NBA 2024 Offseason Check-In: Memphis Grizzlies

Hoops Rumors is checking in on the 2024 offseason for all 30 NBA teams, recapping the summer’s free agent signings, trades, draft picks, departures, and more. We’ll take a look at each team’s offseason moves and consider what might still be coming before the regular season begins. Today, we’re focusing on the Memphis Grizzlies.

Free agent signings

• Luke Kennard: One year, $9,250,000. Includes $1,387,500 in unlikely incentives. Re-signed using Bird rights after team option was declined.

Trades

• Acquired the draft rights to Cam Spencer (No. 53 pick) from the Pistons in a four-team trade in exchange for the draft rights to Ulrich Chomche (No. 57 pick; to Raptors) and the Grizzlies’ 2030 second-round pick (top-50 protected; to Timberwolves).
• Acquired Mamadi Diakite and the draft rights to Nemanja Dangubic in exchange for Ziaire Williams and the Mavericks’ 2030 second-round pick.

Draft picks

• 1-9: Zach Edey
  • Signed to rookie scale contract (four years, $26,202,576).
• 2-39: Jaylen Wells
  • Signed to four-year, minimum-salary contract ($7,895,796). First two years guaranteed. Third year non-guaranteed. Fourth-year non-guaranteed team option.
• 2-53: Cam Spencer
  • Signed to two-way contract.

Two-way signings

• Jay Huff
• Cam Spencer

Departed/unsigned free agents

• Jordan Goodwin (unsigned)
• Lamar Stevens (unsigned)
• Yuta Watanabe (Chiba Jets)

Other moves

• Waived Trey Jemison (two-way).

Salary cap situation

• Operating over the cap ($140.6MM) and below the luxury tax line ($170.8MM).
• Carrying approximately $170MM in salary.
• No hard cap.
• Full mid-level, bi-annual exceptions available.
• Four traded player exceptions available (largest worth $12,600,000).

The offseason so far

It has been a quiet summer in Memphis, where the Grizzlies will bet on the return of a handful of starters and rotation players from injuries to propel them to a bounce-back season in 2024/25. There’s reason to believe that could be a fruitful strategy. After all, this roster is pretty similar to the one that racked up 56 wins in 2021/22 and 51 more in ’22/23.

Injuries to Desmond Bane (he played 42 games last season), Marcus Smart (20 games), Brandon Clarke (six games), Luke Kennard (39 games), Steven Adams (zero games), and especially Ja Morant (nine games) derailed Memphis in 2024/25, but the team will have all of those players back on the court next season, with the exception of Adams, who was sent to Houston ahead of the February trade deadline.

While the Grizzlies didn’t lose any key players this offseason, they still had a hole to fill up front, where they lost Adams and Xavier Tillman during the season. Operating right up against the luxury tax line, Memphis wasn’t in position to add an impact veteran center, but the club used its lottery pick to bring in a potential long-term answer at the position, drafting Zach Edey ninth overall.

Edey is coming off a monster college career at Purdue, where he was named the NCAA’s player of the year in each of the past two seasons. And he showed some promise when he was able to suit up in Summer League last month, averaging 10.0 points, 9.0 rebounds, and 2.5 blocks in 21.0 minutes per game, though he was limited to just two appearances (one in Salt Lake City and one in Las Vegas) due to ankle issues.

Still, it remains to be seen how the 22-year-old will adjust to the speed and athleticism of the NBA game, especially with opposing offenses looking to lure him away from the rim and out to the perimeter. If Edey’s not ready to take on a substantial role as a rookie, the Grizzlies will otherwise have to rely on non-traditional fives like Jaren Jackson Jr., Santi Aldama, and Clarke.

Edey represents the only major addition of the summer for the Grizzlies, who also re-signed Kennard to a new one-year deal and drafted a couple players in the second round in June — Jaylen Wells will have a spot on the team’s 15-man roster, while Cam Spencer begins his career on a two-way deal.

Of the offseason departures, Ziaire Williams is the most notable. He was drafted with the 10th overall pick in 2021, but never developed into a consistent contributor and was dealt to Brooklyn in a salary dump.

Up next

The Grizzlies currently have 14 players on fully guaranteed contracts, with Mamadi Diakite occupying the 15th roster spot — his $2.27MM salary is partially guaranteed for approximately $1.39MM.

Due to that partial guarantee, the Grizzlies don’t have the ability to waive Diakite and then sign a new 15th man for the veteran’s minimum without surpassing the luxury tax line — unless they cut Diakite within the next week and stretch his partial guarantee across three seasons.

I haven’t gotten the sense that Memphis is especially motivated to bring in a new 15th man, so the team may ultimately stick with Diakite for now. If the Grizzlies need to create a little spending flexibility below the tax line down the road, he could probably be traded relatively easily, perhaps with just some cash attached rather than any future draft assets.

Scotty Pippen Jr., who was impressive down the stretch for Memphis last season, may be the leading candidate to eventually supplant Diakite as the club’s 15th man. For the time being, Pippen is on a two-way deal and there will likely be no real urgency to promote him until he nears his 50-game limit.

The Grizzlies do have a few extension candidates on their roster worth watching, starting with Aldama, who is eligible for a rookie scale extension. After a promising sophomore season in 2022/23, Aldama didn’t take a significant step forward in year three, but if Memphis believes that was just a blip in an otherwise ascendant trajectory, the team could look to lock him up this fall rather than risk having his price tag go up in 2025.

Jackson and Smart are each eligible for a veteran extension this offseason, though both players are also under team control through 2026, so if nothing gets done before the season begins, that’s not a cause for concern. A new deal for Smart seems unlikely, given that he barely played due to health problems during his first year in Memphis.

Jackson is a better bet to be a long-term fixture with the franchise, but if he wants to try to make himself super-max-eligible by winning another Defensive Player of the Year award or earning an All-NBA spot in 2024/25, he’ll wait a year to sign anything. He may wait anyway, since his $23.4MM salary for ’25/26 will make it hard for the Grizzlies to offer him a deal worthy of his on-court value (they’re limited to a 40% raise in year one, with 8% annual raises after that).