Team Crossover: Morant and Acuña are exploding!

In the modern world there is nothing fans eat up more than when their favorite pieces of media crossover. Afterall, the Marvel Cinematic Universe has made tens of billions over the last two decades on this very thing. The sports world equivalent of this is when your two favorite teams directly and publicly acknowledge each other and who doesn’t love seeing that? Although seeing two of your favorite pro-sports teams connect is a treat only teams that share a city or sometimes even state get to experience, the Braves and Grizzlies just had a pretty cool crossover moment with no one else but their two biggest stars, Ronald Acuña Jr and Ja Morant. 

Let's set the stage, both stars have had a rocky few years in two very different ways: Ronald Acuña Jr with season ending injuries and Ja Morant with a public image and work-load criticisms from the media and outside fans. On May 26, 2024 in Game 3 of a Memorial Day series in Pittsburgh Ronald Acuña Jr tore his ACL while leading off second. This was coming off of his historic 40-70 MVP season and his second torn ACL in three years, which made it an even harder pill to swallow. On the other hand, Ja Morant has been suspended by the NBA two times in the last 2 years for flashing weapons on Instagram Live posts but the less said about that the better. These incidents created and, in my opinion, reaffirmed a previously held stereotype about the player and man: he’s a thug who doesn’t care about basketball as much as money and partying. I could go on about how these things all derive from the team playing in Memphis and that they wouldn’t occur in any other market but we’ll move on. During a back and forth April 1, 2025 game against the Warriors Ja Morant reciprocated a finger gun celebration he had been getting all night from the Warriors at the Warriors bench after a three. Nothing came of the moment and it wasn’t even acknowledged by the officials during the contest as this celebration is one of the most common in the NBA. However, the NBA and Adam Silver took problem with this and made a show of publicly embarrassing Ja Morant by “warning him” and fining him 25,000 dollars.

One week after the noise and fuss about Ja Morant’s commonplace action he debuted his newest three point celebration. After a three against the Charlotte Hornets Ja mimicked throwing a grenade and covering his ears for cover:

This is clever on so many levels. For one, Morant showed how fickle the NBA truly is because a grenade being thrown is 10x as dangerous as a gun but they don’t bat an eye at it. And two, as Ja Morant says, "I’m taking my words, and I’m throwing them out there, and then blocking out the noise.” 

2 months later, Ronald Acuña Jr was set to make his long awaited return in a Friday night duel with the San Diego Padres and his comeback couldn’t have been more perfect. In just his first swing since returning from that brutal ACL tear, he damn-near demolished the stadium roof by blasting a 467 foot bomb out of the park, and then dropped Morant’s grenade celebration like a mic drop. It wasn’t just homage; it was a statement:

“I’m taking my words, I’m throwing them out there, and then blocking out the noise.”

That sentiment, originally Morant’s, hits different coming from Acuña. In a world where athletes are constantly under the spotlight, where every injury or misstep becomes a national headline, here’s Acuña, rising from the ashes and saying, “yeah, I heard it all, and I’m still swinging, metaphorically and literally.”

What makes this crossover even sweeter? Two elite players in very different sports, both dealing with mountains of external pressure. For Morant, it was incidents on Instagram Live and public image headaches. For Acuña? Back-to-back ACL tears, media questions, even drama with his manager early this season. Yet here they both are, rewriting their narratives in real time.

And the celebration itself, Morant’s grenade, was pure genius. Critics were all over him for showing the “finger gun” celebration, but apparently pointing a grenade at your opponents is just okey-dokey with the league. Now it’s a global symbol of resilience and mental toughness, words thrown out there, noise blocked out.

Then Acuña stepped up with that rocket of a home run on May 23, 2025, and BOOM: grenade, ears covered, message loud and clear. The story made its way across platforms and landed right back at SI: “Ronald Acuña Jr. marked his 467-foot shot by doing Ja Morant’s grenade celebration.”

Media outlets exploded. Socials lit up with praise, memes, takes—but most importantly, Acuña reclaimed the narrative. He accidentally (or maybe very deliberately) synced with Morant, creating a rare two-way bridge between baseball and basketball, Atlanta and Memphis, triumph over tragedy.

This isn’t just crossover fluff, it’s cultural currency. It’s narrative alchemy: blending two separate stories into one. Acuña borrowed Morant’s moment, Morant lent it meaning, and together they turned a celebration into a statement on perseverance and owning your comeback.

At a time when leagues are policing celebrations, image is everything, and players are spelling every move for hidden meanings, these two flipped the script. They didn’t just acknowledge each other—they amplified each other, proving that crossover isn’t just a fun Easter egg for fans. It can be a powerful message: your story isn’t over, your body isn’t broken, and your reputation can always be redefined, but most importantly, we got to see the epic crossover of the Braves and Grizzlies, two of TriZoneTN’s favorites.