With a franchise in transition, Taylor Hendricks offers defensive versatility and starter potential. Can this promising rookie be Memphis's next valuable piece?
The Memphis Grizzlies are a franchise in flux. There’s no sugarcoating it. This organization is clearly headed for major change. The Ja Morant era is winding down, and the Grizzlies didn’t wait for the wheels to fall off. They got ahead of the rebuild by flipping Jaren Jackson Jr. at the trade deadline.
They’ll miss the Swiss Army knife combo big. Jackson Jr. covered mistakes, anchored the defense, and made life easier for everyone else. But Memphis needed assets, and that meant making a painful decision.
In the process, they may have found a familiar type.
Grizzlies fans, meet Taylor Hendricks.
To be clear, nobody is saying Hendricks is Jaren Jackson Jr. That would be absurd. Jackson is a perennial Defensive Player of the Year candidate. For Hendricks to reach that level, he’d need a 99th-percentile outcome.
Still, the overlap is easy to see.
Hendricks is a 6-foot-9 forward with a 7-foot wingspan. He moves well. He can guard across positions. He’s not the weakside rim protector Jackson Jr. was, but he’s useful as a help defender and holds up better on the perimeter than most players his size.
Offensively, it’s a work in progress.
Grizzlies fans are already seeing the issue. Hendricks has hit just 25.0% of his threes in his first three games with Memphis. He isn’t much of a ball-handler, so if the jumper isn’t falling, the offense can stall quickly.
That said, the larger sample matters. Hendricks is a 35.5% three-point shooter for his career. He may never be a knockdown guy, but that’s a percentage you live with given his defensive value. Memphis doesn’t need him creating offense. They just need him to stay functional.
So, does that keep him in the long-term rotation?
Probably.
Do not be surprised if Hendricks starts games for the Grizzlies in the coming years. He was the ninth overall pick for a reason. He isn’t projected to be a star, but he was drafted to be a starter.
He’s not there yet. For all the defensive tools, Hendricks hasn’t impacted winning so far. His career minus-2.6 Box Plus/Minus reflects that.
Context matters. He spent his early career on a losing Utah team, and BPM often struggles to capture players like this — low usage, defense-first, low counting stats. Still, improvement is needed. Given his length, you’d like to see more shot blocking. Averaging 0.5 blocks per game for his career is light.
Here’s the most important part: Hendricks is 22.
This is a raw player. Flaws are expected. What matters is opportunity, and Memphis is giving him one. With limited frontcourt depth and a clear focus on the future, Hendricks should be in line for something close to 24 minutes per night.
That opportunity showed up Monday in Golden State. Hendricks finished with 15 points, 10 rebounds, two assists and three steals in 25 minutes, recording his first double-double of the season and easily his best game in a Memphis uniform.
That doesn’t make him a cornerstone. It doesn’t guarantee anything.
But for a franchise starting over, finding a 22-year-old, versatile forward who can defend, rebound, and survive offensively is a solid outcome.
The Grizzlies aren’t done reshaping this roster. Hendricks won’t define the rebuild.
But he looks like someone who can stick.