pistons. The first, and most obvious thing was the turnovers. I mean, 20 of them. Uncharacteristically, five of them were on Mike Conley, who seemed to be a little lackadaisical with his passing tonight. Zach Randolph accounted for another 4. It seemed like every other trip down the court, one of those two guys got the ball swatted out of his hands. Detroit is a much-improved defensive team this year, but they’re not, well, the Grizzlies, and taking care of the ball has to be a bigger concern for the Griz going forward.

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Another thing that was concerning to me tonight was the ability of the Pistons’ guards to get into the paint at will. Rodney Stuckey and Will Bynum seemed to be able to drive to the basket every single time they wanted to tonight, and the Grizzlies’ big men weren’t rotating properly to cut the drives off in time. I’m not sure whether the Griz are scheming a little differently on defense or whether they’re just doing more ball-watching than usual on defense, but whatever it is, the bigs can’t play as deep as they’re playing and expect to be able to keep opposing guards out of the paint. It’s just not going to work. I haven’t seen a shot chart yet, but it felt like Detroit was able to generate a large number of attempts near the basket, and with Monroe and Drummond both down low to clean up, it was no wonder the Grizzlies had so much trouble getting stops when they needed them.

Speaking of cleaning up: the Grizzlies only had 6 offensive rebounds all night. At halftime, they had 2, and one of those was on Zach Randolph’s last-second putback of a Mike Conley miss. A Memphis Grizzlies team only having 6 ORebs in a game that went longer than regulation is probably an outlier, sure, but that doesn’t make it okay. If that’s a trend that’s going to continue, it’s eventually going to start costing them basketball games.

If you hadn’t read the first paragraph and didn’t know how the game ended, you’d probably think I was describing all of the reasons the Grizzlies lost, right? It felt that way a lot of the night: like the Griz were going to lose because they were outexecuted and because they turned the ball over too many times. It was a back and forth game, with nine lead changes, the Pistons’ biggest lead being 7 and the Grizzlies’ being 10, but there were times when it felt like the Grizzlies’ sloppy play and inability to hang on to the ball were going to cost them the game.

But somewhere around the four minute mark or so, the Grizzlies started getting stops. Marc Gasol got to the line, and then with two minutes left Mike Miller hit a three to bring the Griz within 2 of the Pistons. The whole building held its breath while the shot arced toward the basket and exploded when it went in. I guess it’s a little early in the season for Gap Band, but it probably would’ve been appropriate. From there on out, the Grizzlies began to assert their control over the game and seemed to reconnect with their inner Grindfather, getting stops (and lucking out on a Chauncey Billups missed gamewinner) and riding Marc Gasol to the tie.

Overtime flew by and the Pistons never seriously challenged for the lead once the Grizzlies grabbed it, and the Grizzlies won 111-108 (it would’ve been 111-105 if not for a wide open Will Bynum buzzer beater from 33 feet).

Overall, hard to argue with the win. The Grizzlies still don’t look comfortable in the offense, and the play hasn’t tightened up yet. They appear to still be overthinking everything, never quite sure who to pass to or where to be. When plays break down guys start improvising, and that never seems to go well. It’s going to be a while before this group of guys—especially the new additions to the roster—start to feel completely comfortable on the floor together, and that’s fine. As Dave Joerger said in the postgame presser, the Grizzlies’ biggest talent is that every single guy on the roster plays hard no matter what, and it’s that professionalism (and, yes, grind-ness) that’s going to carry them through some rough patches that other teams might not make it through—like tonight. I’d sure like it if they were able to look good doing it, though. It’d make these things a lot less stressful.

Looking Ahead

Tomorrow night the Grizzlies take on the Mavericks in Dallas in the first SEGABABA (Second Game of a Back to Back) of the season. It remains to be seen exactly how this Mavericks team is going to gel. The Mavericks are on a SEGABABA too, having lost 105-113 to the Rockets in Houston tonight while the Grizzlies were handling the Pistons.

I’d like to see Mike Miller in street clothes for the Dallas game, since he played 32 minutes in tonight’s game. It might not hurt to keep the recovering Tayshaun Prince to 20 or fewer minutes again tomorrow night too. Beyond that, what happens is anybody’s guess. This early in the year, it’s unlikely that either team is currently in the same configuration they’ll be in at the end of the year.

Next week is a busy one for the Grizzlies, with three games—all at home, mercifully—against the Celtics (which, you know, they should be terrible this year, but look at the 2-0 Philadelphia 76ers), the New Orleans Pelicans (who are improved this year as well with the additions of Jrue Holiday and Memphis Tiger Tyreke Evans), and the Golden State Warriors with their white-hot shooting backcourt of Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson. It’s going to be an eventful week of basketball for the Grizzlies, but no matter what the outcome of tomorrow night’s Dallas game, if they can handle business next week and win at least two, I think they’ll be in great shape to tackle the rest of what looks to be a tough month of November.

More information has come across the Twitter transom today about a contract extension for Griz wing Quincy Pondexter—the extension that was reportedly “unlikely” just last week. First was this report last night from the Commercial Appeal‘s Ron Tillery:

Griz expected to sign Pondexter to a 4-year extension tomorrow before deadline, per source. Ed Davis unlikely because sides are far apart

— Ronald Tillery (@CAGrizBeat) October 31, 2013

Later this morning, Chris Haynes of Comcast SportsNet NW reported in a tweet that the deal to which Pondexter has been signed is for 4 years, $14 million. If that’s the case, that’s somewhat less than Pondexter was widely anticipated to sign for. Most estimates had the deal being for at least two or three million more.

The extension of Pondexter comes on the heels of his great showing in last year’s Western Conference Finals, and his continued development coming into the preseason this year. It’s clear that Pondexter still hasn’t reached the ceiling of his game, and has room to improve even more over the next four years. And, if not, this contract is certainly a good deal for the Grizzlies, and it’s not likely to cause any salary cap issues going forward.

As for Davis, I think it’s safe to say that the Grizzlies haven’t seen enough from him yet this season—preseason games and one real game in which he played eight minutes—to know whether they wanted to commit to him at whatever price his representatives were asking. If Davis has a great year, that will turn out to be bad for the Grizzlies’ hopes of keeping him. If he doesn’t, it’ll probably turn out to have been the right call.