The Ja Morant trade ended the long run of speculation around Memphis and moved the 26-year-old star point guard to the Portland Trail Blazers on June 29. The Memphis Grizzlies got Jerami Grant and Kris Murray back, a deal that lands just before free agency begins on June 30 at 5 p.m. CT.
Morant leaves Memphis as a two-time All-Star, the NBA Rookie of the Year and an All-NBA second-team pick in the 2021-22 season. For the Grizzlies, the move turns a franchise centerpiece into roster space, salary structure and two incoming players in one stroke.
Memphis and the June 29 move
The Grizzlies did not wait for the week to play out. On June 29, they completed the trade with Portland and shifted a move that had been discussed for days into a finished transaction on the calendar. That timing matters because the league reaches free agency on June 30 at 5 p.m. CT, then reaches the point on July 6 when trades or deals can officially be consummated.
That sequence gives Memphis less room to stall. The club also had to decide on several team options by June 29, and it already picked up Olivier-Maxence Prosper's $2.5 million option for the 2026-2027 season and GG Jackson's $2.4 million option for the same season. Jackson averaged 21 minutes and 12.5 points through 55 games, while Olivier-Maxence averaged 18.6 minutes and 10 points through 53 games.
Morant's market narrowed
Before the deal, the price tag on Morant had already shifted. On June 23, Vincent Goodwill said the asking price had dropped from draft capital to pick swaps and then to players in exchange for him. The change tracks the market around a player teams had initially been asked to take on with draft compensation.
By June 24, Brian Windhorst said during NBA draft coverage that the Grizzlies were going to really try to trade Morant and that viewers had probably seen the last moments of him in a Grizzlies uniform. He also said the club was looking to totally reset its franchise and that Boozer's selection at No. 3 was part of that reset.
Windhorst added that the Grizzlies were having a difficult time finding a trading partner for their 26-year-old, two-time All-Star, which explains why the market had tightened even as trade interest kept building. Sources had already said the Miami Heat had interest before the Giannis Antetokounmpo deal, and league sources told Yahoo Sports to expect Morant to be traded this week.
Grant and Murray arrive
Portland's side of the deal gives Memphis Grant and Murray, and that return signals the Grizzlies chose immediate roster reshaping over holding the line for a bigger package. For a team that had already been operating through a reset, the trade closes one chapter and pushes the next decision cycle onto the rest of the offseason.
The central unresolved issue is the one attached to the package itself: what, if anything, sat beyond Grant and Murray in the full trade structure. With free agency opening at 5 p.m. CT on June 30 and the moratorium ending July 6, the Grizzlies have already moved the headline piece. What comes after that will show how far the reset is meant to go.
