Tonight the Grizzlies return home from an embarrassing 104-64 loss in Chicago and I make my regular-season debut at FedExForum, having missed the season’s first two games due to holiday travels. Given both of those realities, I’m going to treat this one a little different than a typical game preview.
Five notes on the State of the Griz and tonight’s game:
Another Bad Beginning: Grizzlies fans are accustomed to bad starts even in good years. Even in the five seasons in which the team hasn’t been terrible, the Grizzlies have never been better than .500 a couple of weeks into the season. The Grizzlies starts during the “good” years:
2010-2011: 4-9 start (46 wins)
2009-2010: 1-8 start (40 wins)
2005-2006: 3-3 start (49 wins)
2004-2005: 0-4, then 5-11 start (45 wins)
2003-2004: 2-4 start (50)
A Fragile Place: Ordinarily, this season’s 1-3 start wouldn’t be that much of a concern. Two of the losses came against the teams with the two best records last season (Spurs and Bulls). Two of them against two of the consensus three best teams this season (Thunder and Bulls). Two of them on the road (Spurs and Bulls). Two with the team’s starting point guard sidelined with a minor injury (Thunder and Bulls). So there are a lot of reasons to shrug off that 1-3.
But there are a couple of over-riding reasons not to: For starters, the shorter schedule makes each game more important, allotting the Grizzlies less time to make up for another bad start. But much more troubling are the team’s issues related to injuries and depth.