Culture of winning or tank?

[Saint Cy of JFC]

Ok, let's look at this the other way then. In the past 30 years, the average spot where the NBA MVP was picked has been 9. Last decade, it's trended lower and it's 17. Of course, Jokić repeating skews that, but a number one pick hasn't won the MVP in more than a decade. Nor has anyone picked 2nd.

You wanna expand this a bit? Let's take top 5 MVP vote getters in the past 5 years. The average is 14. Of course, there are a lot of players repeating. It's only been 13 unique players getting top 5 votes the past 5 years. The average is 12 if you just take each of the 11 players once.

Of those 13 players, only 6 were drafted with the team's own pick of the team they were on when they got the votes. The other 7 were either obtained in trades or drafted with a pick obtained in trades. In other words, those picks had nothing to do with the records of those teams the year before. You know the average of the players drafted with their team's own picks and still on the team when they were getting these MVP votes? Twenty! Brunson and Jokić were both second round picks, Giannis went 15th, Booker went 13th, and Curry was 7th. The only one picked in top 5 of those six was Embiid at #3.

I mean, I'd love to tell you that teams get MVP level players by tanking and finishing bottom 5 in the league, but it doesn't look like it.

The Jazz enough picks to the point that a quality team should be able to grab an all star talent. No need to bottom out

 

[fishonjazz]

The Jazz enough picks to the point that a quality team should be able to grab an all star talent. No need to bottom out

Agreed. Again, I wish we wouldn't have made the deadline trades and just had the pick convey right now and got to battle in the play in tournament/first round.
Jimles post just re-enforces that feeling

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[JimLes]

The Jazz enough picks to the point that a quality team should be able to grab an all star talent. No need to bottom out

This. The numbers seem to suggest that while a higher pick does improve your chances of finding your stud, being able to identify talent is the more important factor.

If you've got 5-6 lottery picks and you can't find your All-NBA franchise cornerstone with those, what difference will another 5-6 picks make?*

* see Sacramento, Detroit, Washington, etc.

 

[sahlensguy]

Agreed. Again, I wish we wouldn't have made the deadline trades and just had the pick convey right now and got to battle in the play in tournament/first round.

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Not only would it have been fun for the fans, but would have given Markkanen a taste of what the post season feels like. The trades took that opportunity from him and some of his good role playing teammates to add insult to injury.

 

[sip]

Agreed. Again, I wish we wouldn't have made the deadline trades and just had the pick convey right now and got to battle in the play in tournament/first round.
Jimles post just re-enforces that feeling

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Nah. We need to bottom out if we actually want to build a legit contender. I'm tired of this middle of the pack crap.

 

[sip]

Not only would it have been fun for the fans, but would have given Markkanen a taste of what the post season feels like. The trades took that opportunity from him and some of his good role playing teammates to add insult to injury.

We weren't making the playoffs regardless so keeping our pick was best case scenario. We went on a little run when Sexton went nuclear for a month and we had a softer schedule but that wasn't going to last.

 

[fishonjazz]

Nah. We need to bottom out if we actually want to build a legit contender. I'm tired of this middle of the pack crap.

The data says otherwise though. Check the post by jimles. According to what actually happens (not what makes sense on paper) being middle of the road is actually the best way to draft an MVP level championship player.

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[fishonjazz]

We weren't making the playoffs regardless so keeping our pick was best case scenario. We went on a little run when Sexton went nuclear for a month and we had a softer schedule but that wasn't going to last.

Agree to disagree. I think we had a decent chance. We were ballin. Ya sexton was killing it but that's just kind of who sexton is. During that nice run I thought that Lauri was actually not playing at his best.

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[Handlogten's Heros]

I love when folks are like… tanking doesn’t work… you can get all stars at other points in the draft…

What if… what if you did both??? That’s what OKC did (yes yes I know SGA blah blah blah). We can trade Lauri or whoever for young players and picks too… maybe not on SGAs level but still.

You have to acquire top level talent. Go ahead and dip your poles in as many stocked ponds as you can.

The whole trade for a star discussion is also dumb. We’ve had opportunities to get “stars” at decent prices and balked because they likely wouldn’t re-sign because they are only under contract for a year (Jrue and Pascal and OG)… guess what… 80% of the stars that become available will be in the same situation. I get that we should be patient and we aren’t there yet but nothing about the last 12 months tells me we are more ready now to call someone’s bluff.

I don’t buy that we are big game hunting yet… I don’t know that we trade Lauri or whatever but I think we do more sit and wait unless a perfect opportunity comes along… and I wouldn’t eff around much anymore personally. Yall can drink the kool aid if ya want.

 

[Handlogten's Heros]

The data says otherwise though. Check the post by jimles. According to what actually happens (not what makes sense on paper) being middle of the road is actually the best way to draft an MVP level championship player.

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It’s not. There are many ways to have success and more ways to fail. Waiting to land the next Giannis at 15 or Jokic in the second is less reliable than tanking and there are no rules that say you can’t do both.

 

[fishonjazz]

It’s not. There are many ways to have success and more ways to fail. Waiting to land the next Giannis at 15 or Jokic in the second is less reliable than tanking and there are no rules that say you can’t do both.

The data provided gave an average draft position for MVP championship players. The data is the data.

Look I know that a better pick is better than a worse pick because if you have the first pick then you can still take Gianni's or kawhi or whoever. But the data is the data and I like winning way more than losing. If the data says that winning more and getting a player like giannis is just as likely as losing more and getting a player like Giannis then I would rather win more.

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[Ferguson_Mellochill]

A coach can create a culture and environment where players are unselfish, play hard, share the ball, make good decisions, etc. regardless of the level of talent the team has. So, in other words, the Jazz can do both--instill good habits and still lose games due to lack of talent.