2019 Utah Jazz Off Season Thread

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Are you guys enjoying the mental gymnastics Locke is going through this summer? Right now he's pushing hard the narrative that continuity and friendship are actually not as important and good as we previously thought(aka "as he was pushing for the last 18 months"). It's not that it's unreasonable position and it's not that I don't agree, but I'm kind fed up with how he pushes every single development around this team toward the narrative that most favors the team, no matter if he's been singing the complete opposite song for years before - the moment it suits us, he instantly switches up the story he's telling.

If I am being honest I don’t think Locke was ever sold on last years team...I remember he speculated that there would be changes at the beginning of the last off season on one of his podcasts. He used a reference of a Sonics team in the 90’s that kept the same team from one year to the next and didn’t see a great return the 2nd of the two years. Obviously nothing ended up happening and he put a positive spin on everything, but I really don’t think he is a fan of the “continuity” agenda personally.


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That was my point - he's not really a fan of any particular strategy or path, he just selling hard whatever path the Jazz management chooses even if they are polar opposites two years in a row.

[Soul Patch]

Sounds like you guys are **** the same hog from different sides.

[TO11]

Are you guys enjoying the mental gymnastics Locke is going through this summer? Right now he's pushing hard the narrative that continuity and friendship are actually not as important and good as we previously thought(aka "as he was pushing for the last 18 months"). It's not that it's unreasonable position and it's not that I don't agree, but I'm kind fed up with how he pushes every single development around this team toward the narrative that most favors the team, no matter if he's been singing the complete opposite song for years before - the moment it suits us, he instantly switches up the story he's telling.

If I am being honest I don’t think Locke was ever sold on last years team...I remember he speculated that there would be changes at the beginning of the last off season on one of his podcasts. He used a reference of a Sonics team in the 90’s that kept the same team from one year to the next and didn’t see a great return the 2nd of the two years. Obviously nothing ended up happening and he put a positive spin on everything, but I really don’t think he is a fan of the “continuity” agenda personally.


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That was my point - he's not really a fan of any particular strategy or path, he just selling hard whatever path the Jazz management chooses even if they are polar opposites two years in a row.

I see what you are saying now....I mean I guess I just kind of expect this, he has to put a positive spin to a certain degree on what the Jazz do...he can't just **** all over them all the time. Perhaps he does lean a little too much on the side of the Jazz. I feel like Locke tries to give a lot of "neutral" takes and he kinda says "We'll see how it goes"...he sure isn't a Skip Bayless or Stephen A Smith.

[KqWIN]

David Locke expects Miye Oni to play this year...says he will play more minutes than any other rookie in the division besides Culver.

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David Locke expects Miye Oni to play this year...says he will play more minutes than any other rookie in the division besides Culver.

Yep. I was impressed by Oni. He played very much within himself and wasn't forcing much. He seems like a player who you can put on the floor and rely on not to **** up. They seem to be impressed by his defense too. I was a bit colder on his D, but I have to admit I haven't been watching him specifically to see what he does off-ball. If he keeps hitting the 3 he will play some minutes.

[KqWIN]

David Locke expects Miye Oni to play this year...says he will play more minutes than any other rookie in the division besides Culver.

Yep. I was impressed by Oni. He played very much within himself and wasn't forcing much. He seems like a player who you can put on the floor and rely on not to **** up. They seem to be impressed by his defense too. I was a bit colder on his D, but I have to admit I haven't been watching him specifically to see what he does off-ball. If he keeps hitting the 3 he will play some minutes.

He'll have to beat out Goss, Mudiay, and Niang for minutes...but I suppose it's possible. If Exum gets injured again it opens up more potential minutes.

I personally didn't see anything special with Oni. I didn't think he was completely inept with the ball in his hands, but like you I didn't think he was exceptionally good on defense. It comes down to his shot...and we just don't have the sample size for me to make a judgement. He was just OK in college. I'd rank these guys:

Niang
Mudiay
Goss
Oni

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He'll have to beat out Goss, Mudiay, and Niang for minutes...but I suppose it's possible. If Exum gets injured again it opens up more potential minutes.

I personally didn't see anything special with Oni. I didn't think he was completely inept with the ball in his hands, but like you I didn't think he was exceptionally good on defense. It comes down to his shot...and we just don't have the sample size for me to make a judgement. He was just OK in college. I'd rank these guys:

Niang
Mudiay
Goss
Oni

I think there is a comparison in styles with Royce. He can handle a bit but is not a natural ballhandler... he doesn't shoot much, but is relatively efficient when he does. I need to see more of him on D, but lets say the coaches have seen more of him than us and give him the benefit of the doubt.

Honestly, I have much more questions about Mudiay and Goss than about Oni. I know what he will theoretically be doing on this (winning) team. I have no idea if Mudiay can play on a winning team at all. I'm one of his biggest doubters here. He's just never showed that he can be a positive factor for his teams and he's had plenty of chances to show it. With Goss... I'm very unimpressed by the little I've seen of him in Europe. Hell even by his highlights you would have hard time figuring out how exactly he will be successful in the NBA. The biggest success he had it seems was on hard floatery/contested layups against inferior athletes. What happens when you put NBA-level athleticism and length against him? How does he defend? He was also horrible in his last SL-stint. I guess his success will have to come from shooting 3s...

But yeah... as you've noted players miss games. It won't be just Dante. There will be injuries throughout the roster and we will need reliable rotation minutes from some of those depth pieces.

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Read on Twitter

Haven't listened to it yet so can't comment. But if something strikes you, lets discuss because this period is the real doldrums of the off-season.

[KqWIN]

Read on Twitter

Haven't listened to it yet so can't comment. But if something strikes you, lets discuss because this period is the real doldrums of the off-season.

Pretty surface level.

- Knew they hit a ceiling as a team
- Have monitored Conley acquisition for 4-5 years
- Wanted to build team to augment Mitchell+Gobert
- Mitchell wants to do anything to help team win
- Gobert is most unselfish player in the league
- Team building is on a shorter cycle due to shorter contracts/player empowerment

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Read on Twitter

[SoCalJazzFan]

David Locke expects Miye Oni to play this year...says he will play more minutes than any other rookie in the division besides Culver.

Several people have taken a stab at minutes per player/position, including me. I just don't see how he gets the minutes to play more than nearly every other rookie this season. Moreover, it's not like he took summer league by storm.

[KqWIN]

David Locke expects Miye Oni to play this year...says he will play more minutes than any other rookie in the division besides Culver.

Several people have taken a stab at minutes per player/position, including me. I just don't see how he gets the minutes to play more than nearly every other rookie this season. Moreover, it's not like he took summer league by storm.

That's where I'm at with Oni. There are an infinite amount of 6'6 guys who can look ok on defense and have up and down shooting over a few SL games. However, this probably didn't come from nowhere. He must have been impressive in practice and left a good practice. It's not something Locke would make up out of the blue and it's somewhat validated by his guaranteed contract.

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Goldstein's model is not high on the Jazz:

Read on Twitter

[SoCalJazzFan]

Goldstein's model is not high on the Jazz:

Read on Twitter

The West is going to be tough, but this is the only prediction that I've seen Utah outside of top 5.

The Nets are waay low, his projections really have them worse than the Knicks and Wizards?

[Inigo Montoya]

As someone who didn't (and still doesn't) like most of the moves the Jazz made this offseason, I still think the 45-win projection and only a 29% chance of winning the first round feels too low. Even I give the Jazz a better record and a better chance to advance to the second round than that.

[KqWIN]

The +/- models won't like our moves. Favors -> Bojan is going to be seen as a major downgrade. What the models don't account for with the swapping of players is synergy. That's what we're counting on to improve the team.

Our bench is also going to be seen as a huge negative. Mudiay, Exum, and Niang all have extremely poor metrics.

[Inigo Montoya]

This model will have to be revised now that Cousins tore his ACL. A competitor just got weaker.

[Inigo Montoya]

The Jazz got an A- for their offseason moves from Basketball Insiders.

NBA Daily: Grading The Offseason – Utah Jazz
http://www.basketballinsiders.com/nba-daily-grading-the-offseason-utah-jazz/

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None of the advanced stats projections are particularly high on the Jazz this year:

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Vegas is higher on the Jazz than all projections and by a good margin. I'm pretty high on this team too, but I understand why the projections are so low. Lets see what happens.

Favors>Bogdanovic by the projections

Mudiay, Exum, Niang, Bradley all have bad statistical projections.
Oni, Goss, Kidd/Howard/Brantley are going to be rookies so the projections for all of them are not high either.

Half of the roster has either bad or rookie projections and we downgraded from Favors to Bogdanovic(at least projections-wise).

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Goldstein's model is not high on the Jazz:

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These ratings are pretty brutal for quite a few teams. I'm not sure in what world the kings could be viewed worse than the griz and the mavs the same as the wolves. From a win total I wouldn't be shocked to see the jazz around that 45 number because the west is so damn brutal. Teams are going to beat up on each other so it wouldn't shock me to see only 1 or 2 teams with more than 50 wins.

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