Could the Grizzlies have made the NBA playoffs with a healthy Ja Morant? Here's what we learned
The clock was ticking and the wait was on. Losses piled up.
The Memphis Grizzlies lost their first six games of the season and had a 4-13 record by the end of November. As the calendar turned to December, hope that Memphis could still turn its season around remained because of the pending season debut of All-Star point guard Ja Morant.
Morant was suspended 25 games before the start of the season for conduct detrimental to the league. Along with the financial losses and award incentives Morant faced, Memphis was falling further behind what was shaping up to be one of the deepest Western Conference playoff races in NBA history.
Morant returned on Dec. 19, and the Grizzlies went 6-3 in the nine games he played before suffering a labral tear in his right shoulder requiring season-ending surgery.
Hopes of any playoff push were crushed at that moment, but what if Morant didn't get hurt?
Now that we know how the Western Conference standings shaped up, it's easier to see if the Grizzlies could have realistically crawled out of a 6-19 hole and made a playoff push.
Could Ja Morant have led Memphis to the playoffs?
Memphis defeated the Los Angeles Lakers 127-113 on Jan. 5 to improve to 12-23. The Lakers, who eventually earned the No. 7 seed, were 17-19 at the time.
The Grizzlies were winning two of every three games while Morant was in the lineup and had 47 games remaining. Over the course of a full season, winning at that pace would have placed Memphis fourth in the Western Conference standings. If the Grizzlies maintained that win percentage after Morant's Dec. 19 return, they would have finished 43-39.
Finishing with 43 wins would have left Memphis short of the play-in tournament by three games. Golden State was the 10th seed at 46-36. Memphis would have needed to finish 34-13 to tie the Warriors. That is the equivalent of a 59-win pace over 82 games.
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Impact on Grizzlies draft status
When the Grizzlies' season ended, some of the results felt like a blessing in disguise, given the circumstances. The Grizzlies had discovered Vince Williams Jr. as a legitimate rotation piece, and GG Jackson's rookie ascension was created by opportunity. All of that and Memphis still had the seventh-best odds of securing the top pick in the 2024 NBA Draft before the draft lottery.
Lottery luck wasn't on the Grizzlies' side as Memphis slid down two spots to ninth in the 2024 draft order. So as it turns out, if the Grizzlies would have had a healthy Morant and theoretically finished just short of making the postseason, their draft positioning wouldn't have been much different.
Memphis would have received the 12th pick based on the results from the draft lottery.
After injuries and trades highlighted the drastic roster changes over the last two months of the season, Memphis now faces an offseason with several unanswered questions in their championship quest. Many of those answers could have came without the injury troubles.
Damichael Cole is the Memphis Grizzlies beat writer for The Commercial Appeal. Contact Damichael at damichael.cole@commercialappeal.com. Follow Damichael on X, formerly known as Twitter, @DamichaelC.
This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: How the Grizzlies season would have looked without Ja Morant's injury
