Grizzlies Part Ways with Juice

Under Grizzlies coach Lionel Hollins,  O.J. Mayo was charged with the tall order of being a scoring guard who could defend both guard positions and play significant minutes running the point. Though not for lack of effort, Mayo, an extremely talented but undersized shooting guard, was never able to establish himself as an elite scorer of Kobe Bryant or Dwayne Wade proportion, and he never quite seemed to be able to provide the steady play at point guard the Griz needed to relieve Mike Conley, Jr. While, financially, allowing O.J. Mayo to drift away into the sea of unrestricted free agency is the best move for the Grizzlies and possibly the best career move for Mayo, the end of this era does not undermine the four great seasons “Juice” spent in Memphis helping the Grizzlies rise to league prominence.

At his best, Juice certainly proved to be a gifted scorer who could excell on fast-breaks, consistently defend well, make his free-throws, attack off the dribble, create his own shot, hit clutch shots, and really clutch shots, and during a close game with a nearly full shot-clock, he could pull up for a jumper from several steps behind the 3-point arc and sink it with unwavering confidence. In the 2011 NBA playoffs series against the Spurs and the Thunder, Mayo had such great performances that you could  almost defend the Grizzlies’ decision to end up with O.J. in the 2008 Draft rather than proven all-stars Kevin Love(traded by Griz) and Russel Westbrook (still available when Memphis picked). Almost.  Then last season in the playoffs we saw glimpses of Mayo’s scoring ability and clutch shooting, but we saw many more instances of him barely beating the 8-second violation when bringing the ball up, and then struggling to initiate the Grizzlies offense or find his own shot while Mike Conley was on the bench in foul trouble.  It became evident that while Mayo had established himself as a valuable asset, the Grizzlies could not afford to keep together their core of Conley, Z-Bo, Marc Gasol and Rudy Gay and then also pay Mayo the money he is due to make with his next contract. We do not yet know what uniform Mayo will sport next year, but sadly it wont be the three shades of blue of the Memphis Grizzlies.

In a perfect universe for the Grizzlies, using a DragonBall Z style fusion, Lionel Hollins and Chris Wallace would be able to fuse together the scoring abilities of O.J. Mayo with the size, athleticism, and intangibles of Tony Allen to create one Super 2 Guard for the salary and roster space of one player, and still have cap space to pursue the back-up point guard the Griz need and/or another shooter. For some reason the Grizzlies have neglected to investigate the possibility of fusion. Meanwhile Ray Allen, who would have been the perfect fit to instantly make the Grizzlies a championship contender by improving the Grizzlies’ 3-point shooting, never seriously considered signing in Memphis and has been claimed by the Evil Empire in Miami. So now, rumor* has it, Grizzlies general manager Chris Wallace has taken bizarre, expensive, and dangerous measures to improve the Griz by approaching the Don himself…

Cliff-hanger: see the sequel to this post, Replacing Juice: Descent to the Commissioner’s Lair 

*=that I fabricated and started