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Should Grizzlies take a big man in NBA Draft?
If you watched the NBA Finals, and you probably did, because Memphis was the highest-rated TV market outside of Cleveland or the Bay Area, you saw high-level basketball played by superstars for high stakes. What you did not see much of was big men. True centers are an increasingly rare sight at the highest-levels of the NBA, and when they do play, it is typically to fill a defensiveor rebounding-oriented role, not to score.
Karl-Anthony Towns, Rudy Gobert, Hassan Whiteside, DeAndre Jordan, Andre Drummond — all of them talented centers, all max money players now or in the future, all unable to play against the smaller lineups often used late in games as the league continues to emphasize spacing and shooting rather than size. The centers who do play must be able to switch and defend players in space. If they can't, they're not able to stay on the floor against teams that can play small.
So where does this leave the Grizzlies, holders of the No. 4 pick in an NBA Draft laden with talented centers?
What about Marvin Bagley III, Mo Bamba and Jaren Jackson Jr.?
DeAndre Ayton won't be there at 4, but he's a 7-1 prototype center. Mohamed Bamba is 7-0 with a 7-10 wingspan, a center if ever there was one. Jaren Jackson Jr. and Marvin Bagley III are both likely NBA centers despite playing as power forwards in college. Those players make up four of the first five or six picks in most mock drafts.
The questions facing the Grizzlies' front office, then, are: Should you take the most talented player, even if that player plays a position that's often schemed off the floor? Should you instead take a wing or a point guard, even if he's lower on your board? Grizzlies general manager Chris Wallace isn't afraid to buck the trends.
"Put me in the minority, but I don't think the big has gone the way of the dinosaur. If you've got the right big, that guy can still do an awful lot of damage," Wallace said. "Even though the league is moving in the small-ball revolution toward shooting the three, you still like to
have guys who can block shots, score on the inside, and do all the things a great big man can do."
That small-ball revolution Wallace referred to isn't coming — it's here. The last time the Grizzlies took a center at the top of the draft, the year was 2009. That year, teams around the league took 22 percent of their shots from behind the 3-point line. This past season, that number was a staggering 33 percent. In 2009, just four teams took more than 26 percent of their shots from behind the arc. This past season? Every team did.
The Grizzlies' dilemma is deepened by the fact they already have a talented All-Star center on the roster in Marc Gasol. If it's hard to play one center in the NBA at times, how can you ever play two? How will the top pick develop if he doesn't see the floor? In that scenario, some of the potential picks are easier fits with Gasol than others. Jackson and Bagley could play as power forwards alongside Gasol, though that may not be either man's ideal NBA position.
What about Luka Doncic?
The path of least resistance, and the one that matches the modern NBA, is to take wing sensation Luka Doncic. He's got the ideal size and skillset to immediately help the Grizzlies. Should he be unavailable at four, things would get interesting. The other top non-center prospects all have significant red flags. Trae Young, the sharpshooting guard out of Oklahoma, is considered a subpar defender. He's also quite small and is best played at the point. Of course, the problem is that the Grizzlies already have Mike Conley. Can you play Young and Conley in the same backcourt? Michael Porter Jr. is the biggest wild card in the draft. He'd fit the Grizzlies from a positional standpoint as a 6-11 wing, but he played just a handful of minutes in college while recovering from back surgery. Given the Grizzlies' checkered past with injuries, would they be willing to roll the dice on Porter? Every decision is fraught with potential peril. If you take a center, you might end up with a guy you can't play down the stretch. Take a wing, and you're taking a risk of fit or health, while potentially passing over more talented players. Success could reload a playoff team. Failure would set the team back years. Good luck.