Welcome to the championship chase, Utah. By acquiring point guard Mike Conley from the Grizzlies, the Jazz will immediately solidify themselves as one of the leading Finals contenders in the Western Conference. And all they have to give up is Jae Crowder, Kyle Korver, Grayson Allen, the 23rd pick in Thursday’s draft, and a first-round pick that likely won’t convey to Memphis until 2022. It’s a good haul for a Grizzlies franchise rebuilding for tomorrow, and a fair price to pay for a Jazz team looking to win it all this season.
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It’s a shame, truly, that the prior paragraph can’t include “All-Star” or “All-NBA” point guard in regard to Conley. The only professional accolade on his résumé is the All-Defensive second team that he made in 2012-13, during the height of the Grit and Grind era. Forget the accolades: Conley is a winner. Those classic Grizzlies teams never won a title, but they made the playoffs in seven straight seasons, and Conley, alongside Marc Gasol, was one of the team’s best players. Every year, Conley got better and better, and now at age 31 he remains one of the game’s steadiest point guards.
Conley will bring his reliable yet dynamic skill set to the Jazz and make life easier on Donovan Mitchell, Utah’s dynamite young guard who averaged 23.8 points and 4.2 assists as a sophomore last season. Mitchell’s raw numbers impress, but his scoring efficiency is average by league standards. He scored only 0.95 points per possession last season, according to Synergy Sports. He had to do it all as a young player. It’s not that Mitchell didn’t have playmakers to help him out; Ricky Rubio is a good playmaker and Joe Ingles is a baller, but neither is a scorer who can help Mitchell handle the load. That’s why the Jazz needed to re-tune the roster. Now, Conley can take some of the burden off of Mitchell with his seasoned scoring and proficient playmaking.
Mike Conley’s Pick-and-Roll Efficiency
Conley ranks annually as one of the league’s most efficient scorers in the pick-and-roll, as the chart above shows. Now he’ll join a Jazz team that finished more possessions using the pick-and-roll than any other team in the NBA, according to Synergy. Conley is so good because he changes tempos and can score from all areas of the court. Over the past six seasons, he’s hit 36 percent of his dribble-jumper 3s, 41.9 percent of his dribble-jumper 2s, and 57.6 percent of his shots around the rim. The man knows how to score. And he can pass, too. Mitchell has shot 40.1 percent on catch-and-shoot 3s in his career, and Conley will feed him more of those chances. Rudy Gobert could be in for a career-best season finishing lobs.
It’s not like the ball will entirely be taken out of Mitchell’s hands. Conley will allow Jazz head coach Quin Snyder to better groom his blossoming star with more timely on-ball opportunities. Mitchell will still do his thing scoring at the end of the clock, and now he’ll have a better teammate to pass the ball to. While Rubio shoots bricks, Conley lights it up. Conley has shot 38.4 percent on catch-and-shoot 3s the past six seasons. Conley isn’t just a standstill shooter, either. He can run off of screens or sprint through handoffs, and jack up 3s or attack the rim.
The Jazz will remain one of the NBA’s best defenses, and now they’ll have a point guard who can take them from good to great on offense. This trade may not generate headlines like the Lakers’ acquisition of Anthony Davis, but it could end up being one of the most important transactions of the offseason. As I wrote on Monday, league executives are expecting an arms race this summer. The Jazz needed to keep up, as teams in the West are looking to bolster their rosters. The Mavericks are considered favorites to land Celtics free-agent big man Al Horford, according to league sources, and the two Los Angeles teams are said to also have interest, though they both have their sights set on bigger fish like Kawhi Leonard. The Rockets recently explored trading Chris Paul into New York’s cap space, but the Knicks refused, according to league sources. Trading Paul would have positioned the Rockets to be a Clint Capela or Eric Gordon trade away from freeing up the cap space to sign Jimmy Butler, who league sources say they plan to pursue. Injuries to the Warriors opened up the West, and there’s a scramble to accumulate talent and take advantage of Golden State’s misfortune.
Meanwhile, it’s the end of an era for the Grizzlies. Grit and Grind is officially over. Gasol is in Toronto, and a champion. Conley is headed to Utah, with a chance to do something special.
The players Memphis will acquire in this deal don’t matter all too much, frankly. Crowder is an above-average defender and a subpar offensive player. Korver is old, and an obvious buyout candidate, if the Grizzlies keep him. Allen was horrific as a rookie, despite ideal conditions for a young player. The Conley deal is all about the picks. While the focus will be on what new Grizzlies head of basketball operations Zach Kleiman decides to do with the no. 2 pick—league executives fully expect Murray State point guard Ja Morant to be the choice—the 23rd pick will provide the team with a shot to add a potentially important role player to complement big man Jaren Jackson Jr. and the second pick. This draft class is often dubbed as weak, but that’s because it lacks star power. Its strength is in its depth. It’s a draft littered with wings and forwards, necessary ingredients to a championship recipe.
The future first-round pick acquired by Memphis in the trade is nothing to sneeze at, either. According to Chris Herrington of The Daily Memphian, it’ll convey to Memphis if it lands between picks eight and 14 in 2020 or 2021, which means it likely won’t since Utah should be a playoff team. It will, however, be only top-six protected in 2022, top-three protected in 2023, or top-one protected in 2024. The 2022 draft could be the year that the NBA allows high schoolers to go straight into the league, which would give that pick additional value. The Grizzlies needed future draft equity since their own first is owed to the Celtics (it’s top-six protected in 2020 and unprotected in 2021) after the previous Memphis regime dealt it for Jeff Green. At least now, the Grizzlies have something to build on for a brighter future, a chance, someday, to make another run at it with a new core, a new Grit and Grind.
