As Mr. Anti-tank, tank this bitch and get Ayton

[MalonesElbows]

I hate using tiers, but the beauty of this draft is its tier 1 clearly extends down to 5, maybe 6 depending on how you feel about Trae Young. I have never seen a draft like this. You have a bouncier Gobert clone in Bamba lined up to go all the way down at 5. That right there should tell you the strength of this draft.

Markelle Fultz and Lonzo Ball could easily go 6 and 7 if they were coming out in this draft.
Its the last year you can tank before the odds flatten to a pancake.

[stitches]

Spoiler:

Look. We replaced Haywood with Mitchell and Hill with Rubio. There was never this huge drop off in talent that you thought there was. The pieces haven't fit well and Gobert has been injured, but we were never anywhere close to tanking right out of the gate. It was never a realistic option at all, and it seems kind of ridiculous to continue bringing it up. We all get caught up in the draft and dreaming of players we'd like to pick, but some people would have traded Gobert for Fultz last year. That's because they get a little TOO caught up in dreaming.

The Chicago Bulls WERE tanking right out of the gate, and they have a nearly identical record right now. Tanking isn't a science, it's an art. Look at what Phoenix did with Bledsoe last year. There is a fine line that you really can't cross in terms of ethics when it comes to tanking. You can sit all your starters for a few games at the end of a season, but in no way can you do anything like that for an entire season. Hinkie was a master, and he still ended up being run out of town with pitchforks and torches. Tanking isn't nearly as simple as you want it to be.

If you look around the league at all the teams that started out tanking, pretty much all of them have had a winning streak at some point. It's never been like that before, and you can bet that all those teams have gotten some helps from the refs at some point. Adam Silver has been criticized repeatedly about the tanking "problem", and there's no doubt he's taking multiple measures to make it appear there isn't a problem. Changing the rules next year was just one of several things Silver has done to address things.

Most team when they tank, the plan is to be competetive and lose. The kind of tanking you're talking about is pretty much getting blown out every game. That kind of tanking does nothing to build loyalty to a franchise, so if you think Utah has a problem keeping players, you have to walk a fine line when tanking, and let them have their little victories during the season, much like the win in Boston.

The whole point in tanking isn't to lose every game and try to get pick #1. The point is try to be a little worse than you really are, and give yourself a decent shot at jumping into the top 3. Whenever you talk about tanking a team that won 51 games last year, you're talking about some really extreme, destroying of the team that just isn't realistic in the real world. In terms of tanking, Utah is doing just fine this year. They legitimately gave the players a chance to compete, and now due to injuries to our best player, are in a pretty good spot to get another good draft pick. I'd like them to get a little more aggressive with the tank at this point, but overall I'm happy with the way things have gone so far.

Yeah, I didn't think we could tank once we made our moves in the summer. That's why we should have been angling for it before we signed good rotational players. Also Mitchell has been much better than anyone expected. Imagine just how bad we would be if he was just a regular rookie in a regular draft class. + the Rubio and other pieces fit is NOT a surprise. I refuse to imagine DL or Quin are stupid enough to think he would fit. They simply panicked. I said it the moment they made the trade. You can search the Rubio thread. My first thought was - they panicked. And they did. There was absolutely nothing that should have made them think Rubio is a good fit and we traded a good first round pick for him. This first rounder could have been a good bullet in the barrel in case a trade up scenario opens up for one of the stars in the draft even if we don't end up with a top pick. The signings of Thabo, Udoh and Jerebko are nice in a vacuum but they are horrible for a team that doesn't need to win this year. We are mediocre bad now because of them. We needed to be BAD BAD!

[Dry Fly]

Players should not tank, but coaches can give players in the long term plans bigger roles and front offices can make moves to trade or experiment with 10 day G-league players. That's where I'm at now.

Coaches? I would put them in the same category as players.

[Dry Fly]

Yeah, I didn't think we could tank once we made our moves in the summer. That's why we should have been angling for it before we signed good rotational players. Also Mitchell has been much better than anyone expected. Imagine just how bad we would be if he was just a regular rookie in a regular draft class. + the Rubio and other pieces fit is NOT a surprise. I refuse to imagine DL or Quin are stupid enough to think he would fit. They simply panicked. I said it the moment they made the trade. You can search the Rubio thread. My first thought was - they panicked. And they did. There was absolutely nothing that should have made them think Rubio is a good fit and we traded a good first round pick for him. This first rounder could have been a good bullet in the barrel in case a trade up scenario opens up for one of the stars in the draft even if we don't end up with a top pick. The signings of Thabo, Udoh and Jerebko are nice in a vacuum but they are horrible for a team that doesn't need to win this year. We are mediocre bad now because of them. We needed to be BAD BAD!

Haywood wanted Rubio I thought. Also, Rubio was at the top of his game last season... but I don't know why I'm defending that move.

I guess the tank (at least RealGM tank) is on. Don't get your hopes up though, the Jazz will never embrace it. To be BAD BAD, you have to have full on tank mode engaged.

But I guess we need to root for something so don't let me rain on the tank parade.

[zero24gravity]

Haywood wanted Rubio I thought. Also, Rubio was at the top of his game last season... but I don't know why I'm defending that move.

I guess the tank (at least RealGM tank) is on. Don't get your hopes up though, the Jazz will never embrace it. To be BAD BAD, you have to have full on tank mode engaged.

But I guess we need to root for something so don't let me rain on the tank parade.

That move was a move made to appease Haywood, which wasn't a terrible idea. All reports said he wanted Rubio, since Hill was gone. It wasn't a panic move, it was calculated as a risk worth taking to keep Haywood happy. Ugh. His legacy of screwing the Jazz lives on each and every day.

[stitches]

This type of appeasement moves pretty much never work. If you have to get a second rate point guard to convince somebody to come to/stay with your franchise then he's not staying anyways. That's like when Miami drafted Shabbaz Napier because LeBron liked him in the draft only to see LeBron walk anyways. Or when PHX went to the LMA meeting with newly signed Tyson Chandler just cuz LMA reportedly liked Chandler and wanted to play PF. Those are desperation/panic moves that haunt you for years. If the player doesn't trust your program/processes and/or trusts another team's program more, one move will not make him stay or go, the whole big picture of where your franchise is and where it's going will be much bigger part of the puzzle.

Do what's your best for your franchise. If the guy cannot appreciate that, it's OK. Let him walk, he probably would have walked anyways, no matter what you did in this specific instance, only this time you wouldn't have compromised your team and its asset base.

[Cappy_Smurf]

Yeah, I didn't think we could tank once we made our moves in the summer. That's why we should have been angling for it before we signed good rotational players. Also Mitchell has been much better than anyone expected. Imagine just how bad we would be if he was just a regular rookie in a regular draft class. + the Rubio and other pieces fit is NOT a surprise.!

I said before the season that we had a decent chance that one of Hood/Burks/Mitchell would replace most of what we lost with Haywood with a bigger role, so it's not like Mitchell stepping up was our only chance to recover. As for how bad we would be, we would be right where you wanted us to be at the bottom, so the differnce between your nuclear tank and what we did would be very little.

I refuse to imagine DL or Quin are stupid enough to think he would fit. They simply panicked. I said it the moment they made the trade. You can search the Rubio thread. My first thought was - they panicked. And they did. There was absolutely nothing that should have made them think Rubio is a good fit and we traded a good first round pick for him.

I mean, does this even really need to be discussed? Thye were trying to keep Haywood, and he signed off on Rubio as if he were really considering Utah. Dl and Quin both got suckered. I am a little critical of DL for not having a better feel, but I remember a quote from Quin to the effect of "we know him and he knows us." Haywood did a good job of giving everybody, including his teammates, false hope. The only one I think that really knew was George Hill, which had everything to do with him turning down his extension. Anyway, we really shouldn't be discussing moves DL made before the indecision, as if he should have been able to see into the future.

The signings of Thabo, Udoh and Jerebko are nice in a vacuum but they are horrible for a team that doesn't need to win this year. We are mediocre bad now because of them. We needed to be BAD BAD!

You've already made the point that nobody expected Mitchell to be this good. If he was a typical rookie, we'd be right at the bottom already without blowing up the team. But the biggest problem with your extrem tank, is that you were trying to sell it as a one year rebuild. It's almost impossible to pull a nuclear tank and turn everything around in one year. Your extreme tank is likely a 2-3 year deal at best, and many teams have gotten stuck in that rutt for considerably longer. Instead, Utah still has a chance at a good pick this year.

Let's see where things go the rest of the year. At least let's wait until the deadline to see what direction DL goes. Right now the team is competetive and still in position to get a good pick. At the very least, you should be happy for Donovan to get some big wins like Boston/Cleveland, rather than losing every game by 30. That kind of losing may be fine with you as a fan, but for most players, that kind of season is soul-crushing.

[Cappy_Smurf]

Players should not tank, but coaches can give players in the long term plans bigger roles and front offices can make moves to trade or experiment with 10 day G-league players. That's where I'm at now.

Coaches? I would put them in the same category as players.

No way. It's absolutely critical that coaches be on the same page as the GM. It makes absolutely no sense for a GM to be trying to take a team in one direction, and at the same time have the coach undermining his efforts.

For the most part though, coaches are pretty low key about tanking. They aren't out there trying to lose, but instead doing one or two things to help the other team gain momentum and take the game legitimately.

[zero24gravity]

I refuse to imagine DL or Quin are stupid enough to think he would fit. They simply panicked. I said it the moment they made the trade. You can search the Rubio thread. My first thought was - they panicked. And they did. There was absolutely nothing that should have made them think Rubio is a good fit and we traded a good first round pick for him.

I mean, does this even really need to be discussed? Thye were trying to keep Haywood, and he signed off on Rubio as if he were really considering Utah. Dl and Quin both got suckered. I am a little critical of DL for not having a better feel, but I remember a quote from Quin to the effect of "we know him and he knows us." Haywood did a good job of giving everybody, including his teammates, false hope. The only one I think that really knew was George Hill, which had everything to do with him turning down his extension. Anyway, we really shouldn't be discussing moves DL made before the indecision, as if he should have been able to see into the future.

The signings of Thabo, Udoh and Jerebko are nice in a vacuum but they are horrible for a team that doesn't need to win this year. We are mediocre bad now because of them. We needed to be BAD BAD!

You've already made the point that nobody expected Mitchell to be this good. If he was a typical rookie, we'd be right at the bottom already without blowing up the team. But the biggest problem with your extrem tank, is that you were trying to sell it as a one year rebuild. It's almost impossible to pull a nuclear tank and turn everything around in one year. Your extreme tank is likely a 2-3 year deal at best, and many teams have gotten stuck in that rutt for considerably longer. Instead, Utah still has a chance at a good pick this year.

Let's see where things go the rest of the year. At least let's wait until the deadline to see what direction DL goes. Right now the team is competetive and still in position to get a good pick. At the very least, you should be happy for Donovan to get some big wins like Boston/Cleveland, rather than losing every game by 30. That kind of losing may be fine with you as a fan, but for most players, that kind of season is soul-crushing.

Thank you! I was starting to think all of Jazz Nation had come unglued.