Jazz vs. Mavs in round one

[Sean]

Sure, 2021's compact season and COVID issues impacted seeding, but I don't agree that the Jazz were over seeded. They had more injuries and a tougher schedule than the Suns for example, but still finished with a better record.

This year you could argue we are under seeded. We have the second highest point differential in the Western Conference and third highest point differential in the NBA. We're comfortably the number one offense in the NBA this year. If we had closed games at just an average success rate, we would be the 2nd or 3rd seed this year.

Now personally I wouldn't argue we are under seeded, because closing games is part of winning games and we've turned in to a team that really struggles down the stretch. We obviously have some fatal flaws to our team that can be exposed by the right team. I don't think this is the same as being over seeded.

I think we've seen enough evidence from Utah over the last four-plus years to know 2021 was the anomaly - not 2022, where they finished pretty much with the same seed (give it take one spot) since getting back to the playoffs in 2017.

 

[SoberasHotRod]

I think we've seen enough evidence from Utah over the last four-plus years to know 2021 was the anomaly - not 2022, where they finished pretty much with the same seed (give it take one spot) since getting back to the playoffs in 2017.

You think we've had the same team since 2017?

 

[fishonjazz]

So, would losing to a Luka-less Dallas in the first round be enough to end this iteration of the Jazz?

I’d have to think you gotta go scorched earth on the roster at that point, right?

Yes.
Not happening though


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[bopahull]

Are you talking about game 6 last year? The Clippers were without Kawhi, but PG played and scored like 30 points. Thats the difference between the Clippers and Mavs, even without Kawhi, they still had arguably a top 10 player in PG. The Mavs have some nice role players but they don't have enough talent without Luka to beat us. Another thing that hasn't been talked about enough, the Mavs are also without their third leading scorer Hardaway Jr. They just don't have enough firepower.

This Jazz team has lost to the least talented teams in the NBA, they are capable of anything.

 

[NUMBERICA]

Yes.
Not happening though


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Unfortunately, I am basically certain this is correct. Did everyone forget the All-Star Game is gonna be here next year? If only for reasons of pride, the Jazz aren’t going to field a tanker (only the second time in franchise history IF they did it) the year they host the ASG.

 

[MTS]

Yeah, MT Steve made amazing points about how good we were on defense during that regular season with Rudy and how much we struggled without him. MT Steve made very relevant points considering we were talking about the playoffs......

I asked Lopo if he had any reason, any evidence whatsoever to justify why he believed that Gobert was a defensive superstar all regular season, to the point where with him we were a top 1 defense and without him a bottom 4 defense, and why that suddenly wasn't the case against OKC in the playoffs when OKC's paint scoring mysteriously died and their top 10 offense fell to bottom 3 against us.

He dodged the question.

 

[NUMBERICA]

I asked Lopo if he had any reason, any evidence whatsoever to justify why he believed that Gobert was a defensive superstar all regular season, to the point where with him we were a top 1 defense and without him a bottom 4 defense, and why that suddenly wasn't the case against OKC in the playoffs when OKC's paint scoring mysteriously died and their top 10 offense fell to bottom 3 against us.

He dodged the question.

-but what about something something and
-at least he’s “objective” and “doesn’t attack our own players”

 

[bopahull]

I think Mitchell is going to average his playoff average of 33+ pts. Whether he's efficient is another question.
I think Gobert and Whiteside are going to combine for ~30/25 most nights.
I think Clarkson and Bogdanovic should combine for 35 pts. most nights.
Conley will play significant minutes on a longer leash and probably put up 15 pts.
Then Royce, House, Hernangomez/Gay, and Butler can fill in another dozen points.
A couple of our guys will probably have a bad game on any given night, and the Jazz might score 114 pts or so, which is their season average.

But I just don't see how the Mavs without Luka are going to finish within 10 points of the Jazz unless the game is a pretty significant outlier.

I hope I'm wrong, but after watching this team blow so many double digit 4th qtr and 20+ second half leads, I'm not confident they won't continue to choke down the stretch.

 

[LoPo]

I asked Lopo if he had any reason, any evidence whatsoever to justify why he believed that Gobert was a defensive superstar all regular season, to the point where with him we were a top 1 defense and without him a bottom 4 defense, and why that suddenly wasn't the case against OKC in the playoffs when OKC's paint scoring mysteriously died and their top 10 offense fell to bottom 3 against us.

He dodged the question.

I said Rudy had a good series. I said Rudy played well. I also said that Donovan was our star in that series, which he was, and you just have to insist that Rudy was also a star which he was not.

OKC lost complete cohesion in that series for a number of reasons - Rudy, we had better defenders back then, Melo not passing, Russ not passing, PG choking at times.

Rudy is a damn good player, and better now than he was then, but he wasn't a star in the OKC series win. You can twist the regular season stats all you want, but facts are facts.

 

[Gameface]

Unfortunately, I am basically certain this is correct. Did everyone forget the All-Star Game is gonna be here next year? If only for reasons of pride, the Jazz aren’t going to field a tanker (only the second time in franchise history IF they did it) the year they host the ASG.

I just try, with a fair degree of success, to forget that the NBA allstar game exists at all.

 

[LoPo]

-but what about something something and
-at least he’s “objective” and “doesn’t attack our own players”

Are you going to sit there and seriously say that Rudy Gobert was a star in the OKC series win? I mean seriously?

 

[Handlogten's Heros]

I hope I'm wrong, but after watching this team blow so many double digit 4th qtr and 20+ second half leads, I'm not confident they won't continue to choke down the stretch.

We haven’t dealt with pressure and there seems to be emotional scarring from the game 6 collapse last year.

It can reverse maybe but brains are weird AF. This is a weird example from my life but I used to get really nervous when taking the CPA exam. I was a great test taker in college but this was different because it had a direct effect on my career… there are 4 parts of the exam that you take on 4 separate dates. Each time I drove to the testing center my stomach would go in knots at the same intersection on my drive… this wasn’t I’m nervous butterflies… it was full on Rodney Hood “you must find a restroom now or you will be ******** your pants” syndrome. Holding it in to the point I’m sweating. Thankfully I found a restroom each time and passed the exam on my first attempts of each part… but every time it happened at the same damn stop light.

Human brains and bodies are linked and we may be psychologically broken. They have a team psychologist and I really think they should be working overtime on the mental part of this. Maybe they have a breakthrough and figure it out. Maybe they wilt under the increased playoff pressure. We shall see very soon.