Marc Gasol wasn’t the star of the night for the Memphis Grizzlies on Sunday evening. Grizz forward Zach Randolph busted out with 22 points in the team’s win over the Sacramento Kings, as the NBA’s best team won its 15th game in 17 tries thus far with Marc acting as the tipping point in the second half. Gasol has been the team’s best player thus far, however, dominating play on both ends with brilliant defense on one side and wily offensive moves on the other.
“Yeah, but he’s always done that, though” Person with No NBA League Pass replies.
“Yeah, but not like this,” I’ll shoot back, before apologizing for the NBA’s callous overlook of the Memphis Grizzlies as a team to broadcast nationally just two times all season.
Marc’s ascendency has been mostly attributed to two factors – coach Dave Joerger’s insistence that he become a bigger part of the offense, and Gasol’s insistence on trimming up some of the bigger parts of his frame. Several basketball players a season are credited with either adding several pounds of muscle, or losing quite a bit of weight over the offseason, but Gasol’s slimmed-down appearance appears to have made the biggest lasting difference of the last few seasons.
It was even the impetus for a recent New York Times feature, which began with this anecdote:
In early September, months after the last N.B.A. season had ended, Mike Conley tuned in to watch the FIBA Basketball World Cup on television. He saw someone with a resemblance to his Memphis Grizzlies teammate Marc Gasol: same bushy beard, same stern game face and same backward shuffle down the court after shooting a jumper from just beyond the free-throw line.
data-para-count="41" data-total-count="421">Except that this player was much thinner. data-para-count="126" data-total-count="547">“I was like, Man, that can’t be Marc,” said Conley, the Grizzlies’ point guard. “It looks like he lost 50 pounds.”
Gasol has refused to cop to the exact amount he lost, but his appearances in both the FIBA World Cup and the Grizzlies’ media day were startling. He wasn’t exactly overweight in years past, and there were worries as to how well the noted banger would pull this off in the trenches, but the loss of a stone or two has done wonders for his mobility.
The center has battled weight issues for years, so much so that when the Grizzlies traded his All-Star brother Pau for Marc’s draft rights in 2008, just about everyone in the NBA community dismissed the trade as completely one-sided. All we’d remembered about Marc, who was then playing overseas in his native Spain, was that he was a terribly overweight 7-footer that hardly showed the same promise as his brother while playing high school basketball in Memphis.
Things shaped up, literally, so much so that Gasol won the NBA’s Defensive Player of the Year award in 2012-13 without providing the gaudy block and rebound totals that typically drive voters to hand out hardware. As a result of his brilliance and the contributions of his fantastic teammates, the once-moribund Grizzlies franchise has made the playoffs four straight seasons while seeming an absolute lock to make it this spring.
The Grizzlies competed well against a healthy Oklahoma City Thunder squad in last year’s postseason, frightening the Thunder in a seven game scare, but the ledger still tells of a first round loss. Adding Vince Carter while expecting a fully healthy year from Quincy Pondexter were supposed to sustain things for the Grizzlies, but the team ran the risk of acting like Just Another Great Western Team in that loaded conference, one that runs about 11-deep with playoff contenders at this point.
Something had to change internally for the Grizzlies to take the next step, and while a 17-game sample size shouldn’t have any of us expecting a Finals trip for the Grizz as an absolute lock, they appear to have succeeded in that realm so far. Gasol is driving this team on both ends, understanding that his role offensively can’t just limit itself to being the big guy that can really pass and hit the occasional long two-pointer.
Marc can still really pass, and he’s shooting outrageously well from that long two-point range this year, but on a Grizzlies team this devoid of offensive options Gasol has to look for his own shot repeatedly.
(He’s also not just looking for his shot because he’s in a contract year, which we went over extensively last week and see no need in rehashing here. He is going to get a maximum contract no matter what.)
It’s true that finding an open Mike Conley or Courtney Lee after the help defense arrives is technically the correct and sensible basketball play, but it may not be the right play in this particular context. In Memphis’ lineup, you want Marc Gasol’s combination of brawn and touch taking a shot over several defenders more than you want him dishing and setting others up.
This doesn’t mean Gasol has gone away from passing – his assist percentage is about the same as last season’s and still a stellar mark for centers – but he’s shooting more and getting to the line more often. The Memphis offense has shot up from 15th to eighth offensively and even moved up a few ticks defensively into the NBA’s top five. This ain’t Vince Carter (who has missed two-thirds of his shots so far) or Quincy Pondexter (who has missed 65 percent of his shots).
This is Marc Gasol, coming into his own. He may not have lost 50 pounds, but he might be the biggest slimmed-down reason why the Grizzlies win 60 games.
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Kelly Dwyer is an editor for Ball Don't Lie on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at KDonhoops@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
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