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The NBA has always had at least one player that everyone seems to know. Whether you’re a hoops fan or not, the superstar names sound familiar and you know of them, even if you’ve never watched a game of basketball in your life.
The 80s and 90s were dominated by Jordan. The 2000s belonged to Kobe and LeBron, and LeBron shared the mantle with Steph Curry in the 2010s.
Two years in to the 20s, and we are starting to see the emergence of the next face of the NBA.
Over the past few years, Giannis Antetokounmpo has been the standout figure in NBA basketball; a global icon hailing from Athens in Greece, he has captivated the imagination of an entire continent and helped boost the popularity of the sport in a region historically dominated by association football. Giannis’ domination on the court is well documented and he now has an NBA Championship to add to his already incredible résumé despite being only 27 years old. Giannis is arguably the current face of the NBA, alongside the seemingly timeless LeBron James.
But the torch may be about to be passed on.
Selected with the second overall pick in the 2019 draft, Ja Morant has been the focal point of a young and developing Memphis Grizzlies team ever since. With the league’s third best record, the Grizzlies are on course for their best ever season and will be looking to add a first Southwest Division banner to the rafters at the FedEx Forum. Ask any Grizzlies fan though, and they’d probably be disappointed with just a divisional title come the end of the season given how well their young team is doing.
That success is largely down to Ja. He is the explosive, exciting, dynamic talent that every team in sports craves.
He is also must see TV; something that the NBA itself craves.
At just 22 years old, Ja’s ceiling is a relative unknown. Already an All-Star and MVP candidate in just his third season in the league, he has drawn interest to Memphis in what is otherwise a small market; similar to the impact Giannis has had in Milwaukee. National media outlets and journalists are all clamouring to get a piece of Ja Morant and to have his face on their screens. And despite the smaller market in Memphis, he is worth it. It seems like not a single game goes by where there is not a sensational Ja Morant highlight posted on social media. A posterizing dunk perhaps, some circus shot buzzer beater, or a casual 50-piece. He and his youthful Grizzlies teammates are bringing an air of vibrancy and positivity to the game, and it’s impossible not to enjoy watching Memphis basketball at its best for 48 minutes.
From a business standpoint, he is a marketer’s dream. Boasting style that wouldn’t look out of place at Paris Fashion Week, shout-outs in songs from world famous artists, and celebrities wanting to sit courtside at his games, he is your modern NBA superstar. In the age of social media, his audience of over 7 million followers across Twitter and Instagram is representative of his popularity and is another string to his bow in his claim to be the new face of the NBA. Scroll through the NBA's Instagram page or go over to YouTube and search for Ja Morant highlights; you’ll be lost in hours of mind-blowing footage that would be impressive if it came from an exhibition game, let alone in competitive matchups against some of the world’s best defenders in the world’s best basketball league.
Per the NBA, jerseys with the ‘Morant - 12’ printing were the 7th most popular in terms of sales through the first half of the season. Ja is the youngest of anyone in the top 10 and with the relative size of the Memphis market, out-selling the likes of James Harden, Anthony Davis and Joel Embiid – all bona fide superstars – shows the true gravity of the man out of Murray State.
He is where he is today because of his unique basketball ability and like-ability, but his longevity at the top of the game and as the face of the NBA will take hard work. Something that Morant is certainly not afraid of.
When Ja was a kid, his father, Tee, set up boot-camps for him in the backyard of their South Carolina home, affectionately coining them ‘TTG camps’ – ‘Train To Go camps’. Morant Senior wanted his son to work hard and be ready to show people he was built for any obstacle thrown at him. Those building blocks have stuck with Morant Junior ever since, and you can see the progression he has made since joining the league, both in his technical ability and his physical ability. While his 6’3” frame makes him a fairly average height for an NBA Point Guard, his quite ridiculous vertical jump of 44 inches elevates him (pun intended) well above his colleagues. For reference, the average NBA vertical jump is 28 inches.
Ja’s stats have rocketed too. From 18 and 19 points per game in his first two years respectively, to a monstrous 27.6 this season which sees him as the league’s 6th best scorer, and once again, youngest of anyone in the top 20.
As the NBA seems to revert back towards a big-man game after the emergence of small ball over the last decade, averages such as these for a third year guard are quite remarkable, yet it isn’t naïve of us to expect those numbers to increase in the coming years. Ja’s meteoric rise to super-stardom is unfolding before our very eyes and an MVP award is not out of reach for the 22 year old this year. If it's not this season, there will almost certainly be at least one MVP trophy in Ja's trophy cabinet by the end of his career.
He’s already the face of the next generation of basketball players, and soon to be the next face of the NBA.
So for the time being, sit back, grab some popcorn, and enjoy the Ja Morant show.
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