Grizzlies VP on Jaren Jackson Jr., Marc Gasol
The Commercial Appeal's Peter Edmiston recently spoke to Grizzlies Executive Vice President of Basketball Operations John Hollinger for a wideranging look at the Grizzlies' offseason and their future. In Part 1, Hollinger talked about the Grizzlies offseason plan. In Part 2, Hollinger talked about the team's ownership, decisionmaking, and a focus on player development.
In Part 3, Hollinger expounds on Jaren Jackson Jr. and his blinding potential.
Q: After you've been around him and watched him during Summer League, what is the outlook for Jaren Jackson Jr.? Does he start right away? What do you see as his ceiling?
JH: I think whatever happens, we want it to happen organically, and not get ahead of ourselves, and make sure we're taking all the right steps on him, and not getting too excited and skipping ahead.
That said, when you ask me what his ceiling is, I struggle to come up with a limit. I think he's shown the ability to do things a lot of people in this league just can't do. We're very excited about his future and we just have to see where it goes and how much of that future we'll get a glimpse of this year.
Q: How would Jackson starting as a 4 alongside another big like Marc Gasol affect his development? Do you see him as a 4 or a 5 longterm?
JH: We don't see it as too big of an issue. The big roles on a lot of teams are interchangeable. We don't want to put him into overtly physical matchups yet, because he's 18 and his body is still filling out. I think once he's more fully developed physically, I think he probably can be a 5 most of the time. That said, with his defensive ability, he can guard on the perimeter, so you don't really have to be as caught up in definitions, because he's shown such a flexibility in the types of roles he can play offensively and defensively. Even if you were to say that long-term, he was a 5, he's capable of playing with other bigs, and it doesn't necessarily have to be certain kinds of other bigs, his skillset is flexible enough that he can adjust to whatever he's paired out there with.