The 2017 off-season...Hayward, Hill, Ingles...?

[url]https://thejnotes.com/2017/08/02/need-reassurance-utah-jazz-look-no-last-years-playoffs/[/url]

[QUOTE]While I certainly agree that losing out on a star player like Hayward is a setback, I think it shouldn

[url]https://hoopshabit.com/2017/08/01/3-australian-nbl-clubs-to-prepare-the-nba-for-2017-18-season/[/url]

[QUOTE]Former NBL MVP Joe Ingles began his professional career in the league while fellow Australian, Dante Exum, also has an affiliation with many of its players. Those two, in particular, will be certainties to take the court when the NBL side

[url]https://www.slcdunk.com/2017/8/3/16088164/2017-nba-offseason-utah-jazz-ricky-rubio-number-3-the-downbeat-vivint-arena-renovations[/url]

[QUOTE]After Hayward

[url]http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/basketball/australian-nba-star-andrew-bogut-training-in-us-as-four-teams-circle-for-his-signature/news-story/3f0d0012d7be09512f6706323f2f15bb[/url]

[QUOTE]If he doesn

[url]https://thejnotes.com/2017/08/03/utah-jazz-espn-projects-45-wins/[/url]

[QUOTE]Even with All-NBA center Rudy Gobert still on the roster, some pundits are sleeping on the Jazz.

SportsLine, for example, projected the Jazz as a 38-win team last month. And with a litany of Western Conference playoff teams making major roster improvements, it

[url]https://thejnotes.com/2017/08/03/joe-ingles-reminds-utah-jazz-fans-keep-proper-perspective/[/url]

[QUOTE]Although Hayward

[url]https://hoopshabit.com/2017/08/02/dennis-lindseys-shrewd-contracts-make-utah-jazzs-future-flexible/[/url]

[QUOTE]All the moves they had made over the past year

[url]https://hoopshabit.com/2017/08/02/utah-jazz-joe-ingles-wants-andrew-bogut-2017-18/[/url]

[QUOTE]Assuming Bogut wants to remain in the NBA, it won

[url]https://thejnotes.com/2017/08/02/utah-jazz-joe-ingles-wants-andrew-bogut/[/url]

[QUOTE]They were clearly willing to eat one contract when inking Royce O

[QUOTE]Katz: Did you have that same mentality when you were in Utah and you actually got traded? Do you feel like you

[QUOTE]Adrian Wojnarowski: Free agent forward Luke Babbitt has agreed to a one-year deal with the Atlanta Hawks, league source tells ESPN.

[url]https://www.ksl.com/?sid=45286878&nid=304&title=can-ricky-rubio-put-it-all-together-in-utah[/url]

[QUOTE]People close to Rubio explained the downturn by citing what was happening off the floor. Rubio had grown close to Minnesota head coach Flip Saunders, bonding over the shared experiences of Saunders' Hodgkin lymphoma and Rubio's mother's lung cancer. Saunders died in October 2015, and the entire Minnesota organization went through the 2015-16 season in a grieving process under head coach Sam Mitchell.

But new team president and head coach Tom Thibodeau wanted to move forward — understandably. But Rubio wasn't quite ready: his mother passed away in May 2016 and Rubio invested his grieving energy into Spain's Rio Olympic campaign. By the time the season came around, Rubio needed a break.

Thibodeau wasn't going to give him one. Known for his never-ending deep yelling at players throughout games, practices, shootarounds, and everything else, Thibodeau's habits grated on a tired Rubio.

The coach changed the offense, taking the ball out of Rubio's hands somewhat. In October, a report came out that Thibodeau planned to make Kris Dunn his starting point guard 20 games into the season. And two games into the season, Rubio sprained his elbow, adding injury to insult. Rubio said the injury affected him throughout the first half of the season.[/QUOTE]

At least he has lots of excuses. Should fit right in.

[QUOTE]And after that, he was on fire.

For the rest of the season, Rubio averaged 16 points per game on 42 percent shooting.[/QUOTE]

42% is on fire? I guess if Trey Burke is the standard maybe

[QUOTE]The difference could not be more stark: Hill's strengths are usually off the ball, where he's an excellent catch-and-shoot finisher and attacker. [/QUOTE]

His strengths were that he fit right in being able to play with and without the ball like almost all of their non bigs could.

[QUOTE]Rubio did really benefit from the spacing that Karl-Anthony Towns' shooting ability provided in Minnesota, and their pick-and-pop play was maybe Minnesota's most reliable scoring weapon. [/QUOTE]

Exactly. Minnesota couldn't shoot either but they did have a stretch big which the Jazz only have off the bench

[QUOTE]"I think I can really help him play at an All-Star level," Rubio said of Gobert.[/QUOTE]

Way to go! He was already all-NBA without you :facepalm

[QUOTE]Rubio's offensive problems are real, but they're in two areas: his catch-and-shoot ability and his weirdly awful layup game. To be sure, Rubio is one of the worst players in the league in both categories. Teams help off of him when he's spotting up anywhere[/QUOTE]

And that's huge. If I'm the other team the only guy I start the game guarding on the perimeter is Ingles.

[QUOTE]Part of Rubio's renaissance over the second part of last season was hitting catch-and-shoot jumpers at 60 percent effective field goal percentage, which was even higher than Hill's season mark of 59 percent. It is reasonable to be skeptical that that improvement can last for a whole season.[/QUOTE]

Why be skeptical when the wizard thinks he is the man?

[QUOTE]the Jazz are impressively confident they can change Rubio's finishing around the rim in a meaningful way. Two seasons ago, Rubio shot just 33 percent on layups, which is crazy, but he's improved all the way to 50 percent over the last two campaigns. That's still bad, but better. The Jazz's coaching staff believes that with drills and technique he can improve on that to become somewhere near league average — 55 or 60 percent or so.[/QUOTE]

The same drills that have Exum and Neto so effective at the rim? :rolleyes:

[QUOTE] Last year, the Jazz had the third-best defense in the league but were just 25th in forcing turnovers.That figures to change in 2017-18 in a big way. Rubio has led the league in three of his six seasons in steal percentage, the percentage of opponent possessions where Rubio steals the ball away. Add Donovan Mitchell's talent (he picked up a summer-league record number of steals this July), Thabo Sefolosha's game (he was fifth in the league in steal percentage last season, tied with Draymond Green), and more playing time for Ingles (led the Jazz in steals last year) to that calculus. All of a sudden, the Jazz could be one of the best teams in the league at forcing turnovers.[/QUOTE]

How much will Sefolosha play without a shot? Mitchell could be in the G-league. Can Ingles be effective in more minutes?

[QUOTE]"As you guys know, Quin trains and builds great habits."

The Jazz feel they can get Rubio back to elite defensive status.[/QUOTE]

So what about Exum, Burke, Kanter, etc.?

[QUOTE]Jazz fans remember the 2015-16 season when poor performances in close games cost Utah a playoff berth.

Minnesota's been doing that for six years running. They've underperformed their point-differential win-loss total by 25 games over the course of Rubio's six seasons, and there are some that believe Rubio is primarily at fault. The Minnesota Star-Tribune wrote:

"Crunch time on offense often requires a player to beat his man off the dribble to score or... make a tough shot. Those are not Rubio’s strengths, and the Wolves have often struggled to get good shots (and therefore score) in the clutch as a result."

Now, to defend Rubio, the biggest issue with the Wolves in clutch situations has been primarily defensive, something that the Jazz should be able to figure out much better than Minnesota, thanks to Gobert at the helm.

The Jazz will give Rubio chances to show that the problems were Minnesota's, not his. There's statistical evidence that shows clutch performance should revert to the mean. But if not, the Jazz could end games without Rubio on the floor.[/QUOTE]

The front office cost them the playoffs by having Burke instead of a vet on the team. They will have trouble scoring down the stretch. Will cost them many games. Should he be on the team if you can't finish games with him?

[QUOTE]There's reason to be optimistic here: if you can meld together the best stretches of Rubio's career, he could be an All-Star caliber player. A top-five passer with the pull-up game of the last two seasons, an aggressive catch-and-shoot game like after the deadline last year, and the defense of 2015-16, well, that'd be something special.

Something like a 2017 Jason Kidd?

"Jason Kidd is a big example where he improved his shot and then he became one of the best point guards," Rubio said. "The confidence they've shown for me from the beginning is awesome, and now I have to answer with good games. I have confidence in me."

For Rubio, now is the time to put it all together.[/QUOTE]

Kidd wouldn't fit either. Let's be realistic.

[url]https://www.ksl.com/?sid=45290209&nid=304&title=jazz-announce-shorter-preseason-schedule-with-international-flavor[/url]

[url]http://www.sltrib.com/sports/jazz/2017/08/04/in-radio-interview-utah-jazz-president-drops-hints-on-new-nike-jersey-designs-inbox/[/url]

[QUOTE]It was one of the topics the Utah Jazz president discussed on a Wednesday radio interview on 1280 The Zone

[url]http://www.deseretnews.com/article/865686093/Analysis-Jazz-will-have-issues-with-floor-spacing-shooting-and-scoring-next-season.html[/url]

[QUOTE]Utah Jazz will have issues with floor spacing next season[/QUOTE]

Ya think?

[QUOTE]Based purely on the losses Utah suffered this offseason (Hayward and Hill) and the signings made — Ricky Rubio, Thabo Sefolosha and Jonas Jerebko — the Jazz are expected to make slightly over 22 threes per game, which would place them among the three-worst shooting teams in the NBA. This, of course, does not include the incoming production of Donovan Mitchell, who hasn’t recorded any statistics so thus cannot be used in the projections.[/QUOTE]

Jonas is the 5th big. No guarantee Thabo plays either

[QUOTE]With a lineup of Hill, Rodney Hood, Hayward, Derrick Favors and Gobert (the team’s starting lineup last year), the Jazz had a spacing rating of 73.5. That rating, which Nick Sciria created to measure the success of varying lineups in terms of 3-point shooting, will dip to roughly 63.3 with the lineup Snyder is expected to trot out next season, which consists of swapping Hill out for Rubio and replacing Hayward with Hood in the starting lineup. If the projection holds true, the Jazz would go from being one of the league’s most efficient shooting teams to simply mediocre.[/QUOTE]

Ingles likely starts. Hopefully Hood won't but it sounds like he's the man in their opinion. Mediocre would look good right now. I'd say they could be awful

[QUOTE]Finding Hood, who led the Jazz in threes attempted per game last season, and Ingles will be Rubio’s offensive priority.[/QUOTE]

Hood would be better off taking less 3's and getting to the hole. Ingles is a role player!

[QUOTE] If the targets (Hood, Ingles, Mitchell, Joe Johnson and Alec Burks) aren’t hitting the shots consistently, the offense will have to become more complicated, since defenses will be looser on the perimeter, making life more difficult for Gobert inside.[/QUOTE]

Mitchell wasn't a great shooter in college. And Favors inside as well. It's ugly!

[QUOTE]The Jazz wanted to find a couple of players known for their ability to knock down the outside shot, but the options weren’t available.[/QUOTE]

Sure they were. Another was signed today. For some reason the Jazz think it's 1997 again.

[QUOTE]Sefolosha, Jerebko and Rubio are all somewhat versatile and have “Jazz DNA.”[/QUOTE]

The first two might not even play. Jonas probably won't at least to start the year. Rubio has Sloan Jazz DNA anyway

[QUOTE]However, none of them will push the Jazz enough to keep their recent trend of increased shooting going. It will be up to the players that were already on the roster, like Hood and Ingles, to make up for what the Jazz lost this summer.[/QUOTE]

No they will need more from the new guys. The idea that Hood will somehow be more efficient with more shots or that Ingles will suddenly be more than a role player is unrealistic. Ingles is the guy I'm guarding on the perimeter. He will have a tougher time. Hood(and Burks) will be able to score but how efficient will he(they) be?

[QUOTE]Favors at full strength gives the Jazz the best inside scoring in the league with the best passing guard to find those high percentage shots.
Chasing what everyone else is doing will fail the Jazz.[/QUOTE]

The rolls to the basket won't be there without shooters