reports Tim MacMahon and Michael C. Wright of ESPN<\/a>.<\/p>\n\u201cIn the aftermath, Morant told players around the league and some of his former coaches that he isn\u2019t playing for Memphis anymore, sources said.\u201d<\/p>\n
He\u2019s expected to get his wish this offseason.<\/p>\n
The Grizzlies looked for a Morant trade at the February deadline, but nothing materialized that Memphis general manager Zach Kleiman liked \u2014 the offers were \u201cmodest.\u201d He did trade Jaren Jackson Jr. to Utah in the wake of trading Desmond Bane to Orlando the previous summer. The Grizzlies are in a rebuild and Morant \u2014 a fan favorite in Memphis \u2014 is almost unquestionably going to be moved. <\/p>\n
However, Morant is not going to bring back the haul of draft picks that Jackson and Bane brought to Memphis, ESPN reports.<\/p>\n
Several executives from other teams polled by ESPN believe the Grizzlies should have better luck finding a destination for Morant this summer, with the caveat that Memphis shouldn\u2019t expect to get much value in return.<\/p>\n
A few things hold teams back from going all-in on Morant. One is that he is owed $87.1 million guaranteed over the next two seasons, and in an NBA where teams are trying to avoid the tax aprons, that is a lot of money to take on for anything short of an All-Star player (which Morant has not been in recent years). Second is Morant\u2019s lenghty injury history \u2014 he has not played in 65 games since his rookie season and not more than 50 in any of the last three. Finally, there is Morant\u2019s ball-dominant style \u2014 he has to have the ball in his hands and be the primary shot creator to be at his best \u2014 and that is not a natural fit on a lot of rosters.<\/p>\n
That said, this summer there will be teams chasing the bigger names \u2014 Giannis Antetokounmpo, maybe Kawhi Leonard \u2014 that will strike out, and suddenly see Morant as an option. The ESPN story mentions the retooling Sacramento Kings, who spoke to the Grizzlies at the deadline but didn\u2019t come anywhere near a deal. <\/p>\n
Wherever it is, expect Morant to be in a new uniform next season. He\u2019s ready to move on from the Grizzies and they are ready to move on from him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ja Morant\u2019s frustration with the Grizzlies and coach Tuomas Iisalo is no secret \u2014 the team suspended its…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":711961,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3795],"tags":[7,294,293,177,4070,6],"class_list":{"0":"post-711960","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-memphis-grizzlies","8":"tag-basketball","9":"tag-grizzlies","10":"tag-memphis","11":"tag-memphis-grizzlies","12":"tag-memphisgrizzlies","13":"tag-nba"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116416236987845304","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711960","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=711960"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/711960\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/711961"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=711960"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=711960"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=711960"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}