![rudy gay trade grizzlies rudy gay trade grizzlies](https://images2.minutemediacdn.com/image/fetch/w_2000,h_2000,c_fit/https%3A%2F%2Fbealestreetbears.com%2Fwp-content%2Fuploads%2Fgetty-images%2F2017%2F07%2F107040814.jpeg)
But Lowry is expected to become one of the best targets.
#RUDY GAY TRADE GRIZZLIES FREE#
Gay’s value is up in the air on the free agent market. Gay is expected back on the court this month.ĭespite Gay averaging 17.8 points on 45 percent shooting during 6.5 seasons in Memphis, then-Grizzlies president Jason Levien traded him to Toronto in 2013 because he was “inefficient.” Grizzlies owner Robert Pera fired Levien a year later for undisclosed reasons not related to the Gay trade. The 11-year NBA veteran averaged 18.7 points and 6.3 rebounds in 30 games with the Kings last season before suffering a season-ending tear of his left Achilles tendon on Jan. Gay was set to earn $14.2 million in the final year of contract with the Sacramento Kings next season. Gay and Lowry are both free agents this summer after each player opted out of their respective contracts for the 2017-18 season. It wasn’t quite, but it was still a pretty good draft. "I might be going to my grave," West said, "thinking this was a special day for our franchise." Two picks later, the Utah Jazz struck gold with another rugged college power forward, Paul Millsap, a four-time All-Star. Johnson was a fun, physical player, but, like most second-rounders, he didn’t really pan out, lasting only two seasons in the league, one with the Grizzlies. The team’s failing was in selling too low on Lowry a couple of seasons later. Relative to draft position, future three-time All-Star Lowry may well be the best draft pick the Grizzlies have ever made. View Playlist: The Memphis Grizzlies NBA draft history
#RUDY GAY TRADE GRIZZLIES FULL#
In a lottery full of landmines (the top pick was Italian forward Andrea Bargnani and two other top five picks, Adam Morrison and Shelden Williams, were busts) Gay probably had the second-best full career, trailing only No. 8 in Gay, who averaged 18 points in seven seasons with the Grizzlies. West was right that the Grizzlies needed to shake up a maxed-out team, and in a rocky draft he got the best player available at No. Still, the judgment here is that West made the right call, even if it didn’t work out quite as well as the franchise hoped. Oddly, a returning Battier would have more memorable playoff heroics in a Grizzlies uniform than Gay. Instead, he watched other players (Zach Randolph, Marc Gasol) pass him in the team’s pecking order before a salary crunch spurred his exit.
#RUDY GAY TRADE GRIZZLIES SERIES#
Traded the following season, Gay never played in a playoff series win for the Grizzlies. He starred the next season, when the team was upset, in nauseating fashion, by the Los Angeles Clippers.
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Gay missed the team’s first playoff run, in 2011, due to injury. A lot of fans were upset to see Battier go at the time, and Gay’s subsequent performance - he was a good player in Memphis but never the All-Star West had envisioned - makes the move controversial even today.