Larry Kuzniewski
It’s counter-intuitive to say that a 16-point loss, the Grizzlies’ fourth in a row, was encouraging. And yet, given the way things went the last time the Grizzlies played the Golden State Warriors—the worst loss in franchise history—it’s not crazy to say that Wednesday’s 100-84 home loss to the best team in the league (and maybe one of the best teams in league history, given the way they’ve started the season) wasn’t all bad news for the struggling Grizzlies.
The first and most obvious thing is the defense: it was recognizable last night. Even with Russ Smith thrown into the mix as the backup point guard having to try and stop Steph Curry (which, as he found out, is less possible that it sounds) and newly-acquired Mario Chalmers and James Ennis behind the bench in suits, the Griz gave the Warriors their best shot on Wednesday night, very nearly held them under 100 points, held Curry to 3 of 10 from long range, and… lost by 16 at home.
All is not right with the Grizzlies, still. But at least last night showed that Monday night’s performance—in which they hung tough with the Clippers most of the night despite having no offense—wasn’t a fluke, that what looked like serious effort issues to start the season were (hopefully) temporary. Some points of discussion:
Game Notes
Larry Kuzniewski
➭ Mike Conley is still not right. After not making a shot in the first half, Conley’s third quarter was much improved, but that’s like saying “At least my Pinto has a radio.” It’s still fundamentally not where the Grizzlies need Conley to be if they’re going to make the playoffs this year, much less be any good.
Not only is Conley struggling to get his own offense going; he also looks tentative, like he’s afraid of getting into the lane and drawing contact, something he’s never had an issue with before. I think there are probably two reasons for this, both fairly obvious:
- He still worries about the broken face he suffered during the playoffs last year, even though he apparently feels comfortable enough to play without the Rip Hamilton facemask he was sporting for the whole preseason.
- More importantly, I think Conley and Gasol both have realized that they simply have to be able to play their best basketball in April and beyond for the Griz to have a chance to do anything in the postseason. Taking abuse every single night during October and November makes that impossible, especially for a guy like Conley, who gets absolutely leveled on a regular basis around the basket (which is kind of the deal when you play the way he plays). Whether this is a conscious decision to take fewer hits or a subconscious aversion to contact, I don’t know.
If Conley has changed the way he plays, the team needs to adapt with him, or it’s going to be a long, bad contract year for him.
➭ Matt Hrdlicka and others were talking about this last night and during the Clippers game, so I cant take credit for the observation, but Marc Gasol can’t bend his knees well. This is a new and bothersome variation on the “Marc Gasol is not in game shape” meme we’ve all been talking about since the season began, but Gasol’s limited movement, poor conditioning, and now his lingering neck issues have combined to make him much less effective than his norm, to say nothing of the Super Gasol we saw in the first half of last season.
I’m not really worried about this as a season-long thing; as long as he listens to his body and doesn’t try to force anything—something Gasol is reticent to do as someone who wants to play every game—he’ll be fine. The team told him to take the summer off. He apparently took it really off. Like Conley, this may take a while to work itself out.
Larry Kuzniewski
➭ JaMychal Green had another good game as an energy/garbage guy: he scored 9 points on 3 of 4 shooting, grabbed 9 rebounds, blocked a couple shots and got a steal. I haven’t figured out yet why Green’s performances—in which he looks like a really nice hustle-based bench big—result in such poor single game +/- numbers and bad net ratings, too, but on the surface, anyway, Green is playing hard and (maybe this is a little too honest) making me question how much the Grizzlies really need Brandan Wright.
➭ Speaking of the bench, here was a lineup that did really well in the third quarter: Russ Smith, Courtney Lee, Matt Barnes, JaMychal Green, Zach Randolph. I’ve become a fan of these Z-Bo-as-bench-center units this season, and I think that’s where he’s headed long term as his career winds down, but even this season he just fits as the 5 in that lineup. The Lee/Barnes wing combo is a new look, like a Lee/Jeff Green combo that can actually defend and knows where to stand, JaMychal Green just floats around and shows up out of nowhere for rebounds and putbacks (and the occasional corner 3, which he hasn’t attempted in a while), and Russ Smith only knows how to play basketball at Ludicrous Speed. It’s a fun group. There’s potential there, so don’t be surprised if you see some variant of that 5-man unit logging serious second unit time this season.
➭ Marc Gasol hit a three. Be prepared. Someday soon he’s going to start taking them all the time.
Tweet of the Night
This moment of panic from the first half sums up the unadulterated terror of Grizzlies fans while they’re playing the Warriors and Golden State is on a run:
MAKE WITH THE BASKETBALL MARC GASOL WE PAID YOU ALL OUR MONEY WE CAN’T EVEN BUY BBQ AND YOU EAT FANCY PAELLA AND DON’T MAKE SHOTS
— MeTweet (@MeTweetGrizz) November 12, 2015
Larry Kuzniewski
Presumably not going anywhere any time soon.
Up Next
Friday night the Grizzlies face the Portland Trail Blazers at home, in what is the first real test of their improvement as of late. They were always going to play harder for the Clippers game because they strongly dislike each other, and the Warriors game was always going to be a double-digit loss, but Portland… Portland’s gotten off to a much better start than anyone expected them to this year, and while their offense has been humming, the Grizzlies should be able to pay them back for the loss they suffered in Portland last week if they defense has tightened up.
Plus it’ll be our first look at Mario Chalmers and James Ennis (if he plays) in a Grizzlies uniform, so while most of the Forum crowd, myself included, will be having horrible Tigers/Jayhawks flashbacks, it will also be a chance to see whether Chalmers is actually going to be an improvement over Beno Udrih or not. I think the writing was on the wall from preseason that Udrih wasn’t going to be the same guy this season (except for his white-hot midrange game), but Chalmers comes to Memphis with a lot of question marks, beyond the obvious “Is some Tiger booster going to slash his tires on a nightly basis?”
If the Grizzles have really gotten it together, at least on defense, the Portland game should show us that.
