You gut the roster around Don and lose as many games as possible and reevaluate next year.
I was thinking about this, off-topic of course. But you know, Stockton and Malone being so durable was a double-edged sword. Yeah we had them and were contenders all the time because they were iron men, but we also never had the advantage some other teams did of going from competing to a high draft pick right back to competing again because a key guy was down for a while. The Spurs are the poster-children for this. Went from not just competing but contending to the #1 pick in one of the best drafts of all time, right to a ring inside of 3 years. But we trudged along with Malone and Stockton never dealing with serious injury, so we never had the shot at that high pick guy that could have gotten us over the top. Interesting to think about, that Malone and Stockton being so steady could have cost us a chance at a ring as much as it gave us the opportunities we had in the first place.You don’t think him playing half the season improves the win total? The odds might be flat 1-3, but the teams with the worse records still have the higher pick lottery notwithstanding.
Also, David Robinson was legitimately plagued with injuries that year. Tanking didn’t have to be part of the equation to shut him down.
Robinson >>> Mitchell and
Duncan is likely >>> anyone in this draft
Rebuilding in most cases also takes longer than three years. Let’s say the Jazz get lucky and only take two: Mitchell has a year left before his opt-out and then the Jazz if they’re “lucky” gotta pay him the super max.
Let’s say they aren’t lucky, he’s gone without compensation if they keep him that long. And the longer he’s here the less he’s gonna net in a trade for a multitude of reasons.
Last and probably least: he doesn’t really want to be here (has been crickets about all the moves and anything about the team) and he shouldn’t want to be here either. I would rather him move on, it’s in the best interest of all parties.