"It's up in the air right now," Crittenton said. "You never know if I'm going to be traded. It's the NBA. You can't be relaxed. I just want to be somewhere I can play."

Crittenton impressed Grizzlies coach Marc Iavaroni in summer league play, despite the fact Crittenton played out-of-position at small forward.

"He's more under control, more poised," Iavaroni said. "He doesn't have those moments where he's trying to go through three guys and he has nowhere to go. He's making much easier plays. He's more poised."

--New Grizzlies assistant coach Kevin O'Neill is in charge of the team playing tougher, more physical defense.

Last season, Memphis tied with Milwaukee for the highest opponent's field goal percentage (.480). The Grizzlies finished the '07-08 campaign with the third-most points allowed (106.9 points per game), and the third-worst opponent's assist average (23.9).

"We want to be a team that plays in a group," O'Neill said. "A lot of times people talk about whether guys are selfish on offense. The same thing is true on defense. If you don't go and help your teammate and do the right thing on every possession, then you hurt your overall team defense. We want to adopt the philosophy that you've got one guy guarding the ball and four guys helping to guard the ball at all times."

What sets O'Neill off is when a defender gets beat by someone with the ball.

"We want to make people shoot over the top of us," O'Neill said. "If you can get some stops, you can win games down the stretch."

QUOTE TO NOTE: "We're setting ourselves up to have a big bang down the road, but not in the distant future." -- Grizzlies general manager Chris Wallace, on the patience required in doing a roster makeover.