Ja Morant paid a heavy price. His FedExForum return proved Memphis did, too | Giannotto

They were sitting there in the Memphis Grizzlies' locker room, long after their 116-103 win over the Indiana Pacers, trying to explain to Ja Morant again just how different this FedExForum crowd Thursday had been from the one that greeted them the first two months of this regular season.

“Where everybody at?” Desmond Bane asked rhetorically, in an attempt to demonstrate his reaction upon taking the floor in every game before this one.

“We’d have rows of empty seats,” Xavier Tillman Sr. chimed in.

It was then that Tillman asked the Grizzlies’ superstar if he had ever noticed one fan in particular who usually sits courtside, right across from the team’s bench. He’s often holding up a cell phone camera, Tillman noted. But before he could get to the point of this anecdote, Morant cut his teammate off and let out a laugh.

“I haven’t been here for eight months, my boy,” he said.

Oh, we noticed. Everyone did.

Morant has paid a heavy price for the mistakes he made the past 18 months — but so did Memphis. So did the Grizzlies. So did the NBA. That’s what Morant’s first two games back from a 25-game suspension have reinforced.

The game missed him as much as he missed it.

So two days after that too-good-to-be-true game winner in New Orleans, Morant returned home like a conquering hero, and the basketball felt almost secondary to the scene.

FedExForum, sold out for just the fourth time this season, was filled with Memphis rap stars courtside and No. 12 jerseys in the stands up to the rafters. There was a thunderous ovation when Morant was introduced last in the starting lineup and a deafening “M-V-P” chant as he went to the free-throw line late to put the finishing touches on a second straight win. There was, frankly, a team on the court that looked nothing like the one that had stumbled to a 6-19 record.

"The vibe's a little different, isn't it?" Tillman said. "You can walk around with your head up, like we got a chance tonight."

There was even an attempt at a parade to commemorate the occasion. There was confetti and signs and a marching band of kids provided by the Memphis Youth Arts Initiative. Former Memphis football player Mowbray Rowand came up with the idea after watching Morant’s sublime season debut, hoping to play off the lyric Morant would often cite after wins last season: “It’s a parade inside my city.”

Rowand, along with rapper 2 Chainz, recently opened the downtown restaurant Esco. It’s billed as the official postgame dinner spot of the Grizzlies. Fans have shown up, he said. Just not for the reasons he hoped when signing the deal.

“Sometimes people need a drink, get their minds off things, off the losing,” Rowand said. “We needed that bright light back.”

As if to drive home the point that essentially, a new season is upon us, Derrick Rose took the public address microphone before tip-off for a holiday message. But he made sure to end it by highlighting the man everybody was there to see.

“On behalf of the fans,” Rose said, “welcome back, Ja.”

Of course, the place went nuts.

Morant admitted he almost had to go back into the locker room when his daughter, Kaari, approached him teary-eyed before his pregame warmup routine. He pulled her in close and said a prayer. The moment meant so much to him, he made it a point to show Bane a video of it in the locker room.

More: Surprise visits, subdued nightlife and halftime texts: Inside Ja Morant's suspension

His father, Tee Morant, said he had “anxiety through the roof.”

This also was his first game at home after being noticeably absent during the suspension.

He was walking around the court to shake hands with ushers he hadn't seen, take selfies with anyone who asked, and point to his heart at the messages fans had put on posters they made for the occasion. When he reached season ticket holder Andy Groveman, wearing a kippah, behind the Grizzlies’ bench, the two embraced.

“I gave him a blessing: 'We got you. Keep it on the road,' ” Groveman said.

If only because the way Morant plays basketball means so much to so many. If only because the way the NBA dealt with him this time, suggesting another poor decision off the court might actually be crippling to this franchise and his career.

This point, by the way, still irks Morant’s father.

“They judge my son by status, not by his age,” Tee Morant told The Commercial Appeal. “He didn’t commit a crime, but there’s other people who committed crimes against somebody and get less punishment than my son.”

Maybe he shouldn’t be saying that publicly right now. But he’s not wrong, either.

Whether Morant is a changed person from this experience, his exile lasted long enough.

So Thursday, it was Morant who told the team in the huddle during a timeout “we're back having fun again" after throwing an alley-oop to Santi Aldama, according to Bane. After the game, it was Morant who told Grizzlies coach Taylor Jenkins to leave the locker room and come back in again after Jenkins had entered simply clapping.

"You got to come in screaming after a win," Morant said. "You got to celebrate.”

Especially when there hasn't been much reason to the past eight months.

You can reach Commercial Appeal columnist Mark Giannotto via email at mgiannotto@gannett.com and follow him on X: @mgiannotto

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: Ja Morant's return: Inside Memphis Grizzlies star's FedExForum return