I’d like to introduce a new term I came up with just now: “Hack-a-Marjanovic”. It’s like Hack-a-Shaq, except instead of purposefully fouling a player because you know that he sucks at free throws, it’s where you keep fouling a player, but not intentionally, because the player is simply too much of a beast to not foul.
The Grizzlies were executing Hack-a-Marjanovic perfectly tonight. Not like they had a choice; Marjanovic was too big for any of them to handle. He only played 13 minutes, but in that span he scored 19 points and earned 12 free throws (making 11). We’re not going to extrapolate those stats out to per 36 minutes, because we all know that if Marjanovic was forced to play that many minutes, the league would step in and take him out under the guise of maintaining competitive balance.
Of course, the problem with that many free throws is that it makes this highlight video not so good. He was 4-of-5 from the field, but those buckets are lost amidst the torrent of charity stripe heroics. 19 points for Marjanovic should be one of the greatest highlight occasions of the year, but instead it’s just okay.