Despite just renegotiating and extending his contract with the Memphis Grizzlies last summer, Jaren Jackson Jr. may have officially entered “other teams believe he will be traded” territory.
Speaking on a recent episode of The Zach Lowe Show, Zach Lowe dropped a throwaway comment about the Cleveland Cavaliers that should pique the attention of the Grizzlies, and their fans.
“They had dreams of ‘Could we get into the Giannis derby?’’ Lowe says, at around the 11:58 mark of the podcast. “‘Could we chase a big man like [Domantas] Sabonis, like a JJJ?’”
The tenor of this discussion hovers somewhere between speculation, and sourced. Lowe is not implying the Grizzlies ever made Jackson available. He currently can’t be traded until January 13 anyway. But tethering his name to a specific team suggests that Cleveland, in this case, is waiting on Memphis to make the mother of wholesale pivots.
This is how the NBA rumor mill starts churning
If the Cavs are holding out hope Jackson could become available, you can rest assured they are not the only ones. You can’t blame them, either.
Jackson isn’t having a banner season by his standards, but his absolute peak is among the league’s most tantalizing. Few players are as versatile and impactful on the defensive end, fouling and rebounding warts in mind. The three-point efficiency waxes and wanes, but he’s a legitimate floor-spacer. And over the past few seasons, most prominently in 2024-25, he has expanded the range and effectiveness of his self-creation.
Toss in the fact that Jackson is still only 26 and now under team control through at least 2028-29 (he has a player option for 2029-30), he arguably has more market appeal than ever.
None of which means Memphis has to move him, or should be looking to move him. But this is how these proceedings start: Teams and national pundits identify big names they believe can, or should, trickle onto the trade block. Speculation and discourse then take on a life of their own.
The Grizzlies know this all too well. They are already navigating some version of it with Ja Morant. And while it may be tempting to dismiss this Jackson tidbit as something less than a whisper, it has real-world implications.
The Grizzlies will be under more scrutiny moving forward
If nothing else, the outside interest in Jackson increases the amount of pressure under which Memphis will operate. That is…not ideal.
Then again, the Grizzlies in many ways signed up for it. Trading Desmond Bane over the offseason, while justifiable, was not the move of an organization hell-bent on winning now. The team’s influx of injuries has only added fuel to speculation. Ditto for the dynamic with Morant.
Memphis is putting some distance between itself and awkward conversations with its upswing over the past month. This is a temporary respite, insofar as it's a respite at all. The Grizzlies won’t escape the vultures circling their most valuable player(s) until, or unless, they prove that they’re good enough to contend in the West—or, at the very least, on the verge of doing so.