Ja Morant is back in the news again for the wrong reasons. He’s been suspended from all team activities by the Memphis Grizzlies “pending league review,” according to a statement from the team, after brandishing a gun — again — on social media.
Morant’s current situation has led to further discussion about what that league review might actually hold and what another suspension for him could potentially look like.
On Tuesday night ahead of the NBA draft lottery, Adam Silver told ESPN’s Malika Andrews that he was “assuming the worst” with the investigation. And that makes it sound like there could be a sizeable suspension ahead for the Grizzlies’ point guard.
Despite the current situation, Morant does have some defenders. One of them is JJ Redick, who doesn’t think a massive suspension is necessary.
JJ Redick asks “Why are we trying to lay down the hammer on a 23-year-old who didn’t break a law?” when there’s no consequence for Greg Abbott telling people to buy more guns pic.twitter.com/dUc8imA9dj
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) May 17, 2023
“As far as we know, all of these things have been investigated, and no law has been broken. I’m not condoning the behavior. I’m not saying there should be no punishment. There should be. There should be consequences. You are the face of the league. You are representing the NBA. You are a role model to young kids — all of that. I don’t think half a season is the right answer.”
Redick dove in a bit deeper on the consequences Morant should face for simply having a gun. He talked about the realities of the country that we currently live in.
“Look, in our country right now, gun culture is pervasive. It’s pervasive. We’ve got mass shooting after mass shooting and nobody is doing a damn thing about it. So I get why we’re so sensitive to this right now. But there’s no consequence for Greg Abbott telling his constituents that they should go buy more guns. And then we have mass shooting after mass shooting in Texas. There’s no consequence for an elected Tennessee official to send out a Christmas card holding AR-15s with his young family, and then there’s a shooting in his very district. There’s no consequences to that. So why are we trying to lay down the hammer on a 23 year old who didn’t break a law? Explain that to me.”
Clearly, a massive suspension for Morant would not sit right with Redick. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens down the line.
