MarShon Brooks and the power of persistence

Forty-one free agent players signed 10-day contracts during the 2017-2018 NBA season. Eighteen played well enough to earn roster spots through the end of the season. Three players ended up with multi-year contracts. Two were two-way G-League contracts and one was a standard multi-year contract, guaranteeing an NBA roster spot for the following season.

That player was MarShon Brooks.

The Memphis Grizzlies had been out of contention since basically November and had nothing to lose by taking a flyer on the former first-round pick out of Providence. Brooks had been out of the NBA for four years by this point so it seemed like more than a long shot. On the other hand, he was someone who’d played and been successful in the league already and was only 29.

In his first game back, MarShon came off the bench late the first quarter. He missed his first shot but knocked down his second and was lights out from that point on. He scored 20 or more in all three games, shooting nearly 60 percent from the floor including 11-of-17 from 3. The three-game total of 70 points was more than any player in Grizzlies history had produced in their first three appearances with the team. Two days after his third game, the Grizzlies announced that Brooks had been signed to a multi-year contract.

It had been 1,451 days since he played his last game in the NBA.

What Brooks accomplished just making it back to play one game defied such overwhelming odds that it’s hard to comprehend. The numbers he put up and the fact that a 10-day contract, essentially an extended tryout, turned into a multi-year deal, both add to the overall implausibility of this situation. So how does this even happen? How did someone with this kind of ability not make it back to the NBA sooner and why did he only last three years the first time around?

For one, everything MarShon Brooks has accomplished has been in the face of overwhelmingly long odds. And to use Brooks’ own words: “You’re only as good as your opportunity.”

MarShon Brooks was the furthest thing from an elite, blue-chip athlete. For starters, he wasn’t a varsity player until his junior year at Tucker (GA) High School. He grew more than six inches after his sophomore year and by the time he was a senior, he helped lead his team to a 30-2 record and a state title. But he wasn’t the team’s leading scorer, wasn’t even the top prospect on his team and he hadn’t been recruited by any major Div. I programs late into his senior year.

As Tom Layman of Boston Globe detailed in a 2013 piece on Brooks, that changed when Steven DeMeo, an assistant coach at Providence, attended a game to scout one of his teammates at Tucker. Brooks immediately caught DeMeo’s attention. He saw raw athleticism and an ability to score from anywhere on the court with ease. After an official visit, Brooks was offered a scholarship and committed to play at Providence in the Big East.

His career arc as a college player, especially to start, was almost a carbon copy of what he’d been in high school. As a lanky, 6-foot-4, 175-pound freshman, he was far from a college-ready player when he got to campus. He spent two years in the weight room getting stronger and adding size so he could compete in the much more physical college game. He broke into the Friars starting lineup as a junior and averaged 14.2 points, occasionally showing flashes of the greatness DeMeo had seen watching him play in high school.

As a senior, he emerged into one of the best players in the Big East, leading the conference in scoring with 24.6 points per game. He had a 52-point game against Notre Dame and scored 42 in a road win over Georgetown. Brooks finished his four-year career at Providence as a Wooden Award finalist, second-team All-American and one of the top 10 scorers in program history. Heading into the 2011 NBA Draft, Brooks was also one of the top guard prospects.

The Nets sent a future pick to the Celtics to move up and take Brooks with the No. 25 overall pick. During the lockout-shortened 2011-12 season, he started 47 of 56 games, averaging 12.9 points a game and earned second-team All-Rookie honors. In July before the 2012-13 season, the Nets acquired Joe Johnson in a trade with the Hawks. Playing behind Johnson, a six-time All-Star on a max deal, Brooks’ role and his numbers across the board drastically diminished in his second professional season.

The (now Brooklyn) Nets were involved in another blockbuster the subsequent offseason. Brooks was sent to Boston as part of the infamous nine-player deal for Paul Pierce and Kevin Garnett. As a Celtic, he played sparingly, splitting time between Boston and the D-League, Maine Red Claws. In early January, he was traded to Golden State where he spent just over a month before the Warriors traded him to Los Angeles to finish out the year playing for an injury-riddled, 27-win Lakers team.

Four trades over a calendar year meant four different head coaches, sets of teammates and systems. His minutes were sporadic and unpredictable, making it nearly impossible to develop a rhythm. Two seasons removed from a second-team All-Rookie debut, he was an unrestricted free agent, coming off by far the worst season of his career and was completely uncertain about his future.

“All you can do is just work hard and control what you can control,” he told a reporter during the Lakers media exit interviews. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the last three years, it’s that you’re only as good as your opportunity.”

He didn’t realize it at the time, but it would be four years before he’d get another opportunity to play in the NBA.

Following a season in Italy, Brooks was offered a contract with the Jiangsu Nangang Dragons of China’s CBA. League rules limit teams to carrying only two foreign players which means the quality of play is well below most European leagues but still one of with solid competition in terms of international basketball.

The situation turned out to be exactly what MarShon Brooks needed. Given free reign as the team’s primary scorer, he found the confidence he’d lost on his way out of the NBA. Brooks looked like the player who’d been unstoppable at Providence. He found a scoring rhythm, got teammates involved and became a more complete player than he’d ever been.

Brooks spent three seasons with the Dragons, averaging 35, 36.2 and 36.6 points. His assist and rebounding numbers climbed steadily as well and in addition to scoring nearly 37 points a game in 2017-18, he also averaged 5.7 assists and 7.2 rebounds.

The other advantage that came with playing in the CBA — the season ends in March, allowing players to return to the states for the end of the NBA season. In late March last year, he had just finished the best season of his career and was home in Atlanta when the Grizzlies called.

It’d been four years but he’d never given up on the dream of making it back to the NBA. Being as good as the opportunity hadn’t allowed him to be anything close to good before. This time, he found a good opportunity in a 10-day contract with the Grizzlies and took advantage. He wasn’t good, he was better than anyone with that opportunity had ever been.

He played in seven games total for Memphis last season, continuing the offensive he’d produced during his first three games to finish the year as a 50 percent shooter averaging 20.1 points and 3.6 assists per game. Through three games this season, the amount he’s played has varied and he’s averaged only 4.5 points per game.

Brooks won’t average 20 points as he did in a handful of meaningless games down the stretch last year. He may not be a consistent contributor, but he’ll have moments. His ability to come off the bench and explode for 20+ points at any given time is something Memphis hasn’t had in the past and it’s something that can swing games. After years of waiting and working, Brooks is finally a perfect fit.