How do the Jazz stack up against WC Contenders?

[SoCalJazzFan]

This is my best guess:

LAC
HOU
LAL
UTA (#4)
DEN
GSW
POR, SAC, MAV, and NOP all fight for last two spots.

[KqWIN]

I'm not high on POR this year. Much has been made about who we lost this year...they lost a ton too. Aminu, Harkless, Turner, Curry, Layman, Kanter, Leonard...that's a lot of good minutes and that's not even mentioning the massive downgrade from Nurk to Whiteside.

Nurk to Whiteside is not a downgrade in my opinion. Also Nurkic will be back at some point. Whiteside is a massive upgrade over Kanter though. The blazers also have other players replacing those guys that I like better or have higher upside. As it stands they will be relying on a lot of unproven guys off the bench but I like them all.

C- Whitside, Scal
Pf- Collins, Tolliver, Hoard
Sf- Bazemore, Hezonja, Little
Sg- McCollum, Hood, Trent
Pg- Lillard, Simons

I think Hood and Simon's are going to be a dynamic duo off the bench and Nurkic will likely be back around February.

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This seems to be our major disagreement. I think Whiteside is a massive downgrade from Nurkic, who was one of the best C's in the league last season. He's in a contract year, so I guess that could be good (or bad) for POR...but he's just not close to the quality of Nurk IMO.

Their bench looks very bad. They're taking a ton of chances. If the all work out that's great, but like you said there's a ton of unproven guys and none of them are particularly reliable. Overall they have a ton of uncertainty and no clear upgrades on their roster. Lot's of clear downgrades though.

[Catchall]

The Lakers, with mediocre shooting, mediocre defense and terrible PG play, take the 6th seed with 48 wins, thereby drawing their cousins the Clippers in the first round.

Lebron James the new PG for the Lakers with a career avg of 7.2 apg and career total of 8,662 assists ….terrible PG play WOW , I wouldn't doubt if Lebron James leads the NBA in assists this year

Yeah, okay, moving Lebron to the PG spot helps. So their line-up probably looks like...

Javale / Cousins
Davis / Kuzma
Kuzma / Dudley / Daniels
Green / KCP / Bradley
Lebron / Rondo / Cook

The question for them will be how many games Lebron and AD play.

[KqWIN]

The Lakers will be good if they get past the meme team stuff. Green was a great pickup. He's a better player than Bojan.

[Catchall]

The Lakers will be good if they get past the meme team stuff. Green was a great pickup. He's a better player than Bojan.

Oof. Danny Green isn't better than Bojan. He's strictly a spot-up shooter who averaged 10 ppg last year. You must be remembering his Spurs days.

[KqWIN]

The Lakers will be good if they get past the meme team stuff. Green was a great pickup. He's a better player than Bojan.

Oof. Danny Green isn't better than Bojan. He's strictly a spot-up shooter who averaged 10 ppg last year. You must be remembering his Spurs days.

I didn't say he was a better scorer. Plus, he just had a career year.

[zero24gravity]

Let's just get the Jazz in the Least, and have the #1 seed wrapped up by mid-season. (When i say "nobody", I mean no big impact players.)

Raptors, worse (lost Kawhi, added nobody)
Celtics, worse (lost Kyrie & Horford, added Kemba)
Sixers, worse (lost Butler, added nobody)
Bucks, worse (lost Brogdon. added nobody)
Heat might have a shot if they land Westbrook, but otherwise, there's nobody else worth worrying about. Even the Pacers lost more than they added. Nets in 2021 might be good.

[Daddy 801]

Kinda surprised the pessimism about our upcoming season. I’ll eat crow if I’m wrong, but I think we made massive upgrades. We’ve all been saying for years we needed spacing and the times we had bad spacing in Crowder we were elite. And the majority of us have said Crowders defense wasn't as as good as advertised. If Bojan has similar defense to Crowder and with his massive offensive upgrade the Jazz are going to get buckets. Conley is an upgrade.

The only question in my mind is the defensive mins Favs represented. I’ll happily take the defensive downgrade Ingles/Bojan/Green/Niang represent for the offensive upgrade they represent.

I think we have a legitimate chance at a ring this year. The playoffs confirmed 2 things to me. You need above average players at all positions so you can exploit the advantage on offense when a team double teams your best player. They will double Donovan or Conley at times and now we have guys who can take advantage of these mismatches. The other thing a team needs is an elite player that can get to the line. That is the one main area we need Donovan to get better at. If he can up his drawing foul % we can be elite in the playoffs. I believe Conley is already good at drawing fouls so that’s nice.

We are clearly a better team but the same goes for most of the west. We also just hitched our ride to a couple 30yr olds so the improvements aren't likely to be sustainable for long. I'm definitely interested to see how it shakes out in the end.

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I’m fine with their ages because of the situation we are in. The window is the next 1-2 years. If we don’t win it all in the next two years, it would be time to rebuild around Donovan very quickly. Having veteran presence is sorta what we need given the situation. Conley and Bojan both have been primary options and now they don’t have to be. But, it also takes pressure off Donovan to be the superhero. Veterans and superstars win in this league. Luckily we have two youngerish guys who play like veterans in Donovan and Gobert.

The rebuild (if not successful in next two years) would really depend on what Gobert wants to do, what level he is playing at in two years, and what type of contract he wants. He is probably in his prime the next 2-4 years. Big men peak earlier and he relies on his athleticism. The time is now or never IMO with Gobert. And he might be gone in a year from now....which sucks to think. But I believe his contract is up at the end of this year.

If they blow it up in 1-2 years they can have a ton of capspace before signing Donovan to his max.

[Daddy 801]

Let's just get the Jazz in the Least, and have the #1 seed wrapped up by mid-season. (When i say "nobody", I mean no big impact players.)

Raptors, worse (lost Kawhi, added nobody)
Celtics, worse (lost Kyrie & Horford, added Kemba)
Sixers, worse (lost Butler, added nobody)
Bucks, worse (lost Brogdon. added nobody)
Heat might have a shot if they land Westbrook, but otherwise, there's nobody else worth worrying about. Even the Pacers lost more than they added. Nets in 2021 might be good.

Sixers added Horford. That’s a huge addition. I get in a vacuum that Butler is probably more valuable to most people. But Horford has a huge impact on games due to his ability to space the floor and defend the interior. The sixers might be better now. Embiid might get more touches, they might take more 3’s, the paint might be more open for Simmons to be a post up player on the other teams PG. I wouldn’t automatically assume they are worse.

They can run a really funky starting lineup that other teams will scramble to be able to compete with. Simmons, Richardson, Tobias, Horford, Embiid is a HUGE lineup that despite their size can space the floor. That’s not a team defensively I would want to go against. On offense the can space the floor and run handoff action until Simmons is against the PG and he can easily drive past or post up smaller guys and they can divert Simmons lack of shooting into an advantage.

Just saying. Don’t sleep on Sixers.

[Daddy 801]

The Lakers will be good if they get past the meme team stuff. Green was a great pickup. He's a better player than Bojan.

I find myself usually agreeing with you. And I really like Green. But this seems off. What makes him a better player to you? The only area I can think of is defense. And I honestly don’t know enough about Bojans defense to know. But I was impressed with Green in the finals.

[KqWIN]

The Lakers will be good if they get past the meme team stuff. Green was a great pickup. He's a better player than Bojan.

I find myself usually agreeing with you. And I really like Green. But this seems off. What makes him a better player to you? The only area I can think of is defense. And I honestly don’t know enough about Bojans defense to know. But I was impressed with Green in the finals.

Defense is obviously the biggest thing. It's half the game, and I think Green is one of the best in the league. Would not say the same for Bojan on offense and I'd also put Green's offense over Bojan's defense.

Also, the +/- analytics are overwhelmingly in favor of Green, and that's hard for me to ignore.

[Daddy 801]

The Lakers will be good if they get past the meme team stuff. Green was a great pickup. He's a better player than Bojan.

I find myself usually agreeing with you. And I really like Green. But this seems off. What makes him a better player to you? The only area I can think of is defense. And I honestly don’t know enough about Bojans defense to know. But I was impressed with Green in the finals.

Defense is obviously the biggest thing. It's half the game, and I think Green is one of the best in the league. Would not say the same for Bojan on offense and I'd also put Green's offense over Bojan's defense.

Also, the +/- analytics are overwhelmingly in favor of Green, and that's hard for me to ignore.

I do like +/- as a stat. But Green has been on nothing but great teams pretty much his whole career. I could see his +/- being inflated by that.

[KqWIN]

I find myself usually agreeing with you. And I really like Green. But this seems off. What makes him a better player to you? The only area I can think of is defense. And I honestly don’t know enough about Bojans defense to know. But I was impressed with Green in the finals.

Defense is obviously the biggest thing. It's half the game, and I think Green is one of the best in the league. Would not say the same for Bojan on offense and I'd also put Green's offense over Bojan's defense.

Also, the +/- analytics are overwhelmingly in favor of Green, and that's hard for me to ignore.

I do like +/- as a stat. But Green has been on nothing but great teams pretty much his whole career. I could see his +/- being inflated by that.

I'm talking about the adjusted +/- stats. Green is far ahead all of them.

[zero24gravity]

Let's just get the Jazz in the Least, and have the #1 seed wrapped up by mid-season. (When i say "nobody", I mean no big impact players.)

Raptors, worse (lost Kawhi, added nobody)
Celtics, worse (lost Kyrie & Horford, added Kemba)
Sixers, worse (lost Butler, added nobody)
Bucks, worse (lost Brogdon. added nobody)
Heat might have a shot if they land Westbrook, but otherwise, there's nobody else worth worrying about. Even the Pacers lost more than they added. Nets in 2021 might be good.

Sixers added Horford. That’s a huge addition. I get in a vacuum that Butler is probably more valuable to most people. But Horford has a huge impact on games due to his ability to space the floor and defend the interior. The sixers might be better now. Embiid might get more touches, they might take more 3’s, the paint might be more open for Simmons to be a post up player on the other teams PG. I wouldn’t automatically assume they are worse.

They can run a really funky starting lineup that other teams will scramble to be able to compete with. Simmons, Richardson, Tobias, Horford, Embiid is a HUGE lineup that despite their size can space the floor. That’s not a team defensively I would want to go against. On offense the can space the floor and run handoff action until Simmons is against the PG and he can easily drive past or post up smaller guys and they can divert Simmons lack of shooting into an advantage.

Just saying. Don’t sleep on Sixers.

I overlooked Horford's addition, which is a good pick-up. I still don't see them being better, but maybe not worse either. Also, Simmons will be more and more of a liability as his career goes on, because he's such a terrible shooter and teams will figure out how to minimalize his strengths. Seriously overrated. Sixers will move him in 2 years or less is my prediction.

[Daddy 801]

Let's just get the Jazz in the Least, and have the #1 seed wrapped up by mid-season. (When i say "nobody", I mean no big impact players.)

Raptors, worse (lost Kawhi, added nobody)
Celtics, worse (lost Kyrie & Horford, added Kemba)
Sixers, worse (lost Butler, added nobody)
Bucks, worse (lost Brogdon. added nobody)
Heat might have a shot if they land Westbrook, but otherwise, there's nobody else worth worrying about. Even the Pacers lost more than they added. Nets in 2021 might be good.

Sixers added Horford. That’s a huge addition. I get in a vacuum that Butler is probably more valuable to most people. But Horford has a huge impact on games due to his ability to space the floor and defend the interior. The sixers might be better now. Embiid might get more touches, they might take more 3’s, the paint might be more open for Simmons to be a post up player on the other teams PG. I wouldn’t automatically assume they are worse.

They can run a really funky starting lineup that other teams will scramble to be able to compete with. Simmons, Richardson, Tobias, Horford, Embiid is a HUGE lineup that despite their size can space the floor. That’s not a team defensively I would want to go against. On offense the can space the floor and run handoff action until Simmons is against the PG and he can easily drive past or post up smaller guys and they can divert Simmons lack of shooting into an advantage.

Just saying. Don’t sleep on Sixers.

I overlooked Horford's addition, which is a good pick-up. I still don't see them being better, but maybe not worse either. Also, Simmons will be more and more of a liability as his career goes on, because he's such a terrible shooter and teams will figure out how to minimalize his strengths. Seriously overrated. Sixers will move him in 2 years or less is my prediction.

I think they would be wise to move Simmons.

[sipclip]

You are very high on Whiteside it seems. IMO he's not good. At all! Nurkic is definitely better than him but I agree he's probably better than Kanter.

You have to be kidding me. In Miami he and Spoelstra clearly didn't mesh for some reason but to say a guy that is likely to put up 18pts, 14rbs and 3blks a game is not good is comical to me. Look for him to lead the nba in rebounding and blocks this year which will also put him top 3 in the defensive player of the year battle. The guy is a top 30 player in the right situation and I think the blazers are the perfect situation.

[sipclip]

Let's just get the Jazz in the Least, and have the #1 seed wrapped up by mid-season. (When i say "nobody", I mean no big impact players.)

Raptors, worse (lost Kawhi, added nobody)
Celtics, worse (lost Kyrie & Horford, added Kemba)
Sixers, worse (lost Butler, added nobody)
Bucks, worse (lost Brogdon. added nobody)
Heat might have a shot if they land Westbrook, but otherwise, there's nobody else worth worrying about. Even the Pacers lost more than they added. Nets in 2021 might be good.

Sixers added Horford. That’s a huge addition. I get in a vacuum that Butler is probably more valuable to most people. But Horford has a huge impact on games due to his ability to space the floor and defend the interior. The sixers might be better now. Embiid might get more touches, they might take more 3’s, the paint might be more open for Simmons to be a post up player on the other teams PG. I wouldn’t automatically assume they are worse.

They can run a really funky starting lineup that other teams will scramble to be able to compete with. Simmons, Richardson, Tobias, Horford, Embiid is a HUGE lineup that despite their size can space the floor. That’s not a team defensively I would want to go against. On offense the can space the floor and run handoff action until Simmons is against the PG and he can easily drive past or post up smaller guys and they can divert Simmons lack of shooting into an advantage.

Just saying. Don’t sleep on Sixers.

I overlooked Horford's addition, which is a good pick-up. I still don't see them being better, but maybe not worse either. Also, Simmons will be more and more of a liability as his career goes on, because he's such a terrible shooter and teams will figure out how to minimalize his strengths. Seriously overrated. Sixers will move him in 2 years or less is my prediction.

This sixers also added Josh Richardson who is the perfect fit for them. Thybulle should also be an immediate contributor. If we were in the east we would clearly be behind the bucks and sixers. Possibly the celtics as well.

[Daddy 801]

Sixers added Horford. That’s a huge addition. I get in a vacuum that Butler is probably more valuable to most people. But Horford has a huge impact on games due to his ability to space the floor and defend the interior. The sixers might be better now. Embiid might get more touches, they might take more 3’s, the paint might be more open for Simmons to be a post up player on the other teams PG. I wouldn’t automatically assume they are worse.

They can run a really funky starting lineup that other teams will scramble to be able to compete with. Simmons, Richardson, Tobias, Horford, Embiid is a HUGE lineup that despite their size can space the floor. That’s not a team defensively I would want to go against. On offense the can space the floor and run handoff action until Simmons is against the PG and he can easily drive past or post up smaller guys and they can divert Simmons lack of shooting into an advantage.

Just saying. Don’t sleep on Sixers.

I overlooked Horford's addition, which is a good pick-up. I still don't see them being better, but maybe not worse either. Also, Simmons will be more and more of a liability as his career goes on, because he's such a terrible shooter and teams will figure out how to minimalize his strengths. Seriously overrated. Sixers will move him in 2 years or less is my prediction.

This sixers also added Josh Richardson who is the perfect fit for them. Thybulle should also be an immediate contributor. If we were in the east we would clearly be behind the bucks and sixers. Possibly the celtics as well.

I don’t think I’d put the Celts above us. Two years ago it would of been unthinkable for me to say we are past them, but I think we are. The loss of Horford and Kyrie is huge, the addition of Kemba is huge. Hard to say where they will be at seasons end.

[stitches]

You are very high on Whiteside it seems. IMO he's not good. At all! Nurkic is definitely better than him but I agree he's probably better than Kanter.

You have to be kidding me. In Miami he and Spoelstra clearly didn't mesh for some reason but to say a guy that is likely to put up 18pts, 14rbs and 3blks a game is not good is comical to me. Look for him to lead the nba in rebounding and blocks this year which will also put him top 3 in the defensive player of the year battle. The guy is a top 30 player in the right situation and I think the blazers are the perfect situation.

I'm not particularly impressed by counting numbers. Kanter never lacked numbers either. IMO his game is not particularly conducive to winning and there is a reason Spolestra... and about 5 other coaches prior ended up marginilazing him even though he puts up big numbers. I don't think he will ever be in the defensive player of the year battle. His defensive game is all flash and no substance. He chases blocks like cat chases flash lights and lacks the discipline and basketball IQ to play smart defense. There is a reason his teams are not better defensively with him on the floor even with all his gaudy rebounding and blocking numbers.

He will help the blazers at the 5 while Nurk is out, but I wouldn't expect him to be a difference maker.

[Inigo Montoya]

The rebuild (if not successful in next two years) would really depend on what Gobert wants to do, what level he is playing at in two years, and what type of contract he wants. He is probably in his prime the next 2-4 years. Big men peak earlier and he relies on his athleticism. The time is now or never IMO with Gobert. And he might be gone in a year from now....which sucks to think. But I believe his contract is up at the end of this year.

If they blow it up in 1-2 years they can have a ton of capspace before signing Donovan to his max.

The problem is that as long as they have DM and Gobert they will never blow it up. They will ride these two players for as long as they can into another 5 years of playoff purgatory with no shot at contention. And worse, with DM's max and Gobert's supermax they won't have the cap space to make the team better.