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Who would you rather keep, Lauri Markkanen or John Collins? (Please read scenario)

If the Jazz choose to keep only one of John Collins or Lauri Markkanen, who should they keep?

  • John Collins

    Votes: 6 16.7%

  • Lauri Markkanen

    Votes: 30 83.3%
  • Total voters
    36
SoberasHotRod

SoberasHotRod

Well-Known Member
2025 Award Winner
It feels like Lauri stock is at an all time low and Collins stock is at an all time high on Jazzfanz. It made me think of this poll question.

The scenario: The Jazz decide that they would like to have one, but only one of Collins or Markkanen next year. They want a play finisher that can help the young guys develop, but not too much talent in order to tank again next year. Assume Collins opts in to his one year $26.6 million dollar contract. (Lauri is making about $50 million per year for 3 more years). Assume that you are getting expiring contracts and draft compensation (whatever you think is fair value) for both of them in a trade.
 
The only situation where I think keeping Lauri is valid is if we land Flagg, and if we land Flagg, I'd probably prefer to trade Lauri anyways.
 
The Lauri hate is ridiculous. We WANTED him to have an off season. We WANTED him not to carry the team.

Can you guys not imagine a scenario where we put him in bad spots intentionally? Can you not see that the play around him was piss poor for the first half of the season where he played most of his minutes?
 
Folks would overreact to that but it is a fair question. Things to consider:

1. In the most recent, 2024/25 season their production has been roughly similar: same PPG, Collins shot and rebounded better, Markkanen had more "gravity" and opened up more opportunities for other players.

2. For his entire career Markkanen has been a player who gets injured a lot: he usually plays <60 games per season. It is certainly a concern.

3. Collins has been getting progressively better last several years, Markkanen has been playing worse and worse for the last two years. These are very different trajectories and we can find excuses for Lauri but there is a non-zero chance that he never returns to his 2022/23 form. (10%? 20%? 30%? ... who knows...)

4. Lauri is probably the third option on a contender. When you play the third option the max it severely limits your roster building: you must find your first or second option in the draft and start competing nwhile this player is still on the rookie contract.

5. However, Lauri is way more flexible in where he can play: he could do SF, PF and some center against certain matchups, while Collins is rarely effective playing outside of the PF position.

People will probably vote based on how certain they are that Lauri could return to his All Star form in the future and maintain it. I honestly do not know.
 
The Jazz Wonderbra said:
The Lauri hate is ridiculous. We WANTED him to have an off season. We WANTED him not to carry the team.

Can you guys not imagine a scenario where we put him in bad spots intentionally? Can you not see that the play around him was piss poor for the first half of the season where he played most of his minutes?
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You can say the same about Lauri in the last months of the 2022/23: the Jazz were tanking and put him out paired with horrible players. However, Lauri posted 29/9 in March and was scoring 38 and 40 points playing alongside Kessler-Olynyk-Agbaji-THT. He was clearly unable to do it this season despite the fact that Kessler has improved a lot and Collins & Sexton are much, much better players.
 
SoberasHotRod said:
Assume Collins opts in to his one year $26.6 million dollar contract. (Lauri is making about $50 million per year for 3 more years). Assume that you are getting expiring contracts and draft compensation (whatever you think is fair value) for both of them in a trade.
Click to expand...
IF the Jazz manage to extend Collins for 18-20 million for 3 more years they probably should trade Markkanen: yes, John as the 3rd option is less impactful than Lauri but they can save 28-32 million per year for another impactful player and get some nice package for Lauri. Markkanen is a depreciating asset and if he has another year like that he will quickly become another untradable Atlanta John Collins.
 
I don’t consider it Lauri hate to want him gone. If I didn’t think he was good, I wouldn’t mind him staying. Fact is, great players and tanking do not mix. It’s not in anyone’s best interest to continue that partnership. The way I see it, we either torch the prime of his career or he torches our rebuild.

If we get extremely lucky we can maybe have the best of both worlds. Flagg would make it work, but every plan with Flagg works. I don’t really want to test our luck with another tank+Lauri season. Moving forward and going for a Bridges+George type swoop would end in disaster methinks. So a reasonable path forward would be to trade him.
 
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KqWIN said:
I don’t consider it Lauri hate to want him gone. If I didn’t think he was good, I wouldn’t mind him staying. Fact is, great players and tanking do not mix. It’s not in anyone’s best interest to continue that partnership. The way I see it, we either torch the prime of his career or he torches our rebuild.

If we get extremely lucky we can maybe have the best of both worlds. Flagg would make it work, but every plan with Flagg works. I don’t really want to test our luck with another tank+Lauri season. Moving forward and going for a Bridges+George type swoop would end in disaster methinks. So a reasonable path forward would be to trade him.
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Good post

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