Anatomy of a Ja Dropper

He's so damn fast and smooth. One of a kind.

Good morning. Let’s basketball.

Ja Morant. He’s back. This is absurdly smooth in full stride to avoid the pick from Cory Joseph and stay in rhythm to get the easy jam ahead of Cade Cunningham.

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Ja's bag is DIFFERENT 😮‍💨

Let’s break it down to get a fuller appreciation of what Morant can do.

Joseph knows Morant is coming fast by the time the former hits midcourt; he turns his head to see how this is developing and this is developing in a dangerous fashion.

A half-second later as Morant is in between dribbles Joseph starts to plant to make a play for the swipe in transition.

Morant has his eyes up and can’t go middle because Cunningham is racing back on defense. There’s no real pass threat because he’s ahead of Brandon Clarke, Santi Aldama and Desmond Bane (who helped force the steal with a trap on Bojan Bogdanovic in the first place). This is a great move by Joseph to a) get the steal or b) get contact and stop the break.

But Morant’s moving SO FAST that he gets the dribble back to his right hand faster than Joseph can lunge for it. He immediately identifies Joseph’s plan and hits the wraparound dribble in three-quarter stride.

Saddiq Bey, No. 41, did not see that coming. Cunningham can’t really do anything at this point. And Joseph is on his way to exiting the frame.

Ja Dropper.

The whole play took four seconds. Ja got 85 feet with the live dribble behind three opponents and got a clean crankback two-handed dunk in the end. In four seconds. Unbeatable.