NBA Season Preview 2019-20: Every team’s biggest question

Memphis Grizzlies: Is Jaren Jackson Jr. ready for a leading role?

Much like we discussed with Cleveland earlier, the Memphis Grizzlies are a team with little in the way of expectations this season. This is a franchise in the early stages of a complete rebuild, resigned to their likely position at the very bottom of a hyper-competitive Western Conference. As such, their primary concern at this point in time is seeing growth from the young players they hope will form the backbone of the next great Grizzlies team.

As it stands now, Grizzlies fans have plenty to look forward to. One year after landing Michigan State’s Jaren Jackson Jr. with the fourth overall pick, they found their heir apparent to the departed Mike Conley in the form of electric point guard Ja Morant, and added perhaps the steal of the draft in hyper-productive forward Brandon Clarke with the 21st pick. This trio forms the backbone of the Memphis youth movement, with another high lottery pick likely on the way and some interesting young role players — Tyus Jones, De’Anthony Melton, Bruno Caboclo, Dillon Brooks — in the mix as well.

Perhaps none is more important than Jackson, who looks the part of an ideal center for the modern era of the NBA. Last season, Jackson appeared in just 58 games before a quad injury shut him down for the season, but in that short time, he put his potential two-way value on display. Per 36 minutes, Jackson averaged 1.9 blocks and 1.2 steals on his way to an encouraging +1.6 D-PIPM for the year. Despite being fairly raw as a scoring threat, he still posted an effective field goal percentage of 54.9 percent, bolstered in part by a healthy 35.9 percent shooting percentage from behind the 3-point arc. In other words, Jaren Jackson Jr. can be the kind of unicorn big man that every team craves.

With Jackson now healthy and ready to tackle his sophomore season, the Grizzlies would like to see some signs that he’s ready to handle being a No. 1 option. It likely won’t always be pretty, but the Grizzlies can afford to be patient.