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.
This Memphis Grizzlies season, which arrives in full form Wednesday night with an opener against Ol’ Pal Jaren Jackson Jr. and his Utah Jazz, will be a different kind of experience.
Rather than playing wait-and-see with a star player, Ja Morant, whose body and mind aligned sparingly in recent seasons, it will be about getting to know a new would-be star, a preposterously precocious teenager, Cameron Boozer, who’s arrived with a chiseled body, a quick mind and a ready-made facility with nearly every aspect of the sport.
The NBA’s expanded postseason, new anti-tanking rules and the Grizzlies’ own desire to put the disreputable but perhaps necessary display of last season behind them should conspire to produce more meaningful games played far deeper into the season.
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