CORE QUESTION: Is Utah Jazz’s Trio with Keyonte George, Lauri Markkanen & Ace Bailey Set to REIGN?

CORE QUESTION: Is Utah Jazz’s Trio with Keyonte George, Lauri Markkanen & Ace Bailey Set to REIGN?

Is the core of Keonte George, Lowry Markin, and Ace Bailey enough? Maybe. I say no, but maybe. Plus a ton of other Ask LJ questions. Next on Locked on Jazz. You are Locked on Jazz, your daily podcast on the Utah Jazz, part of the Locked On podcast network, your team every day. >> How are you? I am David Lock, radio voice of Utah Jazz Jazz MBA insider, and this is Locked on Jazz. It’s your daily podcast on the Utah Jazz, giving you insight, expertise, geeky numbers, and hopefully making it way better to be a Jazz fan each and every day. Thank you for making Locked on Jazz your first listen. Thank you for making Lockdown the number one sports podcast network on today’s show, Ask LoJ Edition. Isn’t there a better route than Austin Reeves? Do you really believe in Austin Reeves? Isaiah Collier’s improved play. What’s the most misunderstood thing about this team by the fans? That’s interesting. I don’t know if I have a good answer. I’ve been thinking about it since the question came in. our all access people will get their question section as well for all the all access members of the everyday club and uh a bunch of others coming your direction on today’s show which on this Friday edition is brought to you by sorry I did not pre-prepare that my fault this is bad bad bad bad David work right there uh to the everydayers you’re the best thank you very much hope you’re catching Arenac when you come to a Jazz game this year we have it set up. You download the sound event app and you get the broadcast ad free and you get in arena. We got a most moving um got the most most moving email from a blind listener uh in the arena last night that was just really moved me like like shook me during the broadcast. All right, today’s show is brought to you by Statcast. What? NerdCast on Jazz Plus and SG Plus. Oh wait, our first question comes in from Jeremy Brunner. Oh wow. What is the stat cast you were doing on Saturday? Um, maybe it cames in from Scott Rogers who are jazz producers and jazz Scott Rogers is our graphics guy. Jeremy uh Brunner is our head of broadcasting. So, Saturday, Kevin Pelton is flying into town tonight. I’m picking him up. We’re going to dinner. Uh, he’s going to we’re going to hang out all day Saturday. So, neat treat for me to have one of my closest friends coming to town. So, Kevin Pelton is coming into town. He and I along with Michael Smith are going to do the broadcast. Sean Fensky from the Jazz Front Office. The godfather Dean Oliver is going to join us. uh the challenger George Rodman, while he’ll be busy during the game, we’ll do a pre-established segment with him and we’re going to do a broadcast that’s all here’s my vision of what we’re doing Saturday. It’s on SCG Plus and Jazz Plus. We are doing a broadcast where we show you the but we’re going to do it through the lenses of statistics. So, what statistics matter, how you evaluate players, how you look at things a little bit like MLB’s Statcast. So, that’s what we’re doing. Scott Gerard will do the radio and I will be on with Kevin Pelton uh doing that for you on uh Saturday on SEG+ and Jazz Plus. So, please check it out. We greatly appreciate it. All right, let’s get to your questions. They’re truthful ones. If Walker was healthy, how good would the Jazz be this year? This is a really good question and this is one that I think as the front office after this season moves forward is where you really have to start the discussion. We’re kind of getting to that point of the season where I think you can. So, the biggest thing to me is that the Jazz defensively are still terrible. They’re 29th in the NBA defensively. And I would like to believe that if Walker was with this team, we would be a better defensive team than 29th in the NBA. Now, frankly, we had Walker last year and we were 30th, but I just feel like we were heading in the right direction there. And then there were skills that Walker I think was going to develop some this year that I I think would have helped a great deal. The other thing is we just would have never had the lineups without Ysef Nerkitch or Walker Kesler if we had stayed healthy. And the defensive rating in those lineups is the worst in the NBA at a defensive rating of 130. So when you take Walker Kesler and Ysef Nerkage off the floor, we really just don’t have a center on the roster. And our line, our defensive rating is a 130. And that’s why we’re so bad defensively when we’re not very good. Don’t misunderstand. We’re a 118.0 when Ysef Nerkish is on the floor. That’s not particularly great. But the biggest difference if Walker was here, we would not be 28th in the league defensively. I mean, even if we were when Ysef Nerkage was on the floor, if Ysef Nerkage was on the floor all the time, we were 118. I think that’d be 20th in the NBA. And so I have to feel like we’d be better than that with Walker. So that puts us in the middle of the pack. So suddenly we’re in the middle of the pack defensively. We’re pretty good offense. We’ve kind of shown we can score. We’re middle of the pack offensively. We’d probably be close to a 500 team, which wildly different than what anyone thought. So I do think if Walker’s healthy, we’re probably a 500 team and we’re probably knocking on in the playin and trying to sneak into the eighth spot. If we’re just seems to be with Gant’s jump, with Lowry’s step, with just the depth, with the energy that the group has, the the quest to be competitive, that’s where it feels like we would be. Golden State, Memphis, Portland, Phoenix, right in with them if Walker was healthy. Is the core of Keonte, Lowry, and Ace good enough to build around. So really, again, these are very good questions. and the ones the front office. My instinct on this is no only because I actually said no to start the year. But Keonte as W Hardy said last night is really freaking good. And so if Lowry is a top 30 player and Keant is moving into a top 60 player, the real question is just when does Ace Bailey put it all together? And I’ve said this numerous times, but Ace Bailey does not need to be great until November of 2027, but if we’re going to use Jason Tatum as somewhat of a comp, in Jason Tatum’s third year, he finishes 12th in the MVP voting and he becomes an all-star. His rookie year, he averaged 14 points a game on 10 shots. It’s kind of where Ace is heading. Um Jason Tatum went to the free throw line three times a game which Ace is allergic to the free throw line right now. So that’s where there really has to be some growth. Um but really whether or not truthfully whether or not the core of Keonte Lowry and Ace is good enough comes down to Ace’s development. Everything kind of still comes back to Ace’s development. If Ace makes the jump and follows the path of a Jason Tatum, like Jason Tatum now is a top 10 MVP player. I mean, that’s a high bar and you really got something and you’re in it. If he just becomes a nice player, then it’s probably not enough. The the point there is what I’m saying is I still think that Ace has to be the lead guy and if Ace does, then Kee and Lowry might be good enough to build around. The one I talk about a lot here is Tracy McGrady. with Ace and he’s an MVP candidate by by his fourth year. He was a slower developing he he really didn’t play much his first two years. He was 18 when he came in the league. Really young straight out of high school. Didn’t have the college year, but he finished six in MVP voting in his first year in Orlando. So that year three that we’re seeing out of Keonte has to happen for Ace. And when it does, then maybe Keonte, Lowry, and Ace are good enough to build around if Ace makes that jump. Because then you have Lowry top 30 and Keonte’s probably top 40 by that point. And yeah, maybe it is. Which gets really interesting on this whole how you build, what you do with your cap space, how you do all this, and then you add Walker in as a defensive player and some versatility. Things are going really well for the Jazz right now. Like honestly, our biggest concern is that we’re winning too many games, but everything else is going very well for the Jazz. Will Hardy is developing players. Keonte is really freaking good. That is going to be our new line. Uh Lowry is has just been a beast and showed more development. And Ace, Ronnie Price was on the broadcast with us last night. He’s just like, “Oh, Ace is awesome.” There be a generation of kids run around that love a player like they love Ace Bailey like they’ve never loved anything in their life. So, is the core of Keonte, Lowry, an Ace good enough to build around? Maybe. Is my instinct that you need another piece in there? Yeah, but like we did the Austin Reeves game la yesterday, which is what would be one of my pieces and that’s the that’s the free agent. What’s interesting about Austin Reeves is the the money gets tight really fast if you max him out because you’re paying Kee here shortly and he K keeps doing what he’s doing right now. He’s going to get paid. You’re paying Ace shortly thereafter. It gets tight fast. You can deal with it, but it gets tight fast. But I do think my instinct is we still need another significant piece with Kee Lowry. But we got to keep watching Keonte and figure out where this is going, right? I don’t necessarily know where the Keonte ride is taking us. If we go look at the NBA top 100 player list and we look at that the kind of tumultuous guard list of Trey Young at 26, Darius Garland at 27, John Moran at 28. Well, he’s better than all of them this year. Dear Fox at 33, Jamal Murray at 34. They’re probably better than him. That tumultuous guard list is going to drop. So now we start getting into the 40s and 50s and you’re into Tyler Herro. Like yeah, Keonte George might be Tyler Herro who ranked 50th on the locked on top list. Austin Reeves was 58. Kee might be Austin Reeves. Austin Reeves is really good in the pick and roll as we talked about yesterday. He’s probably undergarded on this. A Denny Advida was at 62 is probably way better after the year he’s having right now. He’s you’re suddenly Yeah. Keonte might be moving into the 60s and Lowry was misg graded in all of this after a not very good last year which was which was right. He did not have a very good last year. But Lowry is now into this group of Chad Holgren, Jimmy Butler, this whole group. It’s very interesting. the top 20 to 30 players kind of there’s a massive slippage in this in this group of players. Kawhi Leonard not having a very good year. Paula Bonero, not James Harden, not Jiren Jackson, not Trey Young, not Daryus Garland, not John Morant, not Jimmy Butler, not like there’s a trans there’s a transition taking place here. Good questions. The Locked on Jazz Everydayers get the next set of questions and they’ve got some good ones. They’re the dieards. They’re the everydayers. It’s next on Locked on Jazz. Oh, I don’t want to do that. I hit the wrong button. I almost ended the whole show accidentally. Woo! Someone’s sleepy. Today’s edition of Locked on Jazz is brought to you by Murdoch Hyundai located in Wood in Logan and in Lynen and of course at 4646 South State Street. It is our good friends, the Murdochs and their amazing customer service for over 90 years in Utah making sure that you have a no regrets experience. and then giving you even a little extra along the way. The Hyundai cars are amazing. As you know, I am a often purchaser of Hyundai cars at this point. I’m driving the Santa Fe hybrid right now. It is such a great car. Super space. Skis fit great. Third row of seats when needed. Beautiful power coming up and down the mountains. Uh I haven’t had to drive it in snow yet, but will be able to and it will be terrific. Uh hope I get to drive it in snow here pretty soon, frankly. Uh, all of those things at Murdoch Hyundai. If you’re going to stop by in Lynon or in Logan or in Salt Lake at 4646 Southstate Street, let’s get you the VIP experience. Email me first at dlock09. That’s dlock09gmail.com. We like to get you available uh to have the VIP experience over at murdochy. Today’s show is also brought to you by Door Dash. 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Door Dash in your bag all season long. Thanks so much for making Locked On Jazz your first listen of the day. We are free and available on all podcasting apps and thank you for making Lockdown the number one sports podcast network. Special hello just moments ago to Trevor Tulson who joined the Everydayer Club. Glad to have you aboard Trevor. Also to Christopher Hull Holfelts who joined yesterday. Glad to have you aboard. and Nick Archeletta. Fabulous to have you aboard the Everydayer Club. We’ve got two different clubs for the Everydayer Club. You can get for Everydayer Club, you get adree Lockdown Sports Today, access to our dis exclusive Discord group, which is going to grow and be super fun. That’s $5 a month, $50 a year. You get ad free and lockdown sports today. The all access club. You get, are you ready? Here we go. You get a daily newsletter. You get 15% off and access to the merch store. You get one-on-one texting, interacting with me in the all access group, which gives you yesterday you got the Lakers defensive offensive profile. You got the Jazz clutch numbers. You got a bunch of the whole break overall game day sheet from me. Uh, plus all sorts of interaction. You get exclusive segment here on the show in just a second. You get Leaf to Lean’s weekend breakdown of all the draft prospects. You get his extra draft prospects. That’s all at $15 a month or $150 a year. You get two months free. You do it. Go to sup lockedonjazz.supcast.com. That’s locked onjazz.supcast.com. Locked onjazz.supcast.com to join the everyday club. All right, let’s go to our everyday questions. This comes in from Matt Larson. How are the Jazz going to make sure they keep their pick? Matt, that question is somewhat intuitively obvious. All right, last night was a good night. We are at eighth. Charlotte has won five of 10, two in a row. They have their full roster back. They actually look good last night. They had LaMelo Ball, Brandon Miller, Khan Cadipa, who’s really good, Miles Bridges, and then they started Ryan Kulker as they planned all year and they’ve won. So, they’re at nine wins. We got a chance to for them to pass us. Milwaukey’s at 11. They need to keep winning. Dallas is at 11. They’ve won six of 10. When Anthony Davis plays, they’re pretty good. Remember, we beat them without Anthony Davis. Portland won last night. They’ve won 11 games. Chicago’s won last night. They have won only eight. They’re a little nerve-wracking. They’ve won 11 games. So, the teams that could catch us and cause us problems are Milwaukee, Dallas, Portland, Chicago. I don’t think Golden State’s in bad place, but I don’t think they’re about to end up pulling the plug. Charlotte has nine. So, we’re at 10. Charlotte’s at nine. I think we could swap places with them. Brooklyn’s at seven. I don’t know that we can swap places with Brooklyn. Brooklyn has won four of 10. I just don’t think so. Indiana’s lost three in a row. They’re at six. I don’t think we can swap places with them. Sacramento’s lost four in a row. They’ve only won six games all year. I don’t know that we can swap places with them. The next ones that are really interesting are the Clippers have lost five in a row. They are a complete unmitigated dumpster fire, but they don’t have their pick. So, there’s a chance we could swap places with them. At some point, they might start winning games. I kind of doubt it. I don’t know. I don’t know what to do there. Uh New Orleans has won three in a row. They’ve now won six games and there’s a minor chance we could switch places with them because they don’t own their pick either. So, honestly, our best case scenario is that Charlotte jumps us and the Clippers in New Orleans jump us and we can get to five. But, I don’t think we can do better than that. So, I think we’re going to go on a draft lottery day at five at six or seven and it’s going to be nerve-wracking as hell. I just there’s just not the league has just taken a twist we didn’t expect and we’re way better than we thought with all the injuries and odds. What are the odds the NBA shorts this season? Sh uh Shane Brown is the question. The question was actually a little longer. Um here’s what he really said. I totally agree with you about style of playing, increased movement, and amount of possessions being the main cause for the uptick in injuries. What are the odds that the NBA actually lowers the amount of games in the season? And what do you think the timeline would be? Also, what do you think the appropriate number of games is? So, let me address this in a few different ways. So, one, I I’m very concerned about this, and I actually have talked to some other broadcasters about this. Chuck Cooperstein and I had dinner about this the other night. I think we’re breaking our players. I think this way we play, the game we play, Ronnie Price was on last night talking about how fast it is. I I think we’re breaking our players. I I’m not I think the game has become too physically demanding for the bodies of NBA players. We’re playing too many possessions, too much space, too many closeouts, and too fast. That’s too many cuts. And if you watch the 80s or 90s and actually watch it, you’ll understand. Okay, we’re not going to shorten the season. Uh I just don’t can’t imagine that. So the next question is, are we going to lengthen the season so that there’s less games every week? We can really only lengthen by starting earlier, which dives right into football, which is not good. I do have a little bit of a theory that sports are so hard to follow right now for fans that you actually more fans are becoming one sport fans. Like when I grew up, I was a basketball, football, baseball fan, and I watched all of them and then when baseball season was over, you just switched. But with the way movements and player movement and information is, you kind of follow your team 12 months a year. Thank god cuz that’s what lockdown is. Um so I do wonder whether there’s maybe a different fandom that you can do this with. Um but I think the answer might be that we start the season October one. Players won’t like that because it’s their summer and all sorts of things. Um but I think that the cost of starting deeper into the NBA into the NFL season and having some less good ratings early is worth having players healthier. And so I think the answer is we start two weeks earlier. Camp’s already really short. Maybe you mitigate players coming into the le early in the year. And but we have a problem in the league. Um and the calf strain whether Tom Habster’s article is right. That’s all related to the step back. Whatever is going on, I’m concerned we’re breaking our players. It’s not because they’re soft. It’s not because of load management. It’s literally the opposite. Um, and so, and I don’t think I’m not entirely sure load management answers a ton of it. I think spreading it out so that they have some more days off and a few less backto-backs. The study needs to be done as like, well, we’re about to play some crazy stretches here. Do players get hurt in these stretches? And then I think, you know, like from our standpoint, we probably should sit players because there’s no value in putting Lowry, Keonte, or our key pieces in injury risk. Like when we go to San we’re going to play Denver Memphis back to back then Detroit San Antonio back to back with two backtoback 3 AM’s like I’m sitting guys in one of those um just because the burden and that’s not great like we shouldn’t be wanting to sit guys because of the burden that’s load management but the other thing we have is just everyone’s getting hurt like we just haven’t when was the last time we played a game now so much because of who we are and everyone rests against us but when was the last time we played a game where someone was the team We saw a full team like the Knicks and they beat us by 100. Um, but like we saw Dallas without Anthony Davis. We saw LA without Austin Reeves. We saw like we just go down the list, right? Uh, we saw Brooklyn without Michael Porter Jr. We saw Houston, they didn’t play one of their guys in one of their two games. So, I you know, I think that it’s it’s pretty clear that like yeah, I think we’re breaking our players and I’m concerned about it. I think it’s a massive issue uh for the league. Uh from Hank Nelson, is there any reason Ace is not attacking the rim? It’s a great question. Um Ace is rim percentage is not good and then Ace’s free throw percentage is worse. Um so, a few things. If you watched last night’s game, I thought it was a good indicator. Ace really doesn’t read the game very well yet when he drives to the basket. There’s multiple guys coming. I think he’s late to see him. Um, he doesn’t quite have it figured out who’s coming from where and and then he has always been able to fly over the top of people and be able to finish and now he can’t. And so he’s not used to having to draw fouls. I think this is skill development. I’m figure I assume he’ll figure it out. he’ll need to or else he’ll be a wildly inefficient player. Um, but he has and he needs to improve his handle a little bit, which is probably the easiest skill there is to develop. Uh, but yeah, he just doesn’t read the game very well right now, particularly if he’s coming from the top. From the sides, he seems to read it a little bit better when guys are coming to get him. So, good question, Hank. All right. Would it be what is the most misunderstood thing about this team for the fan base? And would it be better to sign two players with our 40 million rather than one player with our 40 million? Interesting questions as we continue on Locked on Jazz. Friday edition of Locked on Jazz is brought to you by Rocket Money. Cancel your unwanted subscriptions today and go to rocketmoney.com/lockedon. Ever feel like money just disappears every month? It happens fast. A few subscriptions here and impulse buy there. Suddenly the numbers in the bank account don’t match the numbers in your head. Rocket Money helps you with clarity. Track every dollar. 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Thanks so much for making locked on jazz your first listen Saturday stackcast. Make sure you grab that. All right. By the way, for all you who are flipping the stream on SEG Plus and Jazzbuster radio, greatly appreciate it. Uh hope you’re enjoying that. Let’s continue. The questions are great. I love I love our Friday shows. We used to do this like every few weeks and then the questions got so good about a year ago we do it every Friday. Who is the most misund What is the most misunderstood thing about this team? That’s really interesting. Like, so the first thing I have to understand is what the fan base thinks. So, here’s the only thing I would say that I think has not been talked about enough and it’s because everyone’s being polite. John Collins, Colin Ston, and Jordan Clarkson were all good dudes. There’s nothing wrong with them. But their departure opened up the oxygen to allow Keonte George to become Kee George. Is opening up the door for Isaiah Collier right now to be Isaiah Collier. open up the door a little bit for Lowry Markin, but he’s just not a natural leader. So, it it’s it’s not as big a deal for him. But that’s and in turn, what you’re getting right now is a team that is very serious about getting better and trying to win and trying to play right. And not that John, Jordan, and Colin weren’t serious, but they just had been around long enough that they kind of understood what was really going on. And so, they whether they meant to be or not, they probably weren’t as serious. and they didn’t have this like 24, 36, 48month point of view. Um, so these guys are hungry to get better all the time. They’re not established. They haven’t been paid. They haven’t got there. And it’s creating an energy amongst the team that couldn’t have happened if they didn’t trade Colin Sexton, John Collins, and and Jordan Clarkson. And so while Austin A got kind of ridiculed in the offseason for trading Colin Saxon have to give up a draft pick and trading John Collins and not getting much other than frankly Kyle Anderson and Kevin Love have been pretty good. I mean Kevin Love’s been important in the locker room as well and giving in trading Jordan cutting Jordan Clarkson for nothing. Clearly the market didn’t yield anything on any of those guys but then instead of holding on to them or waiting or something just moving them to clear oxygen I think was super important. Wouldn’t it be better to sign two players for 40 million than one so that player like Austin Reeves so you can get to 240 minutes? This is a great debate. This might even make part of Stackcast. Um, this is a great debate. So, it kind of goes back to the question, do you believe Lowry, Keiante, and Ace are good enough? If you believe that Lowry, Keonte, and Ace are a good enough core for the future, then yes. then you should be trying to sign two players to 20 million each to get us to 240 minutes would be good a lot faster. If you believe we still need kind of another stud in there, then you got to go spend the money. But then you’re right, you’re going to have to fill out your 240 then with younger players. Ronnie Price and I were talking about this last night on the air. Old teams might be bad now. The game is so fast, there’s so many possessions that there’s a chance that old teams are bad. Oklahoma City won with a really young team. San Antonio is competing with a pretty young team. Houston, Phoenix was old last year looked awful. Clippers this year are the same version, old and awful. Old might equal awful now. So, it might be all right to go sign somebody. My point on that is it might be all right to have a very young bench. Is there any chance Austin Rivers Austin Reeves would leave LA or you just throwing it out there? Um, so the here’s the scenario where he would leave. There’s two ways it happens. One is he wants his own team. He doesn’t want to be he wants to be 1A and 1B with with Keante uh or he wants to be one AA. Thinks Ke is two. And he doesn’t want to be two guaranteed two to Luca. That’s one. Two, there’s a funny psychological game that goes on. So the Lakers can offer him a five-year contract for the Max and the Jazz would offer him a four-year contract for far less money. But if the Lakers don’t offer him all of that, then they’re somehow being cheap with him and not giving him respect. And if the Jazz are offering all of it, then the Jazz are being more respectful even though it’s less money. It’s a very weird psychological thing that happens with players in negotiations, but it’s true. Um, so that would be the scenario. I hear he loves I heard yesterday he loves golf. He’s got a good relationship with Luca. LA Excellence believes he would never possibly ever leave, so it’s probably unlikely. He supposedly golfs every day. Wouldn’t be able to do that here. So maybe there’s something to that that Sorry. What do the Clippers do? I don’t know. I think it’s a fascinating story. Same thing with Phoenix. Like what does Phoenix do last year? They’re the exact same team. It’s a disaster. And they’re getting worse by the day. And they don’t have their pick and they not sure they have tradable assets. I don’t think anybody wants Harden, Kawhi, Leonard, Bradley Beal. Maybe somebody wants Zubac. And like at some point they just have to unload this thing and restart it and they don’t have their pick this year. But they’re so desperate. I don’t think they even have room to make a run and they’re just not good. Like their starting lineup last night’s bad. James Harden was out last night and I love Chris Dunn as a human, but Chris Dunn is not a starting point guard in the NBA. Chris Dunn is still kind of semi like borderline like rotation player in the NBA and he started for them. And Bob Don Bogdanovich was their other starter last night and they got smoked by Oklahoma City like the rest of us. But yeah, they’re I mean they’re playing three rookies now off the bench. I mean it’s holy smokes and they’re super old and slow and I I have they just missed. Lawrence Frank’s one of the best GMs in the league and just missed. Isaiah Collier going to jump to your top of your young seven after 30? So probably not top is still in that young seven, but Isaiah Collier the last two games has been marvelous. I love watching this. I love this job for the um for the stories of the humans. This Isaiah Collier concept that I really thought he was on the brink of like getting lost and we weren’t seeing him for a month and now he has been this impactful and Will Hardy said last night I thought last night was the best game he’s ever seen him play. What impresses you the most about this group? I think there’s that comment from Will Hardy last night that they’re serious about it and that they’re hungry to get better. It’s fun to watch. Orlando, Saturday, I’ll be on Statcast. Scott Gerard will be on the broadcast. Join us on Jazz Plus, on SCG Plus for Statcast. Join Scotty with uh Ron Boon. Have a great day. Thank you very much for tuning in. We in a great week. You guys are the best. Please join our everydayer club. You can join get locked on sports today exclusive for audio. It’s the only way you get it anymore is on the everydayer club. That’s our daily like NPR up first daily show, national show. You get the discord group. 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Utah Jazz’s dynamic young trio—Keyonte George, Lauri Markkanen, and Ace Bailey—ignite debate: Is this core enough for a serious playoff push, or does the roster still need another star? David Locke examines the evolving roles and skyrocketing potential of George and Markkanen, while raising crucial questions about Bailey’s development timeline and the team’s defensive woes in Walker Kessler’s absence. Can Jazz fans expect this lineup to break into the NBA’s elite, or will front office strategy shift as salary cap pressures mount?

Key topics include the impact of recent roster changes, breakout player performances, and the heated discussion surrounding potential moves for talent such as Austin Reaves. David Locke highlights statistical trends, injury concerns, and the underrated energy fueling the young squad. With the future of the Utah Jazz hanging in the balance, fans are left wondering—will another piece complete the puzzle, or are a new era’s building blocks already in place?

0:00 – Utah Jazz Core: Keyonte, Lauri, Ace
10:15 – Team Progress & Draft Position
26:03 – Fan Questions, Team Misunderstandings

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