Haven't been on this forum since 2014. Just getting back into hardcore NBA fandom. Whats been going on with the team?

[Purch]

Posted this a few weeks ago on the other Jazz forums and completely forgot about this one.

Was pretty hardcore into the NBA during the Deron Williams/Boozer era, Millsap/Al Jefferson, Hayward/Burks/Kanter/Favors eras. I lost a lot of my NBA interest during the Kevin Durant GS ERA. That move was so weak that it killed so much of my interest in the sport. I've been slowly getting back into it, and I figured this year is when I'll dive back into my league pass and my Jazz fandom.

I missed a good chunk of the Mitchell/Gobert ERA, but from what I saw it was nothing to write home about. What's the current team looking like?

Who are the top pieces, who are the young players with the potential and who are the valuable role players? What's the coaching situation looking like?

[Inigo Montoya]

Posted this a few weeks ago on the other Jazz forums and completely forgot about this one.

Was pretty hardcore into the NBA during the Deron Williams/Boozer era, Millsap/Al Jefferson, Hayward/Burks/Kanter/Favors eras. I lost a lot of my NBA interest during the Kevin Durant GS ERA. That move was so weak that it killed so much of my interest in the sport. I've been slowly getting back into it, and I figured this year is when I'll dive back into my league pass and my Jazz fandom.

I missed a good chunk of the Mitchell/Gobert ERA, but from what I saw it was nothing to write home about. What's the current team looking like?

Who are the top pieces, who are the young players with the potential and who are the valuable role players? What's the coaching situation looking like?

Welcome.

What's going on with the team is that the Mitchell\Gobert team had shown to have reached its ceiling and was wisely broken up for assets. Right now the Jazz are (probably) tanking after failing to land top players in free agency or via trades, and electing to deliberately rely on a very young core of players who will hopefully get a lot of time on the floor and rack up enough losses to be a bottom 3-4 team. In the past two seasons the Jazz were supposed to be one of the worst teams in the league but played better than expected until the trade deadline (around .500 record both seasons at that point) and then decided to pivot and outright tank after that point in both seasons, which made it too late to get a good draft positioning. The hope is that this season the Jazz will commit to the tank and do it right from the jump, so they'll be able to pick in the top 4, which will guarantee them a very good player (Cooper Flagg, Ace Bailey, VJ Edgecombe, Nolan Traore, Dylan Harper).

Top Pieces:
Markkanen (allstar who can fit on any team. High trade value)
Kessler
George (jury is still out on him but the Jazz seem to be very high on him)

Young players with potential:
Kessler (probably the most proven and the one guy who has shown he's at least a legit starter)
George (his range is between Clarkson and Jamal Murray, depending on who you ask)
Cody Williams (the 10th pick in the latest draft)
Hendricks (9th pick of the previous draft)

Those are the main ones. I happen to think Filipowski can be a sleeper.

Valuable role players:
Sexton is the main one. Others have warts such as large contract (Collins) or age and efficiency (Clarkson)

Coaching situation:
The Jazz hired Hardy two seasons ago (now entering his third) and gave him a five-year deal. He has shown a lot of promise and made the team play better than it should, which cost it precious draft spots and kept it out of the Wemby sweepstakes. There is some criticism of him, I'm sure, but personally I think he's good (and I didn't like Corbin and Snyder).

[HadAnEffectHere]

Mitchell-Gobert hadn't really reached its ceiling, Mitchell just really disliked Gobert and living in Utah and Ryan Smith refuses to pay much luxury tax so Ainge convinced him to blow the team up instead of going deep into draft pick debt and the luxury tax.

Ainge convinced Smith that they would be able to

1. Tank for Wemby/Scoot in 2023.
2. Trade the Mitchell+Gobert picks for 2 other stars.
3. Start competing for a title without going deep into the tax.

None of this worked so now Ainge is scrambling badly.

2 was also planned under the assumption that the Cavs could implode in the long-run and the Wolves could implode right away and none of that happened. The only potentially valuable picks the Jazz own are the 2027 Wolves' pick and the 2029 Cavs' pick, neither of which are likely to be valuable at all. So the value of Utah's picks is much lower than expected, reducing Ainge's ability to trade for stars.

The only thing that has clearly worked is that Markkanen randomly developed into a star while Sexton and Kessler may also be solid players. The young players other than Kessler have shown... not a huge amount so far, but we'll see.

[WinterSoldier]

Mitchell-Gobert hadn't really reached its ceiling, Mitchell just really disliked Gobert and living in Utah and Ryan Smith refuses to pay much luxury tax so Ainge convinced him to blow the team up instead of going deep into draft pick debt and the luxury tax.

Ainge convinced Smith that they would be able to

1. Tank for Wemby/Scoot in 2023.
2. Trade the Mitchell+Gobert picks for 2 other stars.
3. Start competing for a title without going deep into the tax.

None of this worked so now Ainge is scrambling badly.

2 was also planned under the assumption that the Cavs could implode in the long-run and the Wolves could implode right away and none of that happened. The only potentially valuable picks the Jazz own are the 2027 Wolves' pick and the 2029 Cavs' pick, neither of which are likely to be valuable at all. So the value of Utah's picks is much lower than expected, reducing Ainge's ability to trade for stars.

The only thing that has clearly worked is that Markkanen randomly developed into a star while Sexton and Kessler may also be solid players. The young players other than Kessler have shown... not a huge amount so far, but we'll see.

This is a good description of events over the last few years. Everything blew up the Jazz management's face and they are lost on how to fix anything. They are too scared to tank and have too little value to make good trades, so basically the exact same position we've been in for the last 25+ years. The chances are if you check in another 10 years it will be the same.

[bkohler]

Mitchell-Gobert hadn't really reached its ceiling, Mitchell just really disliked Gobert and living in Utah and Ryan Smith refuses to pay much luxury tax so Ainge convinced him to blow the team up instead of going deep into draft pick debt and the luxury tax.

Ainge convinced Smith that they would be able to

1. Tank for Wemby/Scoot in 2023.
2. Trade the Mitchell+Gobert picks for 2 other stars.
3. Start competing for a title without going deep into the tax.

None of this worked so now Ainge is scrambling badly.

2 was also planned under the assumption that the Cavs could implode in the long-run and the Wolves could implode right away and none of that happened. The only potentially valuable picks the Jazz own are the 2027 Wolves' pick and the 2029 Cavs' pick, neither of which are likely to be valuable at all. So the value of Utah's picks is much lower than expected, reducing Ainge's ability to trade for stars.

The only thing that has clearly worked is that Markkanen randomly developed into a star while Sexton and Kessler may also be solid players. The young players other than Kessler have shown... not a huge amount so far, but we'll see.

Interesting to see this point of view. I don’t agree with most of it but it’s a reasonable way to look at it. Really it comes down to how you view Ryan and Danny’s motivations. Not putting words into your mouth but I’d categorize this as the pro-Gobert, anti Danny / anti Mitchell / anti tank camp- would that be an accurate?

[HadAnEffectHere]

Mitchell-Gobert hadn't really reached its ceiling, Mitchell just really disliked Gobert and living in Utah and Ryan Smith refuses to pay much luxury tax so Ainge convinced him to blow the team up instead of going deep into draft pick debt and the luxury tax.

Ainge convinced Smith that they would be able to

1. Tank for Wemby/Scoot in 2023.
2. Trade the Mitchell+Gobert picks for 2 other stars.
3. Start competing for a title without going deep into the tax.

None of this worked so now Ainge is scrambling badly.

2 was also planned under the assumption that the Cavs could implode in the long-run and the Wolves could implode right away and none of that happened. The only potentially valuable picks the Jazz own are the 2027 Wolves' pick and the 2029 Cavs' pick, neither of which are likely to be valuable at all. So the value of Utah's picks is much lower than expected, reducing Ainge's ability to trade for stars.

The only thing that has clearly worked is that Markkanen randomly developed into a star while Sexton and Kessler may also be solid players. The young players other than Kessler have shown... not a huge amount so far, but we'll see.

Interesting to see this point of view. I don’t agree with most of it but it’s a reasonable way to look at it. Really it comes down to how you view Ryan and Danny’s motivations. Not putting words into your mouth but I’d categorize this as the pro-Gobert, anti Danny / anti Mitchell / anti tank camp- would that be an accurate?

I wouldn't really describe this as pro or anti Mitchell/Gobert/tanking. I think there were real and large things Mitchell disliked about playing in Utah and playing with Gobert that would have been tough to handle and would have caused many teams to consider blowing it up.

My take is generally anti-Ryan Smith, however, as my perception is that he fell to a scam from Ainge because Ainge promised a cheaper path to winning. The Jazz had six firsts available to trade after their loss to the Clippers and their only move with those picks was to salary dump Derrick Favors.

Without that disastrous 2021 offseason, I would be much more positive to neutral about trading Mitchell and Gobert, but the 2021 offseason was so bad that it makes me evaluate all of Ryan Smith's moves in terms of him being deluded about saving money.

[bkohler]

Gotcha, I’ve also see an anti Gobert/ pro Mitchell / anti-Danny/Ryan view point. A anti Mitchell/anti Gobert/ pro Danny view and a meh all around view.

I’d love to see the last couple viewpoints define the last few years from their point of view as well.

[bkohler]

Without that disastrous 2021 offseason, I would be much more positive to neutral about trading Mitchell and Gobert, but the 2021 offseason was so bad that it makes me evaluate all of Ryan Smith's moves in terms of him being deluded about saving money.

Interestingly, I’ve always chalked this up to Dennis Lindsey making that move and that being the thing that made Ryan bring in Danny.

[HadAnEffectHere]

Without that disastrous 2021 offseason, I would be much more positive to neutral about trading Mitchell and Gobert, but the 2021 offseason was so bad that it makes me evaluate all of Ryan Smith's moves in terms of him being deluded about saving money.

Interestingly, I’ve always chalked this up to Dennis Lindsey making that move and that being the thing that made Ryan bring in Danny.

That just doesn't seem like a job saving move to me. A traditional job saving move would be taking Favors' contract and attaching 2-3 unprotected firsts to get a wing player who could defend and shoot.

Trading away Favors and signing Gay and Whiteside saved the Jazz a good chunk of money so it feels like it came down from ownership.

[babyjax13]

Welcome back Purch! There are still a few of us still around from when you were posting actively! I think the posts above describe pretty well what is happening with the Jazz!

[Jammer]

Potential Opportunity Lost

There was a rumor of a one day opportunity to trade Lauri Markkanen to Golden State that would still allow him to be traded before the trade deadline should Golden State want to. If Utah WANTED TO TRADE HIM, Markkanen might have been amenable.

Wiggins would probably have been the salary offset, along with:

Golden State's 2026 and 2028 Unprotected 1rst Round Picks
Atlanta's 2026 and 2028 2nd Round Picks

I had said well before the deadline that I considered that a walk-away price for Golden State, meaning no additional pick swaps unless a dead body besides Wiggins was coming back.

I personally thought Wiggins was a better fit at SF, and he's having the best year of his career so far. In 2022, when Golden State won the Championship, Wiggins was their second best player behind Curry. Although he's a sporadic shooter, 2 out of every 7 games he's unstoppable, and he's an excellent defender who can run the floor and post up.

I think Utah (meaning Ainge) was asking for too much from the Warriors considering Wiggins potential resurgence to his old self. Not just Podziemski but the pick swaps were pushing it unless a dead body was coming back to justify additional assets.

I probably watched about 200 MINNESOTA GAMES WHEN WIGGINS WAS THERE.

This is one I think Utah may have let slip because Golden State's 2026 and 2028 1rsts could yield a decent player or 2, and the Atlanta picks would be in years that Utah already traded their 2nd Round Pick and only have one 1rst Round Pick.

[babyjax13]

Potential Opportunity Lost

There was a rumor of a one day opportunity to trade Lauri Markkanen to Golden State that would still allow him to be traded before the trade deadline should Golden State want to. If Utah WANTED TO TRADE HIM, Markkanen might have been amenable.

Wiggins would probably have been the salary offset, along with:

Golden State's 2026 and 2028 Unprotected 1rst Round Picks
Atlanta's 2026 and 2028 2nd Round Picks

I had said well before the deadline that I considered that a walk-away price for Golden State, meaning no additional pick swaps unless a dead body besides Wiggins was coming back.

I personally thought Wiggins was a better fit at SF, and he's having the best year of his career so far. In 2022, when Golden State won the Championship, Wiggins was their second best player behind Curry. Although he's a sporadic shooter, 2 out of every 7 games he's unstoppable, and he's an excellent defender who can run the floor and post up.

I think Utah (meaning Ainge) was asking for too much from the Warriors considering Wiggins potential resurgence to his old self. Not just Podziemski but the pick swaps were pushing it unless a dead body was coming back to justify additional assets.

I probably watched about 200 MINNESOTA GAMES WHEN WIGGINS WAS THERE.

This is one I think Utah may have let slip because Golden State's 2026 and 2028 1rsts could yield a decent player or 2, and the Atlanta picks would be in years that Utah already traded their 2nd Round Pick and only have one 1rst Round Pick.

I think we can get better for an extended Lauri.

[Inigo Montoya]

Yeah, not down with trading for Wiggins.

[bkohler]

Yeah, not down with trading for Wiggins.

Idk Aaron Wiggins seems fun

[BigJimFinn]

Potential Opportunity Lost

There was a rumor of a one day opportunity to trade Lauri Markkanen to Golden State that would still allow him to be traded before the trade deadline should Golden State want to. If Utah WANTED TO TRADE HIM, Markkanen might have been amenable.

The word in Finland is that Lauri had strong preference to stay in Utah. He's a family man and modest outdoorsy guy who puts a lot of value on quality of life. After the disappointing experiences of his first five years in the league, being settled both on and off the court is attractive, nevermind the $200M. I can't see Lauri having been amenable to an arrangement where he could be traded twice in a year and with no certainty of a new contract.
I don't see that making much sense for Jazz either with that return. They don't need any more tearing down to go for full tank this season. They are still looking for their first option star, but those GSW picks don't look likely to help there, and certainly not worth losing their second star. And even a marginal all-star level player wanting to stay in Utah is so rare they definitely did not want to move him against his wishes.
So, that proposal looks like it was never a realistic opportunity. What is your source for the rumor?

[Jammer]

Potential Opportunity Lost

There was a rumor of a one day opportunity to trade Lauri Markkanen to Golden State that would still allow him to be traded before the trade deadline should Golden State want to. If Utah WANTED TO TRADE HIM, Markkanen might have been amenable.

The word in Finland is that Lauri had strong preference to stay in Utah. He's a family man and modest outdoorsy guy who puts a lot of value on quality of life. After the disappointing experiences of his first five years in the league, being settled both on and off the court is attractive, nevermind the $200M. I can't see Lauri having been amenable to an arrangement where he could be traded twice in a year and with no certainty of a new contract.
I don't see that making much sense for Jazz either with that return. They don't need any more tearing down to go for full tank this season. They are still looking for their first option star, but those GSW picks don't look likely to help there, and certainly not worth losing their second star. And even a marginal all-star level player wanting to stay in Utah is so rare they definitely did not want to move him against his wishes.
So, that proposal looks like it was never a realistic opportunity. What is your source for the rumor?

There were lots of reports that Golden State was exploring acquiring Markkanen, and if he signed the extension the first day, he could have been moved before the trade deadline. Obviously if he wanted to stay that would be a reason to not sign on that one day, but delay it. My comment was more centered around Golden State's likely offer vs. Utah's likely ask. Wiggins is a marginal second option, OUTSTANDING 3rd option which is what he was in Golden State with Curry and Thompson ahead of him as shooters.

Markkanen is probably a legit 2nd option, and better shooter, so obviously more valuable in closing out games, although Wiggins defensively is a beast and never gets enough credit for his two way versatility.

My comment was more centered around that any trade died because Utah wanted Swaps and Podziemski in addition to Two Unprotected 1rsts and Two Atlanta seconds. Seemed like too much given Wiggins overall career, despite the dropoff last season and the 2nd half of the season prior.

Since Wiggins has started off with the best season of his career, it amplifies the potential missed opportunity. But your point is that Lauri would not have wanted to go to Golden State, which means a trade was likely not in the cards. I just speculated it might have been if the price was acceptable to Utah, which it obviously wasn't.

[Crunch 99]

Wiggins has plenty of talent, but I question his commitment to bring it night in and night out.

[babyjax13]

Wiggins is a negative value contract. 4 good games doesn't change that