It's safe to say It's been a concerning start to the season for Ja Morant and the Memphis Grizzlies. Now, Grizzlies fans are left with one painstaking possibility in their minds: that they may have already seen the best version of Morant in his NBA career.
This would have seemed like a positively ludicrous suggestion just a couple of years ago. But now, considering everything that's gone on over the last few seasons for Ja in Memphis, it's a question that at least has to be ruminated on.
The latest incident from last week wherein Morant received a one-game suspension for his postgame comments only served as the latest chapter in what is becoming a lengthy history of troubling happenings in the young star's career.
None of these off-court incidents have been career-crippling in and of themselves, but adding them all up over the course of the last several years makes for a troubling and distracting backstory to what should otherwise be a star-studded career for a super athlete. At the end of the day, Ja looks like a far cry from the player he was during the 2021-22 season right now.
Can Morant ever return to his pre-2023 self?
It really seems like yesterday that the Grizzlies were coming off that May 2022 Western Conference semifinal series with the Golden State Warriors. Morant had just finished up a season where he took home the Most Improved Player award, finished seventh in MVP voting, earned his first career All-Star selection, and was selected to the All-NBA second team. The sky was the limit for Ja. He was a near consensus top 12 to 15 player in the league, and it looked like nothing could stop him.
Now, it seems there are far more questions than answers for him following multiple off-court incidents, suspensions and overall distractions from his on-court performance. The Grizzlies' offense is different from what it was three years ago, and Ja doesn't look like quite the same player on a nightly basis. There are even questions about if Memphis could turn to trading him at some point this season.
All this creates quite a bit of uncertainty, and Grizzlies fans are left asking if they have already seen the best version of their franchise player. There's still a world in which things get turned around, but the waters are still a bit murky right now. If Ja Morant can return to looking like the player he was pre-March 2023, it will change everything for this franchise.