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Gasol won't demand trade: 'I have a responsibility to this city'

Wesley Hitt / Getty Images Sport / Getty

As the Memphis Grizzlies spiral toward irrelevance, obscurity, and the lottery for the first time in seven years, calls have grown loud for the team to trade aging star Marc Gasol and lean into a full-scale rebuild.

Grizzlies general manager Chris Wallace has defiantly squashed that notion to this point, so it stood to reason that the most realistic trigger for a Gasol trade would be a demand for one from the two-time All-NBAer and former Defensive Player of the Year.

Gasol, however, insists that's never going to happen.

"I have a responsibility to this city," he told ESPN's Zach Lowe. "I'm not gonna quit, no matter what."

Gasol has spent the entirety of his 10-year NBA career in Memphis, and spent some of his teenage years there when his brother Pau starred for the Grizzlies. Marc is the franchise's all-time leader in win shares, and helped lead them to seven straight postseason berths, including their first and only four playoff series victories.

He says he'll feel the same about wanting to stick it out in the only NBA home he's known even if things get worse for the 8-19 Grizzlies.

"I would want to see how we got there - what the process is," he told Lowe. "But as long as (owner) Robert (Pera) wants me here, my teammates want me here, they think I'm part of the solution - and not part of the problem - that's all I need."

At the same time, Gasol wouldn't be resistant to a trade if it was something the team wanted.

"If they think it is best, I would do anything for this franchise," he said.

On top of their vocal insistence of such, the Grizzlies front office recently signaled their commitment to Gasol by firing head coach David Fizdale, with whom Gasol, by all accounts, did not get along with.

With Gasol's longtime running-mate Mike Conley still sidelined with an Achilles injury, and the Grizzlies having lost 15 of their last 16 games, things don't look hopeful for the franchise right now. But, the fact they notched three wins against the two best teams in the league (the Houston Rockets and Golden State Warriors) when Conley was healthy early this season, and that they've played the Warriors and San Antonio Spurs tough in the playoffs in the recent past, gives Wallace cause for optimism.

"We've played well against top teams," he told Lowe. "I know it's not the same as winning, but we have gone down with dignity against them in the playoffs. Maybe one year the playoff gods will shine upon us. Everybody can dream, all right?"

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