Seeing AL Objectively - SLCdunk article

[Gyp Rosetti]

Jefferson will be 27/28 this season which is part of an NBAer's peak years. He's plenty experienced as it will be his ninth season in the league. It will be his third year here so there are no acclimation excuses. He's in a contract year and he just got his *** handed to him in the playoffs so all the motivation should be there. There are no excuses left. Unless Al improves by leaps and bounds on the defensive end, with boxing out, and with getting to the free throw line, he needs to ****ing go.

 

[Scorpjazz]

WHile I am now on the side of trading Al or Sap, either one, to better help the team going forward, Big Al was easily the number 1 reason we made the playoffs last year. Easliy the most consistent and productive player. Not even close really. To say other wise is silly and just points out blind hate. You dont need to want him on the team to admit that.
Yes, it is better for the Jazz to move him for the betterment of the young guys moving forward and the team as a whole, but when you say stupid **** like that, everything else you say means less, if anything.

 

[green]

Here is the #1 question you have to ask yourself about Al:

"You are going to pay him 14 million a year. IF you let him walk, would you miss him?"

The answer is.....NOPE. Shouldn't a 14 million dollar a year man be missed when he leaves? You ask, how can you not miss Al's 19 and 9? Here is how:

By swapping Al out for Favors, you immediately get much, much better defensively. Let's say Favors manning the paint causes Utah's points scored against to drop 4 points, which isn't a stretch when you consider how poorly Al boxes out, defends the P&R, how slow he rotates, etc. That means you only need 15 of Al's points.

When Al went down last year, Favors averaged 17 pts and 13 rebs. Let's say Favors only averages 15 points and 10 rebs over a season. Al's rebounding is taken care of and since Favors averages 5 more points without Al, you only need 10 points from Al Jefferson's production.

To think that Kanter, Burks, Hayward, Foye, Marvin Williams, Mo Williams couldn't each average less than 2 more points per game is silly.

So, if we let Al never come back and play for the Jazz, he would not be missed at all, BUT some of you are saying we should PAY HIM 14 MILLION PER YEAR?????

That is insane. That is what you pay your best player on the team. Not a player that sits out and isn't missed at all.

 

[green]

One more question:

How many times last year, when the Jazz were up/down 2-5 pts in the fourth quarter or overtime, did Al put the Jazz on his back, get a defensive stop, then a bucket and one, then another stop to carry the Jazz to victory? I can't think of one. I do remember Paul and Burks doing that multiple times last year. I do remember Favors brining the Jazz back from down 10 to within 1-2 points or even the lead, just to be benched and watch us lose with Al on the floor.

PLAYERS LIKE THAT ARE NOT 14 MILLION A YEAR GUYS. SIGNING PLAYERS LIKE THAT TO 14 MILLION A YEAR DEALS IS WHAT CAUSES TEAMS TO FAIL.

 

[NAOS]

One more question:

How many times last year, when the Jazz were up/down 2-5 pts in the fourth quarter or overtime, did Al put the Jazz on his back, get a defensive stop, then a bucket and one, then another stop to carry the Jazz to victory? I can't think of one. I do remember Paul and Burks doing that multiple times last year. I do remember Favors brining the Jazz back from down 10 to within 1-2 points or even the lead, just to be benched and watch us lose with Al on the floor.

PLAYERS LIKE THAT ARE NOT 14 MILLION A YEAR GUYS. SIGNING PLAYERS LIKE THAT TO 14 MILLION A YEAR DEALS IS WHAT CAUSES TEAMS TO FAIL.

last year, my least favorite feeling during the game was that sense that invaded my body when Al was automatically subbed in with 6 minutes left. ****.

 

[fishonjazz]

I would never want to see Humphries in Jazz uniform EVER again.
Although I do still own one of his old Jazz jerseys from his rookie year.

I had a humphries jersey from his rookie year too.... then i gave it to one of my friends as a gag gift for his birthday.
We went out drinkin at the club that night and he wore it, and got some pretty strange comments because of it.

 

[NUMBERICA]

Objectivity from SLC Dunk? Right.

 

[theNBAnerd]

One more question:

How many times last year, when the Jazz were up/down 2-5 pts in the fourth quarter or overtime, did Al put the Jazz on his back, get a defensive stop, then a bucket and one, then another stop to carry the Jazz to victory? I can't think of one. I do remember Paul and Burks doing that multiple times last year. I do remember Favors brining the Jazz back from down 10 to within 1-2 points or even the lead, just to be benched and watch us lose with Al on the floor.

PLAYERS LIKE THAT ARE NOT 14 MILLION A YEAR GUYS. SIGNING PLAYERS LIKE THAT TO 14 MILLION A YEAR DEALS IS WHAT CAUSES TEAMS TO FAIL.

THIS is exactly why i'm ready to be done with al. he doesn't win games for us. if we want a guy who will put up nice stats but never win us games, there are much cheaper guys than al's 15M.

i went back and looked at every game we lost this past season despite being in the contest in the 4th quarter. winnable losses, in other words, that we coughed up late. you know how al performed in those fourth quarters? 3.6 points and 2.7 rebounds in each of those 4th quarters (&OTs) on 25/73 shooting (34%). the sad part is, those numbers were IMPROVED from when i did the same study in mid february.

in the same exact fourth quarters & OTs, paul took virtually the same number of attempts but produced 5.8 points on nearly 50% shooting (37/80). anybody who knows what happens to the average NBA player's shot percentage during crunch time knows how impressive it is that even in these clutch battles, paul is 3 makes off of 50%. so why on earth didn't more of those possessions go to paul? seven of the games i am referring to were decided by 4 points or less, so go to a more effective stretch scorer for just a couple extra buckets and the jazz could have been 43-23 last season. but instead, we kept going to a guy who was 34% when it mattered most.

as ineffective as the give-ball-to-al-and-watch strategy is over the course of the game, it's even WORSE as a mechanism for stretch basket-making.

 

[Thee Jazz Fan]

One more question:

How many times last year, when the Jazz were up/down 2-5 pts in the fourth quarter or overtime, did Al put the Jazz on his back, get a defensive stop, then a bucket and one, then another stop to carry the Jazz to victory? I can't think of one. I do remember Paul and Burks doing that multiple times last year. I do remember Favors brining the Jazz back from down 10 to within 1-2 points or even the lead, just to be benched and watch us lose with Al on the floor.

PLAYERS LIKE THAT ARE NOT 14 MILLION A YEAR GUYS. SIGNING PLAYERS LIKE THAT TO 14 MILLION A YEAR DEALS IS WHAT CAUSES TEAMS TO FAIL.

People here seem to chose not to remember his good moments. He does things that frustrate us, but he also does a lot of things that help the jazz as well.

 

[NUMBERICA]

People here seem to chose not to remember his good moments. He does things that frustrate us, but he also does a lot of things that help the jazz as well.

Every player has both good and bad moments. In other news, fire is hot.

 

[green]

People here seem to chose not to remember his good moments. He does things that frustrate us, but he also does a lot of things that help the jazz as well.

I love this line from Al's immediate family. Here is my response:

Remind me. Show me specific games where he put the Jazz on his back against a playoff team and willed us to win.

I dare you.

 

[NAOS]

THIS is exactly why i'm ready to be done with al. he doesn't win games for us. if we want a guy who will put up nice stats but never win us games, there are much cheaper guys than al's 15M.

i went back and looked at every game we lost this past season despite being in the contest in the 4th quarter. winnable losses, in other words, that we coughed up late. you know how al performed in those fourth quarters? 3.6 points and 2.7 rebounds in each of those 4th quarters (&OTs) on 25/73 shooting (34%). the sad part is, those numbers were IMPROVED from when i did the same study in mid february.

in the same exact fourth quarters & OTs, paul took virtually the same number of attempts but produced 5.8 points on nearly 50% shooting (37/80). anybody who knows what happens to the average NBA player's shot percentage during crunch time knows how impressive it is that even in these clutch battles, paul is 3 makes off of 50%. so why on earth didn't more of those possessions go to paul? seven of the games i am referring to were decided by 4 points or less, so go to a more effective stretch scorer for just a couple extra buckets and the jazz could have been 43-23 last season. but instead, we kept going to a guy who was 34% when it mattered most.

as ineffective as the give-ball-to-al-and-watch strategy is over the course of the game, it's even WORSE as a mechanism for stretch basket-making.

candidate for Post of the Offseason.