{"id":784202,"date":"2026-07-11T21:39:27","date_gmt":"2026-07-11T21:39:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/784202\/"},"modified":"2026-07-11T21:39:27","modified_gmt":"2026-07-11T21:39:27","slug":"trail-blazers-ja-morant-pushes-back-on-bad-guy-narrative","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/784202\/","title":{"rendered":"Trail Blazers&#8217; Ja Morant pushes back on &#8216;bad guy&#8217; narrative"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Ja Morant has the chance to rebuild his career in Portland, to revive his reputation as one of the league\u2019s most electric talents.<\/p>\n<p>But he knows it will be far harder to remake the perception so many have of him as a \u201cbad guy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cObviously, I\u2019ve done what I\u2019ve done in the past, but it\u2019s been addressed and handled already. I don\u2019t see why, years later, that\u2019s still the topic when nothing\u2019s happened since,\u201d Morant said <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/BenGolliver\/status\/2076005923768971588\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">in his first media availability<\/a> since being <a href=\"https:\/\/nypost.com\/2026\/06\/29\/sports\/ja-morant-traded-to-trail-blazers-in-end-to-troubled-grizzlies-tenure\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">traded to the Trail Blazers<\/a>, per ESPN. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cI feel like if I was that guy you wouldn\u2019t be talking to me now.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.77777778;display:block\" fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39956599\" width=\"1024\" height=\"576\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/second-half-nba-basketball-game-7532416.jpg\" alt=\"Memphis Grizzlies guard Ja Morant dribbling the basketball.\" class=\"wp-image-39956599\"  \/>Grizzlies guard Ja Morant (12) during the second half of a game against the Houston Rockets on Wednesday, March 1, 2023, in Houston. AP<\/p>\n<p>The two-time All-Star is just 26 but has seen his stock dip significantly, having played just\u00a079 games in the past three seasons due to injuries and off-court issues.<\/p>\n<p>Morant, who has averaged 22.4 points and 7.4 assists since being taken with the No. 2 overall pick in the 2019 NBA Draft, looked like a shell of himself last season, as he struggled to stay healthy and shot a career-worst 41 percent from the field (23.5 percent on 3-pointers). <\/p>\n<p>However, Memphis\u2019 difficulty trading the guard also stemmed from his image.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>Morant served an eight-game ban in 2023 for \u201cconduct detrimental to the league\u201d and a 25-game suspension to start the 2023-24 season, following incidents in which he displayed a gun on an Instagram live stream. <\/p>\n<p>Morant was also suspended for one game this past season for an altercation with coach Tuomas Iisalo.<\/p>\n<p><img style=\"aspect-ratio:1.49926794;display:block\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" data-modal-image=\"39956592\" width=\"885\" height=\"590\" src=\"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/user-expressly-acknowledges-agrees-downloading-131964433.jpg\" alt=\"Ja Morant of the Memphis Grizzlies looking on after a game.\" class=\"wp-image-39956592\"  \/>Ja Morant of the Memphis Grizzlies looks on after the game against the Cleveland Cavaliers at FedExForum on April 06, 2026. Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDo I feel like I need a new start? I love it. I\u2019m happy for it,\u201d Morant said. \u201cGet to start fresh. New home, new team, new organization. I get to show the fans in Portland a different Ja \u2026 Over the years, I\u2019ve grown a lot. I\u2019ve learned a lot<\/p>\n<p>\u201cJust staying more focused and what\u2019s the most important thing. not worrying about any of the outside stuff. \u2026 Anything that was a problem in Memphis shouldn\u2019t matter to me no more. My focus is Portland.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ja Morant has the chance to rebuild his career in Portland, to revive his reputation as one of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":784203,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3784],"tags":[7,601,178,177,6,687,471,3967,66,1617],"class_list":["post-784202","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-portland-trail-blazers","tag-basketball","tag-blazers","tag-ja-morant","tag-memphis-grizzlies","tag-nba","tag-portland","tag-portland-trail-blazers","tag-portlandtrailblazers","tag-sports","tag-trail-blazers"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116903514457411607","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/784202","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=784202"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/784202\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/784203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=784202"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=784202"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=784202"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}