Where do the Memphis Grizzlies rank in the southwest division?

Where do the Memphis Grizzlies rank in the southwest division?

It’s another episode of Lockdown Grizzlies and this time around we are going to be taking a look at the division, the Southwest division that is. Who is Memphis better than out in the Southwest? Who is better than the Grizzlies? And we’ll close out this edition of the show taking a look at the creepy googlyey John new Nike commercial. All that and more on this edition of Locked Down Grizzlies. Let’s lock in. You are Locked On Grizzlies, your daily Memphis Grizzlies podcast, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. Welcome to this episode of Locked On Grizzlies. It is I, Joe Mullenax, one of your hosts. And it’s always a good day when I’m able to say that, especially in these dog days of the off season because that means I get a chance to hang out with my wonderful partner, Memphis Grizzlies Beat Writer for the Commercial Appeal in Memphis, Tennessee, the Michael Cole. But I know this week it’s a special week in Memphis every year. One of your favorite weeks every year, partner, because you’re not you’re not just an NBA. Don’t make me do this. Don’t you make me do this. You’re not just an NBA beat writer this week. You are also a golf writer, if I am not mistaken. Woo. So excited to be on the green. It’s nothing like it. There you go. Well, you can rock your bird. Catch me on one. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we’re not with them anymore, but Oh, yeah. We Sorry. You you can catch me somewhere on the course. Uh I’ll be there though. I’ll be there. I’ll be there Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, you know, um you know, taking in the action. So, yeah, we’ll we’ll see what what happens. over the last few years. It’s It’s been some pretty I don’t remember last year, but I know the year before that was a pretty dramatic finish. Uh so yeah, we’ll see. We’ll see what happens. FedEx St. Jude Championship. If you’re out there, say hello. Say hello. Yeah, absolutely. Hit up to Michael. Tell him how wonderful he is because it’s true. And tell him how much better the show would be if it was just him and not not me and which is also true. I don’t like that. Uh today’s episode is brought to you by Game Time. Download the Game Time app, create an account, use code lockdown NBA for $20 off your first purchase. We are free and available wherever you get podcasts as proud members of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team each and every single day. Like, comment, rate, review, subscribe on Apple, Spotify, Google, Amazon, YouTube. Literally anywhere you get a podcast, you can get Lockdown Grizzlies to Michael and I hope that you are an everydayer at this point. If you’re not, if today’s your first time through, hello, how are you? Thanks for stopping by the little corner of the internet that we like to call Lockdown Grizzlies. We’re going into year four to Michael, which is crazy to say. Shout out to you, Joe. Yeah, congrats with Locked On Grizzlies. I tell you what, you know, uh, after SB Nation kicked off Grizzly Bear Blues, it’ll always be GBB to me. Darn it. Um, you know, one day, one day I’m going to go back and, uh, listen to that interview you did when I first got the job and and you were at the podcast. Just just see how far our chemistry has come, you know, since No, it’s come a long way. It’s been a long way. Yeah. Yeah. But it’s been a long it’s been a journey to say the least. And uh you know I’m very grateful to Nick and David and obviously to Michael, everybody here at Lockdown. Uh three years has flown by. That’s a fact. And um you know excited for year four, excited to be working with the Michael and excited to be with you on this episode of Lockdown Grizzlies as always. And we’re going to lock in here partner on the Southwest division at large. Obviously divisions aren’t that important anymore, right? But you can still win a divisional title. It was important to the Grizzlies a couple of years ago when they did actually win the divisional titles. It was the first time they had ever done it. So, I I I do think it’s a nice tidy way to check in on teams that the Grizzlies are going to see more than they’re going to see anybody else, right? They’re going to see the Houston Rockets. They’re going to see the San Antonio Spurs. They’re going to see the New Orleans Pelicans. And they’re going to see the Dallas Mavericks more than they see anybody else on the NBA schedule because of that divisional matchup or those divisional matchups. And I thought it would be fun to structure it in a way, partner, where we would talk about team. We we would basically rank Southwest Division. And I think that you and I are going to be pretty different in the middle. I’m fairly confident we’re going to be similar at the top and we’re going to be similar at the bottom. So, we’re going to start at number one. And this is locked on Grizzlies, but we are not a homer podcast. It would be asinine to say that any team other than the Houston Rockets is the number one team in the Southwest Division to replace Dylan Brooks and Jaylen Green with Kevin freaking Durant. Yep. And to trot that team out with the defensive weapons that Houston has. Maybe you’re really high on Victor Webbbyama partner, but I’m fairly confident most folks going into the season have OKC1, Houston 2, which Yep. So, facto means Houston’s the number one team out in the Southwest. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Uh that that’s where I am right now. Houston’s number one in the Southwest. Uh did a really good job of, like you said, turning Dylan Brooks and Jaylen Green uh into Kevin Durant. I like what they did getting Dorian Finny Smith, too. like they have a lot of optionality with their starting lineup, which is something I factor in. And as we talk about these rankings and uh shout out to the everydayers, if you’ve been an everyday, if you’ve been listening to the podcast for a while, uh you you know that, you know, I think I could say this for you too, Joe, but I’ll speak for myself solely and Joe can chime in when he wants, but uh I weigh the regular season in the playoffs on different scales. And trust me, if you’ve been following the Grizzlies, you understand that sentiment as well with this team being a number two seed in the regular season uh in recent years twice, 2022, 2023, and they go into both of those playoffs and they lose to teams who were, you know, lower seeds or whatever the case may be. You know, the Warriors that was a championship type team and eventually, I think, won a championship that season. But in the case of the Lakers, you know, that was a first round series. Sure, there were injuries and whatnot, but um two times basically where the Grizzlies were the higher seed and uh didn’t advance uh further in the playoffs. So, you you learn to kind of take the regular season for what it’s worth. And what I’ve said on this show time and time and again is the regular season, Depth wins in the regular season. Depth doesn’t win in the playoffs. Uh you you got six or seven good guys in the playoffs, you’re ready to roll. you’re playing 10 guys in the playoffs, you’re probably going to get hollered at, screamed at because the other team’s going to be playing Anthony Edwards, LeBron James, Luca Donuch, uh, 40 minutes. Uh, so depth is a nonfactor. I won’t say it’s a complete non-factor because, you know, you have situations like Tyrese Hallebertton and those type guys getting hurt and it’s good to have a Andrew Nimhard or, you know, those type of players to step in, but at the same time, depth is not as big of a factor in the playoffs as is in the regular season. So, when we’re talking about regular season, when we’re going to be talking about winning this, you’ll start to notice that for me, uh, the way that I weigh the regular season in the playoffs, a little bit different. But getting back to your original point, Joe, Houston number one in particular because they have the two things combined. They have the top end talent uh, with the Fred Van Fleet, uh, Kevin Durant, you know, Alpron Shingon. Uh, but they also have the depth amen Thompson as well. I don’t want to leave him out. There are so many other names you can say, but they also have the depth as well. you know, if a Fred Vanet goes down, you know, for a little while, you got to Reed Shepard who’s I think could take a nice type of jump uh here really soon. Uh you got the, you know, Dorian Finny Smiths of the world who can could step in and be that ace defender if a man Thompson, you know, is struggling or whatever the case may be. You got the Jabari uh Smiths of the world who’s capable of being uh, you know, a top level scorer as well. They they got a lot of talent over there. Really impressive team, Houston. I think where we might diverge a little bit partner is at number two and I am curious who your second best team in the Southwest division is. Well, if if we’re talking regular season because that’s where we’re talking right now because this is where I I get into that whole point I just made where things shift uh based on how I expect the regular season to go. Uh I got the Grizzlies. Got the Grizzlies is number two uh in the Southwest division at this point in time. Um, but in the playoffs, the Grizzlies would not be the number two team in the Southwest Division in my mind. Not so fast, my friend. Oh, there you go. Shout out to Lee Corso, who’s retiring from college game day here in a few weeks. Uh, I have the San Antonio Spurs as the number two team in the Southwest Division, which means the Memphis Grizzlies are not in the top two. Oh, you’re you’re buying this hype, huh? I am all about Victor Wanyama. Here’s a guy who is 7 foot five who is probably going to be the defensive player of the year each of the next 10 seasons as long as he is healthy, right? And again, he obviously wasn’t healthy this past year. It was a I think a blood clot is if I’m correct. Uh so again, it’s important to point out it’s not like he has bad knees or something like that. It was a something that he should be fully healed from and he’ll be ready to go. Um, I think that you have a defensive monster there and you have the offensive capacity that goes along with it. Again, he’s a 7 foot five guy that shoots probably more three-pointers. Let me know when I can chime in here, too, because I’m Oh, sure. I will. Um, I think you got De’Aran Fox there in San Antonio. He just signed a max contract if I remember correctly, a contract extension. So, Fox is going to be there for a while. They have topend talent. That is young, right? Don’t forget Sevon Castle, uh Harper, I believe, that they drafted in the draft this past year. So, they have a phenomenal core and yeah, they’re young and I do think that that’s an important thing to point out, but the Grizzlies were young three years ago and they were the number two seed in the Western Conference. So, I’m buying the San Antonio Spurs hype and I think they are better than the Grizzlies as presently constructed. I I I I like what they could be, but Joe, what have we seen that have shown us that? Even when they got De’Aran Fox, there was there wasn’t anything that that we saw was like, “Oh, man, that that team like with the Rockets, when you go to the Rockets the year before and you watch the way that they closed that season.” Everybody was like, “Oh, just wait till next year.” You and they took that step. They took that leap. But with San Antonio, it’s all projection, right? Even last season, like we didn’t even get to really get into it, but Victor Wendyama was this huge favorite for defensive player of the year. This isn’t me, hey, I’m, you know, go check what I’ve said on Wendy. I been big on WHY uh since he was in France. But he was this huge defensive player of the year favorite. Did you watch the Grizzlies play against that defense? Did you watch the NBA play against that defense? They weren’t a top 10 defense in the league, but oh, he gets three steals, he gets four blocks, and he has these fancy stats. To me, the defensive player of the year is anchoring a top five top 10 unit. That’s usually how we that’s usually where we, you know, that’s that’s the baseline. Like even if Marcusaul, he wasn’t averaging 15 steals and 10 blocks and all these crazy gig gadget numbers like um you know, when but guess what? Mark Gasol was anchoring at the time what was one of the best defensive teams, you know, of that time. Uh so with that all that being said, like I’m looking at the Spurs, they don’t strike me as the most physical team. They’re young. Like I like these young players. I like Stfan Castle, but guess what? You go look at Stefan Castle’s advanced numbers, you’re gonna see a whole lot of in inefficiency, and I’m I’m just not that bought into it. Dylan Harper, love him as a prospect. He was really a large part of the year. I had him number one, but guess what? He’s a rookie. We just saw how that played out with the Grizzlies. And then you go on and down the list, you got Deon Vel. That’s a player they had on the trading block recently. Like he some inconsistencies there. Harrison Barnes, we’ve seen that story. There was a reason uh they didn’t run it back with him in 2016 with the Golden State Warriors and they went and got Kevin Durant, whatever the case may be. So, but look, I’m not hating. It’s a talented team, but the Grizzlies put it on them last season a decent amount. And I do think Dear Fox being there will help that case or whatever, but I’m I’m not I’m not just jumping. It’s not like Dear Fox has just taken a bunch of teams in the past and elevated them to huge winners like he’s had. He It took Damonte Sabonis coming there and probably being 1A, 1B, however you looking at it for that team to get to the next step. De’Aran Fox and Victor Winyama barely played together last season. There’s not a ton of overlap between those two guys. I think that it’s hard. Again, you in fairness, you said it’s about the potential and I am basing a lot of it off of that, but they are long. They are athletic. All of the things that you have said in the past that the Grizzlies are going to have issues with in terms of long, not physical. Not physical. I think physical on the Spurs. Stefan Castle and Dylan. This is a baby. They’re both babies. Jaylen Well, you might as well say Cedric. You might as well say Cedric Coward’s gonna be physical. And Jaylen Wells, I mean, I mean, Jaylen Wells is absolutely, he’s the best point of attack defender on the team. They absolutely are expecting him to be physical. So, let the Michael and I know. Hit us up in the comments. Let us know on X at Michael CJ Mullenex. I have a feeling you’re going to side with the Michael because it is locked on Grizzlies here. And I knew that. I didn’t want that to be the C. Are you a homer like old Demich over here or are you a fair analyst of basketball? I’ll put it like this. The Spurs Mullen. All right. The Spurs aren’t the team to be worried about. There’s another team that we hadn’t talked about that that that could really put it on the Grizzlies, but but we’ll we’ll get there cuz I’m because I’m I’m sounding like a homer right now. That ain’t the team that I’m worried about. It’s another one that’s scarier to me. And that is a wonderful segue into our next segment when we come back here on Locked on Grizzlies. We will continue this conversation. Who are the Grizzlies actually better than in the Southwest Division? We’ll talk about that next here on the podcast. Stick around on Lockdown Grizzlies. Today’s episode of Lockdown Grizzlies is brought to you by Game Time. Have you ever decided at the last minute to head to a ball game with friends or family? Maybe it’s game day and you suddenly realize that you want to be in the stands. That’s exactly where Game Time comes in. It’s the easiest way to grab lastminute tickets without the stress. With the money you save on tickets, you can splurge on food, drinks, merch, and even a bigger group invite to come along. Game time makes it possible and they make buying tickets fast and simple. Prices on the apps app actually drop the closer you get to first pitch and they’ve got incredible lastminute deals, clear seat views, and a lowest price guarantee that takes the worry out of buying. There are seat views right in the app before you buy so you know exactly where you will be. Take the guesswork out of buying tickets with Game Time. Download the Game Time app. Create an account. Use code lockdown. NBA for $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply again. Create an account. Redeem the code L O C K E D O NA for $20 off. Download the Game Time app today. Last minute tickets, lowest price guaranteed. All right, buddy. So, you we both have Houston number one in the Southwest Division as of this recording. We have a difference in number two. You have the Memphis Grizzlies being the massive homer that everybody knows that you are. And I being the journalist with integrity as everybody knows I am. Clearly the everydayers are well aware. If there’s somebody that’s rational on this podcast, it’s me. It’s Joe. I’ve got Yeah. I couldn’t even finish that with a straight face. We’ve we’ve got the Spurs or I’ve got the Spurs. Yeah. At number two, that means I’ve got the Grizzlies at number three. And this might be another space where you and I diverge a little bit because I do not fear the Dallas Mavericks without Kyrie Irving. I want to stress that I don’t fear them. I think that they are extremely dependent on what Kyrie in particular brings to the table. Now, does that mean that they won’t be competitive against the Grizzlies? No. And there’s obviously a decent chance coming back from a torn ACL when he suffered the injury. I believe that was the injury, a torn ACL. There’s a decent chance that Kyrie could play the second half of the season, a decent chunk of basketball. That’s a different conversation. Like our top 100 rankings that we’re doing for locked on NBA like that’s that’s different. Kyrie comes back. I think Dallas is a major threat to the Grizzlies in this division, in this conference. I think Kyrie, you know, Dallas, despite themselves, thanks in part to the number one overall pick, uh, Cooper Flag, they are in a position to really accentuate the things that Kyrie does great and limit the things that he doesn’t do so well. So, this is a current ranking. I’ve got the Grizzlies in front of Dallas, but I have a sneaky suspicion you uh maybe have that flipped, at least in terms of Dallas being higher than I’ve got them. Yeah. Um, look, I I have the Grizzlies technically like like again going back to what I said originally. If we’re talking about who’s going to have a better regular season record, I think it’s going to be the Memphis Grizzlies. If we’re talking about if these teams matched up in the playoffs, who’s going to win with with the added factors that you just said, Kyrie Irving potentially being available and all that, I don’t really think the Grizzlies have a chance against the Mavs um as constructed. And to get to the point of, you know, talking about the regular season and things like that, like I say this a lot, too. There’s another thing that we talk about when we talk about the Western Conference, I said so much of it is matchups. It’s not kind of a direct correlation to, oh, this team is better than this team, so that means that team’s better than that. It’s not a transit, how do you transitive property? There we go. There it is. It this ain’t math. This is real life. This is real NBA basketball. So just because you know the Grizzlies can beat up on the Spurs and the Spurs may beat the Mavs doesn’t mean the Mavs can’t beat the Grizzlies you know so to speak. Now what gives me the problems when it when it comes to the Mavs because everything that the Grizzlies have kind of struggled with in the past is what this Mavs team should be good at. They have all this size and length. It’s going to make it very difficult for John Mor. It’s going to make it very difficult for Jiren Jackson Jr. They have the ability to put Anthony Davis at the four. We saw that uh in the playoffs against the Lakers when LeBron James started off the series guarding Jiren Jackson Jr. He had a field day. Jiren had a field day. They switched it up, put Anthony Davis on him. Jiren didn’t have another big game like that the rest of the series. So, um they have the ability to start out Anthony Davis on Jiren Jackson Jr. and then they have these other options. They have the Derek Lively. They have, you know, the Daniel Gafffords. They have Cooper Flag who they can move down to the four. We haven’t talked about that much. Um, I just think they’re going to be very good defensively. And going into the season, the Grizzlies are going to have the same question. It’s going to be a lot of pick and roll. It’s going to be a lot of John Morant. And when we talk about the history of this team in the playoffs, the problem has been to when you get in those late game situations and you’re dependent on these guys. Uh, there there’s been an inability to score. And the Mavs, I think the Mavs could be the best defense in NBA, right? Better than OKC. They have that potential. You don’t think they have OKC? You don’t think they have that potential? Klay Thompson. Klay Thompson. Clay. Oh, yeah. Better than Houston. The ghost of Klay Thompson at the two. The ghost of Klay Thompson. Oh, now it’s the ghost. He’s going to compete in this economy. We’re talking about Klay Thompson as an elite defender. I didn’t No, no, no. I I never said the words 25. He’s no a major defensive force. He’s going to look like it when he’s playing beside Cooper Flag at the three. He’s going to have Anthony Davis at the four. And he’s gonna have Derek Lively at the five. Wow. He’s not He I mean, you’ve been hanging out with Nick Angst. Klay Thompson ain’t some pushover defensively now. He he he can’t move laterally the same way, but you you ain’t just That’s an important part of defense, partner. He he’s not moving the same. But guess what? It it’s an important part, but when you’re 67 and you have the ability to close out, um which he does, it’ll be all right. Now, uh, early in the season, a lot of their trajectory or, you know, their ceiling will depend on a guy like D’Angelo Russell. But, um, as we known over the course of years, he’s been a very inconsistent player. He’s had times like, you know, a couple seasons with the Brooklyn Nets where he looks amazing. He’s had times like the last couple years with the Lakers where he doesn’t look amazing. So, uh, he he’s the trajectory, right? He’s the ceiling. A lot of what this team looks like, first half of the season, all that will depend on him. But I say all that to say, uh, I think any given day that team can beat anyone because defensively they’re going to swarm you with the size, uh, with the defensive versatility that they have. Uh, they’re going to struggle to score at times. They’re going to struggle to shoot sometimes, but when those shots fall, when Anthony Davis is having one of those 35 and 15 type nights, Cooper Flag knocks down a couple shots, get it going, they can be dangerous uh, because of what they can do on the defensive end. And again, going back to what we talked about, like the Spurs don’t strike me as the most physical team out there. Dallas, they’re right up there with Houston, with OKC, Timberwolves, those type teams defensively. I don’t know why you’re looking at me like that, Joe. Like, they don’t have Klay Thompson, Cooper Flag, Anthony Davis, Derek Lively across the board. That that is a lot of size. That is a lot of switchability because Anthony Davis don’t mind going out there on the perimeter. Derrick Lively doesn’t mind going out there on the perimeter. Cooper Flag doesn’t mind going out there on the perimeter or uh downsizing and guarding a big there isn’t another team maybe OKC OKC is probably the only one there isn’t there just isn’t another team where you can say switch everything have fun we we got size across the board Klay Thompson is 35 years old right now like right now he’s 35 years old that’s pretty old in NBA years if he wasn’t mildly washed he would still be on the Golden State Warriors roster Golden State was okay with Clay. You know who they missed? You know who they missed last season? They missed Clay. They couldn’t find a starting shooting guard the whole season, right? You saw it. He started like They definitely thought my boy Airpods would be better than he was. I’ll give them that. So, it did not. At least not yet. Hit us up on X at the Michael CJX. Let us know in the comments. Uh we’re not going to talk much about the New Orleans Pelicans. No offense. Um it’s it’s very broken there and it would just make us sad, you know. I think that the Pelicans are pretty clearly the worst team, but they also I mean, but Zion, you know, Zion obviously if he’s healthy, uh could could up a little bit. Yes. Deonte when they get him back. Yeah. Just a lot of a lot of ifs, even more ifs than the Grizzlies have to be honest with you. uh when we come back here on Lockdown Grizzlies. Moving on from our rankings of the Southwest division, heading into John’s newest Nike commercial. Uh creeped me out a little bit, but you know that that’s probably a good thing. It’s a commercial I’m going to remember, and that’s what I’m sure Nike was going for. We’ll talk about that next here on Lockdown Grizzly. Stick around. Today’s episode of Lockdown Grizzlies is brought to you by Open Phone. If you’re running a business, you know that every mis call is money left on the table. Think about the last time that you had an urgent need. A plumber, a service provider. If the first person didn’t answer, did you wait? No, you didn’t wait for a call back. You moved on. That’s why you need Open Phone. They’re the number one business phone system built to streamline and scale your customer communications, all from an app on your phone or computer. Open Phone allows for you to message or manage business calls and texts from a single app. and they have an AI agent that handles after hours calls, answering common questions, and capturing leads so that you never miss a customer. Open Phone is offering our listeners 20% off your first six months at openphone.com/lockdownba. That’s op.comlockdownba. And if you have existing numbers with another service, open phone will port them over at no extra charge. Open phone, no missed calls, no missed customers. So to Michael, you are much cooler than me. Anybody that has watched, whether it’s just this episode or listened to this episode. Being cool is subjective, Joe. Being cool is subjective. No, no. We can do a quick straw poll in the comments and No, you don’t need to do that. And we’ll probably I’ll just post a poll on X and it’ll confirm. Um, you’re cooler than I am, and that’s fine. Social media is a real place. No, it it is not a real place. Lots of things have confirmed that over the last several years, but I digress. John Morance’s new commercial. Okay. Now, I watched this commercial. I I reposted it like a lot of folks. Uh make them watch. That’s the whole point. That’s the whole theme. That’s what they’re going for with the international tour that he just uh I think it’s finished up now. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Um so all that it all is interconnected and intertwined and it’s the creepy bulgy eyes, right? Like people are watching their eyes are like darting around. They’re bulging out of their heads and must see. Yeah. must see. And I compared it probably too aggressively, but it’s it it was similar to me like the old 1980s Michael Jordan with Spike Lee. It must be the shoes, right? The Air Jordan kicks. And again, I’m not saying that Jaws Jordan or that this is going to be that iconic. The similarity is in that it makes me remember it, right? Like I remember the ad because of the creativity invested in it. There’s sentimental ads that Nike does. Sometimes they did that with a Joshua release if I remember correctly. Might have been the first one that was a little more like his upbringing and where he came from and that sort of stuff. Y uh but but you know the the stuff like this again Nike is a business. Nike is trying to make money and they continue to invest both time and treasure in John Morant. So, as much fun as our our colleagues at Lockdown NBA are going to have putting Jaw Morant outside of the top 20, which is going to give me a conipion fit when it happens. As much as people are trying to make Jaw as the future of the NBA, seemingly not a thing, arguably the most powerful engine non-television related. Yeah. In basketball, very clearly sees John Morant as this kind of guy. It’s just further evidence that the future still may be Jaws for the taking, man. Yeah, Jaw ain’t went anywhere. I mean, at the end of the day, you know, we talk about it like we, you know, his perception changed, I guess, so to speak, uh, over the course of time and, you know, there’s a whole process to that, how you’re viewed nationally or whatever the case may be. But, at the same time, the jersey sales haven’t changed. um his his the way he attracts an audience has not changed. I traveled to those games. I remember after the incidents happened and everything when he got back when we were in New Orleans that first game back there was a bunch of kids lined up waiting. This is his first game back after 25 games suspension lined up right there in the breezeway waiting hand with their markers, jerseys, jaws, t-shirts, all of that. And we were just looking like man this is the kids are very forgiving. so to speak. The people are very forgiving. And quite frankly, uh it wasn’t as big of a, you know, whatever you want to call it, a black hole or a mark uh on his career as it was being uh put out at the time. And and Nike has fully backed him since. And again, when you want to get into the numbers, the Jaw 3 just released on yesterday on on the sneakers app uh sold out in less than an hour. Every se every size. And Nike’s got a lot of sizes. I mean, we’re talking about the kids all the way up to to men’s, I think like 17, some something like that. But, uh, sold out all the sizes. So, um, I mean, look, that goes to show how he’s viewed, but also the the Jaw 3. I really like the model and uh the creativity that they put into that shoe and kind of distinguishing it as a different shoe than the first jaw one jaw 2 and really the the low cut model that has become like preferred with many of the shoes whether it’s the LeBron 20, the Kobe 6’s all these recent shoes. Well, Kobe 6’s and Kobe X aren’t recent, but they all have these uh low top models that have become kind of the preferred model. Uh and Joshua is got a little different flavor to it. And uh I guess you could say they took a little bit of a risk there and so far uh it feels good. But yeah, the the ad to make them watch uh you know, it’s kind of with the point that he’s been one of the most watched players in the NBA. He’s making them watch and that was what the tour was about. And um yeah, you’re right, Joe. They are kind of putting a lot of, you know, Jai is a big time investment for Nike and that’s been the case since, you know, uh he got his first shoe. they branded him as Nike’s first uh Gen Z signature uh sneaker athlete, you know, uh and that’s kind of the way that they treated him uh going forward since then. I think that the biggest thing for me, you know, watching it from afar, and it’s not it’s not just a Memphis thing. I say that often on this show. I see it in Virginia. I see kids wearing John Maria jerseys. I see people wearing the shoes uh at my job. I see the commercials. I see all of these things on a na international or not international on a national scale. We’ve seen it internationally now with Jaw on the shoe tour. I’m sure it won’t be the last one because it was very clearly a success. I I just continue to struggle with and you you mentioned that the internet’s not a real place or at least social media is not a real place. I I think that a lot of the uproar over all of this came from that place. And I’m sure again we talk about money. Nike has all the money in the world to do all sorts of research into how this actually impacts the market, how it could hurt them. If Nike thought that John Morant was going to hurt business, he would no longer be a part of the Nike family. They have reached a different conclusion. And I think that now it’s up to Jaw to go out there and reinforce his place as one of the NBA’s very best players. Clearly Nike is betting that he’s going to do just that. And that is going to be a fascinating thing to watch over the days, weeks, and months to come. Thank you so much for being with us on this episode of Lockdown Grizzlies. Hilariously enough, the joke is on me. Uh, I made fun of Demich earlier in the show for doubling up as a golf reporter over the next few days, but that means that I’ll I’ll I’ll be covering solo, understandably so, because Michael’s very busy over the next few days. Uh, lots of different angles we can take. You know, trying to be respectful of our audience to Michael and the dog days here. Uh, lots of different things we can talk about. You and I both have to submit our top 100s for locked NBA over the next couple of days. I’m probably going to talk about that process a little bit where I put Jaw, where I put Jiren. It’s been a fun exercise that I’m excited to talk to everybody about. And you know, maybe between now and the next episode, you can shoot me some of your thoughts as well. Yeah. Yeah. I I’ll make sure I do that for sure. Yeah. So, top 100 talk and more coming up on our next episode of Locked On Grizzlies. The actual voting going down as we speak among locked on NBA voters. Make sure you’re liking, commenting, rating, reviewing, subscribing wherever you get podcasts. We’re proud members of the Lockdown Podcast Network. Your team each and every single day. Apple, Spotify, Amazon, Google, YouTube, all those fun places. Make sure you’re in every day at this point checking us out every time an episode drops. Again, we’re in August now. Three to four episodes a week with Demich doing the golf tournament. It’s going to be three. You’ll get one more episode from us this week. Probably closer to Friday, but it might be a little earlier. Just every time an episode drops, we truly mean that in the month of August, uh, make sure you’re hanging out with us here on Lockdown Grizzlies. And thank you for making Lockdown Grizzlies your first listen today. Now, for your second listen, find the Lockdown NBA podcast where there is no offseason. Doug, Matt, and Hayes keep you up to date on contract negotiations, rumors, and everything you need to be the most informed NBA fan. Find Lockdown NBA on YouTube or wherever you listen to podcast. Part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, your team every day. for Demich. I am Joe. Thank you so much for being with us on this episode of Lockdown Grizzlies. I will catch you on our next edition. Demich will catch you next week. Until then, stay locked in wherever you get podcasts. We are free and available. Thanks for being with us on this one. We’ll catch you next time. See you.

The NBA’s southwest division in the Western Conference will look different this season. In this episode, co-hosts Damichael Cole and Joe Mullinax break down where Memphis stands among the five teams, plus Ja Morant’s latest Nike ad.

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