Make no mistake about it, the Jazz season ended last night at the hands of the 17 win Minnesota Timberwolves. The current playoff odds by John Hollinger peg the Jazz as having a 4.4% chance of making the playoffs, and that might be optimistic. The Jazz season officially ends on April 13th after their last game against the Denver Nuggets, but really losing to the Twolves was the real end. There will be time to review what happened in this unusual season, but now I am going to focus on the game I attended last night.

When discussing the game let me start off the few positives – the Jazz rookies. Gordon Hayward made some tough threes and his current season three point percentage is an impressive 44%. If he can continue to shoot this well then he might make me reconsider my prediction that he will never be an average NBA player. He looked like a different player last night than he has for the majority of the season. Derrick Favors looks like he is an active rebounder and one can certainly see the potential that made him the 3rd pick in last year’s draft.

However, neither of those players were nearly as impressive as Jeremy Evans. Watching the game it seemed like the Jazz were a different team when the tall, lanky, athletic 2nd round pick from Western Kentucky was on the court. One can point out the fault that he doesn’t seem to do much offensively besides dunk the ball, but he seems to be one of the players that always finds himself in the right position. He moves well without the ball and is able to find openings where he can collect the ball (either off a rebound or a pass) and dunk it. In a game where the Jazz lost by 21, it is noteworthy that Evans had a +/- of +10. It wasn’t just a subjective opinion that with Evans on the court the Jazz were a much better team.

Guess who was on the receiving end of this alley-oop from Earl Watson?

Those were the positives and considering the final result it is nice at least the Jazz rookies were impressive. However, it is impossible to be a Jazz fan and be happy with the game last night. It is one thing to give up 131 points to the Knicks, but it is a completely different thing to give up 121 points to the lowly Timberwolves. It looked like the Jazz defense was lost all night. I don’t know if it was a lack of energy, a lack of focus or just that this team is just a terrible defensive team. In terms of defensive efficiency the Jazz are now ranked 22nd out of 30th, so that probably gives you an indication of their defensive talent. The team’s defense made Jonny Flynn and Wayne Ellington look like the future starting backcourt of the Western Conferance All-Star team.

If defense is the number one negative I saw from last night here are a few others:

• Give Raja Bell credit for extra shooting practice before the game. At least he is trying because when the game starts he is a complete non-factor. Why didn’t the Jazz just sign Ronnie Brewer instead of Bell? Bell needs to the 10th man on the team for the Jazz to make an impact.
• I can see why some people complained about Devin Harris’s lack of consistent effort in New Jersey. Sometimes it seems like Harris can be an All-Star (the Pacers game) and then other times like this game he barely looks like a backup point guard.
• It is early to think about the draft and I almost always am a proponent of drafting talent over need, but is there anyway the Jazz can NOT draft a guard in the 2011 Draft?
• Has there been one game this year where Andrei Kirilenko has been worth the $217K he is paid per game? Yes, AK47 in a little over 2 games gets paid as much as Jeremy Evans entire salary this year.
• You can’t fault Memhet Okur for his injury, but it does make me wonder how this team would look with a frontline of Okur, Millsap, Jefferson, Favors and Evans.

Maybe I am being too harsh on the Jazz. They were without Paul Millsap and it isn’t like Al Jefferson is normally going to go 4-13 from the field. This team will be better than a team that losses by 21 to the Timberwolves. Right? Regardless it won’t matter this year. This year’s season is over as the Jazz have been reduced to an organization that should focus their efforts on player development and scouting.

Yesterday, Al Jefferson scored 34 points on 71% shooting and won the game on a tip-in at the buzzer. This was another impressive recent game from the Jazz power forward. Following Jefferson this year there have been two main things that have stuck out:

1. How much better he has played without Deron Williams?
2. How there seems to be a reverse correlation between how Jefferson is playing and the Jazz winning?

Looking at the first point here are some numbers to consider:

• In the 8 games after Williams was traded, Jefferson has scored 28 points a game on 60% shooting.
• In the 57 games he played with Williams he averaged 17.4 points per game on 48% shooting.
• His average game score (a Hollinger metric used to judge a player’s productivity in a game) went from 13.7 per game with Williams to 23.5 without Williams.

In the pre-season Williams told Jefferson that he was going to “make him an All-Star.” It is early, but if he continues at this rate then Williams would have fulfilled that prediction by leaving.

Below is a graph where I took Jefferson’s game score and average them out in five game buckets. For example the first bucket (games 1-5) shows Jefferson’s game score average of 13.5. The last bucket (games 61-65) shows Jefferson’s game score average of 23.1.

There is definitely an upwards trend that graphically represents Jefferson’s impressive streak lately. However, as Jefferson has improved the Jazz have been losing more and more. Below is a breakdown of the number of wins in those same 5 game buckets:

Unfortunately Al Jefferson’s improvement hasn’t resulted in wins. That doesn’t mean that Jefferson’s good play is preventing the Jazz from winning. There could be many other factors affecting the Jazz ability to win. I assume the Jazz optimist will look at Jefferson’s recent play as a positive, while the Jazz pessimist will think Jefferson is one of those players that only plays well on bad teams. Time will tell if Jefferson is a good player stuck on a bad team (think Ray Allen in Seattle) or an overrated player who only puts up good stats on bad teams (Shareef Abdur-Rahim).

It has been nearly two weeks since the Deron Williams trade and the Jazz are still trying to find out what they have in Derrick Favors and Devin Harris. The two players have only played a combined 272 minutes, which is way too small of a sample size to start judging that portion of the trade. (We won’t know about the success of the two draft picks for awhile, so it will be even longer before we can judge the second part of the trade. In other words it is going to be a long time before we know if this trade was a net positive, negative or neutral for the Jazz.)

However, I am impatient, so I reached out to Mark Ginocchio of the Truehoop Nets blog Nets are Scorching. For anyone interested in the Nets or the NBA in general I highly recommend this blog.  I had read some of his opinions on the trade and wanted to ask him some questions on Derrick Favors and Devin Harris. Below are my questions and his insightful answers

KM - I heard rumors that Devin Harris was frustrated with losing and wasn’t giving as much effort as he did early in his career.  Are these rumors true? Did you see a consistent effort from Harris or do you think that he would only play hard in certain situations?

MG – Let me preface this by saying that Devin Harris was really put through a lot this season, starting in the preseason when he was first mentioned as trade bait in a Carmelo Anthony deal. He’s said all the right things, and while he’s dealt with his share of injuries, I never thought he was milking an injury due to lack of interest or effort (a la Vince Carter in Toronto). However, I do think Harris suffers from some focus issues and he didn’t seem to appreciate Avery Johnson’s micromanaging. There are games where Harris appears like he’s looking to score first, create second and then there are times where he’s looking to pass too much, rather than take an open shot or create for his slumping team. And he’s always been a wild card on the defensive end. He was one of the best defensive PGs I’d ever seen when he was in Dallas, but since he’s come to the Nets, his effort and focus on that end had to be questioned, especially during last seasons’ 12-win campaign.

KM - Derrick Favors – was he someone you wanted to draft? Was the plan all along to bring him along slowly? Did it concern you that he only played 19 minutes a game, while other rookie post players Demarcus Cousins and Greg Monroe were playing 27 and 26 minutes a game respectively? If you could go back in time would you have had the Nets draft someone else?

MG – Once the Nets lost the John Wall sweepstakes, I think the idea for front office was to draft Favors and to use his boundless potential as trade bait for a “superstar” player. He was the centerpiece for any talks for Anthony, and obviously a key to the Deron Williams trade.

He’s just so raw, but he has crazy athleticism and good defensive instincts (though he picks up way too many stupid fouls). I would have loved getting to watch him come around slowly, but I obviously understand why the Nets would shop him for guys like Deron and ‘Melo (more so Deron). Giving that the Nets were almost certain to trade that pick, I can’t imagine wanting someone else. Cousins is a head case and would probably scare some teams off, and nobody else taken after Favors seems to have his ceiling as an athletic freak.

KM – Derrick Favors – He seems like an active rebounder, but when it comes to shooting he is limited to dunks and layups. Are there any insights you had while watching Favors play?

MG – Favors can also mix in a mid-range jumper from time-to-time but I don’t think he’s ever going to be a traditional stretch-four. However, a lot of his offensive limitations, at least with the Nets, were brought on because the team never called any sets for Favors. He was on the floor primarily to rebound, block shots, and scavage points through putbacks and easy dunks. I don’t think Avery Johnson ever had any confidence in him as an offensive player.

KM – Harris and Favors – The Jazz have really struggled defensively (20th in defensive efficiency). Will Harris and Favors help there?

MG – Provided that Favors can stay on the floor, I say yes. Kris Humphries is a better scorer and rebounder than Favors, but the team still had a better defensive efficiency when Favors was on the floor as opposed to Hump. As for Harris, as I said earlier, it depends on where his effort and focus level are. When he’s 100%, Harris can be a lockdown defender, but he hasn’t really focused on that aspect of his game since his Dallas days.

In 1990 the British band Go West came out with the song “King of Wishful Thinking.” It is equal parts catchy and annoying. Check out the lyrics and you might see some similarities with the Utah Jazz situation right now. Anyway, in the interest of getting over Deron Williams I want to provide the extreme optimistic view on the trade.

• Devin Harris - Will be 85% the point guard of Deron Williams at 50% the cost. This will provide the Jazz with a solid point guard and financial flexibility.
• Nets 1st round draft pick 2011- Right now the Jazz have a 6.3% chance of winning the 1st pick. In an ideal world the Nets will keep losing and the Jazz will end up with a top 3 pick that they use on Kyrie Irving. Irving then becomes a superstar point guard.
• Warriors 1st round pick 2012- In this scenario the Jazz are set at point guard (Irving and Harris), power forward (Millsap and Favors) and center (Jefferson and Okur). They Jazz would use this probable late lottery pick on a dynamic wing. This wing player will be combined with a Hayward for a young, productive nucleus at shooting guard/small forward.
• Derrick Favors - This is the ultimate stretch, but stay with me for a second. Not many NBA players were really good at 19 years old. Favors was a highly regarded high school prospect (#3 according to rivals) and a highly drafted prospect (3rd pick last year). He has been relatively productive (WS/48 of 0.9) in limited minutes with the Nets. He is a good rebounder and shoots a high percentage. There are obvious faults (outside shooting and passing ability are the primary ones I see), but again he is only 19 years old and from all indications has a ton of talent. Now I know this isn’t fair and I am certainly not making any predictions based on this, but check out the comparasion between Derrick Favors rookie year and Kevin Garnett’s rookie year. Both were high draft picks, who played the post on terrible teams. 

I decided to compare Favors as a 19 year old with other highly drafted post players to see how his numbers compared to other players numbers as either a 19 year old, a rookie or both. Below is the comparisonof the advanced stats with the numbers highlighted in green being better than Favors and the red numbers being worse than Favors. The stronger the color determines the degree of difference. If the cell is not highlighted then the numbers are very similar to Favors current numbers:

The summary is that it doesn’t look like Favors is going to be a bust like Darko, Curry, or Kwame Brown. However, the flip side is that I wouldn’t bet on Favors being as productive as Love or Howard. Since I am being optimistic though I decided to focus on the remarkable similarities in offensive rating, defensive rating and WS/48 between KG and Favors.

Anyway, the goal of this post is to provide optimism to the Jazz fans that might be spending too much time refreshing Chad Ford’s mock draft lottery. The draft is four months away and it is looking more and more likely that June 23rd is going to be an important day for the Jazz organization.

My first impressions of the trade of Deron Williams to the Nets for Derrick Favors, Devin Harris and two first round picks are below:

• First impression is positive. The Jazz couldn’t afford to be “Lebroned” and to get what they did from the Nets looks to be a fair deal.
• Normally, I don’t like trading a quarter for two dimes, but I feel like all things consider Kevin O’Connor did a great job. My only regret is that he didn’t do this earlier in the year before the Jazz lost Coach Sloan.
• Can an organization known for its stability have a crazier few weeks than the Jazz?
• The Jazz are now a better defensive team. Deron Williams was an extremely talented offensive player, but defensively he had regressed. This was my own opinion from watching the Jazz play and the data on basketballvalue.com seems to support it considering the Jazz are 10.24 points per 100 possesion better when Deron Williams was off the court. Not that +/- is the end all be all, but it is worth noting that he was the worst Jazz defender based on that.
• The Jazz are going to go from a bad 3 point shooting team (34% is 21st in the league) to an even worse 3 point shooting team. Deron Williams is a career 35.8% three point shooter compared to Devin Harris’ 30% mark from behind the line. How is this going to affect their offense.
• Harris has been an above-average NBA point guard during his time in the league. As such he is paid as an above-average NBA point guard. His salary over the next 2.5 years is reasonable at $9.3M next year and $8.5M the following year.
• Derrick Favors will probably be the player that makes or breaks this trade. He is only 19 and is already a solid power forward. His WS/48 is 0.09, which is right below the average NBA player of 0.10. In the immediate future he should help the Jazz with their rebounding considering his TRB% of 16.2% would be the highest on the Jazz team. In the long term his rookie contract is very favorable to the Jazz considering the natural progression one should expect from a 19 year old forward.
• I like the Jazz getting depth on the front court to match up with teams like the Lakers. Of course this comes at the expense of their backcourt. I really wished a Jazz trade would bring along a shooting guard who was at least average. Raja Bell’s time as a starter in this league should be coming to an end.
• A lot of this trade will depend on the 1st round picks the Jazz get. Will they be high and will the team actually make any good picks? If those picks turn into Morris Almond and Kosta Koufus 2.0 then that will obviously be a disappointment.

Overall I am pleased and wish Deron Williams well in New Jersey. He played well for the Jazz for 5.5 years and even with the Sloan situation he was a great draft pick for the team. Of course I think it can now definitely be written that the Jazz should have drafted Chris Paul.

Anyway, those are my quick thoughts on this trade. Any other thoughts?

The Jazz season has taken a sudden turn for the worse. An icon has left the team and the short and long term outlook looks to be very negative. The pessimism from Jazz fans has reached a point that it kind of reminds me of the state of the Jazz entering the 2003-2004 season. Following a 1st round exit, John Stockton retired and Karl Malone left to go to the LA Lakers. The outlook was bleak. To give you a comparison the Jazz going into the 2003-2004 season weren’t thought of much differently than this year’s Cleveland Cavaliers. 

Somehow Jerry Sloan was able to work his magic and help that team win 42 games. The fact that the Jazz almost made the playoffs was as close to a miracle as you can see in the NBA. Let’s consider some of the facts:

• The offense on that team was dreadful considering their eFG% of 45.6% (23^rd in the league) and offensive efficiency of 83 points per 100 possessions (24^th in the league) are two of the worst stats you will see for a Jazz team.
• The following players were the top eight in terms of minutes played; Andrei Kirilenko, Greg Ostertag, Raja Bell, Carlos Arroyo, Jarron Collins, Raul Lopez, DeShawn Stevenson and Sasha Pavlovic.
• The three highest players were Ostertag, Glen Rice and Keon Clark..

Besides Jerry Sloan (who should have won the Coach of the Year award that year) the main reason the Jazz weren’t the 2010/2011 Cavs was Andrei Kirilenko. In contrast to Malone or Stockton, who thrived with predictability and order , AK47 was one of those players who excelled in chaos. When a play broke down or something unexpected happened, Kirilenko always seemed to be there with a steal, block, assist or dunk.  He finished the 2003-2004 season as one of the best players in the league. He was 5^th overall in Win Shares, 13^th in WS/48, 7^th in steal %, 5^th in block %, 8^th in PER and he did this all while playing the most minutes of his career. Also, in terms of a value in the NBA it doesn’t get much better than paying $955K for 11.6 wins. 

On October 30th, 2004 the Jazz rewarded Kirilenko with a max contract worth $86 million over 6 years. By doing this the Jazz were signaling the post-Stockton/Malone era was going to be led by Kirilenko. They are still paying for that mistake. They are still carrying that albatross.

In fairness to the Jazz the mistake didn’t seem like a poor decision at the time. At the time he was young, productive and someone who looked to be getting better. Right after he signed the contract Bill Simmons rated him 13th in his trade value column. Below is what he wrote at the time about Kirilenko:

He’s only 23 … made $955,000 last season … already the second-best defensive player alive (behind Ben Wallace, ahead of Ron Artest) … perfectly capable of creating his own offense, although he’s too unselfish to do it … put up rotolines of “19-5-7-8-5″ and “10-12-6-6-5″ in the span of eight days last December … grabbed a starting spot on the annual “Guys Who Would Just Be Plain Fun To Play With” team, along with Yao, Luke Walton, Brent Barry and 11-time MVP Jason Kidd … and he looks like a cross between Fred Roberts and Ivan Drago.

However, he been in a constant decline ever since he signed that contract to the point that he is now the 4th best player on the team. Just looking at Bill Simmons trade columns he went down from 13th to 15th to 29th to 56th to one of the worst contracts. He is still a productive player, but he is no where near being worth being the 6th highest paid player in the NBA. Below are two graphs that show that while his salary increased tremendously his productivity has actually declined.

This albatross has had a real impact on the Jazz roster, because talented players have left or been traded away because the Jazz could afford them. Below is a list of the players that left primarily because of money concerns:

• Mo Williams? Went from making $366K to $1.8M from the Bucks. Would the Jazz have signed him if they hadn’t signed Kirilenko?
• Eric Maynor -The only reason Maynor was traded was because the Jazz were over the luxury tax and the Thunder agreed to take Matt Harpring’s contract. The team wouldn’t have had to do that if Kirilenko had never been signed to his current deal. I would much rather have Maynor than Earl Watson or Ronnie Price.
• Kyle Korver – The 3 year – $15 million contract wasn’t unreasonable for a player like Korver, but it seemed like the Jazz didn’t even consider bringing him back. Would they have considered it if they had had some additional room left under the salary cap? A career 41% three point shooter, who also doubled as free throw closer is worth $5 million a year.
• Ronnie Brewer - Why did the Jazz sign Raja Bell over Brewer? The salary difference wasn’t that much, so maybe including Brewer in this discussion is unfair. Regardless, the Jazz did trade Brewer to the Grizzlies because of the luxury tax. The outcome of this was a negative reaction from Deron Williams and a smaller chance of winning in the 2010 playoffs. Also, the trade gave more playing time to the last player on this list. This helped drive up his market value and ultimately led to the Jazz losing both Brewer and his replacement.
• Carlos Boozer – Despite his shortcomings, Carlos Boozer is a better player than Al Jefferson. Check out their stats next to each other if you don’t believe me. No matter what John Hollinger wrote in the preseason, I think it is clear the Jazz are a better team with Boozer as opposed to Jefferson. Would the Jazz have signed Boozer and not traded for Jefferson if they didn’t have to worry about Kirilenko? They might have decided against keeping Boozer, but it would at least have been an option. Also, an option would have been keeping the player below.
• Wesley Matthews – This is one that really hurts considering the Jazz situation at shooting guard. Raja Bell and C.J. Miles continue to be below-average options, while Wesley Matthews has played well in Portland. The Jazz passed on a Matthews contract partly because of the luxury tax penalties they would have incurred because of Kirilenko.

Now the real unfortunate thing might not be the signing of the contract or even the decline of his play. The worst part of this entire story might have been the out the Jazz were given in September 2007. Kirilenko asked to be let out of his contract. This was a get out of jail free card for the Jazz. They should have done whatever it took to honor his request and voided his contract. It would have been the best thing for both the Jazz (who were paying too much for what they were getting) and Kirilenko (who would have been more happy in Russia). That is the point in time I wish the Jazz organization could go back in time and try again.

In the meantime as a Jazz fan I am glad that there are only a few more months left of paying a max contract to Andrei Kirilenko.

For the longest time I have been a Jazz fan and being a Jazz fan over the past 23 years means that I have been watching a Jerry Sloan coached team. Today, Jerry Sloan announced he was resigning as head coach of the Jazz. There will be ample time to get into the reasons why, but for now I would just like to focus on the amazing, unprecedented career for Coach Sloan. In my life there has been no other comparison.

Around the time I was born in 1983, Coach Sloan started off as Scout Sloan with the Utah Jazz. He later transitioned to the role of assistant coach and by the time I was ready to enter kindergarten he had taken over as head coach of the Jazz from Frank Layden. He was successful from the start as he led the Jazz to a 55-27 record in his first full year as the head coach.  He was consistently good to the point that I went from being a kindergartener to a sophomore in college without ever seeing the Jazz miss the playoffs. Think about that. My life changed in immeasurable ways, but one thing that was constant was watching Jerry Sloan lead the Jazz to the playoffs.

When John Stockton retired and Karl Malone left, many thought that this was going to be the end of the line. Things really bottomed out by the time I was graduating college as the Jazz finished a 26-56 season. They then drafted a point guard prospect out of Coach Sloan’s home state of Illinois named Deron Williams. Pairing Williams with free agents Mehmet Okur and Carlos Boozer paid dividends almost immediately. By the time I was really feeling comfortable working in corporate America, Coach Sloan had led the Jazz back to the Western Conference Finals.

It is amazing to think of how long Coach Sloan has been the head coach of the Jazz. There have been 245 coaching changes in the NBA since he became the head coach of the Jazz. There has been two trips to the NBA Finals. There have been 1,127 regular season wins. There has been a changing of the guard from Stockton/Malone to Williams/Boozer. There have been inventions in technology that have changed the world with the added side bonus of allowing people like me to share their thoughts on blogs like this. There are many, many ways to slice and dice the ways things have changed since he started. For me it comes down to the fact that you can chart certain milestones in my life with the career of Coach Sloan.

Thank you Coach Sloan for being a Hall of Fame coach for the Jazz. You will be missed.

Tomorrow the Bulls visit Salt Lake City for one of the more anticipated games of the year. The reason isn’t the return of Kyle Korver of Ronnie Brewer, even if both of them played in a combined 446 games in a Jazz uniform. The reason isn’t because the Jazz are trying to get an important win that will help them improve their current playoff odds from the coin flip ESPN is projecting right now. Those are both important reasons, but the real reason is that Carlos Boozer returns to face a team that paid him over $70 million for 6 seasons of mixed results.

The story of Carlos Boozer was always a complicated one. In the beginning there was controversy over Boozer supposedly going back on his word to the Cavs to sign a free agent deal with the Jazz. In the middle there were injuries that made Jazz fans miss the stability of players like Stockton and Malone. In the end there was Boozer being a little too honest and public about his desires to play for another team. From the alpha to omega, Boozer was one of the most discussed players in Jazz history.

Now, that his tenure is over for the Jazz it is safe to look back on his Jazz career and provide a passing or failing grade to the contract. Let’s review the pros and cons of Boozer’s tenure with the Jazz:

• Pro - When he played he played well. His WS/48 was always above average and most of the time it was in the All-Star caliber range.
• Con - He missed 138 possible regular season games due to injuries. I don’t know if you can fault him for getting injured, but this was something that really hurt the Jazz during those six years.
• Pro – The 2006-2007 Season: He played in 90% of the regular season games and during that time he played incredibly well. He produced 10 out of the 51 regular season wins and finished 8th in the league in Player Efficiency Rating. He continued his incredible play in the playoffs by leading the Jazz to the Western Conference Finals. The key game and one of the most exciting, memorable Jazz games of my life was the Game 7 victory over  the Rockets in Houston.  Boozer finished with 35 points on 56% shooting in 41 minutes of playing time.  Also, he had 14 rebounds, including an the game winning offensive rebound plus two free throws with 20 seconds left.
• Con – The 2005-2006 Season: He played in less than half the Jazz games and only contributed 3.5 Win Shares for a Jazz team that missed the playoffs with only 41 wins. The team had to expect more for a player being paid $11.5 million that year.
• Pro – Helping the Jazz get back into the playoffs: In the years after Stockton and Malone left the team a lot of people thought the Jazz were in for a long, painful road back to the playoffs. If you need an example check out the Minnesota Timberwolves without Kevin Garnett over these past 4 years. However, the Jazz didn’t fall in this trap because with the help of Boozer they became a perennial playoff team again. In Boozer’s last four years the Jazz made the playoffs, which is something that shouldn’t be discounted.
• Con – Matching up against the Lakers: Boozer was a great player for the Jazz. For all the negativity surrounding him, it doesn’t change that fact that against most teams Boozer was a dominant inside force. One huge exception however was when Boozer and the Jazz played the Lakers. He was too short to guard Gasol and too slow to guard Odom. Unfortunately for the Jazz they were matched up three consecutive times in the playoffs against the Lakers. The final result of those three matchups were three wins for the Jazz and twelve wins for the Lakers. A 20% winning percentage, even against the best team in the conference, was not a pretty sight for Jazz fans.

Final Notes

In the end Boozer’s career answered many questions. Was the contract he signed overpriced? Yes, he was paid $70 million to produce 40.2 wins, which means the Jazz on average paid $1.75M per win. To give you a comparison Mehmet Okur produced more wins (44.8) and was paid $20 million less over the same time period. Was he effective on offense? Absolutely yes. Deron Williams and Boozer ran a great pick and roll that helped make the Jazz one of the best offenses in the league. He made 54% of his field goals for the Jazz, which is better than Millsap and Jefferson’s 53% and 48% respective field goal percentages this year. Was he terrible on defense (especially again the Lakers)? Yes and no. His struggles guarding other players was often lamented, but at least he could be counted on grabbing defensive rebounds. Also, the defensive efficiency for this year’s Jazz team is worse than it ever was in any of Boozer’s six years with the Jazz.

In the end was Boozer worth it? Did the pros outweigh the cons? Was he career in Utah a success? All things consider my conclusion is yes.

I don’t want to write about last night’s game against the Lakers. The lazy turnovers, the poor defense and the missed shots all contributed to one of the more depressing losses in recent Jazz history. It wasn’t that the loss was unexpected (the Jazz always seem to lose to the Lakers, which is another story), but the way the Jazz lost made me wonder if this team was going to ever win again.

They have to win again. I mean they have still won 60% of their games and have exactly the same record as last year’s Jazz team did after 45 games, so they have to be a better team than what they have shown over the past five games. So what does it take for the Jazz to win? To answer that questions I looked at the team game log for this year as well as Hollinger’s overall team stats. From the game log I tried to see what stats made the most difference in the Jazz winning or losing a game. For the overall team stats I looked at the past nine years to see if there was any relationship between the stats and each season’s total win total for the Jazz. 

The most important statistic in predicting total team wins is effective field goal percentage. There is a 76% *correlation between how the Jazz shoot and how many wins the team can expect in a year. They won 54 games in the 07-08 season, which not coincidentally enough was the season they shot the best with an eFG% of 52.8%. This year they are have an eFG% of 50%, which is good for 14th in the league and is the Jazz worst mark since the 2005-2006 season.

*Just a quick note explaining correlation. Correlation in my example looks at the mutual relationship between two sets of data. The higher the correlation % the more in line the two sets of data (wins and eFG% for example) move together.

Below is the correlation chart between Hollinger’s team stats and overall Jazz wins:

Considering that eFG% is the most important stat for winning then it would help the Jazz win more if players like Kirilenko and Jefferson made a little bit more than their 47.9% eFG%. Kirilenko seems to settle for too many mid-range jump shots and not surprisingly his jump shot eFG% comes in at only 41%. Every time he shoots one of those mid-range shots he is decreasing the chance the Jazz will win. Unfortunately it seems like he is relying more and more on his jump shot. As a percentage of total shots his % of jump shots has gone up from 54% to 55% to 61% the past three years. Both Kirilenko and Jefferson need to stop settling for jump shots and take the ball to the basket more.

One thing that has been mentioned by Hollinger and on Monday in an excellent article by Zach Lowe is how the Jazz defense has been a problem. His main points are the Jazz aren’t good defenders and don’t do a good job of grabbing defensive rebounds. For the Jazz both stats have been less important in predicting total wins. Over the past nine seasons defensive rebounding has only had a 25% correlation to wins and defensive efficiency only has had a 31% correlation to wins. In other words both stats are important in predicting wins for the Jazz (the better the Jazz are = more wins), but they seem to be less important for the Jazz than for other NBA teams.

Now to switch courses a little bit, let’s look at the game logs to see how the Jazz do under different parameters. I wanted to answer the question of what stats predict the probability of the Jazz winning. I went through the game log and ran a few scenarios to see how the Jazz have done over the past 45 games. Start each point below with “When the Jazz…”

• Shoot better than their opponent in field goal % they have won 88% (22 out of 25) of their games.
• Have a better than their average (1.74) assist to turnover rate they have won 87% (20 out of 23) of their games.
• Shoot better than their average 46.3% they have won 83% (19 out of 23 games) of their games.
• Shoot better than their average (78.4%) on free throws they have won 81% (17 out of 21) of their games.
• Shoot better than their average (35.8%) on three pointers they have won 70% (14 out of 20) of their games.
• Have a better than average (71%) defensive rebounding rate they have won 63% (10 out of 16) of their games.
• Shoot worse than their average of 46.3% they have won 36% (8 out of 14 games) of their games.
• Shoot worse than their opponent they have won only 25% (5 out of 15 games) of their games.
• Have a worse assist to turnover rate than their opponent they have won only 19% (3 out of 16) of their games.

Therefore it isn’t much of a surprise how the Jazz lost to the Lakers last night. They need to shoot better and turn the ball over less. Basically they just need to play better basketball. I am probably pointing out the obvious with this analysis, but considering I didn’t want to write about the game last night this was a worthwhile distraction.

Before we get to the question about whether or not Paul Millsap should be an All-Star this year let’s consider a simple question. Why is Millsap not even in consideration?  First, Millsap was left off the ballot. Now, Bill Simmons writes an All-Star preview and lists out 22 Western Conference players without mentioning Millsap. I understand that he might not be a shoe-in All-Star for a lot of reasons. Does the 4th best team need two All Stars? (Deron Williams is a definite All-Star, and I would challenge anyone to disagree with that statement.) Do his stats really measure up?  I think it is a discussion that needs to be had and thankfully for the loyal readers of this blog I’m up for the challenge.

Let’s review the 12 forwards that were listed ahead of Millsap in Simmons All-Star game article.  Carmelo Anthony, Kevin Durant, Pau Gasol, Dirk Nowitzki, Kevin Love, Blake Griffin, Tim Duncan, LaMarcus Aldridge, Lamar Odom, Zach Randolph and Luis Scola. One thing that most of those players have in common (exceptions are Duncan, Gasol and Odom) is that they score a lot of points. In fact if you look at just points per game then it is pretty clear why Millsap was left off the list of potential All-Stars. The 17.2 points per game that Millsap is averaging doesn’t imply All-Star forward.

However, if you look at advanced stats then the case can be made that Millsap should be in consideration. You still might come down on the side that he shouldn’t be an All-Star, but at least you will include him in the conversation. Below are the advanced stats for those 12 players with the stats worse than Millsap’s highlighted in red:

Here is a summary of the above:

• Paul Millsap does two things incredibly well that most people probably either don’t realize or discount. He is really good at stealing the ball (2.1 STL %) and not turning the ball over (9.3% TOV). Those numbers ranked 1st and 2nd respectively out of the twelve highlighted forwards.
• Millsap also has really good shooting percentages. His effective field goal percentage of 54% is only behind Odom and Nowitzki among the forwards.
• Millsap also is an underrated defender. While, it is hard to quantify defensive impact (for example how do you judge defensive rotations?) you can look at his steal percentage and his block percentage of 2.1%and realize that if nothing else Millsap is an active defensive player.
• Overall this translates into a pretty good Win Shares and Win Shares per 48 minutes. Out of the twelve forwards he comes in at 7th in Win Shares and 6th in Win Shares per 48 minutes.

That being written, I would move the following players behind Millsap in the Western Conference forward All-Star queue:

1. Luis Scola- I hope this was another joke by Simmons like his Greg Oden line. The only thing Scola has over Millsap is rebounds, assists and usage %. The first two are only minor differences though.
2. Carmelo Anthony- An overrated scorer with bad advanced numbers, who also just happens to have played 15% less minutes than Millsap.
3. Zach Randolph- This is closer than the first two, but still I think Millsap is a better player. Randolph shoots a worse percentage and has an absolutely dreadful assist percentage of 7.6% compared to Millsap’s 12%.
4. LaMarcus Aldridge- Millsap shoots better, rebounds better, passes better, steals better and turns the ball over less.  How is this even close? Alridge has played a ton of minutes and blocks a few more shots, but that shouldn’t make up for the fact that Millsap is a much better player. Even Alridge’s points per 36 minutes is only 1.5 more than Millsap’s 18.1, so you can’t really point to scoring as that big of difference.
5. Blake Griffin- This might surprise people who only watch Sportscenter highlights because Griffin is a regular on the Top 10, but his numbers aren’t very far off from Millsap. Griffin gets the lead in PER because of his strong PPG and rebounding numbers. Millsap gets the lead in WS/48 minutes because of his better shooting efficiency numbers. I am fine if you want to put Griffin ahead of Millsap, but it isn’t as easy as one of Griffin’s slam dunks.

After that I would concede the argument to Duncan (great player on the best team), Odom (his numbers surprised me as well), Durant, Nowitzki, Love and Gasol.  That would place six forwards on the roster.  If we filled in the guards with Chris Paul, Kobe Bryant, Manu Ginoboli, Russell Westbrook and Deron Williams that would leave one open spot. If you are following my train of thought then you might realize that the 12th man on the 2011 Western Conference All-Star team should be Paul Millsap.