Daily Memphian
Chris Herrington
Chris Herrington has covered the Memphis Grizzlies, in one way or another, since the franchise’s second season in Memphis, while also writing about music, movies, food and civic life. As far as he knows, he’s the only member of the Professional Basketball Writers Association who is also a member of a film critics group and has also voted in national music critic polls for Rolling Stone and the Village Voice (RIP). He now splits his time between Minneapolis-St. Paul, where his wife works, and Memphis.
The Memphis Grizzlies are moving from one era to another. They are “pivoting to a younger build,” as lead basketball executive Zach Kleiman said after the Feb. 5 trade deadline. They are “moving forward,” as the team wrote in a subsequent letter to season-ticket holders.
In this series of columns, I’m looking at the Grizzlies’ basketball-management track record in the seven seasons under Kleiman’s direction. How have they operated and how well? And what can we — or, perhaps more importantly, they — learn from past performance as a team rebuild moves forward?
NBA front offices have varied duties when it comes to building and managing a team. Players are acquired via draft, trade and free agency, and often leave via the latter two routes. Contracts are negotiated. Coaches are hired and fired. Personalities are managed and strategy is decided and implemented.
In the first column in this series, I explored the Kleiman-era draft record. In this one, I’ll look at the front office’s trade history.
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