The NBA is “looking into” a gesture made by Memphis Grizzlies’ star Ja Morant during Tuesday’s game against the Golden State Warriors, per ESPN.
Morant was seen miming the act of training a firearm at the Warriors’ bench after a timeout was called following a pair of Jimmy Butler free throws.
As the SFGATE detailed, Warriors’ guard Buddy Hield might have instigated the incident with his own gun gesture, though, this wasn’t initially seen by the referees: “Warriors guard Buddy Hield actually seemed to spark the incident when he made a gun-toting gesture toward the court from the Dubs bench during a free throw late in the fourth quarter. After the free throw and a called timeout, Morant then made the gesture back at Hield and toward the Warriors bench.” Following this, both players ended up receiving technical fouls.
Draymond Green had an immediate reaction to what Morant is doing, which can be seen, along with the gesture, in the above video from the Warriors’ NBC Sports broadcast partner.
The NBA would likely look into this anyway, given that it’s not a good look for Hield, Morant or the league itself, but given Morant has been twice suspended for appearing with a gun on social media for a total of 33 missed games, it’s not difficult to see why they’re going to zero in on this.
The Grizzlies have already been on a slide of late, as they’ve fallen to sixth place in the Western Conference after losing seven of their last eight contests. Losing Morant, who leads the Grizzlies with 22.7 points per game, for any amount of time to another suspension would only make a bad situation worse.
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