With Ja Morant, Grizzlies are cracking the Warriors’ code

MEMPHIS, Tenn. – Stephen Curry reached out his hand and Ja Morant shook it back, though neither actually broke stride. Game 2 was over, the greatest game of Morant’s career, and he looked back with his one good eye as the two headed to locker rooms on the opposite ends of the FedExForum court Tuesday night.

“We going to have some fun,” Morant said to Curry, and he later revealed it was what Curry had said to him and Jaren Jackson Jr. after Game 1.

So the more telling comment came from Curry, once the Memphis Grizzlies evened their series against the Golden State Warriors at one game apiece with a 106-101 win.

Once he was asked whether the compelling and increasingly contemptuous first two games of this NBA Western Conference semifinal series had taken him by surprise.

Once he answered with a hint of resignation in his voice, from knowing what Morant had just done could be done again because Golden State might not have anybody who can stop it from being done.

“You just got to win four games,” Curry said. “Somehow, some way.”

There’s a vulnerability and desperation to these Warriors that didn’t exist the last time they were in the NBA playoffs, a sense they have to prove they can reach that championship level again in this new decade of contention, and every bit of off-court drama in this matchup with Memphis, every emotional mood swing, should be digested and viewed with that in mind.

It has been there since this series began, a series setting up to be the one talked about more than any other in this round of the postseason. Both Golden State and Memphis will head to San Francisco for Saturday’s Game 3, able to talk themselves into believing they should be up 2-0 based on how they played.

Memphis, the team that scored more points in the paint than anyone else in the NBA this season, is outshooting Golden State from 3-point range. Golden State, founding fathers of the smallball revolution that ranked in the top five in the NBA in every 3-point shooting category this season, is pounding Memphis on the offensive glass.

It is a strange dichotomy that produced a sensational opening flourish these past few days, full of tension and triggers.

“Dillon Brooks broke the code,” Golden State coach Steve Kerr declared after Game 2, and it reads as ridiculous as it sounds coming from the coach who never brought up this code just two days earlier when Draymond Green yanked Brandon Clarke from midair.

But what if that inflammatory statement provided the Warriors with as much cover as it did rightful outrage over a selfish flagrant foul that could merit a suspension?

What if, with Morant, the Grizzlies could be on the verge of cracking Golden State’s code?

Those 47 points Morant scored were each sensational in their own way, and the final 15 materialized in a fantastic closing kick, as well-timed as any moment in franchise history.

It was Morant beating Curry and Klay Thompson and Jordan Poole and whoever else the Warriors threw at him, on layups and floaters and more 3-pointers than he had hit since Dec. 29. It happened because Golden State doesn’t appear to have anyone capable of sticking with Morant for any significant amount of time anymore.

Brooks’ controversial foul left Gary Payton II with a fractured elbow three minutes into Game 2. Golden State should have been angry. Just like Grizzlies fans were mad at Green.

It was a dangerous play by Brooks. It seemed Kerr, Curry and Green were all pushing for Brooks to be suspended without actually using those words, the argument being that Payton’s injury deserved further retribution.

If Golden State is going to be without its Morant stopper for the time being – although Payton didn’t exactly shut down Morant in Game 1 – the Grizzlies might as well be without their best possible option at stopping Curry for an extra game. But what does “The Code” say about an elbow injury when a player awkwardly braces for a fall?

The very notion of it, brought up by Kerr, tells you how much of a threat Memphis is to Golden State, and how serious Morant makes that threat.