What Memphis Grizzlies said about Dillon Brooks saying team has 'no swagger'
Dillon Brooks always has something to say. So it's no surprise ahead of the Memphis Grizzlies' first game against Brooks since he was let go from the Grizzlies in the offseason, Brooks had yet another jab at his former team.
"You can see they have no swagger," Brooks told the Houston Chronicle ahead of Wednesday's game.
He even said in the Houston Chronicle story, the Grizzlies this season is like, "the girlfriend you used to have. You don't know how good she is until she's gone."
When Grizzlies coach Taylor Jenkins was asked about Brooks, the "ex-girlfriend", he brushed it off.
"That’s an interesting comment. I’ve been happily married for 10 years with four beautiful kids," Jenkins said. "I’ve got a beautiful marriage."
That's Brooks' perspective. The Grizzlies aren't fazed by Brooks' usual antics.
"I haven't seen anything that he's said," Desmond Bane said. "I ain't even worried about what anybody else got to say about our locker room."
That's just who Brooks is.
"That’s part of his game," Bane said. "He’s an antagonizer. I don’t even know what the word is. It’s part of his game.”
It sets the stage for the first of four matchups between the Grizzlies (3-10) and the Rockets (6-6), which is 7 p.m., Wednesday night at Toyota Center.
Brooks' recent jab is his latest criticism of the franchise since his departure to Houston in July. Last week, he told Sports Illustrated he was the "scapegoat" for the Grizzlies.
“What I didn’t like about Memphis was they allowed that so they can get out of the woodwork, and then I’m the scapegoat of it all," Brooks told Sports Illustrated. "That’s what I didn’t appreciate. And then ultimately they’ll come to me on the low, as men, one on one and tell me something, but then not defend me when everything went down.”
The Grizzlies completed a sign-and-trade deal with the Rockets in July to send Brooks to Houston. Brooks, who played his first six seasons in Memphis, is averaging 13.9 points per game this season.
"He's a heck of a player, he's having a great start to the year," Taylor Jenkins said. "Really happy for his early-season success."
For the most part, the Grizzlies are looking forward to their first shot at Brooks. Just probably not as much as Brooks, who's had the Grizzlies "circled on my list", he said during Rockets media day.
“I want to play against him," Jaren Jackson Jr. told The Commercial Appeal after Sunday's loss to the Celtics. "I’ve been talking trash to Dillon for five years, so it’s great.”
And despite having three wins to start the season, the Grizzlies aren't questioning their own "swagger", unlike Brooks.
"It's our swag, first and foremost," said Jenkins, when asked about how he knows his team will have that edge he said its played with the last couple of games.
Reach Wynston Wilcox at wwilcox@gannett.com and on the X platform, formerly known as Twitter, @wynstonw__.
This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: What Memphis Grizzlies said about Dillon Brooks saying team has 'no swagger'
