So, What’s Up With Ja Morant?

Despite residing on the sour end of three consecutive game-winning shots over the past week, the Memphis Grizzlies find themselves well-positioned in the West as they enjoy a bounce-back 2024-25 campaign. At 38-23, they hold the conference’s No. 4 spot and are 1.5 games behind the second-seeded Los Angeles Lakers.

Jaren Jackson Jr. has cemented himself as an All-NBA-caliber star. Desmond Bane continues to dissect defenses with his outside shooting, playmaking and fast-break forays. Rookies Zach Edey and Jaylen Wells are flashing plenty of promise (and positive impact!) during their inaugural NBA seasons. Santi Aldama is putting forth a career-best year to become an indispensable, multifaceted bench weapon for Memphis.

Yet all of this has wide-ranging success has come without Ja Morant looking like, well, Ja Morant. After missing most of 2023-24 due to suspension then injury, Morant has returned and played 37 of the Grizzlies’ 61 games this year, beset by smaller nightly footprints, a less fiery play style and random nicks and bruises sidelining him a few days at a time.

Morant Hasn’t Played Like A Star

The Morant who earned two All-Star bids and an All-NBA Second Team nod between 2021 and 2023 has not totally vanished. He’s still a very good player. That Morant is just not who usually stamps his signature on games right now. Through 4.5 months, he’s averaging 20.9 points (54.5 percent true shooting), 7.4 assists, 4.1 rebounds and 1.2 steals. His 20.9 points per game are much closer to the pre-All-Star production (18.4 points per game) of his first two years rather than the output he logged the next two seasons (26.8 points).

His plus-2.3 Estimated Plus-Minus ranks 48th league-wide and sits near the heels of 43rd-place LeBron James (plus-2-4) and 37th-place Jalen Brunson (plus-2.8). Although advanced metrics like these are not infallible player rankings, they make clear Morant is forging high-level impact, even it’s below the standard his previous seasons have established. During his prior two healthy years, he finished 31st (plus-3.1, 2021-22) and 26th (plus-3.7, 2022-23) in EPM.

Morant’s declining box-score numbers can largely be explained by Jackson’s offensive emergence, a lighter minutes load (career-low 29.5 per game) and usage rate (34 percent is his lowest in a healthy season since 2020-21). But there are plenty of other factors — qualitative and quantitative — supporting EPM’s assertion he is not playing quite like the pugnacious point guard who led Memphis to a top-two seed in 2021-22 and 2022-23.

Memphis overhauled its offensive system this year (detailed breakdown here) to reduce ball-screens (30th in pick-and-roll frequency) and organized offense in favor of greater free-flowing egalitarianism empowering everyone to attack and create off the bounce. That’s seemingly had a negative effect on Morant, whose touches, time of possession, usage and shots are all down. The Grizzlies’ offense is actually 0.1 points better per 100 possessions without him on the court for the first time since his rookie season.

His decision-making has worn the brunt of this philosophical shift. As a driver, scorer and passer, he often appears unsure of how to proceed. According to NBARAPM, his 16.9 percent bad pass turnover rate is a career-worst. This year, Morant is increasingly prone to getting himself caught in the air without a plan, resigned to errant passes, audacious, risky finishes or desperate, half-baked audibles. A disconnect around the rim and in pick-and-rolls with Edey hasn’t helped either. Those two have struggled to establish chemistry together, which could be ironed out as they share the floor more in the coming years.

For now, though, all these components have made Morant a shaky operator who delivers a handful of head-scratching giveaways most nights.

While the Grizzlies are shooting a franchise-best 68.9 percent at the rim this year (sixth in the NBA), Morant’s 58.7 percent clip (39th percentile among guards, per Cleaning the Glass) is his worst since his rookie season. In fact, it’s 7.6 percentage points below the NBA average. As a rookie, his 58.3 percent mark was only 5.3 points below average.

A Change In Approach

The springy, elastic point guard looks tentative downhill. Earlier this year, he vowed he wasn’t dunking anymore in an effort to avoid injury. He’s generally kept that promise A career-low 2.5 percent of his field goals are slams in 2024-25, a stark drop from the 5.9 percent of his first five seasons. But thus far, the dunks-for-durability swap he sought hasn’t materialized. He’s missed 24 games, which is tracking to be his most aside from the mess of 2023-24.

Per 36 minutes, he’s registering the fewest drives of his career (20.1), tallying points 60.6 percent of the time and posting a career-worst 8.2 percent turnover rate. Across 2021-22 and 2022-23, he scored on 70.8 percent of his drives with turnover rates of 5.5 percent (2022-23) and 6.7 percent (2021-22). There’s a cumbersome cautiousness to his approach he should probably spurn, if possible.

For example: he’s recorded a singular offensive foul in 37 games (2.7 percent) after committing 31 in his first 257 regular season games (12.1 percent). Fewer offensive fouls is a welcomed phenomenon, but they underscore his subdued nature and that certainly has not benefitted his game. He’s added noticeable strength to aid him on both sides of the floor. Yet he’s not such a sturdy, small guard like Donovan Mitchell or Jalen Brunson to the point he can play as methodically within the trees as they do. He’s a high-flying buzzsaw whose greatness is predicated on those traits. He cannot downshift to the degree he is this year and maintain that greatness.

Maybe, the constant string of injuries have sapped some of his top-tier explosiveness and flexibility, and he’s no longer the form of aerial acrobat we once saw. Or, a year away from games and returning to a new offensive environment is warranting a lengthy reassimilation period. But if that dynamic, unabashed athlete is available, it could serve Morant best to cast away his hesitancy and let it rip again. The health woes haven’t subsided, while All-NBA stardom has.

It’s entirely plausible he merely requires more time to adapt. Memphis has taken the ball out of his hands more than ever this year. According to NBARAPM, he owns an on-ball percentage of 36, the first time in his career that number has ducked south of 42 percent. Sometimes, he seems to grow antsy and lets it fuel hasty, erratic decision-making, as though he’s uncertain another chance will arise on the possession.

His 31 percent 3-point rate is nearly eight points higher than the 23.1 percent rate of his first five seasons. Both off the catch and the dribble, he’s hoisted plenty of dubious long balls this year and is making just 28.7 percent of them (25.6 percent on pull-ups, 32.2 percent on catch-and-shoots). Note the shot clock on these, there’s simply no need for some of the triples he’s firing.

Many of those should be reserved for the league’s finest marksman, not a career 31.4 percent outside shooter who’s drilled 28.7 percent of his long-range attempts this year.

Although it’s understandably been somewhat overshadowed by the turnover problems, Morant remains a dazzling, manipulative and impactful passer. His 35.8 percent assist rate is eighth among players with at least 900 minutes to their name this year. He’s 12th in points created via assists per game (18.1) and 13th in potential assists per game (12.2). He’s averaging a career-best 5.9 at-rim assists per 100 possessions, setting up Edey, Brandon Clarke and Memphis’ network of cutters.

Can Morant Rediscover His All-Star Ways?

For the first time in Morant’s six-year career, the Grizzlies are fielding a top-15 half-court offense (13th). Previously, they’d never eclipsed 22nd. Logic suggests an improved offensive context would behoove his numbers and scoring efficiency. That’s not proven the case, which highlights some rigidity as an off-ball cog and the aforementioned decision-making struggles he’s navigating this year. His 54.5 percent true shooting is 2.9 points below league average, the second-worst mark of his NBA tenure, while his plus-1.2 Offensive EPM is also the second-worst mark of his career.

Among Memphis, Los Angeles, the Denver Nuggets, Houston Rockets and Golden State Warriors, only three clubs can join the Oklahoma City Thunder (barring drastic injuries, they’re a lock) in winning a first-round series. And just one of those surviving three can nab a Western Conference Finals berth. Equipped with a top-10 offense and defense, the Grizzlies are capable of such a run.

They’ll need Morant to find his form, though. Rostering a very good, mildly mercurial starter at point guard isn’t sufficient to shepherd them there. A bona fide, bankable star is likely required. It’s a benchmark he’s plenty familiar with, but hasn’t reached much this year aside from an occasional dipping of the toes. As the final six weeks of the regular season unfold, Morant wading deeper into those star-laden waters is a necessity to bear the fruits of his and Memphis’ lofty playoff aspirations.