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Contenders for 4th position? I think so.
Posted by: Riley Gisseman on September 15th, 2012
The author's views are entirely his or her own and may not reflect the views of the Utah Jazz.I think the Jazz are going to be a threat for the 4th seed in the west for a few reasons,
They had 3 weaknesses last year: 3 point shooting, Defense, and fouling. And have adressed each one of them.
3 point shooting:
The Jazz last year did not have any 3 point shooters at all. literally. They had 0 people in the top 75 in three shooting last year and with the pickups of Mo Williams, Randy Foye, and Marvin Williams they have three in the top 45. They also will have the young guys stepping up (Hayward and Burks). With consistent threats on the outside and Post the Jazz will continue to be one of the best offensive threats in the league.
Defense
All three additions for the Jazz have been defensive upgrades for who they are replacing. And with Favors development we will jump “high to the sky”
Fouling
Ever hear the phrase “addition from subtraction”? Well that is true here, The Jazz traded Devin Harris who was fouling a whopping 3.5 times a game. That’s the highest on last years team by 0.7 fouls! The Jazz management is also going to try to address this problem during training camp.
The Jazz will also get much better on Offense while Favors and the young guys game progress. This team is ready for a big leap this year.
Replies: 17
Views: 763
17 Responses
I think you and the Jazz brass are thinking alike. Most important if players buy into a team effort and not self glory. I will say without hesitation that this is the best team the Jazz have ever had 1-15.
The Thunder, Lakers, Spurs, and Clippers are all better then the Jazz in my opinion.
I think fouling will continue to be an issue.
This is a decent team, that should continue to improve from within because of all the young talent on hand, but they won’t be major players in the conference this season.
I see another first round exit in the works.
what makes the Clippers better than the Jazz, seriously?
@Logan. two words… Chris Paul.
I would really love the Jazz organization to make a push for him come FA next year.
We did not correct the biggest problem on defense so it will not matter. A big can make up for a wing player. Wing players can not make up for a big. Favors can not make up for the poor defense either. We have seen that in the numbers. So no the defense has not been fixed.
When players are scrambling because of poor execution/mixed assignments by a person on defense that is where A LOT of our fouling comes. So I do not think the fouling has been fixed.
The offense will only be better if we change it for some of our other players that are better at a movement based offense. It does not sound like Corbin has any plans of doing that.
Everyone is underestimating all the teams in the West. The Thunder,Lakers,Clippers,Grizzlies,Mavs,Nuggets,Spurs are all better then us and then there are teams that are right on our level Wolves,Warriors,Kings,Hornets. Now before you say the Kings and Hornets are not be careful because they handled us pretty well last year and they have improved more then we have. So they have gained ground.
@LK Anderson I agree, deepest team weve ever had.
@John LOL
Defense… I dont know. We upgraded players who are better defenders instinctively, so we did get better. But the defensive sets being used, less fouling and situational lineups are coaching and that is what will win games. Corbin has all the tools he needs. No excuses
I think we are just as good if not better than the clippers. Chris paul is great but,we played them very close last yesr and won at least once against the. So i would say we are right there with them and, the spurs are only getting older so we will need to see how good they will be. Two sleeper teams to watch for i think will be the t wolves and suns. I think they could creep up on alot of teams this year. 4th or 5th i think is about right though for the jazz
You guys understand we would have to be 2nd in our division to get the 4th seed right? We are at least third best in our division. And the 4th and 5th in our division are tough as well. So we could easily have a losing record in our division.
I understand you want to be optimistic but also do not just say all these things that are not true.
@Dallan I don’t comment on here much, but, you are guilty of what you are claiming others are doing. Where are the facts that these changes are not being made? I guess your point is correct that they ‘haven’t changed’, because we haven’t played a game yet. Also, on defense you said “A big can make up for a wing player. Wing players can not make up for a big. Favors can not make up for the poor defense either.” Favors is a big, a potential all-star defensive player. I am not saying that you are right or wrong. Just know that the numbers are not the only indicators. If they were, statiticians would be running the show, not people who ‘know’ the game.
@a few people – I think there are a few people getting too offended on here, and it is making it not really fun to read the comments anymore. There are too many points of view to tell people they are right or they are wrong. Nothing is fact until it happens. All we have are trends (both by instinct, and statistical) to TRY to PREDICT the future. Big Al might be an all-star this year, heck, G-Time could be too. We might be 2nd in the west, or 3rd, or 4th or 8th, or barely out… too many factors to be calling others out.
@Michael Stat people do run the game right now. Advanced numbers are becoming A HUGE part of front office hiring and firing. We just hired a stat guy because we are lacking in that area. I am saying that you can change the defensive philosophy all you want but if Al is getting 30 mins a game it does not matter. You think throughout his career he has only had one defensive philosophy? He has actually never been on a top half team in defense. Also thank you for commenting. Thank you for not getting offended by my post and giving a legitimate argument.
Dallon who besides the thunder is better? Denver is ok but, the jazz are right there with them portland sucks and the twolves are still a question mark i dont see how we couldnt be second in are division.
Denver was better then us last year. Got better by adding Iggy and are young so you got improvement there. They are 2nd until we prove otherwise. Portland still has talent and the T-Wolves have a ton of talent so ya i would say we are going to be in a fight for 3rd
In our division
I see the Jazz doing much better this year… Looking at the standings we were tied (record wise), with 7th. Denver was only 2 games ahead of us. I hate this word, but, “if” we were to look at the number of games were determined by 3 or less points that we lost last season, there were 6 of them. So, just a few baskets here or there can determine your standings from #8 seed to a #3 seed (Lakers were 41 and 25 – only 5 games ahead of us). So, “if” we only just finish out games better, it could be the difference between the #3 seed and # 8 seed.
IMO, this is the reason why you should always look at #1 as your goal. A few overtimes that go your way, or even that little extra play at the end of some games can determine a lot.
With that being said… This is why I don’t mind being an optimist when it comes to my team.
Wasn’t there a few times during the season last season when we were in the top 4? I know we were 10 and 5 for the first 15 games… January and February were murderous for the Jazz, but we started and ended the season great. I am curious to see how our youngs deal with being hungry for more playoffs after a sweep. And maybe not go on the losing spells we had in those 2 months. Anyway, GO JAZZ!
Still not sure if iggy will make denver better i really dont see why we couldnt be 2nd. Twovles lost alot to and rubio wont be the same either so i really dont see to much of a challenge besides denver and thunder.
The Jazz adressed their 3 biggest weaknesses.
Its just a matter of fast and how well we gel as a time. Mo Williams will do a much better job running the show than Harris. He’s an experienced professional, and I see him benefitting from the team.
Back up point guards will be Tinsley and/or Randy Foye. (If you didn’t know, Watson’s knee is still an issue and he has said himself he will NOT be ready to go when training camp starts)
We have two very good ball handlers in Mo Williams and Gordon Hayward. Randy Foye is a pretty decent ball handler and Alec Burks shows a lot of potential.
I’m predicting the beginning of the season to be pretty rough as the team learns to play together. But by December I think we will be on a roll.
I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that the Jazz will get the 6th seed. have the Jazz as most likely getting the6th seed right now. They could go as low as 8 or as high 5.
OKC, SAS, and LAL are going to be 1-3, respectively. It’s going to be a real scrap between Utah, Denver, Memphis, LAC, and Dallas.
I don’t think I’ve read one prediction on here where the poster takes Utah’s schedule into consideration. That’s a huge factor. Utah has a ton of away games at the beginning of their season. More than I remember them having in recent history. For the past few years, from Boozer to Favors, Utah has had impressive (better than expected) starts at the beginning of their season (first 20 games) then trailed off somewhere in the middle only to try and salvage a playoff birth somewhere toward the end.
I think Utah will have a rough start at the beginning of this season. I think the road games couple with team chemistry still cooking will stall their build up of wins. However, I think they will definitely turn a corner once January rolls around, and I think we will see Utah go through some bursts of win streaks. I’m sure there are much more thoughtful analyses out there of how their schedule will affect their wins, but that is my gut feeling for now.
Schedule aside, I think more teams will become worrisome of Utah’ front court, with Favors, Millsap, and Kanter adding steam to their drive. I think if Utah can keep other teams defenses focused on the paint, then our backcourt will open up and we will see our perimeter shooters come out and show their true potential, including Hayward and Burks. We could potentially have one of the best 3-point shooting teams in the NBA this year (Mo Williams, Randy Foye, Marvin Williams, Gordon Hayward, Alec Burks, and yes even Paul Millsap could all be shooting over 35% from beyond the arc- and in some cases, I’m sure we could have some guys shooting closer to 40%. Don’t forget Hayward shot something like 47% his rookie season.)
Defensively, I think Millsap, Hayward, and Favors will be our biggest defensive instigators. Millsap lead the team in steals, Hayward’s hustle has shown him making blocks on one end of the court leading to dunks and 3-point plays on their end of the court, and Favors can straight up deny the ball from whomever he wants. With those 3 guys as a solid defensive core, Utah still needs to keep up the defense on the perimeter, and this is where Mo Wiliams and Alec Burks will have to step up. We may also find another defensive threat in Marvin Williams and Jeremy Evans provided they get a decent amount of playing time. Again, like an earlier poster said, this is up to the coach and training camp and team chemistry to determine how well the team will rotate and move through defensive sets.
If Utah shoots well from the perimeter and defends well, then fouling should not be a problem.
At best, Utah finishes 4th.
At worst, Utah finishes 8th.
Making 2nd round of playoffs a definite possibility.