The Grizzlies Were Wrong

The Memphis Grizzlies were unceremoniously booted from the playoffs by the resurgent Los Angeles Lakers over the weekend. One of the recurring subplots of the series was the behavior and words of Dillon Brooks. Brooks has long been a polarizing figure on the Grizzlies. The main problem with Brooks is that he thinks he's an amazing player, when the reality is that he's just some guy. Yesterday, the Grizzlies finally acknowledged this reality, as it was loudly proclaimed in the media that Brooks, who is a free agent, will not be back with the team next season. And I keep wondering, as I've wondered all season, how good the Grizzlies would have been if last season they had traded Brooks instead of De'Anthony Melton.

Let's start with Brooks. This season, he averaged 30.3 minutes, a career high. He played 73 games, the second most of his career, with the only season eclipsing that total being his rookie year of 2017-18. If the Grizzlies had been growing weary of him, they had a funny way of showing it. His effective field goal percentage was .468, the second-worst career and worst in his last four seasons. To put that in perspective, there were 122 players who played 70+ games and averaged 30+ minutes this season. Only three of them had a worse eFG%.

For many years, Brooks has been labeled as an elite defender, but using this same 122-player sample, it's hard to see. While he ranked eighth in personal fouls, he ranked just 90th in blocked shots and 45th in steals. And again, that's a subset of guys who play all the time. If you back out to Basketball-Reference's "qualified for minutes per game" leaderboard, Brooks ranks a middling 128th out of 260 in steals per 100 possessions, and 215th in blocks per 100 possessions. In this metric, the only teammates he placed better than were Luke Kennard and Tyus Jones. There is more to defense than steals and blocks, but watching the Grizzlies, it never seemed like Brooks was capable of doing anything more than defending by agitation, and at some point you need to be able rely on skill. The closest corollary for Brooks is really a hockey enforcer, but back when I watched the NHL, those guys all played on the third or fourth line – they weren't starters or guys counted on to play in the clutch.

There's an alternate timeline here, one where in the offseason, the Grizzlies had jettisoned Brooks in favor of keeping Melton. One of the reasons Melton was traded was seemingly because with Ja Morant, Tyus Jones, Zaire Williams, and John Konchar, the team had a lot of guys south of 6'6". But if anything, Melton, while just 6'2", breaks out of that mold. He's a pesky defender capable of guarding guys taller than him. The 76ers agree. According to NBA.com, the third most frequently lineup this season by the 76ers had Melton on the court at the same time as guards James Harden and Tyrese Maxey. And that lineup, which also Tobias Harris and Joel Embiid, had the best defensive rating of their five most frequently used lineups.

Is that definitive proof that the Grizzlies could have just swapped out Brooks in the lineup for Melton, and played Melton alongside Morant, Desmond Bane, Stephen Adams, and Jaren Jackson, Jr.? No, it is not. But I wonder. Melton is going to have a long career as a consummate pro, a guy who brings a lot of things to the table without taking much off it. His only real demerit is his height. He shot his usual excellent percentage from 3-point land this season, while shooting a career-best .484 on two pointers. He dropped his turnovers per game to a career-low 1.3, and his 1.6 steals per game were fifth-best in the Association (Brooks, at 0.9, ranked 92nd).

I thought the Grizzlies made a mistake the second they traded Melton. Their compensation – Danny Green (shipped off to the Cavs after only playing 43 minutes in a Grizzlies uniform) and the draft pick that became granite block of a human David Roddy, who was just OK as a rookie – didn't seem like fair value at the time, and seems like an absolute steal for the Sixers now. Meanwhile, the Grizzlies are at a real crossroads, as neither Roddy nor anyone else on the roster is good enough to slot into Brooks' 30 minutes per game. It'll be interesting to see what they do this summer.