Memphis, It Was Realer Than Real

I’ll kick this thing off with something kind of funny. 

I had just come out of the locker room and was on my way to practice, when my agent Austin told me the GM wanted to talk with me. He had already prepped me on the real possibility of me being traded, but I didn’t know exactly when everything would go down. And I guess I didn’t really want to believe it.

So, I’m like, “Right now??” He said, “Yeah…. Right now.” So I start walking out of the gym, and some of the guys are looking at me, and I don’t know, I just wanted to break the ice. So I’m like “Yo, I’m out!!” Joking around. In my head I thought, You never know what it could be, honestly. But when I walked in the room, I knew immediately. And yeah, Zach basically said he was sorry it had to end like this. It’s funny, though, when the conversation ended I was just awkwardly looking around all confused like John Travolta in Pulp Fiction. Like, Well, what now? I literally asked him, “Can I go back upstairs and say bye?” Like he was gonna press a button, and the trap door was gonna open up. 

Man listen, I didn’t know if it was like Love Island or what!!

Like, Jaren has left the villa.

But in a way, I guess it is kinda like that.

I don’t know if you’re supposed to be this real, but maybe I saw the writing on the wall. Maybe also, part of me knew that and still just wanted to ride out this last year with my guys, and leave it there. I don’t know. Either way, I was packing my bags. 

I bumped into Ja first. He was like, “So?” I was like, “Utah.” He was like, “Oh, wow.” We were just in real shock for a minute. I didn’t really know how to feel. And Ja was Ja, man. I’ll never forget what he said:

“You been a pro for eight years, just continue to be that.” 

That right there??? Man that really just put the whole thing into perspective. 

Eight years………

Eight years with the Grizzlies organization, with this CITY, these fans…… It’s been a journey. When we were rolling, there was nothing you could say. Nothing. FedExForum was JUMPING. If you don’t remember that, then I guess you just weren’t really there. But I guess it’s like they say: All good things must come to an end.

I remember after getting the news, I walked in the locker room looking at my phone, about to shower. I already had a text from Lauri, welcoming me to Utah. But one thing I’ll never forget was a moment in the locker room before I left, when everyone was joking around again. And it was just so weird because in my head it was like, Wow, this is the last time I’m gonna see this. They were about to leave to get on a plane. It was a wrap. But I was joking around as if I was gonna see them later. I was just laughing, deep down thinking like, Wow, I’m definitely gonna miss y’all boys. I didn’t say it in the moment. But I’m saying it now.

I’ve just been reminiscing on it all……..

I remember the summer after my first season, I randomly got called to come in and work out at a specific time. I had a feeling who would be there, but they couldn’t tell me. Turns out, Ja had come in for a lil’ workout. And I’m not technically allowed to be in the building with him or something because he wasn’t on the team yet. So I just happened to be there when he was there. I wouldn’t say there was ever pressure to become friends, but I think both of us knew that they would obviously love it if we were tight. Haha. But once we started kicking it more and more, we found out we just rocked with the same stuff. So in the end, nothing ever needed to be forced. Twelve is the easiest person in the world to be friends with.

And yeah, I think us being as young as we were, and things getting lit quick, just set everything in motion.

It all started when Jae Crowder hit that game winner off Ja’s pass, one of the first home games in Ja’s rookie year. That was when we knew. He went coast to coast, went behind the back and then passed, and we realized, Oh my God. And it was just that first big pop in the arena. The whole building stood up, and you could just feel what was coming. 

But the bubble really did it. We all were just around each other all the time. We celebrated birthdays. Me and BC got close. Me and Dillon were always close. As a group, we just bonded over that experience and became super super tight. Going into the 2020–2021 season, we knew we were good, we were just trying to turn that corner. We drafted X — Xavier Tillman, my boy, who I was very close with in high school and at Michigan State. That’s my actual brother. I was his best man at his wedding. Then we got Des, and at that point we’re starting to be like, Alright, we got pieces now. We beat the Warriors in the play-in and went to the first round. It didn’t go our way, but the way we saw it after that, we had no ceiling. Everyone was saying, “Oh, we definitely next up.”

Then 2022 hit.

All Access was coming to town. ESPN was coming to town. Rappers are court side. Everyone is a believer — fully. We started off with no expectations and blew the league out of the water. Everything was clicking. I remember we went on a 11-game win streak, and then Dillon’s birthday fell right after that so we were turnt up. Taylor had that energy. He would have break-bread dinners, we’d go bowling, play kickball, have staff games, three-on-three, we’d have staff one-on-one. We went to a baseball field and played baseball with custom jerseys. We went to an escape room. We would do a ton of stuff together, like real wholesome. Haha. Basically, we weren’t trying to sit in a hotel.

I got too many memories from that time, man……. Dancing in the hallway, probably adding a new piece of whatever choreography to whatever we were doing every game, blasting music in the locker room. Everyone mobbing during postgame interviews — that was organic. I saw Dillon talk about that on stream the other day. That’s true. We were definitely the first ones to do that, for sure. We’re messing up interviews. We’re crashing stuff. All those late-night talks at four in the morning about winning a ring one day — I’ll never forget it. Man, you could see the sun come up with these guys. And it was really THAT in some cities. (IYKYK!!!) We could not be stopped at all. It was ridiculous.

I remember when we beat Minnesota in the first round, in 2022, I was like, Oh my God. The edge in that series was just different. That was a grudge match. Ant, Jaden, KAT...... We weren’t messing with each other forreal. Haha. We really weren’t. So that was such a stressful series. It was brutal. We were barely in the lead throughout the series. Every game was a comeback. You never thought it could be more toxic than that. And then you go into a Golden State series — a very toxic, very real playoff series. I literally had the thought like, Dang, if I wasn’t playing in this, I would want to watch every game.

When it came to our “confidence,” I don’t think we ever saw it the way other people did. We became a very polarizing team, and while that didn’t bother me, it definitely wasn’t lost on any of us. Here’s what I’ll say: We always thought we were having the edge that we needed to have, to beat teams. We never wanted to be beat on that. And that was out of pride for Memphis. You have to remember, our group had really only played there, except for a few people. We’re molding ourselves off the energy of the city, and off the last Grizzlies to ever do it that big — shoutout to Z-Bo, Tony Allen, Mike, and all them. We weren’t really trying to come off one way or another, but you also weren’t going to make us stop being us.

Looking back on everything now, I don’t think we took it for granted, but we definitely didn’t see a situation where we wouldn’t always be winning. I think we had so much success so early, that people forgot we were still growing. If we had made certain mistakes we made a little earlier, I don’t think the reaction would have been as extreme. But we made them at a very high point in our careers, with a lot of eyes on us. And when we were still just learning how to grow up as men. You gotta understand, there were things we had to deal with in our private lives — taking care of our families, some of us raising kids and these kinds of things. I’m not afraid to admit that it weighed on us at times. I know people said we needed to be more professional to get over that hump — I’ll be honest, I don’t necessarily agree with that. Professionalism comes from how you prepare, and behind the scenes, we were an Xs and Os team. We practiced hard and worked out even harder. There’s just no way anyone worked harder than us.

But in the end, I guess it just wasn’t enough.

At the end of the day, I just want y’all to know that Memphis was home to me. And everything I did here was from the bottom of my heart. When it came to how I showed up, I wasn’t just doing things for the community — I was a part of it. I loved giving back. I went to literacy events, always had different youth groups out to games and to celebrate the holidays. Basically, I just felt lucky to be embraced by this city and wanted to show love back every chance I got. And that’s never gonna stop. This isn’t really goodbye — it’s see you later. Memphis will always be home.

Something that I’m really proud of is tapping in on the music side of things, with the underground. Yeah I get how that sounds, Oh, another NBA player who thinks he can rap? Go figure. Haha. But long story short, before Covid hit, I was in the studio all the time. I remember I got plugged with the producer T Trendin. When things shut down, I made this little studio in my closet on the rack, and he would come through, and we would just make cool stuff. 

I only bring that up to say, I got to know this city on a level that few people get to, and for that, I’ll always be grateful. To me, being a part of the culture — that’s everything.

Memphis, it’s been realer than real.

Before I go, I want to thank a few folks who made this journey what it was, starting with J.B. Bickerstaff. I only had him as a coach for a year, but that was my dog. And then when Taylor came in, we made a strong connection that will last forever. I will always be in that guy’s life. I go to his house a lot and hang out with him and his kids. He really showed me what this NBA thing is about. Thank you to Erik Schmidt, who’s been there from the jump. He used to be a video coordinator, and I’ve watched him move up to being one of our main assistant coaches. He would travel around with me and work with me in the summer. And we were working together till the end. Thank you, Coach Darko, who’s the coach of the Toronto Raptors now. He was one of the guys who worked with me, too. He really brought that Eastern European energy, that brutalness that I really needed. I took bits and pieces from freaking everybody — a lot of staff that has passed through. But those guys for sure are people who made a severely high impact on me. And it was a short time, but Tuomas really knows the game. He cares about winning, and you want a coach like that.

Thank you to my teammates — my brothers. Listen, we know what it is: You only get a certain window in this league. You have to win a championship to stay together. And if you’re not doing that, they’re going to blow it up, and that is what it is. But I look at where everyone’s at now, and despite every obstacle, no one faded. And I just think that says it all. Des is playing great basketball right now. Dillon’s having the best season of his career. And then I’m me. And I’m going to continue to be that in Utah, once I’m fully healthy.

And finally, thank you to the amazing fans that make up this city I’ve been blessed to call home for eight years. You embraced a young kid from Indiana, and for that I’ll always be grateful. I don’t take any of it for granted. Every night I went out there, I just wanted to make y’all proud. And I want to shout out the culture forreal because I see it reflected in so many places I go. Memphis has something special. Everyone’s trying to copy your swag. And when everyone’s taking your swag, you’re homegrown, and you’re always going to stand the test of time. For the guys that are still there and the dudes that are going to come through that program after us, all I ask is that you show them the same love you showed me. Ride the wave because you just never know when it’s going to end.

Memphis, thank you from the bottom of my heart. This journey meant the world to me. I wrote this for you.

It’s love forever,

Trip J