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Following Potential 2026 Draftees

KqWIN said:
It's frustrating that our concern is about keeping the pick at all. Realistically, we should be maximizing our chances at top 4 just like last season. Like the objective isn't to avoid disaster scenario, it's to put our team in the best position to win going forward. I've accepted the fact that patience has run out and we're moving forward with Lauri, but with or without Lauri we should be looking to maximize our best asset which is our own pick.

Not everything can be perfect tank wise, but letting pride and the winning culture of 28 wins stop you is ridiculous. I'm can't take any kind of "winning/losing" culture narratively seriously when we instantly forget about it. I would respect it more if we had people complaining about why we have Ace or spreading the gospel about how great it was to win with vets in the half tank years. I'd disagree, but at least it'd be logically consistent.
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At some point there is a line between we've done everything we can to lose as many games as possible, and we went too far. For example, for me I was ok with Lauri sitting games against bad teams last year, but thought we went too far when we were sitting Kessler as well. The line is probably different for everyone. I'm just curious where is your line?

For whatever efforts we do to make our team worse, we also have to consider the consequences. I don't really believe in losing culture either, but I do believe in young guys developing better by playing with good players (I know you don't believe in this). There are also other consequences like making players/coaches/agents upset that should be weighed against the benefit of increased lottery odds.

I think we should do more to lose around the edges as well, but I think those things would still result in a 20-25 win team and so I'm not too upset with where we are at right now.
 
SoberasHotRod said:
At some point there is a line between we've done everything we can to lose as many games as possible, and we went too far. For example, for me I was ok with Lauri sitting games against bad teams last year, but thought we went too far when we were sitting Kessler as well. The line is probably different for everyone. I'm just curious where is your line?

For whatever efforts we do to make our team worse, we also have to consider the consequences. I don't really believe in losing culture either, but I do believe in young guys developing better by playing with good players (I know you don't believe in this). There are also other consequences like making players/coaches/agents upset that should be weighed against the benefit of increased lottery odds.

I think we should do more to lose around the edges as well, but I think those things would still result in a 20-25 win team and so I'm not too upset with where we are at right now.
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Doing the stuff to win around the edges accounts for half of the win total. This Jazz team is not good or built enough to justify losing a top-8 pick with triple swap rights to the league’s preeminent superpower. It is absolutely ridiculous that this is even a debate. At least the ‘22-‘23 looked great to start; this team has eeked out half of its wins (with a ~.316 win percentage/25-win pace) against play-in or worse competition.
 
NUMBERICA said:
Doing the stuff to win around the edges accounts for half of the win total. This Jazz team is not good or built enough to justify losing a top-8 pick with triple swap rights to the league’s preeminent superpower. It is absolutely ridiculous that this is even a debate. At least the ‘22-‘23 looked great to start; this team has eeked out half of its wins against play-in or worse competition.
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We weren't going to start sitting players on opening night, so we win that Clipper's game regardless. We easily could have lost to Phoenix by playing Lauri less minutes. We definitely could have lost to Boston. We beat Indiana by 30, so I think we probably win that one no matter what. We easily lose to Chicago with less Lauri minutes. We probably lose to Sacramento if we sit Lauri for rest.

Yeah, you are definitely right. We should be at 2-3 wins at the most right now.
 
The Jazz are only two games ahead of the 4th worst record and we have people overreacting way too much. That's with Key/Lauri having career years. They are probably going to struggle at some point (already has started). The Jazz will be fine. I expect them to finish 5th overall.
 
Things that can be done to easily lose games when it really matters to lose games (that dont include doing anything with Lauri/Keyonte or trades):
  • Play Cody Williams
  • Play Taylor Hendricks
  • Give Ace Bailey more on-ball reps
  • Play Filipowski at the 5 against starting lineups

The Jazz will do these things. I get being anxious about it, but when Locke has explicitly told us that Jazz want to keep their pick, best believe they will do things to keep the pick.
 
SoberasHotRod said:
At some point there is a line between we've done everything we can to lose as many games as possible, and we went too far. For example, for me I was ok with Lauri sitting games against bad teams last year, but thought we went too far when we were sitting Kessler as well. The line is probably different for everyone. I'm just curious where is your line?

For whatever efforts we do to make our team worse, we also have to consider the consequences. I don't really believe in losing culture either, but I do believe in young guys developing better by playing with good players (I know you don't believe in this). There are also other consequences like making players/coaches/agents upset that should be weighed against the benefit of increased lottery odds.

I think we should do more to lose around the edges as well, but I think those things would still result in a 20-25 win team and so I'm not too upset with where we are at right now.
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I don't think we went to far. Tanking the way we did is one of the best things this regime has done. Process wise it gave us the best chances to get the most out of the draft. If you want to do results based analysis instead, it's what got us Ace and I'm happy with it.

It's hard to give a "line", but I will list specific things I dislike about what we're doing:

- Playing Lauri every game
- Playing Lauri a career high in minutes
- Prioritizing Svi/Anderson/Love/vets over rookie contract players
- No minutes for Cody/TH
- Walt/Brice short leash
- Hesitancy to experiment (i.e Flip/TH at center, Ace on ball reps)

I see very little to no value gained from the above items. I'd go as as far as to say we are getting some negative value completely unrelated to tanking from that. Small changes to these things may only result in a few more loses, but those loses can prove to be critical in draft position and in our case be the difference between having a pick or not. And I'll say it again. Saying we're "fine" because we can still keep the pick is just preventing disaster scenario. For me that's nothing to be excited about and is just the bare minimum. Just like last year, I want the best odds at the best players. We may not be able to get #1, but we can do better than we are.
 
NUMBERICA said:
This Jazz team is not good or built enough to justify losing a top-8 pick with triple swap rights to the league’s preeminent superpower. It is absolutely ridiculous that this is even a debate. At least the ‘22-‘23 looked great to start;
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I wanna dive on this triple-swap rights thing and contrast it to having three firsts: it is worse to lose this pick than to draft later with our own pick in ‘22-‘23 because this is our only pick. We lose our entire draft with this pick, a top-8 pick on top of that, with swap rights on top of that.

I’m going to use some pretty math and flatten odds just to illustrate the fundamentals. Every team would have a 3.3% chance of getting to the top of the draft, which with triple-swap rights, the Jazz would have a 10% to get to the top. If the Jazz had three separate picks, they would still have a 6.7% chance of doing so if they were sufficiently good. With swap rights instead (saying nothing of increased odds due to ducking the protections), they lose all 10%.

Getting more specific and tied to reality: There is a non-zero possibility the Timberwolves miss the draft and hit on the lottery (not necessarily the #1 pick), and if the Jazz forfeit the pick, they forfeit the swap.

Coughing up this pick would be almost criminal malfeasance. If they wanna play house about being contenders next year, go nuts.
 
Saint Cy of JFC said:
The Jazz are only two games ahead of the 4th worst record and we have people overreacting way too much. That's with Key/Lauri having career years. They are probably going to struggle at some point (already has started). The Jazz will be fine. I expect them to finish 5th overall.
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We will only be fine if the Jazz get an injury or do the things we are advocating for. 2 games seems like not much but... we are competing with 4 or 5 teams within that 2 game difference. We did not expect to have this much tank competition... it got crowded fast. A team like the Blazers or Bucks sustain a key injury and they join the fray. Sometimes 2 games is the difference of one draft slot. NBD... sometimes its the difference between 3rd and 6th.

The Kessler injury blesses the tank effort. Go ahead and make the non-essential cuts around the edges and have the FO "work with" the coaching staff to get on the same page. Many NBA teams fail trying to have their cake and eat it too... just like we are trying to do.

We have the perfect tank weapon in Cody. He's a top ten pick so you can justify playing him even when he may be the worst player in the league (literally). The FO needs to sacrifice Will's bestie to do it most likely but that might be like a 3-4 win difference if you shift the Svi minutes to Cody.
 
Saint Cy of JFC said:
Things that can be done to easily lose games when it really matters to lose games (that dont include doing anything with Lauri/Keyonte or trades):
  • Play Cody Williams
  • Play Taylor Hendricks
  • Give Ace Bailey more on-ball reps
  • Play Filipowski at the 5 against starting lineups

The Jazz will do these things. I get being anxious about it, but when Locke has explicitly told us that Jazz want to keep their pick, best believe they will do things to keep the pick.
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If we didn’t already have a longer track record of them ****ing around and ****ing up than them doing it right, I would be less anxious.
 
Thankfully, the schedule should be pretty tough this month. By my count, the Jazz will go 3-11 in December (give or take a game), hopefully that will clear things up for everyone.
 
Saint Cy of JFC said:
Things that can be done to easily lose games when it really matters to lose games (that dont include doing anything with Lauri/Keyonte or trades):
  • Play Cody Williams
  • Play Taylor Hendricks
  • Give Ace Bailey more on-ball reps
  • Play Filipowski at the 5 against starting lineups

The Jazz will do these things. I get being anxious about it, but when Locke has explicitly told us that Jazz want to keep their pick, best believe they will do things to keep the pick.
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It really matters now more than later in the season to do these things. Many more teams are trying... later in the season many more teams are tanking. The gains that come from tanking in the later part of the season will be offset partially with other teams tanking hard.

Locke generally tries to calm the fanbase down... he can flip later and just say "Cody was the 9th or 10th pick in the draft... why bother tanking if that is where the pick lands".

Jazz are literally playing with fire. No one that plays with fire plans on getting burned. The Jazz are no different. Maybe they don't get burned... but there is no value in playing with the fire.
 
Handlogten's Heros said:
We will only be fine if the Jazz get an injury or do the things we are advocating for. 2 games seems like not much but... we are competing with 4 or 5 teams within that 2 game difference. We did not expect to have this much tank competition... it got crowded fast. A team like the Blazers or Bucks sustain a key injury and they join the fray. Sometimes 2 games is the difference of one draft slot. NBD... sometimes its the difference between 3rd and 6th.

The Kessler injury blesses the tank effort. Go ahead and make the non-essential cuts around the edges and have the FO "work with" the coaching staff to get on the same page. Many NBA teams fail trying to have their cake and eat it too... just like we are trying to do.

We have the perfect tank weapon in Cody. He's a top ten pick so you can justify playing him even when he may be the worst player in the league (literally). The FO needs to sacrifice Will's bestie to do it most likely but that might be like a 3-4 win difference if you shift the Svi minutes to Cody.
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They dont need an injury at all.

Hardy is going to play Cody/Taylor major minutes. He has shown he is willing to do that already.

Hardy signed a huge extension. You really think he doesnt want AJ Dybansta/Darryn Peterson/Cam Boozer? He does, but he also wants to develop the players he has through the methods he believes works. It's a balancing act. We are far from needing to panic about it. The Jazz still have the hardest remaining SOS among bad teams besides Dallas (who should easily be a better team). Sacramento has the 3rd easiest remaining schedule.

Until we see multiple teams in our range make some crazy moves to get worse, I'm extremely confident it will be fine.
 
Handlogten's Heros said:
It really matters now more than later in the season to do these things. Many more teams are trying... later in the season many more teams are tanking. The gains that come from tanking in the later part of the season will be offset partially with other teams tanking hard.

Locke generally tries to calm the fanbase down... he can flip later and just say "Cody was the 9th or 10th pick in the draft... why bother tanking if that is where the pick lands".

Jazz are literally playing with fire. No one that plays with fire plans on getting burned. The Jazz are no different. Maybe they don't get burned... but there is no value in playing with the fire.
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Exactly, you play the early season as competively as possible (within reason) to gather data on your team's quality and the players you want to develop. You tank later when everyone else more or less starts tanking.
 
Handlogten's Heros said:
It really matters now more than later in the season to do these things. Many more teams are trying... later in the season many more teams are tanking. The gains that come from tanking in the later part of the season will be offset partially with other teams tanking hard.

Locke generally tries to calm the fanbase down... he can flip later and just say "Cody was the 9th or 10th pick in the draft... why bother tanking if that is where the pick lands".

Jazz are literally playing with fire. No one that plays with fire plans on getting burned. The Jazz are no different. Maybe they don't get burned... but there is no value in playing with the fire.
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I wouldn't call it half and half, but I can't see much of an argument to plan to tank later when you already can. The best time to do this was yesterday.

When we inevitably do this, are we going to start saying that we're destroying our team culture and the development of our young players? And when we land at X lotto spot, are we not going to care that 1-2 more L's would have had us 1-2 spots higher?

This is not a binary situation. The tank is not "fine" or "not fine". We may have a disaster scenario outside of the top 8, but that is not the entire equation. Every spot in the lotto is important and can be very relevant. How can we not know this when it was so important this last lotto?
 
Saint Cy of JFC said:
They dont need an injury at all.

Hardy is going to play Cody/Taylor major minutes. He has shown he is willing to do that already.

Hardy signed a huge extension. You really think he doesnt want AJ Dybansta/Darryn Peterson/Cam Boozer? He does, but he also wants to develop the players he has through the methods he believes works. It's a balancing act. We are far from needing to panic about it. The Jazz still have the hardest remaining SOS among bad teams besides Dallas (who should easily be a better team). Sacramento has the 3rd easiest remaining schedule.

Until we see multiple teams in our range make some crazy moves to get worse, I'm extremely confident it will be fine.
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Dallas absolutely is in position to out tank us. They have a hole the size of Texas on their roster. They are rumored to be really serious about moving AD. Kyrie just has to wait to come back and play. Easy money.

Sacramento will likely be better if they can get Sabonis back but they don't have to make a move to tank. Their biggest salaries are pretty checked out and they have a terrible coach.

Lauri is playing like 37-38 minutes per in the close games... I think Hardy is 1000% playing to win those even though he knows about the draft.

There is a legit difference of opinion between the Ainges in the FO. Coach's aren't always thinking about 3-5 years down the road. Without a bigger push from the FO I am not sure Will is gonna push the tank agenda.
 
NUMBERICA said:
When the tanking gets harder.

We've had the data for three years. This team isn't legit.
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Oh give me a ****ing break. You see what Keyonte is doing this year? You dont get that if you just try to sabotage the team around him and Lauri. That's a clear example of why this stuff is way more nuanced than the tank purist want to make it out to be.
 
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