The Utah Jazz have a problem

The Utah Jazz have a problem

The Utah Jazz have an identity problem. Let’s talk about it. It’s the Hoopser Show. [Music] All right, guys. Before we get into it, make sure you like the video, subscribe to the channel. The channel’s growing. Be a part of it. I would also appreciate it very much. All right. So, I wrote about this on SLC Dunk. You can go read that article. And the name of the article is what Socrates could teach the jazz right now. And basically the gist of that article comes down to one of my favorite quotes attributed to Socrates, probably writed to, and it is know thyself. Basically the idea is that you need to know who you are before you can go ahead in life. And Socrates at that time also talked about knowing thyself being the entryway to wisdom. How can you learn anything if you don’t know who you are, what your purpose is, what your goals in life should be. If you don’t know who you are, you cannot become something else or become better. And right now, I feel like the Utah Jazz do not know who they are. They don’t know who they are. You could argue with this starting lineup a lot of different things, like that it’s worked and that it’s the right one. They’re one and one after the season started. Although, you could argue that the Clippers are just a lazy old team and that they couldn’t beat the Sacramento Kings with this starting lineup. You could argue that the every single player on this starting lineup is fine, but the one that I think is just not very arguable is SI Mik. Why is SI starting over Ace Bailey? Why did the Utah Jazz, who had the worst record in the league last year? And yes, they manipulated lineups to get there, but still, had they not manipulated manipulated lineups, they would still have been a bottom five to seven team. No question. And yet they’re not playing Ace Bailey, who they were lucky to get after losing the lottery. They still ended up with Ace Bailey. Thank you, Omar Cooper. And he’s not playing in the starting lineup. Si Mcky is. What is the point of that? Yes, the Jazz go into the season. Austin says the goal is to win games. Well, they’ve won one and lost one. And Sim Mcky is getting those minutes that Ace Bailey should get. We know that Ace Bailey is on a minute restriction. Before you type in the comment and let me know. I know he’s on a minute restriction, but there’s some weird things about that as well. If uh the Jazz have been telling fans that Ace Bailey was on a minute restriction because of sickness. The only thing, and you can go read the article in SLC Dunk, is that Ace Bailey said it wasn’t because of sickness. Well, what was it for? Well, we did learn after preseason that Ace Bailey got shut down because of some knee tendinitis. Why are the Jazz not telling us the truth? Why are they saying he’s on a minute restriction because of sickness when it’s likely because of knee tendinitis? It’s just strange, right? Has anyone heard of a minute restriction because someone got a cold? I haven’t, right? And you know, maybe it was a terrible flu, but according to Ace Bailey, it wasn’t that bad. He was a little under the weather, but the way the Jazz have framed it, he was on, you know, fluids in the hospital and that’s not what it was. It’s likely because of knee tendonitis. Can we just be honest with the fans? Can we just tell the the fans what’s going on? Do you not think that Ace Bailey is better than SV Mick right now and you can’t win games with with Bailey getting minutes over Kylic? If that’s how you feel, then tell us. But obviously you don’t think that’s going to go over well with fans or with anyone. That’s why you’re telling us it’s sickness or whatever. Minute restriction, all this stuff. It doesn’t make a lot of sense. It’s it’s it’s a little fishy to me. Right. Outside of that, you know, if if you just tell the fans what’s going on, like, is it the worst thing in the world to tell fans that it’s tendonitis? Why wouldn’t you just say that? That makes no sense to me right now. If the Jazz are playing these players for some sort of showcase, maybe they’re just trying to showcase Mcky. Maybe they’re trying to showcase this team. Well, that might be the case. But, you know, I think there’s a lot of people out there that just know who Sie Mcky is and are clear on that. What is happening now is that Ace Bailey is now stuck on the bench, is not earning his way into the starting lineup, and because of whatever reason he’s struggling, whether it’s, you know, altitude, sickness, tendonitis, whatever, it’s not working out so far when it did in preeason. And that brings another question. The way this Jazz team is made up is and the way they’re playing lineups is as if they are the Oklahoma City Thunder or a team playing for a championship. And that is not who the Jazz are. I don’t even think the most, you know, stareyed Jazz fan thinks that this team as currently constructed is going to win a championship, but yet we’re making lineup decisions as if we are. Would it not be better if Ace Bailey was on the floor with the players that he’s likely going to be playing with in the future? Players like Taylor Hendris, Kyle Filipowski, uh Keonte George, Bryce, whoever, but in a starting role so he can get those reps. It is much more difficult to get good reps when you’re playing off the bench with players that are not as as good as you’d like them to be. Right off the bench, Ace Bailey is playing with someone like Bryce Sensibot who is playing great and doing well in his role, but he’s shooting the ball when he gets it. There is not a play being run to give Ace Bailey the ball. And so, he’s not getting development, very, you know, very good development with this bench team and with the starting unit. He’s not getting it because they’re not running plays for him as well. They’re playing this team like you are playing Walker Kesler at the top of the three-point line running dribble handoffs and then having cutters go to the basket, which is fine. It’s working, but their positions are pretty redundant. When Ace Baileyy’s on the floor with Lowry Markin, we’ve seen it’s not worked very well. The same thing goes for Taylor Hendricks, which is another story. He’s coming off the bench as well. There’s redundancy with this lineup, which tells me that this Utah Jazz team does not know who it is. They are collecting talent as if they’re the Oklahoma City Thunder, but the way this team is already panning out is more like the Sacramento Kings. They are building around players so far with this starting lineup that are not going to take them very far at all. And so the Jazz have to ask themselves, who are we? What are we? What they’re not is a championship contender. What they are is a team that now has some really nice young talent that needs time to play together. And they’ve already made some decisions to help that happen. Trading Jordan Clarkson, trading uh John Collins, trading Colin Ston, and it has already been we’ve already seen benefits of that. Keonte George is playing better. He’s he’s doing much better in this role without having to share the floor with Colin Ston who’s trying to get up every shot he can, right? Same goes with Jordan Clarkson. But they are still halfway in, halfway out. The Jazz have to make some decisions. Do you believe in Ace Bailey or not? Because right now you certainly aren’t acting like you do. And is this uh just another effort to build around Lowry Markin? Well, we’ve already seen what that leads to, and that’s the ninth or tenth pick in the draft. And in this upcoming draft that has three number one caliber guys at the top, are we really going to risk giving a top 10 pick to the Oklahoma City Thunder who already have a wealth of riches for vibes for Lowry Markin? Is that really what we’re doing? Utah has to understand who they are and act accordingly. And I don’t believe in just telling teams to do better or do this. What I’m telling you right now is make the trades that set up Ace Bailey to get developed now. Okay? Because setting things up for players that likely won’t be on this Jazz team when they’re contending for a championship does not matter. The development of SV Muck is not important. It’s not. He should not be playing. Ace, you can argue that Philippowski deserves it. Fine. But Ace Bailey during preseason showed what he could be. And Utah has already gone away from it. They’ve already gone away from it. And they’re in nowhere. They’re in like just no man’s land right now. They aren’t really a contender. They’re not really going to the bottom. They’re literally at 500 in the middle. And they need to develop their star prospect Ace Bailey right now. So what the Jazz need to do right now, stop starting SE Mik and play Ace Bailey. I don’t care if he plays 12 minutes. If he plays 6 minutes a half, but it’s with the starting unit, that’s better than what’s going on right now. And make the trades to get rid of the redundancy. If you are playing Lowry Markin at the three and it’s costing the development of Ace Bailey, then you need to trade Lowry Markin. If you cannot figure out as a team how to get them on the floor together and make it work, then that is the front office’s job and signal to get it done. You need to do that now because we cannot wait like we did before and we got the ninth and tth pick. By the way, how’s that Cody Williams pick looking? certainly looks like a waste to me when we could have been higher in the draft and got someone like Stfan Castle who’s now on the undefeated Spurs playing incredible by the way won rookie of the year and Utah could have had him had they made a decision before. So make the decision now before it’s too late. Is that too much to ask? Make the trade. Do the trade. Do it now. Know thyself, Jazz. It’s time to figure it

The Utah Jazz have not been playing Ace Bailey and it’s a symptom of some bigger problems they may be having. When will they figure these things out?

Subscribe to the Hoops Nerd channel for Utah Jazz News, Utah Jazz Post Game Shows, Utah Jazz Rumors, Utah Jazz Film Break Downs, and more!

My T-Shirt shop: https://www.teepublic.com/user/hansenjames

#utahjazz #basketball #nba