record with current roster

dongibby wrote:

Dallas has two 7 footer's Dirk Nowitzki, Chris Kaman Denver has two JaVale McGee, Kosta Koufos and one that is 7'1 Timofey Mozgov Golden State has Andrew Bogut Huston has Omer Asik and Donatas Motiejunas Clipper's have DeAndre Jordan, Ryan Hollins Laker's have Dwight Howard and Pau Gasol Memphis has Marc Gasol a 7'2 guy and Hamed Haddadi at 7'2 New Orleans has Robin Lopez and Jason Smith, all I am saying is there are a lot of height in the West that's why I say the Jazz are not long or tall compared to most other team's in the West.

Dirk doesnt rebound or play in the paint.
All the rest in bold dont even play or have an impact.
Also McGee isn't a threat scoring, Mozgoz is an average player, Bogut can't stay healthy, Asik is purely a defensive player same with Deandre Jordan.

Yes, the Fakers are big and will have to be dealt with, but they're the only really problem.

Al took Marc Gasol to school last year. Other than that, only big guys on here that can make it tough on our guys sometimes are Kaman and Marc Gasol and they're the only ones on their teams who play in the paint and have an impact. We have at least two.
Our guys can rebound and score with all of those you listed, regardless of height.

Not to mention, if the starting lineup is what I anticipate with MO/GH/Mav/Fav/Al we will have a big SG, a big SF, a big PF and big C compared to average starting players.

Here's an updated Report Card from Chad Ford for the Jazz offseason...

Chad Ford wrote:

Key additions: Mo Williams (trade), Marvin Williams (trade), Jeremy Evans (re-sign), Kevin Murphy (draft), Randy Foye (FA), Dennis Lindsey (GM)

Key subtractions: Devin Harris

The Jazz continue to quietly rebuild both their roster and their front office. They shocked just about everyone when they made the playoffs last season and did a few things this summer to make sure they stayed in contention for a seventh or eighth seed in the Western Conference.

Once again, executive vice president Kevin O'Connor deftly used his assets to add depth to his roster. He turned Mehmet Okur's trade exception into a starting point guard and turned Harris' expiring deal into Marvin Williams.

Mo Williams should be a significant upgrade over Harris at the point. He is a better shooter and plays the pick-and-roll much better than Harris. And Marvin Williams' shooting stroke and defensive abilities give Utah some much-needed depth at small forward.

I also liked their second-round draft choice. Murphy was one of the best scorers in college basketball last season, and he has deep range on his jumper. He is not the strongest or most athletic guy, but he could give the Jazz a nice scoring bump off the bench.

Utah has significant assets going forward, with expiring contracts in Paul Millsap and Al Jefferson along with, most likely, the Warriors' 2013 first-round pick. If the Jazz want to make another big deal, they have the tools to get it done.

But Utah's real progress will be determined by the growth of its young players. Derrick Favors and Gordon Hayward both have a chance to be special. Enes Kanter and Alec Burks could end up being solid as well. If they continue to improve, the Jazz are going to be tough to beat in a few years.

Perhaps the biggest news of the summer, however, was O'Connor's decision to hand over the GM duties to the Spurs' Dennis Lindsey. O'Connor, who has been with the club since 1999, has set up the Jazz for another long run and made a great call in putting in place a succession plan that included Lindsey. He has got the perfect combination of basketball and management IQ, along with the requisite dose of humility, to follow in O'Connor's huge footsteps.

GRADE: B+

http://insider.espn.go.com/nba/story/_/id/8262146/nba-updated-offseason-grades-every-team

Interesting that Ford sees the Jazz as dangerous in a couple years rather than, say this year rather than replicating, (a low bar) the 8th pick or so this year. People have short memories, don't they? Everyone seems to forget the Jazz were in the hunt for the 4-5 pick until the last couple weeks of the season, (where yes, they barely slipped in at . Forgetting youth improvement, the off-season subtractions and additions already made them a better team and I'd argue their are none of the pundits teams 3-6 that can claim similar upgrades at 3 positions. Whattevah, always fun to read the pre-season schmack down cause it rarely works out that way in the end except for the top 3 teams. I say Jazz have a serious shot at home court in the first round and if not that, look out 3rd or 4th seed, comin at ya.

MTJazz wrote:

Interesting that Ford sees the Jazz as dangerous in a couple years rather than, say this year rather than replicating, (a low bar) the 8th pick or so this year. People have short memories, don't they? Everyone seems to forget the Jazz were in the hunt for the 4-5 pick until the last couple weeks of the season, (where yes, they barely slipped in at . Forgetting youth improvement, the off-season subtractions and additions already made them a better team and I'd argue their are none of the pundits teams 3-6 that can claim similar upgrades at 3 positions. Whattevah, always fun to read the pre-season schmack down cause it rarely works out that way in the end except for the top 3 teams. I say Jazz have a serious shot at home court in the first round and if not that, look out 3rd or 4th seed, comin at ya.

I think that was one of the few, if any spot on assessments of how good these players and this team could be. The West this year though has LAx2, OKC, Spurs, Denver and Memphis who all should be better than or at least will fight Utah for seeding. So thats 7 teams right there, not including Minnesota and I guess Dallas. So can't say I boldly disagree with Ford. But.....

I do disagree!! Hah. And agree with you MT. Jazz stayed just as good as last year when they were fighting for the 6,7th seed the last couple weeks. But now their youth and chemistry will be better no doubt. And oh yea, like Ford said we had a significant upgrade at PG. Lastly, we immediately addressed our deficiencies with Marv and Foye and Mo for the outside shooting. Nobody addressed their deficiencies as well as Utah did without losing something. Denver added a stud in Iggy, but lost a ton of outside/3pt shooting in Afflalo and Harrington.
So I agree wholeheartedly, Utah will fight for homecourt in the first round. 3 things are always certain from Utah: the word "dang", Jazz underrated, and construction on the roadways.

rorybreaker wrote:

I picked 35 and making the playoffs for last season. This year 54. But, I bet the the roster will change and I think in a pretty substantial way.

I'm just reiterating my pick (ALSO 54), and pointing out that I also predicted most analysts would lean towards the lazy Bleacher Report style rather than the insightful Mr. Ford's analysis.

Lazy reports will miss the things that have been pointed out in this thread and elsewhere, things that will go unnoticed by the lazy analyst.

Mo Williams doesn't have to be a better player than Devin Harris (I think he is, but...), his skills just have to complement team needs better than Harris'. I think we will see the replacement of one player with a very slightly superior player resulting in a HUGE upgrade in PG play.

Internal improvement. Lazy reporters who don't know the team won't have a clue about this almost inevitable improvement.

Lazy analysts probably still consider the Jazz a "grind-it-out, lunch bucket" kind of team, which stereotype, by now, is almost meaningless. The Jazz are HELLA athletic, strong, long and fast and have great perimeter and backcout size and adequate interior size. We SHOULD be a fast break team, but I don't know if Ty has it in him to push for that.

Situational improvements. The relocation of Foye, Marv and Mo from prior problematic rosters/situations to Utah might, MIGHT (I'd almost say "probably will") result in dramatically improved play from each of them. A lazy reporter won't go to the trouble to check this possibility, but I think it's a highly likely result.

So when you see predictions placing the Jazz 9th in the West, or hovering around .500, that's why you can just write it off.

Growing up, is tough. There will be bumps upon the road. I am not as high as everyone. I still think they improved across the board. Here is my concern. Say they win 50 games. Where is that in the West? It is so freaking loaded. 2007-08 50 wins was good enough for 8th!!!! I think it will be similar.

OKC
SA
Lak ers
Clippers
Nuggets
Grizzlies

Are the Jazz better than any of these teams? I'd say no, but im a pessimist. Even if the Jazz improve, I still see them as a 7th seed.

Romoholic wrote:

MTJazz wrote:

I'm thinking optimisticly. 55 games.

I don't see the Jazz sucking so bad on the road this year for one thing, plus I think the subtle tweak in roster strengths is just enough to take this team up another level when combined with pretty much guaranteed improvements in the young core.

That's the thing. Outside of the additions we have made, we will get improvement from Favors, Hayward and Burks. As well as the subtraction of Bell and CJ, I think this team is going to be very good this season. I'm excited!

Great thread. One of the best points is one I hate to agree with (but, I do), the plus of getting rid of CJ and Raja. I was never a big CJ fan, but, I've always advocated developement of players so I may have defended him instead of saying 3 years ago that we should let him go. And, I was also happy we took Raja back when we did-- I liked him as a Jazz player when we had him the first time, and I was impressed with how well he played for Phoenix (3pters went in!), and he almost became my hero when he cotheslined MJ wannabe in the playoffs after MJ wannabe was repetitavely getting away with constant fouling-- but, Raja definitely didn't pan out for the Jazz with his 2nd stint.

I also over-valued Devin Harris. I thought he would be just about as good as D-Will, with us getting Favors on top of it! (The Favors part turned out pretty good). Now, we have Mo back (who we never should have let go in the first place), and most people agree he is an improvement on Harris! We've upgraded through trades and drafts-- so, now we're potentially strong at every position. Basketball is a team sport, and I hope the Jazz can prove it.

The only thing we don't have is dominance at any one position. We don't have a top five pg, sg, sf, pf, or center. Obviously, we dominated with Stockton and Malone and that took us very far. Arguably, we had a semi-dominant combo of D-Will and Boozer (the way we used them) and that made us one of the top ten. Teams without top players sometimes succeed (last year, Indy, Philly, San Antonio, and the Jazz did really well without having any top five players). But, I think you'd have to go back pretty far to find a championship team that didn't have at least one player that can dominate the way elite players dominate. I'd love for the Jazz to set the record straight. I just don't think we're at that level.

We have a great team, better than most. I'll predict 50 wins-- but, if we gel as a team, we can do much better!

Trollificus wrote:

Lazy analysts probably still consider the Jazz a "grind-it-out, lunch bucket" kind of team, which stereotype, by now, is almost meaningless. The Jazz are HELLA athletic, strong, long and fast and have great perimeter and backcout size and adequate interior size. We SHOULD be a fast break team, but I don't know if Ty has it in him to push for that.

Situational improvements. The relocation of Foye, Marv and Mo from prior problematic rosters/situations to Utah might, MIGHT (I'd almost say "probably will") result in dramatically improved play from each of them. A lazy reporter won't go to the trouble to check this possibility, but I think it's a highly likely result.

So when you see predictions placing the Jazz 9th in the West, or hovering around .500, that's why you can just write it off.

Great post Troll. Thats all I got. Oh, and a reputation point for you. Rejoice.

Oh and to SL above, someone will correct me if I'm wrong, but actually I believe statistically Al was a top 5 center. Crazy huh?

Looking at the schedule I think the Jazz could go 53/29 this coming season, I think they will become a lot better team on the road this season with the new additions to the team. I really don't like to give any predictions but I really feel this is a much improved team going into this season, IMO this is the deepest team that I have ever seen for the Jazz I truly believe this and think they could turnout to be one of the best team the Jazz has ever put on the court. I just don't recall any other team that has had the all around talent that this team has at all of the position's from PG to C they are filled with very capable players who can get it done on any given night.