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Jazz hire Celtics Assistant GM Austin Ainge as new President of Basketball Operations

I care a lot less about the Nepo issue than I do that the Jazz are bringing in someone who will undoubtedly continue with the same philosophy that has put us in the toilet and created the loss of a lot of fans. This is Ryan doubling down on something that has not gone well at all IMO.
 
I have no real opinion positive or negative here. I get the Nepo baby claims but has a long enough track record that I think he’s “earned” his stripes. Who knows who does what in front offices so… not sure he has a traceable track record. Let’s see what happens and judge from there.

I do think JZ was more a relationship guy and maybe not an architect type. Clearly a demotion but he may be fine with it. Dont think this is a DL situation where he’s an “advisor”.

There’s really no way to know if he earned his stripes. I’ve seen a lot of people say his experience disproves the nepo claims, but that doesn’t really address the nepo concern. If you believe he’s a nepo baby, you’re also likely to think his experience came from nepotism and those stripes were given to him. If he hadn’t been hired by his dad, we wouldn’t have to ask these extra questions what was earned and what was given. If he had been hired by a different franchise or we hired someone else's son you'd at least have a little more comfort. But on the other hand, you also don't have to worry that he's just some random child of important person like Vivek did with his daughter.

I'm mostly neutral, but those questions are valid. Like you said, you just have to see what happens from here. One concern I had about Danny Ainge is that he's getting older and might want to pull the trigger quickly and rebuild impatiently. So in that sense I'm happy we have a succession plan in place. If I were a MIA fan, for example, I'd be more at peace if I knew that Pat Reilly wasn't making calls based on his own timeline. Extending Hardy + Hiring Austin Ainge signals we're in this thing for the long haul.
 
Big game hunting! LOL

What an utter joke. Can't think of many things more embarrassing than first becoming the laughing stock of the league and then a safe landing spot for the nepo baby of a failed executive.

Rewarding Ainge by hiring his son after Ainge's pretty catastrophic last few years is... something.

This. Unbelievable.
 
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No, having unrealistic expectations for a rebuild is weird. It takes time, especially when the luck side of things (lottery odds) dont work out in your favor.

I mean, the thing is that the team intentionally put themselves in a rebuild instead of trying to be an OK playoff team at the 2023 deadline.

And the only reason to do that is a Finals or bust thing.

But the way to do that as a small market is to get a ton of young players who all develop quickly into stars or valuable role players while still on their rookie contracts.

That, or get a player on the level of Giannis or Jokic.

The Jazz uhh, aren't succeeding at all in either approach. Kessler, Filipowski, and Hendricks are their only young players with any real potential, Kessler is about to get signed to a huge extension and Hendricks is going to be on his second contract before we can judge him. None of them have star potential. Meanwhile, the Jazz are running out of relevant future picks to be able to do the OKC strategy of just a billion guys on rookie contracts.
 
I guess he is reporting directly to Ainge. This is a bigger deal than what I was thinking at first.
 
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