2025 Memphis Grizzlies Preseason Preview
Last season the Memphis Grizzlies finished with 27 wins and 55 loses. The Grizzlies hope to player fewer than 33 players this season, the leauge leading numbers of players who wore a Memphis jersey last season. To understand what this Memphis team is capable, it’s more fruitful to look back at their 2022-2023 season when the young Grizzlies finished second in the West for the second straight year.
(AP Photo/Brandon Dill)
Ja Morant will look to return to All-NBA form after playing only 9 games last season due to a combination of suspension and injury. In those 9 games Morant looked out of rhythm as he took a career high 5.7 three point attempts on a career low .275 percentage.
Assuming more games allows Morant to be consistent of offense, Memphis should be a well rounded team with a tandem of former former Defensive Player of the Years in Marcus Smart and Jaren Jackson Jr. leading their defense. Smart played 20 games is his first season with Memphis last year, and while Jackson played a team high 66, he will start the season on the injury report.
What might be lost on this Memphis team is veteran leadership, losing Tyus Jones, Steven Adams, Dillion Brooks, and Danny Green, 4 of the most experienced players on that 2023 2nd place finish. Marcus Smart is the veteran on this team with 10 years of experience and no other players with more than 7. This Memphis team is young and they continue to aquire intriguing young players with the emergence of GG Jackson II who played well in his 48 games but will miss a sizable portion at the beginning of this season. Another exciting young player for the Grizzlies will be 9th overall draft pick Zach Eddey. The 7’4” center joins the Grizzlies after 4 years at Perdue.
Memphis should be comfortable to ride with this roster, having control over every one of their players aside from Luke Kennard for the next two seasons. Kennard will be an unrestricted free agent at the end of this year. If they do feel they are in a rush however, Memphis owns all of their future first round draft picks and could match a variety different, larger contracts by aggregating contracts at the risk of upsetting their fan base who has grown fond of a myriad of home grown players.
