SAN FRANCISCO – As the locker room’s elder statesman and 12-year veteran with two NBA championships, Kentavious Caldwell-Pope clearly understands the difficult circumstances the Grizzlies’ rookie draft picks find themselves in these days.
Opportunity can sometimes be overwhelming.
Especially in the NBA when key roles and major responsibilities land too soon.
But early indications are Cedric Coward and Javon Small just might be made for these moments.
“You’ve just gotta man up,” Caldwell-Pope surmised. “We’re throwing them into the fire early. But they’re doing a really good job dealing with the pressure and handling it when we need it. They’ve been able to just play well and apply pressure at the same time.”
So far, Coward and Small seem flame-resistant.
Injuries to experienced players who were initially higher in the rotation pecking order have pushed both Coward and Small to the forefront of the Grizzlies’ bench rotation. Through the season’s opening week, the rookies have responded in stunningly productive fashion.
A three-game sample size is small, yet significant enough to reveal encouraging potential.
Coward, the No. 11 overall pick in June’s NBA Draft, emerged from a sluggish preseason with a scorching debut week of games that really count. The 6-foot-6 swingman is shooting 72.7-percent on 3-pointers, 70.7-percent overall from the field and averaging 19 points, 3.7 rebounds, 2.3 assists and 1.7 steals through three games.
Small, chosen with the No. 48 pick in the second round, is shooting 41.7-percent on 3-pointers and averaging 8.3 points, 5.7 assists and 20.7 minutes off the bench in three appearances. It’s early, but no other team in the league is getting as much production from a set of rookies.
Entering the second week of the season, Coward is second among all NBA rookies in scoring behind Philadelphia’s VJ Edgecomb and Small ranks first in assists. Their collective effort has helped to push Memphis to a 2-1 start headed into the team’s first road trip to face the Warriors on Monday and the Suns on Wednesday.
The Grizzlies have a penchant for positioning themselves with a productive rookie tandem. Last season, Zach Edey and Jaylen Wells were NBA All-Rookie First Team picks. Six years ago, Ja Morant and Brandon Clarke accomplished the same feat after their debut season in Memphis.
There’s a good chance to keep this breakout rookie flame burning.
After hearing of Caldwell-Pope’s analogy of being thrown into the fire, Coward absorbed the heat and added fuel to the metaphor.
“The best way I can say it is that we’re getting thrown into the fire, but we’re not getting burned,” Coward explained. “If you’re not prepared for a situation, that’s when the pressure can get to you. That’s when that fire can burn you. For us, it’s about taking the punches and embracing the fire, not shying away from it or realizing that you don’t want to make a mistake.”
The young Grizzlies are playing through some miscues out of necessity. Coward and Small have stepped up in a guard rotation that lost veteran free-agent signee Ty Jerome to a calf strain in the final game of the preseason. Fellow combo guard Scotty Pippen Jr. suffered a preseason toe injury that required surgery on the eve of last week’s season opener.
Jerome will be reevaluated in three weeks, and Pippen Jr. is likely out for at least three months.
Small is on a two-way contract that limits him to just 50 games with the Grizzlies. That contract stipulates he spends development time with the G League’s Memphis Hustle this season. The injury timelines at the guard position suggest Small would use the bulk of his allotment of NBA games with the Grizzlies during the front-end of the schedule.
Regardless how it plays out, Small wants the opportunity to keep showing he can play at this level and help the Grizzlies grind through their current backcourt bind behind Ja Morant.
“I wasn’t nervous, but it’s different going from college right into your dream job in the NBA,” said Small, a Big-12 First Team selection last season at West Virginia. “From my first (preseason) game up until this point, it’s just been about learning the pace, how to control the offense as a rookie, making sure everyone is in the right spots and just learning each day. I’m just trying to be a sponge and learn from Ja, Ty, Scotty or anyone else who’s been here longer than me.”
Small insists “the game is slowing down” each time he takes the court, which means he’s able to process the action and make decisions at his own pace without feeling rushed. In Saturday’s 128-103 win over the Pacers, Morant and Small combined for 14 assists and zero turnovers in a dominatingly efficient performance.
Meanwhile, Coward paced the Grizzlies with a team-high 27 points after making all six of his 3-pointers. The suddenly hot touch follows an exhibition stretch when Coward played impressive defense but knocked down only 11.5-percent of his 3-pointers and shot 31.1 percent overall.
So, what’s changed?
“The biggest difference is we have Ja out there,” Coward said of Morant, who has played all three regular season games after he missed all five in the preseason with an ankle injury. “At the same time, it’s (gaining) more comfort as you go, as we’re mixing different lineups. The biggest thing is to always be ready.”
As Tuomas Iisalo settles in during his first full season as Grizzlies coach, he’s seeing remarkable growth each day in what has the potential to be a strongly reliable rookie class.
Iisalo applauds Small’s stoic approach.
“He’s worked extremely hard to learn a ton of things in a short amount of time,” Iisalo said of Small. “He’s doing a great job. He listens. He just absorbs. He has a confidence that really works for us, and he’s become big-time for us in a situation that we really needed him.”
As for Coward, Iisalo insisted it was just a matter of time before a breakthrough.
“These guys have gotten a great opportunity, and Cedric is using every minute of it,” Iisalo said. “Obviously, it’s been just waiting to happen . . . all the signs are there.”
There are sure to be growing pains ahead over the course of a long NBA season.
But those signs also point to the Grizzlies having yet again snagged a set of NBA-ready rooks.