A Worthy Rival: Zeke Thorne's Legacy (MyNBA, 2K26)

[NaturalThunder87]

Happy Birthday, Big Zeke: From Wichita Unknown to the Center of the NBA

There are still nights when it feels improbable. Not impossible. Not surprising anymore. Just improbable in the way all meteoric rises are when you stop long enough to trace them back to the beginning.

Wichita, Kansas. An unranked sophomore. A 6-foot-2 guard with a sturdy frame and no national profile. A player who was not yet a story.

Now, on the morning of December 22, that same player wakes up as the most dominant force in the NBA. Not just a worthy rival to LeBron James, but arguably his superior. Ezekiel “Big Zeke” Thorne, centerpiece of the Memphis Grizzlies, turns 20 today, with his team sitting at 21–7, tied for the second-best record in the league. Tonight, Memphis hosts the defending champion Los Angeles Lakers, owners of the NBA’s best record at 22–4.

It is the kind of stage reserved for contenders. It is also the kind of stage Thorne has been creating on a nightly basis.

Two seasons ago, Memphis went 15–67, last in the West and searching for direction. Thorne changed that immediately. Fifty-one wins as a rookie. A playoff berth. A seven-game series against a 60-win Sacramento team that announced, even in defeat, that something real had arrived.

What has followed in his second season has moved beyond arrival and into control. Through 28 games, Thorne leads the league in scoring at 33.1 points per game, rebounding at 15.0 per game, and blocks at 3.0 per game. His 38.5 player efficiency rating leads the NBA as well, a number that attempts to summarize impact and ends up underselling it.

Those are season-long markers of dominance. The last ten games have been something else entirely.

Memphis has gone 7–3 in that stretch, with three overtime wins and a double-overtime victory in Cleveland that felt like it might never end. There was the overtime win in San Antonio, where the Grizzlies closed with a 20–5 burst. Another in Milwaukee. Close games, extended games, games that test depth and resolve. Memphis has answered them, repeatedly.

And Thorne has been at the center of all of it. Over those ten games, he is averaging 41.3 points, 14.3 rebounds, 6.1 assists, 2.2 steals, and 3.1 blocks while shooting 66.5 percent from the field and 93.5 percent from the line. The efficiency matches the volume. The volume stretches belief.

Within that stretch:

• Three 50-point games, including a 57-point, 16-rebound, 12-assist triple-double in Cleveland
• Four additional 40-point games, bringing him to seven games of 40 or more
• Two triple-doubles, each arriving in games that demanded everything
• A 54-point, 23-rebound, 7-block performance in San Antonio that reads like a season condensed into a single night

These are not isolated explosions. They are part of a sustained run that has reshaped expectations of what one player can do within the flow of winning basketball. Because that is the detail that matters most.

The Grizzlies are not simply collecting numbers. They are collecting wins. They have won seven of their last ten, including games that required extra possessions, extra minutes, and, in several cases, something close to endurance. Thorne has met those moments without deviation. Scoring when necessary. Rebounding everything in reach. Creating for others when defenses collapse. Protecting the rim when the game tightens. He does not shift his approach to the moment. He expands to meet it.

And so the question that once followed him from Wichita, through AAU gyms and into draft rooms, has been answered in full. He belongs. More than that, he defines.

Tonight offers another measure, but not the first. The Lakers arrive as champions and as the league’s current standard. Memphis meets them as something no longer theoretical. Something proven, if still evolving. Thorne meets them as the most productive player in the league, in the middle of a ten-game stretch that has blurred the line between excellence and excess.

Birthdays tend to invite reflection. In this case, reflection only sharpens the contrast.

From unranked to undeniable.
From 15 wins to 51.
From promise to production at a level the league is still trying to process.

Ezekiel Thorne is not chasing superstardom anymore. On this December morning, with the best team in basketball waiting that night, he is already living in it.

[Captain Canada]

Thorne has certainly burst onto the scene and has dragged the Grizzlies right up the standings with him

[NaturalThunder87]

Thorne has certainly burst onto the scene and has dragged the Grizzlies right up the standings with him

A dominant force already. No doubt.

[NaturalThunder87]

Lakers Steal One in Memphis as Champions Close Late over Thorne’s Birthday Explosion

There is a particular kind of loss that lingers longer than others. Not because it was lopsided or overwhelming, but because it felt, for most of the night, like it belonged to someone else.

On a birthday night built for Ezekiel Thorne, the Memphis Grizzlies did nearly everything required to take down the defending champions. They led early, they survived runs, and they controlled the game deep into the fourth quarter. With 52 seconds remaining, they were up five and had the best player on the floor.

And still, they lost. That is the difference when the opponent is the Los Angeles Lakers, a team that has already learned how to finish seasons, not just games.

The Lakers, 22–4 and carrying the calm of champions, never panicked when Memphis surged. They absorbed every punch. They stayed within reach through the first three quarters, even as Thorne built another towering performance, and then executed in the final minute with surgical precision.

Thorne’s night was extraordinary even by his recent standards. He finished with 54 points and 18 rebounds, repeatedly breaking through set defenses, finishing through contact, and overwhelming matchups in transition and half court. For long stretches, Memphis did not run offense so much as they ran him, and he responded with power and control.

But the Lakers had answers. Kobe Bryant was everywhere late, finishing with 41 points, 15 rebounds, and 12 assists. He hit the tying three after Memphis thought they had taken control, then helped engineer the sequence that flipped the game in the final seconds. His fingerprints were on every critical possession when the margin shrank.

Inside, Shaquille O'Neal was the constant pressure point Memphis could not fully solve. He added 26 points and 17 rebounds and delivered the defining play of the final minute, powering through contact on the block and converting the and-one that gave Los Angeles the lead for good.

The closing sequence unfolded like a reminder of what championship experience looks like. Kobe ties it. Shaq takes it back. Free throws from Derek Fisher extend it. A deflection from Robert Horry ends the final real Memphis chance. The final score, 119–115, reflects a game that was far tighter than it ultimately felt in the last ten seconds.

There will be frustration in Memphis, especially over how quickly a five-point lead with under a minute left disappeared. There will also be debate over the illegal screen call that wiped out a potential late possession. That is what close losses to champions do.

But there will also be something more important: evidence. For much of the night, Memphis did not just compete. They dictated. They forced adjustments. They put the Lakers in rotation. They turned a heavyweight matchup into a track meet they were fully capable of running.

And Thorne, even in defeat, was the central figure again. Another 50-point night. Another dominant rebounding performance. Another game where he looked less like a rising star and more like a fixed problem the league is going to have to solve repeatedly.

This is where the Grizzlies are now. No longer a 15-win team trying to survive the West. No longer just a young group happy to be in the conversation. They are a contender that can lead the defending champions into the final minute and make them reach for every answer they have.

The difference, on this night, was that the champions had just a few more of them when it mattered most.

[NaturalThunder87]

Jason Williams (21 points, 12 assists, 7 rebounds) finds Ezekiel Thorne (27 points, 14 rebounds, 5 assists) for a bucket

Amare Stoudemire led the Suns charge in a 125-122 win with 28 points, 12 rebounds, 3 steals, and 2 blocks

[GM Rizzo]

Would have loved to see the 4th quarter of that Laker game. Tough loss but hanging with the champs has to feel good.

[NaturalThunder87]

Would have loved to see the 4th quarter of that Laker game. Tough loss but hanging with the champs has to feel good.

I wanna call it 2K Cheese? Don't know. Kobe coming down and immediately hitting a 3 (and it was a really tough shot) made the loss feel inevitable.

That's not even my worst one. There was a game not too far back where I was up 8 or 9 with about 90 seconds to go, thought I had it on lock, and they hit a three on 4 straight possessions, including a buzzer beater that forced OT.

[Captain Canada]

Can really only do so much when you're the only scoring option it seems. Pushed Kobe/Shaq to the end of their rope in that first game.

[NaturalThunder87]

[NaturalThunder87]

NBA Update | January 1, 2005