Source: https://www.si.com/nba/2023/11/16/dillon-brooks-villain-rockets-daily-cover
Brooks wants to clarify something. The criticism did bother him. For a while, anyway. Days after the Grizzlies’ season ended, Brooks tumbled down a social media rabbit hole. He read the comments on Instagram. On X, formerly known as Twitter, he scrolled through the replies. He saw everything. Machine Gun Kelly dropping his name in a freestyle (“Come back like LeBron and drop 40 on you like I should”). James, quoting Jay-Z lyrics, dissing him. (“Unlike you little I’m a grown ass man.”) Anonymous followers burying him. “LA Fitness Draymond,” one wrote. “Tired wrestling heel,” posted another. Suggestions that Brooks’s next stop would be in China briefly had the Shanghai Sharks trending. “That’s when I realized how big the Lakers were, how big LeBron James is,” says Brooks. He shrugs. “It’s part of my life. It’s going to make me a better player.”
Brooks hoped Memphis would support him. Instead, the franchise cut him loose. At a season-ending press conference, Grizzlies GM Zach Kleiman declined to address Brooks’s future. Days later, The Athletic reported the team informed Brooks he wouldn’t be back “under any circumstances.” In March, Memphis coach Taylor Jenkins had called Brooks the player who “epitomizes” the program. By May, that program wanted him gone. “What I didn’t like about Memphis was they allowed that so they can get out of the woodwork, and then I’m the scapegoat of it all,” says Brooks. “That’s what I didn’t appreciate. And then ultimately they’ll come to me on the low, as men, one on one and tell me something, but then not defend me when everything went down.”
In Houston, team officials watched with interest. For months, the Rockets had studied Brooks. They needed defenders. The Grizzlies finished in the top six in efficiency in each of the last three seasons, with Brooks regularly guarding opposing teams’ top perimeter players. They needed veterans. Winning veterans, preferably. Memphis made the playoffs in each of the last three seasons. The swagger, the confidence, the attitude? Houston, with win totals in recent years that looked like locker combinations, desired that, too. “Fundamentally, we want the player we saw in Memphis,” says Rockets GM Rafael Stone. “The aggression, the competitiveness, the willingness to do whatever it takes. That’s what’s attractive to us.”
Homeboy played like dog shit and then ran away like a wimp when it came time to back up the smack he talked. He’s a clown and they got rid of him.
i have to agree with him on this, making him the scapegoat for their bullshit was a garbage move. It’s hard to have an ego when you’ve been humiliated so publicly, he actually embraced it and is better for it! I’m lying if I say I don’t admire it.
Iggy won a Finals MVP holding LeBron to 30 something PPG.
Brooks gets crucified for letting Bron drop a 40 in one game. Gimme a break. Lebron averaged 22 points over the 6 games btw.
LeBron can drop 40 on anyone if he feels like it.
Seeing Dillon Brooks become universally beloved by this sub out of nowhere lol
He wanted the smoke, got the smoke and now he’s bitching about it?
I admit I was wrong cuz I was taken back at the control at first even tho he was a very good defensive player. But he has shown that he has improved offensively by slightly changing his jump shot. I’m impressed and hopefully he will help the rockets make some noise in the playoffs
Another villain brooks W
Here to point out that Memphis is 2-9 without the villain.
And before y’all say, yeah but Ja is out - they were a winning team (some would argue better) without Ja last season.
Dillon brooks was literally the worst player in the league while with Memphis. You can’t be “scapegoated” if it’s literally your fault. Happy that he’s become a viable player now!
I wasn’t a big fan of Brooks, but watching him ball out for our national team made me an instant fan.
In Houston, team officials watched with interest. For months, the Rockets had studied Brooks
Read this in David Attenborough’s voice.
1.) Memphis ABSOLUTELY threw Dillon Brooks under the bus. Pretty wild to see an organization display that level of unprofessionalism
2.) Dillon Brooks deserved it and I was highly amused by him being thrown under said bus
^ Both can be right and aren’t mutually exclusive
Brooks and Vanfleet are exactly what Houston needed. Because they hold Sengun, Green, and Smith accountable. You go from a guy like KPJ(ignoring the off the court stuff, because we all know he sucks, even before his most recent troubles) to Steady Freddy, and we actually run an offense. I figured we would just be god awful for a lot longer
First they scapegoated Iguodala for a mutually agreed upon decision, then they scapegoated Brooks.
Funny how fast a narrative can change.
Dude was up and coming a year prior to las5 years debacle.
He did clown shit though, and now complains that he was treated like one.
There were multiple scapegoats, and yes, he was one of them.
Feels like Ja has been treated like the biggest scapegoat, deservedly so.