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Hyper Risky Move (HRM)

I haven’t posted on here in ages but had to pipe in because I see no point in trading Ingram when Kessler is involved. Walker could be better than Ingram in two years. Why trade him before seeing his full potential. He didn’t have a great sophomore season but most sophomores don’t. Plus he’s still developing and won’t get in the way of a rebuild via the draft.

Where does Ingram get us honestly? The 8th seed. That’s the worst place you can be.
 
KqWIN said:
If you’re bringing up the offense/defense tradeoff you are making the case for Walker Kessler. The Jazz have been better with on the court both of his years. In his rookie year, which is not an unreasonable expectation, he was second in raw on/off to Lauri out of all rotation players. Just focusing on the minutes last year, we were significantly better with only Kessler on the court compared to only Collins, who would theoretically be the one whose minutes would be taken.

Kessler has won this tradeoff and did so massively in his first year.
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Unfortunately, Kessler does not have the same playmakers on the team as in his first, or even second year. He is not the player, who can create his own offense: he needs to be fed the ball in the right position to be effective. Kessler had several experienced playmakers - Conley, Olynyk, Dunn. All of them are gone now. Sexton, Clarkson, and Keyonte are a significant downgrade.

And, by the way, after the All-Star break, with Olynyk gone and many young player getting minutes, Collins posted the highest net rating and plus-minus out of all main rotation players and Kessler - the lowest. Can it be due to the unique circumstances of the shameless tank? It's possible. But it is also possible that, unlike Kessler, Collins depends less on other players to be effective.

In any case, I think it is hard to argue that playing Kessler more would ONLY improve the team's defense without any negative effect on the offense and spacing. And it is also pretty evident that Ainge and Hardy value offense more than defense.
 
so, get this, how about we actually try to get the most out of our current players, and actually try to win games so fans give a dam? risky right? like, they would all actually try and earn their between one and fourtyish million per year contracts instead of just mailing it in for a fifteen percent chance at a possible bust overhyped draft pick. i mean, crazy, right? (sarcasm alert)
 
My interest in Ingram was severely downgraded once the deadline to extend him passed. I’d be interested in doing a mostly Collins/Ingram swap at some point, but I’m not putting any valuable assets into the deal. I basically get him at no risk now, or I’m completely out. I’d much rather keep Kessler, play young, get a top 10 draft pick and then take a hard look at consolidating JC/JC + assets for a bigger fish next offseason.

Sexton / Collier
Keyonte / Williams / Prodica
Hendricks / Top 10 pick
Markkanen / Filipowski
Kessler / Free Agent

JC/JC + the flexible contracts of Svi, Eubanks, Patty and Juzang make me think this is probably the plan. Bite the bullet now, but load every barrel for next year heading into the draft.

TL,DR: I’m not too interested in Ingram as a high cost rental.
 
jazznik said:
Unfortunately, Kessler does not have the same playmakers on the team as in his first, or even second year. He is not the player, who can create his own offense: he needs to be fed the ball in the right position to be effective. Kessler had several experienced playmakers - Conley, Olynyk, Dunn. All of them are gone now. Sexton, Clarkson, and Keyonte are a significant downgrade.

And, by the way, after the All-Star break, with Olynyk gone and many young player getting minutes, Collins posted the highest net rating and plus-minus out of all main rotation players and Kessler - the lowest. Can it be due to the unique circumstances of the shameless tank? It's possible. But it is also possible that, unlike Kessler, Collins depends less on other players to be effective.

In any case, I think it is hard to argue that playing Kessler more would ONLY improve the team's defense without any negative effect on the offense and spacing. And it is also pretty evident that Ainge and Hardy value offense more than defense.
Click to expand...

Again, I totally dismiss this idea that it was the playmakers on his team causing such a big difference. Anytime you mention Conley, it throws your opinion out the window because his best ball came without Conley. Kessler biggest optical is himself, anyone with eyes could see his softness and aloofness was his biggest detriment…not the quality of playmakers. He fell off on both ends because of this. The difference his own personal performance is the key factor, not the difference in playmaking.

I have never said Kessler would not impact the offense. Please do not make up words for me. What I’ve said is that in this offense defense tradeoff, which you brought up yourself, Kessler has won that tradeoff by a ton and especially so in his rookie year. The arguments you proposed in your first post overwhelmingly support Kessler. We’re talking about the tradeoff, and your basic net rating analysis is the biggest endorsement for Kessler there could be.

If Kessler plays the exact same way he did last season, he won’t make the large impact we were talking about..but you could argue that he’s still better than Collins and certainly above replacement level. If he simply plays at the level of his rookie year and gets more minutes, he will certainly make a big impact.
 
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jazznik said:
Unfortunately, Kessler does not have the same playmakers on the team as in his first, or even second year. He is not the player, who can create his own offense: he needs to be fed the ball in the right position to be effective. Kessler had several experienced playmakers - Conley, Olynyk, Dunn. All of them are gone now. Sexton, Clarkson, and Keyonte are a significant downgrade.

And, by the way, after the All-Star break, with Olynyk gone and many young player getting minutes, Collins posted the highest net rating and plus-minus out of all main rotation players and Kessler - the lowest. Can it be due to the unique circumstances of the shameless tank? It's possible. But it is also possible that, unlike Kessler, Collins depends less on other players to be effective.

In any case, I think it is hard to argue that playing Kessler more would ONLY improve the team's defense without any negative effect on the offense and spacing. And it is also pretty evident that Ainge and Hardy value offense more than defense.
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And when he doesn't get the ball he sulks. And when he does get it, if he can't finish easily he's going to avoid contact and put up something soft. And he might just stand in the corner to clank a three instead of cutting to the rim dynamically. Hes a fairly large negative on the offense, almost as much as he's a positive on defense.

I like Kessler well enough and think he has a good future as a Zubac level player, but he isnt going to add many wins by himself. Absolutely zero reason to trade him for the reason of wanting to lose more.
 
Saint Cy of JFC said:
And when he doesn't get the ball he sulks. And when he does get it, if he can't finish easily he's going to avoid contact and put up something soft. And he might just stand in the corner to clank a three instead of cutting to the rim dynamically. Hes a fairly large negative on the offense, almost as much as he's a positive on defense.

I like Kessler well enough and think he has a good future as a Zubac level player, but he isnt going to add many wins by himself. Absolutely zero reason to trade him for the reason of wanting to lose more.
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This is mostly my position as well. I want to see that toughness and grit that he shows on defense on the offensive side of the ball. There’s a solid role for him, but he needs to play within his ability to actually fill it.

TBH - depending on what the Jazz plans are for center long term, I might try working Filipowski into the starting lineup and keep Kessler with the 2nd unit. Especially if the priority this year isn’t wins over development.

Sexton / Collier
Keyonte / Clarkson
Hendricks / Williams
Markkanen / Collins
Filipowski / Kessler

If the Jazz would commit to that lineup and not rely too heavily on Clarkson/Collins, I’ll be pretty happy with the outcome - win or lose.
 
KqWIN said:
Again, I totally dismiss this idea that it was the playmakers on his team causing such a big difference. Anytime you mention Conley, it throws your opinion out the window because his best ball came without Conley. Kessler biggest optical is himself, anyone with eyes could see his softness and aloofness was his biggest detriment…not the quality of playmakers. He fell off on both ends because of this. The difference his own personal performance is the key factor, not the difference in playmaking.

I have never said Kessler would not impact the offense. Please do not make up words for me. What I’ve said is that in this offense defense tradeoff, which you brought up yourself, Kessler has won that tradeoff by a ton and especially so in his rookie year. The arguments you proposed in your first post overwhelmingly support Kessler. We’re talking about the tradeoff, and your basic net rating analysis is the biggest endorsement for Kessler there could be.

If Kessler plays the exact same way he did last season, he won’t make the large impact we were talking about..but you could argue that he’s still better than Collins and certainly above replacement level. If he simply plays at the level of his rookie year and gets more minutes, he will certainly make a big impact.
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You said "But even if he turns us into the 20th ranked defense instead of 30th....That is a massive amount of wins." There was nothing about the defense-offense trade-off in that statement. I just wanted to add the caveat that the amount of wins would be somewhat less than massive since the offense would get worse at the same time as the defense improves. And here you are arguing not against me but against Hardy and Ainge because they are clearly concerned with Kessler's offensive limitations. They are very much aware about his defensive chops but he was moved to the bench and cautiously shopped around because they are not confident that all his defense would compensate for his offensive shortcomings. I, personally, value Kessler's defense much more than them.

And yes, it may surprise you but there are certain types of players who are heavily dependent on playing alongside great playmakers to be effective and the strong center with a limited offensive bag is one of them. Think Gobert, Lively, Kessler. They are very different in that respect from, say, Vukevic, Lopez, and Valanciunas.

KqWIN said:
Again, I totally dismiss this idea that it was the playmakers on his team causing such a big difference. Anytime you mention Conley, it throws your opinion out the window because his best ball came without Conley.
Click to expand...
That was funny, because you know which Jazz player Kessler had the highest offensive rating with in 2022-23? Mike Conley... The second one was Kris Dunn. And in 2023-24? It was again Kris Dunn and by a long shot.
 
Coach Ellis said:
TBH - depending on what the Jazz plans are for center long term, I might try working Filipowski into the starting lineup and keep Kessler with the 2nd unit. Especially if the priority this year isn’t wins over development.
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Can you imagine how Kessler will respond if he pushed to the bench not only by the veteran Collins but now by a rookie drafted in the second round???

I think that the Jazz certainly need to try to figure out if Filipowski has a potential to be a long-term starting center but they either need to do it in a non-obvious way or to trade Kessler first. Because it is almost a guarantee that Kessler will sulk so hard that it will further destroy his trading value. And I do not think he is mentally ready to be a career backup. At least, not at this stage of his career.
 
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