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Reports in the local media Jazz to re-sign Exum

So we failed to use any of our assets to address our most glaring need during the off-season, so we'll instead bring back a player that has failed to produce anything of merit in his entire career, including being released by what may be the worst team in the league this year.

Sounds great! Sign him up!

I heard he's the only player in the league who can shut down Harden.
He played good defense that one time.
I don't think he really can...and if I'm an opposing team I am dying for the Jazz to try to beat me with Trent Forrest. Whether he's shooting wide open 3's or getting into the paint and trying to get his floater/lob game going that is a huge win for the opponent. To me, Forrest is in a tough situation because his offensive game is only passable when he has the ball, but he is also not good enough with the ball to warrant the ball on this team.

If he was shooting low 30's I could see it....but banking on him being a low 30's shooter is arguably a bigger leap than banking on Oni being a high 30's shooter. I just don't believe in his shot. Forrest was 25% in college and 26% as a pro (NBA, Summer League, Preseason).
He shot 33% this year in summer league on roughly 4 attempts per, and his stroke looked much better than last year (still needs improvement, but you can tell he has worked a lot this offseason to improve).

If he is left open, I would not be surprised to see him make 3s at or around 33% based on what I saw this summer.

I don't think Oni belongs in the NBA.
 
He played good defense that one time.

He shot 33% this year in summer league on roughly 4 attempts per, and his stroke looked much better than last year (still needs improvement, but you can tell he has worked a lot this offseason to improve).

If he is left open, I would not be surprised to see him make 3s at or around 33% based on what I saw this summer.

I don't think Oni belongs in the NBA.

He shot 7/19 (37%) in 7 summer league games....but that's still only 19 attempts. When you're basically a 25% shooter your whole career it's going to take a lot more to convince me. Anything above 30% is very optimistic in my opinion because his total track record has him as a 25% shooter.

Oni belongs in the NBA and I think he did exactly what was expected of him last year. When players got injured he stepped in and we didn't miss a beat for the most part. Didn't have a great showing in the playoffs, but to me that showed me he wasn't good enough to make an impact in the playoffs, which is not the same thing as not being good enough for the roster.
 
My thoughts on this that nobody asked for:
- I hated the Exum pick, but he seems like a good kid and I'll continue to cheer for his success.
- From a Jazz perspective having him take the Oni role could make sense. From his perspective it's probably time to make some money in Europe. An 11th to 14th man might make some sense given his fragility, but teams are always going to want to fill those spots with higher upside guys.
- Oni and Forrest provide very different things, however Forrest is obviously the better prospect to develop and give minutes to in my opinion. I think Oni gives us some unique defensive and rebounding skills that could make a switching type defense work, so I guess that is something.
- I'm still of the opinion that having an end of the bench defensive specialist is not going to put us over the top, but we still need to trade some of our offensively talented players for a rotation quality defender.
 
I don't think he really can...and if I'm an opposing team I am dying for the Jazz to try to beat me with Trent Forrest. Whether he's shooting wide open 3's or getting into the paint and trying to get his floater/lob game going that is a huge win for the opponent. To me, Forrest is in a tough situation because his offensive game is only passable when he has the ball, but he is also not good enough with the ball to warrant the ball on this team.

If he was shooting low 30's I could see it....but banking on him being a low 30's shooter is arguably a bigger leap than banking on Oni being a high 30's shooter. I just don't believe in his shot. Forrest was 25% in college and 26% as a pro (NBA, Summer League, Preseason).
Did I say we’d try to beat someone with Forrest? I’m talking about a deep-bench player. Don’t get twisted.

There are reasons for optimism, and I see that you’re not taking them. Fine. But adios, cuz I am. Ciao babe.
 
Did I say we’d try to beat someone with Forrest? I’m talking about a deep-bench player. Don’t get twisted.

There are reasons for optimism, and I see that you’re not taking them. Fine. But adios, cuz I am. Ciao babe.
 
Did I say we’d try to beat someone with Forrest? I’m talking about a deep-bench player. Don’t get twisted.

There are reasons for optimism, and I see that you’re not taking them. Fine. But adios, cuz I am. Ciao babe.

Well, you did say let them sag off him so he can punish them. One way or another he’s going to have to beat the defense if teams do their scouting and leave him wide open. I didn’t literally win the entire game himself lol.

I see reasons for optimism and have mentioned them a lot in the past. The offensive game is just too much of a barrier for me on this team. Like I said, a different team that could use more of an on ball presence could probably work for him.

Don’t mind him as a roster spot guy though. He’s talented enough. Just not as optimistic about his ability to come into the rotation.
 
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For the record, if we were to drop anyone to pick Exum/any other defender the guy I’d actually want to cut is Dok. I know there’s more a financial burden there, but he is the most hopeless prospect on the team IMO. He’s far away from being good enough to contribute now and I don’t think he has much upside either. If we have unlimited money we should just take another shot in the dark with another perimeter defender.

Will be interesting if we pick up Dok’s rookie option.
 
Well, you did say let them sag off him so he can punish them. One way or another he’s going to have to beat the defense if teams do their scouting and leave him wide open. I didn’t literally win the entire game himself lol.

I see reasons for optimism and have mentioned them a lot in the past. The offensive game is just too much of a barrier for me on this team. Like I said, a different team that could use more of an on ball presence could probably work for him.

Don’t mind him as a roster spot guy though. He’s talented enough. Just not as optimistic about his ability to come into the rotation.
If you think you’re adequately synopsizing my views here, then I’m not sure what to say.

Just seems like you’ve found a spot to slowly pour out some of your patented sour soup.
 
If you think you’re adequately synopsizing my views here, then I’m not sure what to say.

Just seems like you’ve found a spot to slowly pour out some of your patented sour soup.

Ahh…my favorite part. The personal attacks because why discuss basketball?

You got me, it’s not that I don’t believe in Forrest because of jump shot. It’s because I wanted to dish out some sour soup.

In fact, I’m optimistic about Oni just because I want to be a downer…wait a second.
 
Ahh…my favorite part. The personal attacks because why discuss basketball?

You got me, it’s not that I don’t believe in Forrest because of jump shot. It’s because I wanted to dish out some sour soup.

In fact, I’m optimistic about Oni just because I want to be a downer…wait a second.
not much of a personal attack. More of a throw-my-hands-up after watching you take what I said down the slanted path that you seemed destined to take it.

And we all know you like some sour soup, braugh.
 
Oni was +19.5 in 365 real minutes last year. Forrest was -4.1 in 198 real minutes. Tiny sample sizes, lots of noise, players get better worse, ect. It’s best practice to take it all with a grain a salt but we don’t have much to go off of. I’m confident Oni can step in and fill in because he did just that last year. Could Exum do that? Probably if I’m being honest. It’s not the most difficult task to play along side great player. Not a huge difference between the two when standing around in the corner and Exum might still be the better defender…but I’m still leaning Oni. He’s proven and I still think he becomes extremely valuable if he gets a little bit better.

Forrest…TBD. He looked great in summer league but preseason gave me hesitation. He was pounding the ball like crazy and shot 5-18. Summer League Exum was just short of a mythological figure so I hesitate to take much stock into that. I love Forrest’s passing and really love his defense, but if teams dare him to score I think we run into major issues. He really knows how to play but it’s hard for me to overlook the shooting. My feeing is that Exum has a better chance of fitting into this roster but I’d still probably give Forrest a real roster spot over him with the hope that his shooting improves.

Oni
Hughes
Forrest
Exum

Dok
Fitts

That’s how I’d see Exum fit into the end of roster hierarchy. Tbf to Exum, his Olympic performance was probably the best “what have you done for me lately” out of all these guys. He was really good this summer. His preseason with HOU was wild. Only 3 shots in 41 minutes.
 
So far I've seen nothing from local (Jazz) media.
I recall listening to some kind of podcast/interview from a few weeks ago, a time when half the fanbase was sure that Butler was the next DM. I can't remember for sure who it was that said it on which show (and no way am I going back to try to find it), but if I had to guess I might say Tony Jones (maybe Andy Larson) on with Spence Checketts.

Anyway, I'll just call whoever it was "Tony" for lack of a better term.

Tony made an offhand comment at the end of the interview that the Jazz still had their eye on a specific backup point guard that they'd be interested in acquiring, but that he wasn't going to name names. I could not figure out who or why. I seem to be thinking that Tony was implying a trade scenario, but maybe I read too much into it. In any case, with DM, JB, TF, and JI effectively serving as backup PGs, that just didn't make sense to me.

Maybe it was Infection's Kris Dunn dream about to come true, I thought, but who else even made sense? Certainly not another smallish guard. Maybe the Jazz thought Thomas Satoransky could be wiggled loose from the Pels with David Griffin's desire to see Kira Lewis get minutes? But would that move the needle with what it would take to get him?

So if it turns out to be Dante (but would Tony call him a PG these days?), I could get on board. I always liked him, though I have no expectations for him now. In a theoretical way, I think he fits better than Kris Dunn, even if not being an overall better player (They're both terrible shooters, though Exum has a higher career TS% and shoots less often. I see him as a better fit in the Royce offensive role: shooting infrequently, providing a dash of slashing and tertiary playmaking; I think Dunn needs the ball to have a role on offense, and how would giving him the ball make sense for the Jazz?). Maybe Dante can guard slightly bigger guys than Dunn can?

I'd be OK if they decided to bring in either of them, but would probably slightly lean toward Dante.

The big question would be whether Oni is cut loose. It would almost seem to be a financial necessity. While I'm not as down on Oni as many here are, he is not providing any value in tertiary playmaking or slashing, as Quin might be hoping for.
 
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