Grizz Gaming

admin

This morning around 6:00 a.m. I rolled over and through one crusty eye noticed the sun was rising, and I sat up straight in bed, going from completely asleep to completely awake in a matter of seconds. The sun was out, my addled brain started piecing together, which must mean that it was later than 6:00 a.m., which must mean that I slept through my 5:30 a.m. alarm, which must mean that I’d missed Grizz Gaming’s early airplane flight to Orlando, where this week we play in an NBA 2K League tournament called The Ticket.

I was equally confused and panicked. Why hadn’t any of the players called when I hadn’t picked them up for the ride to the airport? Had they just gone on and flown without me? Shouldn’t I get up and pack and get going?

Then I realized this morning was Tuesday, not Wednesday. And I laid back and down and squeezed in one more hour of sleep before getting up, getting out and getting something.

This isn’t the first time of late that I’ve been confused by which day it is. Last week we flew to New York on Friday morning, played two games on Friday night, flew back to Memphis on Saturday afternoon, spent a few hours with my family, then came into the office and practiced all day on Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday. We leave on Wednesday (I think!) for Orlando, where we’ll be based until next week. Despite having some bye weeks built into our schedule this season, the NBA 2K League has remained a grind.

But what makes it worth the grind is getting results, which is exactly what’s happened with Grizz Gaming this season. We lost two games in the season-opening tournament, then lost our first three games of the regular season. Since then we’ve improved steadily, and we’ve won 4 of our last 6 games. Today we sit at 5-6, in 13th place out of 21 teams, just one loss out of a playoff spot. In our most recent game on Friday night, we put up 96 points in a win against Detroit, the highest point total any team has scored in the NBA 2K League regular season.

AuthenticAfrican of Grizz Gaming poses for a photo during the game against Wizards District Gaming during Week 7 of the NBA 2K League regular season on May 29, 2019 at the NBA 2K Studio in Long Island City, New York. Photo by Steve Freeman via Getty Images.

I suspected that it was going to take us some time to figure things out. After all, our six-man roster had three 19-year-olds, which included our starting backcourt, Vandi and Jayrod. Once they started figuring out how the League build of the game played and how it works to play on the stage under the bright lights of the studio, our team made a leap. We also made a midseason trade with Orlando for Kelmav, who has given us another dimension on the offensive end as we’ve worked him into what we do. (And at 20 years old, Kelmav also made us even younger.) We still got steady play from our vets, AuthenticAfrican and UniversalPhenom, and DDouble stepped into the role of lockdown defender and has been terrific.

So while some things feel the same—the travel, the endless scrimmages and film sessions— Grizz Gaming is in a much different, and better, place than we were at the start of the season. Which is entirely due to the work all of these guys have put in. We’ve practiced basically seven days a week since we all showed up here back in May. There have been days I’ve given the guys a day off and they all came in on their own, or times they’ve wanted to come straight from the airport to the practice facility to get back at it. We all want to get better, and when that is the prevailing attitude, there’s nothing better.

Which doesn’t mean we’re done. I think the next step for us is consistency, being able to sustain the way we play and bounce back from a bad quarter here and there. Because as much as the NBA 2K League is about playing basketball, at the end of the day, this is a video game, and sometimes, just as in life, you do the right thing but get a weird animations or a strange bounce. So we control what we can control and let the computer decide the rest. But with that being said, we want to put ourselves in the best position possible to get blessed by the game.

I know that it seems like it goes on like this forever, but the reality is we’ve cleared the hump and the season is tapering toward the postseason. We’ve got a tough schedule the rest of the way, but we also know there’s not a team in this league that we can’t beat. All season long, our toughest opponent has been ourselves, and once we all consistently believe in each other and remember to talk and trust, we’ll reach that next level. And we will get there. It’s just a question of when.

Until then, we’ll keep flying back and forth and coming in to the office seven days a week and grinding, grinding, grinding.

Because that’s the only way we know how.

The contents of this page have not been reviewed or endorsed by the Memphis Grizzlies. All opinions expressed by Lang Whitaker are solely his own and do not reflect the opinions of the Memphis Grizzlies or its Basketball Operations staff, owners, parent companies, partners or sponsors. His sources are not known to the Memphis Grizzlies and he has no special access to information beyond the access and privileges that go along with being an NBA accredited member of the media.

langs-world-grizz-gaming-the-grind-never-stops

Lang's World: Grizz Gaming, the grind never stops

It wasn’t all that long ago that Grizz Gaming ended season one of the NBA 2K League. We finished strong but didn’t make the playoffs, and while I was disappointed to not be involved in the postseason, I was also hopeful, because I could see a path forward. We had our two retained players, Authentic African and Universal Phenom, who we could build around. And we would have the seventh pick in the season two draft to select a player who would hopefully be another building block.

That was all back in August. Earlier this week, we officially started our journey into season two with the NBA 2K League Draft, when we selected four players to round out our roster. Which was really the culmination of weeks of work Since the draft pool had been finalized about a month ago, our Grizz Gaming crew has spent so many hours going through the players, thinking through the possibilities, and basically just trying to ready ourselves for any variable that got thrown at us. Along with our newly-added scout/assistant coach Michael “Purp” Thomas, myself and Authentic and Universal have been exchanging ideas and observations and plans, trying to sift through pages and pages and pages of stats and notes and data. While there was a ton to figure out, the best part about it was that after we crunched the numbers, we were all mostly on the same page when it came to the players at the top of our draft board.

Zach Vandivier poses for a picture after being picked in the first round, seventh overall by Grizz Gaming in the 2019 NBA 2K League draft on March 5, 2019 in Brooklyn, New York at the Barclays Center.

With the seventh overall pick, we drafted Vandi (Zach Vandivier), a point guard out of Cleveland. In the second round we added Jayrod (Justin Rodriguez), a shooting guard from New York City. During that lead up to the draft, after sorting through all of the options that were available and considering where we were selecting, at some point we identified Vandi and Jayrod as the ideal backcourt for our system. Of course, we figured there was no way we would be able to draft both of them, and I quietly suspected our best-case scenario might be getting just one of the two. But somehow we were able to get both of the players we wanted, which left us feeling confident heading into the third round.

We also wanted to draft a small forward who could lock down opposing players, and one of the guys high on our list was ToXsiK (Brandon Raudenbush), out of Miami, who played for Cavs Legion GC in the 2K League last season. We figured he’d be gone by the time we got to the third round, but when we made our choice, ToXsiK was still on the board, which made it an easy choice. And with our final selection, we wanted to find someone versatile enough to fill in wherever he might be asked to play, and also willing to play a supporting role. So we turned to one of our former players, DDouble2K (Daniel Davis), who we obviously knew well and were glad to bring back to Memphis.

Looking at our roster, we feel like we addressed our major need from season one, which was getting more scoring on the court. We also managed to put together a group of players who have all played with or against each other at some point, and that shared experience will hopefully make us stronger from the start.

And that start is now. Tomorrow we’ll start booking flights to get our players into town, and after a couple of weeks of scrimmaging and tightening things up, before you know it we’ll be getting back on the plane to head to New York for the season opening tournament.

Last year we competed. This year it’s time to get some W’s.

langs-world-grizz-gaming-is-ready-to-run-it-back

Lang’s World: Grizz Gaming is ready to run it back

It was the first week in May, and the inaugural Grizz Gaming team was landing at LaGuardia Airport in New York City to play our first game in team history. As we filed through the airport and looked for our sprinter van ride into the city, our power forward Antonio Saldivar, a.k.a. UniversalPhenom, turned to me and said, “We really just flew all the way to New York City to play a video game?”

General Manager Lang Whitaker of Grizz Gaming laughs during the game against the 76ers GC during the NBA 2K League Mid Season Tournament on June 8, 2018 at the NBA 2K League Studio in Long Island City, New York. Photo by Michelle Farsi via Getty Images.

Did we ever. And it wasn’t just a one-time trip. This was the first of what would be 16 trips from Memphis to New York to, yep, play video games. Specifically, we went to NYC to compete against 15 other teams in the NBA 2K League, a league that is built around the uber-popular NBA 2K video game series.

That first trip didn’t go so well—in the opening tournament, we lost all three games that we played. We bounced back and won our regular season opener one week later, and then lost four more to get off to a less-than-ideal 1-4 start.

But we worked. We gritted, we grinded. We turned things around, and Grizz Gaming finished our first season with a record of 6-8. Which is not ideal, obviously, but considering that start, to even be in the playoff race down the stretch was a positive.

For season one, all of our games were played in a studio in Long Island City, which meant a bounty of hotel and frequent flyer points, a lot of van rides over and back across the East River, and a lot of late night walks through Manhattan to grab dinner. It was tough, to be sure, but as the season went along we began to settle into a groove and become familiar with the rhythm of life in the 2K League.

And then, by August, it was done. Our players packed up and returned to their homes, all across the United States, and for a few weeks I just sat back and waited for my head to stop spinning. Eventually, two teams that we had beaten, Knicks Gaming and Heat Check Gaming, faced off in the 2K League Finals, with the Knicks taking the crown.

Knicks Gaming celebrates with trophy in a huddle after winning Game Two of the 2018 NBA 2K League Finals on August 25, 2018 at the NBA 2K Studioin Long Island City, New York. Photo by Alex Nahorniak-Svenski via Getty Images.

We pivoted to start looking forward instead of backward. We retained two players from our season one squad: UniversalPhenom, as well as Mehyar Ahmed-Hassan, a.k.a. AuthenticAfrican, who set the NBA 2K League single game scoring record when he poured in 84 points during a triple-overtime loss against the Sixers. As fall turned into winter, thousands of players began attempting to qualify to make the draft pool for season two of the NBA 2K League. And I started quietly slipping into streams to watch potential players do work. (Yes, I will freely admit that this GM has a burner account. On Twitch, at least.)

Now that we’re into 2019, the season two draft is just a few weeks away. I’m assembling my crew and getting ready to put in hours scouting and prepping for the season two draft. Season one was not easy, but going through it taught me a ton, about myself, about my team, and about the 2K League.

We’re ready for season two. Press start, y’all.

langs-world-were-ready-for-season-2

Lang's World: We’re Ready for Season 2

memmwallace

MEMPHIS – With the inaugural season of the NBA 2K League in full swing, we’ve basically spent the last two months bouncing back and forth from Memphis to the NBA 2K League studio in New York City.

And that means we’ve spent roughly half of the last two months on the road. My next-door neighbor is a pilot for a major airline, and I’ve been gone just about as much as he has. It’s tiring and a bit head-spinning.

The thing is, I was already a seasoned traveler – having journeyed from Europe to Africa to South America – and spent the last decade-plus crisscrossing the country covering the NBA. I’ve maintained at least Gold Medallion status on Delta for as long as I can remember, and I can tell you, from memory, where all of the Chick-Fil-A’s are located in most major domestic airports.

I suppose it stands to reason, then, that I have become a pretty good flyer, if I do say so myself. When you are spending the majority of your time in airports and inside airplanes and trudging through hotels, you do your best to figure out ways to make each experience as simple as possible. 

It would likely be helpful if I were more process-oriented, but while I am not the most organized person in the world, I find that having a system and adhering to that system at all times while traveling makes everything easier for me.

Here are my failsafe tips for traveling, with a few thrown in from the Grizz Gaming guys. Ignore them at your own peril... 

1. A backpack is my preferred method of carrying stuff when I travel. A messenger bag or briefcase may be more urbane or stylish, but when I’m traveling I need function over everything. 

2. There are things I use frequently when traveling that always live in that backpack. Even when I’m at home or work, these items stay in that bag at all times, so I always know where to find them when it’s time to hit the road again.

These items include: my laptop and its charging cable; a notebook; a couple of pens (always grab the hotel room pens and throw them in your bag); two iPhone charging cables/plugs and a charging cable for my headphones; two sets of headphones (one earbuds, one over-ear with an optional wire in case you get a plane with a monitor and you want to watch a movie); bottles of Advil, Airborne and Zantac; an HDMI adaptor; my digital audio recorder and a second personal ID.

It’s important to resist the urge to grab and use these items when I’m at home. Because as long as I’ve secured my bag, whenever I check into a random hotel room somewhere or sit down at an airport gate, I always know where to find a charging cable.

3. Avoid checking a bag at all costs. Sometimes it can’t be avoided, sure, but it’s just adding another layer of worry on top of everything else you’re dealing with on the day. Try to pack as light as possible and take the smallest bag available. If I can go with a backpack and a small rolling suitcase, I’m good.

4. This is a small thing, but always plug in your phone when you go to sleep at night. Facing the day with your phone fully charged is always a good idea.

5. Flying direct is always preferable to connecting flights. If you have to connect, leave yourself two hours of connecting time.

6. Flying early is always better than flying late. (There’s been less time in the day for the planes to get delayed, and airports early in the morning are less crowded and easier to navigate).

7. Always wear socks. I don’t care what your footwear situation might be, you should wear socks, unless you don’t mind going barefoot through a veritable ocean of bacteria at the TSA checkpoint. 

8. And as tempting as it may be to wear flip-flops to help speed through the TSA area, I would advise against it. A friend and I once had a narrow connection to make in an airport and needed to run, and he was wearing flip-flops, which just made the whole situation ridiculous. You’re going to another city, not the pool. Wear shoes that are easily accessible.

9. As soon as I’m through the airport security checkpoint, I head for the nearest newsstand. There, I purchase two things that will make the rest of my day easier:

A) The largest bottle of water that will fit inside my backpack. You never know when you’re going to need water, and by buying a large bottle of water, you can usually have enough remaining post-flight to take with you to your final destination (your hotel room), so you don’t have to pay like $8 for a bottle of water at the hotel.

(Pro tip: Whatever you do, don’t buy the water that comes with the squirt top. You are not a professional athlete and you don’t need immediate access to your drink. You’d rather be able to seal that bottle shut and know it’s not going to burst in your backpack.

B) Reading material. I use the Amazon Kindle app on my phone to read books, so I always have four or five reading choices available on hand at all times. But for those moments when you want something tangible to flip through, it’s worth it to have at least one magazine that will present you with at least an hour or so of interesting reading material, which for me usually means either The New Yorker or GQ. 

10. Find your gate, pay attention to the boarding process, and then when they announce that they’re about to begin the boarding process, go to the bathroom. This way when you return in time to get on the plane, you should be good for the next few hours. 

11. I am not a loud proponent of most airport dining options, other than One Flew South in Terminal E in the Atlanta airport. But on travel days, I do think it’s important to take advantage of any opportunity to eat food. Because who knows when that opportunity may present itself again? You might think to yourself, “Self, since this is such a short flight, I’ll skip breakfast and just grab some lunch at my destination.” And then you board the plane, sit on the runway for three hours before taking off, find yourself starving on board and relegated to begging the flight attendant for a second bag of pretzels. And then upon landing, you have to run to make it to your meeting and you still haven’t had lunch.

So before you get on the plane, grab a container of yogurt and granola, or eat a club sandwich or whatever. The whole travel experience is defined by so many random moments, when you have the chance to choose something certain, you should take advantage. 

12. Understanding that, you should also be careful not to buy food and bring it on the plane. Airplanes are a confined space, which is stressful enough without the aroma of a turkey sub with extra onions wafting through the plane.

13. Perhaps the greatest skill I’ve developed in life, other than learning how to live on a budget and how to make perfect scrambled eggs, is training myself to be able to sleep on airplanes. Unless you’re in first class or the exit row, it’s virtually impossible to have the space needed to get any work done. One of the most productive things a person can do on an airplane, I’ve found, is to get some sleep. 

Now, I know there are those who prefer sitting in an aisle seat to take advantage of a few inches of legroom when the aisle isn’t in use.

But I will take a window seat. Admittedly, there’s a bit of a dice roll here, because sometimes you get the window seat without a window at your shoulder, which is a tiny bit cramped. But sometimes you don’t, and you get a few extra inches of shoulder room. Life can be tricky that way. I get in that window seat, put on my seatbelt, stick in my earphones, put on my sleeping playlist – the one that’s worked for me lately is the Apple Music “Night Dreamer” Blue Note Records playlist – close my eyes, lean my head against the wall and doze off.

14. You do not need to recline your seat. Nothing plunges me into a simmering anger on a flight faster than the person in front of me putting their seat back into my knees.  I am over six feet tall, and I can manage to sleep for hours without reclining my seat. You can probably live for a few hours on a plane without needing to lean back into my lap. Be kind, don’t recline.

15. Stay covered. Look, it’s been super-hot lately in Memphis, and I understand the temptation to wear shorts and a t-shirt to the airport. But once you’re up in the air, the airplane usually turns into a veritable meat locker. Seriously, the air pumping into the plane is so cold you can actually see it coming down from the vents as a thick fog. You will want to have at least a light, long-sleeve shirt or hoodie, plus either jeans or pants. 

And socks, of course. But you already knew that.

16. Do not buy one of those U-shaped travel pillows. They don’t work. If they did, wouldn’t everyone sleep with U-shaped pillows at home? The only circumstance I can think of where a travel pillow might be deemed acceptable would be if you were sitting in a middle seat on a long-haul redeye, but even then you’re probably going to spend most of your time fighting your neighbors for armrest real estate. 

17. There are plenty of apps that are certainly useful, but one that is definitely worthwhile if you’re flying on Delta or American or even Alaska Airlines is the Gogo Entertainment App. Through some magic wizardry, once you’re in the air you can connect to the Gogo App and—FOR FREE—watch any movie that the airline has in their library. The problem is that you have to watch on your phone or iPad, but it makes it worth your while if you’re on a plane without entertainment options. 

18. When the airplane lands, don’t be in a hurry. It’s so tempting to jump up and grab your stuff and stand in the aisle, but if you’re in coach you’re going to sit there for at least 15 minutes until you get your chance to deplane. For some reason, time seems to move backward in that situation and people forget how to form an orderly line. 

19. Use the airline app. I’ll admit I was a bit of a luddite and preferred to print my tickets each time I arrived at the airport. But the Grizz Gaming guys showed me how easy it is to put a plane ticket in my phone’s “wallet.” Plus, it’s one less piece of paper for you to worry about.

langs-world-essential-travel-tips-help-get-grizz-gaming-through-road-weary-nba-2k-league-season

Lang’s World: Essential travel tips help get Grizz Gaming through road-weary NBA 2K League season

MEMPHIS - Winning and losing are precarious partners. Each needs the other in order to exist, in order to define one another. It’s impossible to understand how great winning feels without having ever experienced losing.

I’ve thought a lot about winning lately, especially in the context of sports. My son is five years old, and recently began playing in his first youth sports leagues. A few weeks ago, he scored his first goal in a soccer match – a thunderbolt from 20 yards out, like he was Zlatan or someone. Considering most kids in the league (including him) have trouble just completing simple five-yard passes, I have no idea how he unleashed that shot, but seeing that ball bounce into the goal was one of the most fulfilling sports moments I’ve ever witnessed. I wanted to celebrate; he just wanted to play with Pokémon cards.

That game ultimately ended in a tie, and I have no idea what the team’s won-loss record is at this point in the season. To be honest, for these kids it’s more about understanding what it means to compete, how to not give up when they’re behind, to play hard and play well, to be willing to lean on each other.

And then there are games where we desperately care who wins and who loses, like in the NBA 2K League, where I’m the GM and coach of Grizz Gaming. I went into the season-opening ‘The Tipoff’ tournament hoping to use our four group games to try and gauge where we stood. We were lovingly placed into what all of the broadcasters referred to as the Group of Death, where we would have to go up against four awesome teams, including the top two players selected in the Draft.

In our first game, we fell behind early to Boston before mounting a late comeback, eventually making it a 9-point game with a few minutes left before losing by a dozen. In our next game Friday afternoon against Miami, our game-tying three-pointer swished through the net just one-tenth of a second too late. After that dispiriting loss, we had to play two more games that day, and we couldn’t find any footing, losing to Indiana and Dallas.

After we lost our fourth game of the tournament, I went back to my hotel room and laid in bed and stared at the ceiling for a few hours, kicking around all the ways I could have done a better job preparing and coaching our team. Spending time in professional sports locker rooms, I’ve been in plenty of postgame situations where a team had just lost a close one. Yet due to the light atmosphere, an uniformed observer would likely have no idea what just happened. Athletes and coaches constantly talk about having a short memory, whether you win or lose. I need to learn how to do a better job of doing that.

I spent the return flight home from New York to Memphis listening to this incredible, new Leon Bridges album, which is suitably equal parts uplifting and downcast. After getting home to hug my family and spend time with them, the next few days were spent watching film and figuring out how we can best compete against Indiana in our regular-season opener on Saturday. You can either give up or get up. And I’m going to get up, every day, and do work.

In just a couple of days, we are going right back to NYC to try this thing all over again. I am proud of my team for going out and giving their best effort in the tournament. But this is not youth sports. Wins matter.

Winning may not be everything, and it may not be the only thing, either.

langs-world-valuable-lessons-in-winning-and-losing-5-10-18

Lang’s World: Valuable Lessons In Winning and Losing 5.10.18

The Memphis Grizzlies organization announced today the team name (Grizz Gaming), the logo, grizzgaming.com and the team’s official social handles for the esports team set to compete starting in May 2018 in the inaugural season of the NBA 2K League. The NBA 2K League, a joint venture between the NBA and Take-Two Interactive, is a professional esports league featuring the best 2K players in the world. A total of 17 teams will participate and each team will draft five players who will play the game using unique characters.

Grizz Gaming’s logo is bold and balanced. It is inspired by the Grizzlies’ tenacity, updated for a digital space. The ‘Grizz Gaming’ GG ligature combines the ‘Grit and Grind’ ethos of the Grizzlies NBA franchise with a tacit nod to a traditional gaming sign-off, ‘Good Game’. The bear claw updates the Grizzlies’ secondary logo, elevating it to primary logo status, with each of the five claws representing the five players on the team.

The official colors invoke a more simplified version of the Grizzlies’ color scheme, boldly relying on the Grizzlies’ fan favorite Beale Street and Midnight Blues. The secondary logo, Grizz + Grind, incorporates the Grizzlies’ iconic inline type, but utilizing a “+” instead of the usual ampersand that visually identifies with gaming controllers.

“As someone who has voraciously consumed both basketball and video games for my entire life, being the General Manager of Grizz Gaming is in many ways the culmination of my life’s work,” said Grizz Gaming General Manager Lang Whitaker. “I’m looking forward to grinding non-stop as Grizz Gaming prepares to take part in the inaugural season of the NBA 2K League, where we will grit and grind and do our best to represent Memphis and the passionate fans of esports. I always told my Mom that playing video games would one day pay off. Today is that day.”

“The Memphis Grizzlies organization is thrilled for Grizz Gaming to be one of the founding teams of the NBA 2K League,” said Memphis Grizzlies President of Business Operations, Jason Wexler. “Grizz Gaming provides the Memphis Grizzlies organization and our partners with a new avenue to engage with a passionate and dedicated fan base through an esports team that reflects our culture and identity. We look forward to competing with the other 16 NBA 2K League teams who will be joining us in the inaugural season and embrace the opportunity to add our distinct voice and perspective to the growing esports community.”

Fans can visit the newly launched microsite, grizzgaming.com, for all news, updates and happenings regarding the team. Additionally, fans can follow @grizzgaming on Twitter and Instagram, as well as GrizzliesGaming on Facebook and Snapchat to follow along with the team’s inaugural season.

The NBA 2K League will become a part of the constantly growing esports community. By 2020, the industry is expected to grow to $1.5 billion worldwide while the audience is expected to reach 385 million in 2017.

The league’s inaugural season will take place in 2018, beginning with a league qualifier taking place from Jan. 1-31, 2018, that will determine players for tryouts in February. The qualifier will encompass the entire month of January and all prospective players who win 50 games in NBA 2K18’s Pro-Am mode and complete an online application by January 31 can receive an invitation to the next round of tryouts in February. The qualifier is available to anyone in the world who has a copy of NBA 2K18 on Xbox One or PS4 and is 18-or-older. Tryouts will be followed by a draft in March and the league will officially begin play in May.

“The reveal of our team names and logos is an exciting milestone as we move toward the NBA 2K League’s inaugural season in 2018, and we can’t wait for the NBA 2K community and our teams’ fans to see them,” said NBA 2K League Managing Director Brendan Donohue, who oversees all league operations.

The NBA 2K League is a professional esports league co-founded by the NBA and Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ:TTWO). Launching in 2018, the league will feature the best NBA 2K players in the world.  Each of the league’s 17 teams will draft gamers to compete as unique characters in 5-on-5 play against the other teams in a mix of regular-season games, tournaments and playoffs.  The league will host tryouts in early 2018, followed by a draft in March and the season tip-off in May.  For more information about the NBA 2K League, visit www.NBA2KLeague.com.

grizzlies-announce-grizz-gaming-as-nba-2k-league-team

Grizzlies announce 'Grizz Gaming' as NBA 2K League team

Lang Whitaker

NEW YORK CITY - In the interest of not burying the lede, let’s start with the news: I’m signing with the Memphis Grizzlies.

The Memphis Grizzlies have hired me to be the General Manager of the Grizzlies Team in the NBA 2K League, as well as a contributor to their in-house digital content group, Grind City Media. What does this mean? Well, I’ve spent the last two decades writing and talking about the NBA, first at SLAM magazine and then at GQ and NBA.com. Now I’ll be doing it for Grind City Media, on the same squad as great people like Alexis Morgan and Chris Vernon and Mike Wallace. Which means I’ll also be writing for grizzlies.com and grindcitymedia.com, and making podcast appearances, popping up on their game broadcasts, and making all kinds of related content, from Grizz to the NBA at large and some College Football too (Go Dawgs).

And that’s the part of this job that’s easy to explain. The other part I’m going to need you to use your imagination, because it’s something that doesn’t even really exist yet. And even when it does exist, it’s going to be virtual. (You should’ve heard me trying to explain all of this to my Mom.)

In a couple of months, the NBA 2K League will launch. Seventeen NBA teams will have their own squads of video gamers who will represent their franchises and play against each other in NBA 2K. I’ll be running the Memphis Grizzlies’ squad: drafting players; hashing out strategies; generating content along the way; coaching up our players; basically being all-in on the Grizzlies eSports team. Over the last few years, I got to watch up close as my brother and former podcast co-host Rick Fox built his Echo Fox eSports organization into an industry leader, and now the Grizzlies are giving me a chance to do something similar. I have a lot of fun ideas, but the most important thing to know is that this team is going to grit and grind and kick some butt. I’ve played video games, including 2K, my entire life. Now I’m getting paid to do it. What a time to be alive.

Now, how did all this happen? A few weeks ago I knew I was going to have the chance to test unrestricted free agency. I threw out some feelers, started setting up meetings. I had the chance to talk with a bunch of the world’s leading content providers and news outlets, and finally got to a point where I needed to start sorting through the options that were out there.

And then I got a call from the Memphis Grizzlies, who reached out not only to express interest, but to tell me they really, really wanted me. So we started talking. A lot. I spoke with Mike Wallace, Grind City Media’s Senior Editor. I talked with Jason Wexler, the President of the Grizzlies, as well as a slew of other team execs. And when I told them there was interest on our end, they invited my family down to Memphis for a weekend so we could see exactly what they were selling. I’ve actually been in Memphis the last few years for the NBA playoffs, covering games for NBA.com, but that time was mostly spent just going back and forth from my hotel to the arena. (Um, I also may have spent some time at Gus’s.)

So we came down to Memphis and saw the Grizz thump the Warriors (when Steph Curry chucked his mouthpiece at the ref). We went from Mud Island to Collierville, had a big dinner at Rendezvous, and spent hours talking and talking and talking with various people from the Grizzlies. One thing I was told several times over the weekend was that the Grizzlies want to do things differently, which really resonated with me. Because I’ve always believed if you’re going to do anything, why do it the same as everyone else?

I came home and thought about it for a while. The phrase “Believe Memphis” is omnipresent around the city, plastered on t-shirts and bumper stickers. I believe it’s intended to be a rallying cry, a unifying ethos for Memphians to buy into. As amazing as it would be to run the Grizzlies eSports team and to join Grind City Media, for me accepting this offer went deeper. So I started looking at it as a question: Did I Believe Memphis? Like, did I believe it enough to pick up and move there?

After being born and raised in Atlanta, I moved to New York City in the fall of 2000. I will always love New York City. I was in New York during 9/11. I got married while I lived here. My son was born here. I made lifelong friends here. But seventeen years after showing up with a couple of suitcases and a bunch of plans, I’m ready for something new.

The song says if you can make it in New York City, you can make it anywhere. Well, I made it in New York City. And now I want to make it in Memphis, back home in the South. I’ve missed Waffle House and SEC football and Chick-Fil-A and sweet tea and having the chance breathe and enjoy life as it unfolds. The Grizzlies have assembled a team off the court that is as creative and competitive as their team on the court. And I am excited to be part of that team.

So I’m choosing Memphis. I believe Memphis. And I hope you do, too.

why-i-believe-memphis

Why I believe Memphis

The Memphis Grizzlies will participate in the inaugural season of the NBA 2K esports league, the team announced today. The inaugural season begins in 2018.

The Grizzlies are among 17 NBA teams that will compete in the NBA 2K esports league. The other participating teams include Boston, Cleveland, Dallas, Detroit, Golden State, Indiana, Miami, Milwaukee, New York, Orlando, Philadelphia, Portland, Sacramento, Toronto, Utah and Washington.

“The Grizzlies organization is extremely excited to be a founding franchise in the NBA 2K esports league,” said Memphis Grizzlies President of Business Operations, Jason Wexler. “A Grizzlies NBA 2K team is simultaneously a way for us to further engage with our existing passionate and supportive fans and an opportunity to cultivate new Grizz fans locally, regionally, nationally and globally. As an organization, we are committed to competing at the highest levels on the court – whether the court is real or virtual.  We look forward to the challenge and opportunity that an NBA 2k esports league presents.”

In February 2017, the NBA and Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ:TTWO) announced plans to launch a new, professional competitive gaming league that will bring together the best basketball gamers in the world.  In the coming months, the league and its teams will make a variety of announcements related to participating players, team branding, league structure and business updates.

“This is the first step in what promises to be an extraordinary league, bringing together the world's best gamers and showcasing elite competition on an international stage,” said NBA 2K esports league Managing Director Brendan Donohue.  “Our teams have expressed tremendous enthusiasm for esports, and we are looking forward to forming something truly unique for basketball and gaming fans around the globe.”

Fans who want to support the Memphis Grizzlies and purchase 2017/18 Season Tickets can do so by calling (901) 888-HOOP or going online to grizzlies.com. For more information on the Grizzlies, visit grizzlies.com, ‘like’ Memphis Grizzlies on Facebook or follow on Twitter (@memgrizz).

memphis-grizzlies-to-participate-in-nba-2k-esports-league

Memphis Grizzlies to participate in NBA 2K esports league

none

<a href="https://fedexforum.com/arena-policy-updates" target="_blank">CLEAR BAGS ONLY: FEDEXFORUM NOW REQUIRES CLEAR BAGS FOR ALL GAMES &amp; EVENTS!</a>