Hello ,
The Jazz recently completed a four game Eastern road swing. They finished 0-4 including a humiliating 29 point loss to the slightly above average Knicks. After this latest debacle and all the other games the Jazz have given away it's time to blow this Jazz team up. The Jazz lost the first three games on this road swing by a total of 5 points, losing 3 games they could have won. Just based on percentages, the Jazz should have won at least one of those three games. So why didn't they? Because of poor coaching and the Jazz's inability to stop a three pointer in the clutch yet again.
The Jazz gave up 3 big clutch three pointers in their loss to Milwaukee last Monday. They also gave up a big three pointer to Marco Bellinelli in their loss Friday at Chicago. How many times will the Jazz get burned by the three pointer before they change their strategy? Of course they've been using this stupid strategy since Jerry Sloan was Jazz coach. I still remember Danny Ainge hitting a big three pointer when he was playing for the Portland Trailblazers that killed the Jazz in the playoffs.
If the Jazz have a 3 point or more lead, simply foul someone before they can shoot. Even if they make both free throws, the Jazz will still lead by at least one point. The Jazz usually try to play tough defense and weakly give up the three pointer. I'd even prefer the Jazz to foul the three pointer shooter, as long as he's not allowed to make the basket. The player would have to make 3 very high pressure, clutch 3 pointers. I'm so frustrated by the Jazz's dim witted strategy and the Jazz's overall choke job this season.
Then as if those three close losses/ chokes weren't bad enough, the Jazz then went out and played with no heart against the Knicks. The Knicks played without both the highly overrated Carmelo Anthony and the oft injured Amare Stoudemire. (In Grantland's Bill Simmons article about "The Worst Contracts In The NBA", Stoudemire finished second. This stumblebum is still owed $65.1 million for 3 years! This list was released before it was announced that he would be missing 6 weeks to his latest injury. Is his latest injury enough to move him into first place?) I stupidly thought because of those absences the Jazz had a chance to win the game. No, not only did they not win, they didn't even try. Losing by 29 points to a depleted mediocre Knicks team is simply unacceptable.
What do the Jazz need to do? Right now they need to completely go to the youth movement. Play Enes Kanter, Alec Burks, Gordon Hayward and Derrick Favors as many minutes as they can play. Also let Paul Milsap play a lot of minutes. If the Jazz can make the playoffs based on the youth movement, then making the playoffs would be great. If the Jazz somehow stumble into the playoffs using their current strategy, that would be of no value at all. The Jazz would get destroyed by the Thunder or Spurs in the first round of the playoffs. The Jazz stumbled into last season's playoffs and were embarrassingly swept by the Spurs. What benefits have the Jazz received from that? None at all and in fact were hurt by it. Since they made the playoffs, they had a worse draft pick.
Then in the offseason it's time to unload Al Jefferson, Mo Williams, Marvin Williams (#19 in Simmons Worst NBA Contracts Two Years, $15.8 million), Jamaal Tinsley, Earl Watson. I know what you are thinking that the Jazz won't have a point guard. No they'll still have Alec Burks, let's see what he can do. Throw him into the fire and let him become a great point guard or not. Also I'm glad that the Jazz finally released Raja Bell.
Then as for the rest of the players on the roster, DeMarre Carroll, Jeremy Evans, Randy Foye, well they do need players to fill out the roster. Also who in the hell are Kevin Murphy and Travis Leslie? Yes, I realize that Leslie was signed yesterday and fills Bell's roster spot. Of course that's about all that Bell was filling this season. I wish I could get almost $3.5 million dollars to do very little.
The Eastern Conference playoff race shapes up to be Snow White and the Seven Dwarves, obviously the Knicks are one of the dwarves. In this analogy Miami is Snow White, they are now 47-14 and lead the second place Knicks by 8.5 games. How weak is the Eastern Conference when the Knicks have the conference's second best record? For hell's sake 8th seeded Milwaukee leads the 9th place Toronto by 8.5 games. Again this shows how weak and irrelevant the Eastern Conference is, besides Snow White of course.
Look for the Knicks to continue being exposed even more as they start a 5 game road swing tonight. The Knicks play Golden State, Denver, Portland, the Clippers and then close the road trip with a rematch with the hopefully fired up Jazz on Monday. The Knicks play at least 3 teams that better than them in the Warriors, Nuggets and the Clippers. Tonight New York will lose to the Warriors. Will Carmelo Anthony be back? Does it matter?
Following the Lakers win yesterday over the Bulls, the Lakers are now 8th place in the Western Conference. That means if the NBA playoffs started today the Lakers would get crushed by the Spurs in the first round. I love how ESPN mentioned that Dwight Howard grabbed 21 rebounds against the Bulls, but lightly touched on him missing all 5 of his free throw attempts. Again no team is going to win a NBA Championship with either Howard or Anthony as a key player.
themusicaddict
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