Sorry for the post delay. I intended to finish this post from home last night only to find my internet down when I got back.

The Lead: This was somewhat similar to last week's home game against the Knicks, with the Grizzlies building a big lead in the middle of the game against a generally overmatched opponent only to get complacent — and then tight — as the lead evaporated in the fourth quarter. With the Bulls missing four key players — Derrick Rose, Kirk Hinrich, Joakim Noah, and Luol Deng — the Grizzlies led by as many as 25 and took an 18-point lead into the 4th quarter. But the team started that final quarter with an all-bench lineup of Marcus Williams, Ronnie Brewer, Sam Young, Darrell Arthur, and Hamed Haddadi, allowing the Bulls to slice into the lead and build momentum that continued for a while even after the Grizzlies began to get their starters back into the game, eventually holding on for the 104-97 win.

Beyond the outcome, the story of the night for the Grizzlies were a series of lineup and rotation changes: With Marc Gasol out with a strained neck (Gasol is listed as day-to-day), Hasheem Thabeet got his first NBA start and gave a decent performance. Thabeet played 28 minutes and matched career highs with 10 points (4-6 shooting) and 9 rebounds to go along with 2 blocks. He did a pretty good job contesting shots without getting into foul trouble and demonstrated that he can be a scoring threat even without a post game or a jumper provided he can — one, get better at catching the ball around the rim (he flubbed several passes, including a couple of alley-oops) and, two, become proficient at the line (2-5 last night).

The other change for the Grizzlies was the return of Ronnie Brewer, who had missed three weeks with a torn hamstring suffered in his Grizzlies debut. Brewer clearly didn't have his legs fully under him and had bad moments (including a badly missed jumper when the Bulls were making their fourth-quarter run), but generally demonstrated the kind of player he can be for the Grizzlies: Not much of a scorer, but a nice all-around player. He defended and passed the ball well. He broke up a 2-on-1 Bulls break. He had a steal. Only 15 minutes, but a decent start on the road back.

The Lead: The Grizzlies won this one 119-112, but that final score is a little misleading. This was not generally a close game. Through three quarters, the Knicks were simply outclassed both in terms of talent and effort, and were down 94-73. Then the Grizzlies got too comfortable with the lead and stopped playing defense, allowing 39 fourth-quarter points. The game never really felt in doubt, but the Knicks did get it down to 5 points in the final minute.

That lackadaisical fourth-quarter defense kept this one from being the blowout it should have been and prevented coach Lionel Hollins from being able to empty his bench down the stretch and get his starters more rest, which would have been useful with a much more talented Denver Nuggets team coming in tomorrow night.

Despite the disappointing finish, the Grizzlies got efficient performances from four of five starters (lone exception: Zach Randolph, who got a typical 24-11, but on 7-20 shooting) and useful production off the bench. The Grizzlies have now won two in a row at home and five of their past six games to move to 35-31 on the season.

With last night's 111-91 win at Boston, the Grizzlies have extended their current road winning streak to 7 games and have won 4 of their past 5. As of today, the Grizzlies are 3.5 games behind the Portland Trailblazers for the 8th seed and 4.5 games behind the San Antonio Spurs for the 7th seed. With 17 games to go for the Grizzlies, the odds of making the post-season are slim, but there is still a legitimate chance, and I suspect the race will tighten in the coming weeks. Let's look at the schedules for these three teams the rest of the way:

Memphis: 17 games, 8/9 home/road split. 10 against teams with winning records, 6 against teams with > .600 winning %, 5 against teams with > .650 winning %.

Portland: 16 games, 7/9 home/road split. 8 against teams with winning records, 7 against teams with > .600 winning %, 4 against teams with > .650 winning %.

San Antonio: 20 games, 8/12 home/road split. 14 against teams with winning records, 11 against teams with > .600 winning %, 7 against teams with > .650 winning %.

Experimenting with a new game-blog style though, like Hasheem Thabeet, it's still developing:

The Lead: Despite a big assist from Tony Parker's Fourth Right Metacarpal, Bizarro World continued for the Grizzlies Saturday night at FedExForum, where a 102-92 loss to the Spurs was the team's eighth straight home loss, the longest home losing streak since the team moved to Memphis in 2001. Meanwhile, the Grizzlies have won six straight on the road, making the Grizzlies the only team in NBA history to simultaneously have six-plus home losses and six-plus road wins. Has a team ever set a franchise record for consecutive road wins while falling out of a playoff race? And the loss tonight was despite the Spurs playing without starting point guard Tony Parker in the second half, who was diagnosed with a fractured ring finger at halftime and did not return. In the first half, in which the Spurs built a 58-48 lead, Parker's penetration was the engine for the Spurs offense, scoring 8 points on 4-7 shooting and collapsing the defense to set up Spurs shooters, registering four assists.

I don't have much of an explanation for this strange home loss/road win streak, especially with the Grizzlies suddenly winning the second night of back-to-backs regularly. But the quality of opposition certainly has something to do with it. All of the teams the Grizzlies have lost to in this home streak are either playoff locks or contenders. The teams the Grizzlies have beat in the road streak have been half lottery teams and half team around .500.

Game Ball: I'll give Marc Gasol the edge over O.J. Mayo (a game-high 23 points) here. Gasol, with 17 points (7-10 shooting), 13 rebounds, 4 assists, and 3 steals had a more well-rounded game while dealing with tougher match-ups at both ends of the floor. Gasol generally defended Tim Duncan (17 points on 6-14 shooting) well. In the third quarter, when the Grizzlies were making a run, Gasol forced Duncan into consecutive turnovers, one a lost ball, the other a bad pass. Down the stretch, in what turned out to be a back-breaking possession for the Grizzlies, Gasol defended Duncan well for a full 24 seconds, forcing Duncan into a miss at the buzzer, only to have Duncan get an offensive rebound, putback, and foul. And in a disappointing loss, Gasol gets bonus points for the most entertaining Grizzlies play of the night, a first-quarter steal that lead to an unlikely, rumbling coast-to-coast (not-so-) fastbreak dunk.

• The Thabeet pick: Plenty of blame to go around.

But the story of the day for the Grizzlies isn't tonight's game or even the team's weakening grasp on the playoff race. It's the assignment of #2 overall pick Hasheem Thabeet to the NBA Developmental League's Dakota Wizards, with whom he's scheduled to play tonight.

This latest turn in what has been a disappointing rookie season for Thabeet has spurred another look at how the team came to draft Thabeet. (A pick that, it should be noted, was fairly widely questioned locally but not particularly denigrated around the country, with the Grizzlies getting pretty good "draft grades" from most national sites.)

The media narrative that has emerged around the pick goes something like this: That General Manager Chris Wallace preferred Tyreke Evans at #2. Player Personnel Director Tony Barone Sr. favored Thabeet. Scouting Director Tony Barone Jr. was pushing Stephen Curry. And Assistant General Manager Kenny Williamson and Head Coach Lionel Hollins were either leaning Curry or not pushing hard for anyone in particular, depending on which account you believe.

• Hamed Haddadi, looking cool in the Griz rotation of late.

First, on Haddadi. After a couple of stints in Dakota himself and either riding the pine of modeling the latest big-and-tall fashions for the first year-and-a-half of his NBA career, Haddadi is now getting a chance to prove he can be a legitimate NBA player. Good for him.

In three consecutive games now receiving rotation minutes as a back-up center, Haddadi has acquitted himself well.

Against New Jersey on Sunday, Haddadi played 15 minutes and though he only shot 1-4 and picked up 5 fouls, he also had 6 rebounds, an assist and a block and didn't really hurt the team (his plus/minus for the game: +3). He gave the Grizzlies passable back-up center minutes. (Thabeet, by contrast, came into the game and immediately sailed an outlet pass out of bounds. He took a seat after one minute and never saw the floor again.)

click to enlarge

With personnel changes at Beyond the Arc headquarters I'm finding it difficult to do the mammoth post-game reports that have been the semi-norm here over the past few seasons. This has me thinking of ways to rework how this blog operates heading into the summer and next season.

For now, I'm just going to feel my way through, probably with shorter, more subject-specific posts rather than long single-game previews and reviews. For starter, a few thoughts on the fourth quarter of last night's exciting and disappointing 99-98 Grizzlies loss to the Los Angeles Lakers:

For three quarters last night, O.J. Mayo was having a terrific game. He'd scored 23 points on 13 field-goal attempts and was playing Kobe Bryant, if not even, then close enough for the Grizzlies purposes.

Then the fourth quarter came around and Mayo was mysteriously absent from the Grizzlies offense, getting few touches and only one shot attempt within the offense until the very end of the game. Mayo was still active, getting a couple of steals and a defensive rebound, but despite having been the team's most effective player through three quarters, the offense seemed to go away from him. Mayo entered in the fourth quarter at the 9:26 mark and for the next four minutes was on the floor with one starter (either Marc Gasol or Zach Randolph) and three bench players. In that stretch, Mayo took one of the team's eight field-goal attempts. The other seven went to bench players, who shot 2-7.

Alright. After missing the thriller between the two teams at the beginning of the month, I'm in the house for Grizzlies-Lakers. I'm expecting to be repaid with a dud tonight, but hoping for a good game.

Kobe Bryant is back in the line-up for the Lakers. Lester Hudson, who gave the Grizzlies a big boost in the earlier game, will not do the same tonight, as he is inactive.

I'll be tweeting throughout the game and will hopefully have a post-game report up later tonight (pending how much my son chooses to sleep when I get home).

Let's do this.

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Here's the pick protection on the future first-rounder the Grizzlies are sending to Utah for Ronnie Brewer:

2011: 1-14
2012: 1-12
2013: 1-10
2014: 1-9
2015: 1-9

If the pick hasn't been sent as of 2015, the Jazz will receive cash to complete the deal.

Since I'm going on radio with Chris Vernon (730FoxSports.com) at 4:20 this afternoon, I don't have a lot of time now, but some quick thoughts on the deal:

Scouting Report: Brewer, a 24-year-old Arkansas native with strong area ties, is a versatile 6'7" perimeter player. He's a good athlete with a good handle but a shaky jumper.

This season, Brewer has averaged 10 points, 3 boards, and 3 assists in 31 minutes per game, shooting 50% from the floor and 26% from three-point range. This production is down from the past two seasons, when Brewer averaged 14 and 12 points per game, respectively, in similar playing time with much higher shooting-percentages.

I heard this afternoon that the Grizzlies were working on a deal that would send a protected first-round pick next season to the Utah Jazz for swingman Ronnie Brewer. I have not confirmed that this is a finalized deal, but the Salt Lake Tribune is also reporting that Brewer could be traded today.

More as it comes.

UPDATE: Brewer deal done, for protected first-rounder in 2011. I'll be on the Chris Vernon Show at 4:20. Will try to have a trade breakdown post up before then.

I wasn't able to do a full post-game report last night, so a few thoughts about the game and other issues here, with more to come:

Last Night's Game: There are many reasons for the Grizzlies' 109-95 home loss to the Suns last night. Marc Gasol having a rare bad game on both ends of the floor was a killer for the Grizzlies. In shooting 4-12 from the floor and 3-11 from the line, Gasol might have single-handedly squandered enough points to make up the 14-point difference. And at the defensive end, he was a non-factor, with Suns starting center Robin Lopez logging an out-of-character 18 and 10 and the Suns as a whole outscoring the Grizzlies in the paint 58-32. The Grizzlies couldn't stop penetration, were late on rotations, and couldn't protect the rim. A total defensive meltdown, but with Gasol as the back line of defense and generally most reliable defensive player among the starters, his lackluster play was perhaps the biggest problem.

Or maybe it was O.J. Mayo, who had one of those games where his lackluster size and athleticism for the two-guard position really hurt him. The bigger, more explosive Jason Richardson had a big game for the Suns, scoring 27 points on 12-17 shooting.

I'm courtside at FedExForum, where the Grizzlies will host the Phoenix Suns in a rematch of the wildly entertaining Martin Luther King Jr. Day game last month. Like that one, this one will be on national television, albeit NBATV.

After losing six of seven heading into the All-Star break, the Grizzlies obviously need a quick course-correction to stay in the Western Conference playoff race. A win tonight over a Suns team currently 7th in the West and four games ahead of the Grizzlies would be a good start.

Check back later for a post-game report and follow along with my occasional Twitter commentary during the game.

Let's do this.

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1. Limping Into the Break: After starting the season 1-8, the Grizzlies are entering the All-Star break on a bad 1-6 stretch. What is this team's real level of ability? The 2-14 bookends or that 24-9 stretch in the middle? Those options are so stark that it's pretty clearly somewhere in the middle.

Even when this team was playing its very best, reasonable fans knew that potential injury, likely fatigue, a weak bench, and the deep field of good teams in the Western Conference would all work against the team's rather unlikely run at a playoff birth. The Grizzlies remain lucky on the injury front, but the rest of those concerns are all a factor in the team's recent slide from 7th to 11th in the conference standings.

I'll get into this in more detail in a post-All-Star-break preview post, but for the Grizzlies to remain a factor in the playoff race, they're going to need to get back on track in a hurry coming out of the break. With five of eight April games roadies against likely playoff teams, the Grizzlies probably need a cushion going into the final month. The rest of the February/March schedule is relatively favorable, but if the team can't relocate than December/January mojo it won't matter.

I'm courtside at FedExForum where the Grizzlies will host the Atlanta Hawks in their last game before the All-Star break. With the Houston Rockets likely an underdog at Miami and with the Blazers and Thunder playing each other (meaning one has to lose), the Grizzlies could pick up some ground in the Western Conference playoff race with a win tonight — and also stabilize themselves after a rough stretch of three straight losses and five losses in their past six games.

I wouldn't be too optimistic, though. The Hawks are a terrific team and present some match-up problems with their frontcourt athleticism and backcourt size. The combat the latter, the Grizzlies should thinking about giving that O.J. Mayo/Sam Young backcourt a look, as the Hawks have a two-guard (Joe Johnson) who can post Mayo but a starting point-guard (Mike Bibby) who isn't much of a threat on penetration. But I don't expect this to happen.

On the latter, hopefully the return tonight of Darrell Arthur, who will play his first game of the season, will add a bit of speed and activity to the Grizzlies' frontcourt, though it's unfair to expect too much of Arthur after not playing in six months.

Check back later for a post-game report and follow along with my occasional Twitter commentary during the game.

Let's do this.

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