In an attempt to memorialize Utah’s biggest lottery defeat since falling to number 6 in 2005, here is my stream of consciousness during the proceedings last night:

All you need to know for this live-blog to make sense is that I care way too much about the NBA Draft and wildly overrate the value of draft picks.  I rearranged my work schedule to be able to watch the draft lottery and I’ve spent all day trying to not get my hopes up about the Jazz getting Golden State’s draft pick.  I failed, and I really hope that Utah pulls it out.  Sure, the Jazz would get the Warriors’ pick next year as a consolation prize, but today Chad Ford called next year’s draft terrible and I hate delaying gratification.

5:08:  They finally turn it over to the Mock Draft crew and I’m instantly placated by the meaninglessness of everything that Jay Bilas is saying.  Thank goodness for Jay Bilas.  Mark Jones asks Bilas a question about Anthony Davis and Bilas, for the 5,868th time in his career, says that the ‘sky is the limit’ for Davis.

5:11  Jeff Van Gundy calls Magic Johnson “Earvin” and Mark Jones looked confused.

5:12:  Andre Drummond is asked about raising the age limit.  As a resident expert, he says something like, “Umm… once in my sophomore year of high school I took Home Ec… so I think I’m good.  Go UConn!!!”

5:14:  Little known fact:  the Magic 8-Ball gimmick was a late night hit for the Game Show Network back in 1992.  They used the same set.

5:20:  In order to prevent myself from thinking of things more likely than 28%, I’ve spent the last few minutes trying to figure out the age border where analysts start calling Magic Johnson “Earvin.”  So far, Jeff Van Gundy and Mike Wilbon are the only ones on the show to make the leap, so I’m thinking the age requirement is like 45.  How old is Wilbon, anyway?  I really hope we get this pick.

5:26-  Heather Cox interviews David Stern.  It’s heavily edited, but thankfully left in Stern’s dissertation on how everyone is tweeting everything all the time (at the expense of his explanation of why he thinks the age limit should be raised).

5:29-  Do the Jazz have a 28% chance or a 26% chance?  Everyone keeps saying different things.  I suppose that if Charlotte gets the first pick, all of their ping pong balls are gone, raising lower teams’ odds at jumping into the top 3.  Though, on the other hand, that also increases Golden State’s odds at getting into the lottery as well, so the proportions stay the same.  I’m not sure, but I think that the final answer is that there is a 27.3% chance that the Jazz get the pick.  Approximately.

5:33- Magic Johnson decides that Miami’s championship merit depends on their ability to beat a hobbled and old Celtics team (playing its 17th playoff game) in Boston on Friday.  Somewhere, Gregg Popovich laughs heartily and changes the channel.

5:37- Uh-oh.  We’re getting closer.  The’re back to the draft crew and this time they have the official draft ticker at the bottom.  Jay Bilas says everything about Perry Jones that everyone has been saying for two years.  He then pretends that Tyler Zeller isn’t the same person as Patrick O’Bryant and everyone else.

5:46- Mike Wilbon says that 14 teams are hoping the balls bounce their way.  Fifteen teams care this year, Wilbon.  Fifteen.

5:55-  I have no idea why Andre Drummond or Thomas Robinson are here.  What does the lottery tell them?  Drummond could fall down to number six and Robinson could go that low too.  Where is Anthony Davis?  Why am I not seeing him all the time?

5:58- They show the draft order again.  Golden State’s logo is almost illegible.  It looks more like a crystal ball.  Does that mean something?  Or is just my feed?

6:01-  Jay Bilas defends his love for Jeremy Lamb to Chad Ford (under the guise of people who don’t have Lamb in their top ten), stopping just short of saying, “Lamb played in a major conference!  A MAJOR CONFERENCE, CHAD!!!”

6:07-  The analysts pick who they think will win the lottery.  This is awesome because it actually is nothing but a guessing game, which is what they normally do, which is probably why they sound so confident when they pick teams like New Orleans.

6:08-  Everyone keeps talking about the 14 teams whose fates will be decided by the lottery!  THERE ARE FIFTEEN TEAMS CONNECTED.  The Jazz matter! Really!

6:10-  I think I’m going to be sick.  I’m going to be so sad when we don’t get this pick.  I can’t believe how likely I think 27.3% chances are.

6:12- Wes Matthews is representing Portland.  For some reason, I take this to be a bad omen.  Bob Myers and Peter Guber are here for Golden State.  One of the owners is here?  He must know something we don’t.  This is bad.  This is really bad.

6:13-  The Nets girl relays information about drug trade in Russian to Mikhail Prokhorov via ESPN.  The Cavs are staying with the hot hand.

6:15-  Rich Cho looks more scared than everyone else.  He looks like he’s the general manager of the worst professional basketball team of all time.  One final look at the odds. 27.3% chance.  I can’t breathe.

6:16- Houston, Phoenix, Milwaukee.  Chalk so far.  This is bad.

6:16:- Portland.  Wes Matthews doesn’t care.  New Orleans.  We’re doomed.

6:16- Detroit.  THIS IS OUR LAST CHANCE.

6:17-  We lost.

6:18- Anthony Davis, looking terrified at the realization that he is either going to Washington, New Orleans, or Charlotte.  This is a bad day for him.

6:20-  The commercials are still running.  I’m so sad about this.  Even a shot of LeBron  reading through Catching Fire doesn’t make me feel any better.

6:22-  Anthony Davis is going to New Orleans.  Everyone is going to say the fix is in, and maybe they’re right.  I don’t care.  Stupid Warriors.  There should be a rule voiding all losses instituted when starting five rookies.  What’s amazing is that no one is even going to care very much.  Golden State’s Oakland fans are all deeply hurt because the team is leaving and the San Francisco’s “fans” don’t care because they are rightfully embarrassed to be taking on a franchise so pathetic and useless.  Nobody cares, except for Perry Jones, who will spend the next three years underperforming in Oakland before he gets dealt along with a top-7 protected draft pick for John Lucas III, who will be putting up 13 and 7 during a contract year.  Stupid Warriors.  Stupid lottery.

If you want to read more about the Lottery Disaster, head over to SI.com and check out Zach Lowe’s article about how the lottery actually works.

Perhaps it’s because there has been no Jazz basketball for two weeks. Perhaps it’s because when I watch Manu Ginobili play, I feel a deep longing for what he could become.  Or perhaps it’s because I’m still coping with the devastating Spurs sweep. But most likely, I watched this video of Gordon Hayward’s high school state championship game over and over again, because I needed to be reminded that rooting for Gordon Hayward is almost always a rewarding pursuit. Following his disappearing act in the Spurs series, I temporarily forgot that the only reason we had even made the playoffs was because Hayward played all-star level basketball for the last month of the season. Then I watched this video, and I remembered.

The entertainment value of this video is driven by the amusing fact that high school Gordon Hayward and NBA player Gordon Hayward look like, for all intents and purposes, the exact same person. I”m sure he grew in his Butler years, both physically and mentally, but it certainly doesn’t look like it. Brownsburg High School appears to be trotting out the current starting shooting guard for the Utah Jazz as their starting point guard. The happy consequence of Hayward’s unchanged visage in this video was that I felt like I was watching him playing in some obscure summer league, or showing up to play in the kind of random rec game that was all the rage during the lockout. Furthermore, I felt completely justified in drawing conclusions about current Gordon from watching a grainy video about 2008 Gordon. Some of these conclusions:

1. Running Gordon Hayward at the point is absolutely a good idea. I realize that in the few instances when Corbin has tried that experiment, it has failed; but if the offense was re-designed with a facilitating Gordon Hayward in mind, much like the way the Thunder use James Harden with their second unit (a creative, ball-handling, scoring point guard in behavior but a shooting guard in size and court placement), the team could maximize Hayward’s prodigious passing ability. Obviously judging his abilities at point guard based on his performance against other high schoolers would give you skewed results, but anyone who watched the Jazz this season knows that when Hayward is playing well, the whole team is playing well. Putting him at point guard is just a potential strategy to optimize his skill set and ensure that his solid play becomes even more contagious.

2. “Mental toughness” is an overused and often misapplied sports phrase that I usually loathe. Still, Gordon Hayward showed serious mental toughness in this game. To play three quarters of atrocious, brick-laying basketball in a championship game would plunge most professional players (let alone teenagers) into a crippling case of self-doubt that would then marginalize their effectiveness (see: James, LeBron–2011 NBA Finals). At least in this game, Hayward did the complete opposite. He took over the fourth quarter on offense, and before he got into foul trouble, his defense was suffocating. From what I could count, he scored six fourth quarter points (a big deal in a game that ended 40-39), including the buzzer-beating game winner. That was mental toughness.

3. High School basketball needs a shot clock across the board. Sweet mercy.

4. Hayward played confident in this game. Another prevalent theme from Hayward’s sophomore campaign was his wavering confidence. When he finally regained it late in the season, he was a different player. All of his shooting percentages spiked, most notably his free throw percentage–a good indicator of confidence.  He started taking over games when no one else could score. Even in his post game interviews, he seemed more comfortable.

His turnaround jump shot at the 5:33 mark of the clip was a thing of beauty. The good news is that with his height and his vertical, Hayward could get that shot whenever he wanted it, even in the NBA. The bad news is that taking that shot requires confidence to break out of the offensive set–confidence Hayward often appears to lack. The Jazz need the offensively assertive Hayward to provide wing scoring when no one else can, and if this last season was any indication, Hayward just needs time to adjust to the added expectations and the superior competition in the NBA, especially in the playoffs.

Most Valuable Player:

Evan Hall:  Gordon Hayward. During the push for the playoffs, Hayward was the best player on the team. In April, Hayward averaged 16 ppg, 4 rebounds, and 3.5 assists on 51/49/88 shooting splits. Read those splits again! 51% from the field, 49% from three, and 88% from the line! Those numbers are so Steve Nash-ian that I can’t stop using exclamation points!

Nick Smith:  Paul Millsap. While Jefferson may have carried the scoring load throughout the season, Millsap’s all around game makes this a no brainer. Millsap was also our best guy late in huge games.

Jackson Rudd:  This is tricky- Millsap had a lackluster second half of the season, Hayward and Harris had rough starts, and Big Al was never really the difference maker.  It has to be one of those four guys, though, so I’m going with Hayward.  The Jazz were 8-2 this season when he scored 20 points or more, but more importantly, his playmaking skills always fired up the offense and helped everyone get going.

Austin Horton:  Paul Millsap (player), Kevin O’Connor (personnel).  Call me crazy, but it would have to be Paul Millsap, with a honorable mention going to Kevin O’Connor. Obviously, the “P” in MVP would have to stand for Personnel, not Player, but you’ve got to make exceptions for O’Connor. The moves he made in such a short offseason when the lockout was officially ended, and the pick ups/signings he made DURING the season were as important as any on-court contribution from the players this season. But, for MV Player, it has to be Millsap no question.

Sam Strong: This will be the trendy pick but how can you can go with anyone but Milsap here? Anytime this team needed a big shot, after the ball was passed around way too many times, it ended up in Milsap’s hands and he delivered more times than anyone expected him to. He’s a hustle guy who was asked to be a superstar and he did an adequate job. Begrudgingly, runner up goes to Big Al. Hard to believe they make the playoffs without him.

Most Improved Player:

Hall:   Derrick Favors. Over the course of the season, Favors became a prolific rebounder, a decent scorer, and one of the 15 best low-post defenders in the NBA. Five years from now, the D-Will trade will look like a steal for the Jazz, and it will be all Derrick Favors’ fault.

Smith:  Has to be Gordon Hayward. Gordon Hayward is emerging as a mini LeBron James. I’m not putting him in that category, but Hayward can guard 4 positions, has great size, is great in both offensive AND defensive transition, and is great making plays for his teammates. Not many players in the league are that versatile.

Rudd:   Favors wins this by a mile.  Hayward only got the votes in the NBA’s Most Improved Player tally because the national media didn’t notice that he was already lighting everyone up the last month or two of his rookie year.  Favors didn’t put up dramatically better stats, but he became a dramatically stronger presence on the defensive end.  He started to gain a sense of how to take over games defensively that I have never seen from a Jazz player (possibly because there aren’t enough Mark Eaton highlights on YouTube).

Horton:  Gordon Hayward. While his offensive stats were actually slightly below last season’s final numbers (keep in mind it was a shorter season, and he almost DOUBLED his minutes played), his DEFENSIVE stats were light years improved from last season. Last year in 72 games played, Hayward logged 19 blocks, 30 steals, and 98 DRB’s. This season> 41 blocks, 53 steals, and 171 DRB’s. And in 6 LESS games than the previous year. (Addendum: I’d be surprised if he’s not NEXT year’s MIP as well)

Strong:  Hayward all day. I’ve never seen someone’s play drop off as severely as his did from the end of the regular season to the playoffs but that shouldn’t overshadow the strides he made this season. He looked like a lost 10 year-old kid at times last season. Now, he still looks like a 10 year-old but he’s found his groove. If he keeps playing the way he closed the year, he could be something very special.

Rookie of the Year:

Hall:  Alec Burks. I love Kanter, but Burks was the only player on the entire roster who could penetrate at will and consistently get to the foul line. He’s just a rookie, and he was already filling a necessary role for the team.

Smith:  Enes Kanter. While Burks’ play was solid and at times seem to be more convincing than Kanter’s, who honestly expected Kanter to play as well as he did after not having played basketball in 2 years. Sure he’s got a lot to work on, but a big men have the toughest transition into the NBA even if they are coming from the best college program in the country, let alone from a two year hiatus from competition. Kanter’s ability to contribute was a huge surprise.

Rudd:   I’m going with Kanter here based on his elite rebounding alone.  He is only 19 years old and he finished in the Top 10 rebounds-per-48-minutes in the entire league- and that’s not even taking into account the fact that he was competing for boards alongside Favors, who is ranked 15th on the same list.  I love Alec Burks, but Enes Kanter’s rebounding sets him apart for me.

Horton:  Alec Burks. Is anyone going with Kanter? Not that Enes had a bad season, but he definitely faded away as the year went on, while Alec Burks seemed to get stronger, more confident, and smarter as time went on. Burks can definitely bring the energy and ability needed to score a lot of points, and at times he almost single handedly conducted runs that aided the Jazz in comebacks, even if the team ultimately ended up losing the game. While he does have the curse of “when he misses, he misses and misses and misses,” Burks got love and respect from opponents around the league this season, and definitely didn’t look like a rookie for most of the season.

Strong:  The Big Enes’ mic drop almost sealed the deal but you have to go Burks here. Not only did he play more minutes and score more than Kanter, he didn’t look like a rookie when he was in there. Granted, I’m a bit biased, but at this point, Burks looks like more of a potential starter than Kanter.

Best Moment of the Year:

Hall:  Gordon Hayward’s double-block against the Celtics. Of all the highlights from this season, this will be the one I return to YouTube time and time again to watch.

Smith:   Derrick Favors taking over the playoff play-in game vs. Phoenix by completely shutting down anything and everything Phoenix brought down the lane, especially Gortat. Have the Jazz ever had a player that has changed the entire game by his defense? How many guys in the entire NBA can do that? Favors seems to be destined to be a top 5 PF.

Rudd:   March 2, Miami Heat, Devin Harris, and-1 for the win at the end of regulation.  That game made me believe that this team could actually beat anyone on a good night and served as the beginning of Devin Harris’ redemption.

Horton:  3OT Win over Dallas down the home stretch. Riding a 2 game losing streak (@ New Orleans, @Memphis) and looking like they were fading from the playoffs picture more every day, the Jazz were able to dig deep and knock off the depending NBA champions in 3 overtimes, withstanding furious efforts from Dirk, Jason Terry, and Jason Kidd. With that win I physically saw in some of the players’ eyes and faces that they finally BELIEVED they could and should make the playoffs. That game had everything in it. Joy, pain, success, failure, smart decision, ridiculous decisions, and yet the team was able to pool their efforts and come out with a giant win.

Strong:  This is a weird one and anyone who’s been near my Twitter profile knows I’m the last Big Al apologist on earth but his Ally-oop/Tip-in/Was-that-a-shot?-Who-Cares! game winner in Sacramento sticks out to me. That was the first time I remember believing that this could be a playoff team.

“If this team had a captain, it should have been…”

Hall:   I thought Corbin’s refusal to choose a captain was so awesome that I wrote an entire post about it, but with the advantage of hindsight, Devin Harris should have been the captain of this team. The idea of a Team Captain is all motivational symbolism anyway, so the captain should carry himself like the best player on the team, at times play like it, and be self-aware enough to defer when he’s off.

Smith:   Paul Millsap and Al Jefferson. Say what you want about their games, but leadership is about showing up and playing hard. Both of those guys did that all year long.
Pretty solid role models for our young guns. Now if Kanter can just keep learning Big Al’s footwork along the way…

Rudd:  Paul Millsap and Earl Watson should have been co-captains.  Both of them understood the team’s ceiling this season before anyone else did, they were the first players to show a lot of heart early on when things weren’t looking great, and they were both humble enough to do whatever the team needed them to do in order to win.

Horton:  Earl Watson.  If you say anyone else, you’re absurd. Watson was the ultimate leader, even when he was sidelined, from day 1. Even during the lockout when
he wasn’t under contract, the dude was still calling players together and contaminating them with his confidence and belief. There’s that word again, belief. Watson knew from the get go that this team was ready to bloom and achieve more than any outsiders expected. And not only did he say it, he believed it. He backed it up. And he was right. The young guys and the old vets all stood behind him, even if they themselves didn’t realize it. He was the leader in the community, around the media, in the box scores, and on the bench. El Capitan? No, more like Earl Capitan.

Strong:  Devin Harris. He’s not the most popular among fans but he commands a lot of respect in the locker room. He can be an effective leader next season if his quality of play picks up where it left off.

For more analysis on which Jazz players  are most deserving of awards, check out Salt City Hoops’ podcast featuring Spencer Ryan Hall and Jackson Rudd.

Scott Winterton / Deseret News

Genuinely believing that the Jazz would beat the Suns on Tuesday night and clinch the final berth to the playoffs, I decided to invite over one of my friends to watch the game with me. Under different circumstances, I would choose to watch it alone and thereby free myself to express as much desperate sadness or indulgent exultation as I deemed cathartic. After all, there’s hardly any commiseration to be had when watching a game with an opponent’s fan. But this was different. This time, I realized that my emotional response to this game would be critically limited. As a Jazz fan, I could only experience what this game meant on a very self-interested level, and what I wanted to experience and appreciate was what this game meant for basketball. At least potentially, this game could mean the end of the Steve Nash era in Phoenix, and if the end of any era carried significance for the basketball cosmos, it was this end of this era.

So I invited this friend over. His name is Gerritt, and he’s a lifelong Suns fan. Over the course of the game, he admitted this season was more than a pleasant surprise. After the game, he even made a weak attempt to downplay the devastation of the loss, because “hey, we didn’t even expect to be competing for a playoff spot.” We both knew he said this less to portray an accurate sentiment and more to assuage some of my survivor’s guilt. This one hurt for him, and we both knew it. As the game wound down, I asked him if he wanted Nash back. “I don’t think so,” he said. “I would feel bad for him. He deserves better than this.” This obviously referred to the much-maligned supporting cast that the Suns front office has assembled for Nash, but it also suggested some debt owed to Nash–that someone, maybe the Basketball Gods, maybe Miami Heat GM Pat Riley, owed it to Nash to get him out of his Phoenix Fiat and into the driver’s seat of one of the NBA’s Lamborghinis.

I’m not presumptuous enough to conclude that because my altruistic Suns-fan friend can shirk self-interest and wish his team’s superstar a happier future somewhere else that every Suns fan feels the same way. But I’m also not cynical enough to think that a large portion of those fans–fans who have long been Nash’s strongest supporters–would have him collect dust on the shelf of NBA irrelevance. I’d like to believe that they recognize that whatever happens to their franchise player, it should not take away from the many years they spent enjoying him. Even as an unrelated bystander, I could not help but enjoy those years. Nash and his Seven Seconds Or Less Suns represented a way of basketball that thrilled me aesthetically and more importantly, that inspired hope within me. Every time I watched Nash’s teams play (and this Suns-Jazz game was no different), I felt imbued with an extra dose of optimism about the NBA future. After all, if this team that played in this way could be successful, maybe one day, I’d be watching a league full of teams willing to push the ball off of made free throws, only to shoot transition threes. It was a naively romantic notion, to be sure, but it fascinated me.

***

It’s a sad truth, but it’s a truth nonetheless than an artist’s audience rarely wants to experience the whole uninhibited power of his genius. Even in those cases when the audience claims to want it or impetuously demands it, they do so ignorantly. They actually want it on their terms; they want an altered, streamlined version of that whole genius, fashioned to their needs and their tastes. It’s why The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s masterpiece and most unobstructed burst of brilliance, was also a commercial failure by his standards. It’s also why Kobe Bryant was most maligned during his seasons of gratuitous and unrivaled gunnery.

Nash’s artistry, on the other hand, was one of the few exceptions to this trend. Not only was Nash given a shackles-free offensive system in which to shine freely, but he was also blessed with a fan base that adoringly revered everything that he was. With fans like Gerritt, Nash enjoyed a relationship as great as any in the NBA between fans and a player. With Nash in Phoenix, we saw a rare combination of uninhibited but truly appreciated genius.

This is not to say that the players that comprised Nash’s teams were perfectly suited to draw out the legendary talent within him (a ridiculous thought when considered side-by-side with a mental picture of Channing Frye’s face). Fortunately, Nash didn’t actually need that type of specialization in his team. The beauty of Nash’s brilliance was that it could not help but manifest itself, and its brightness was made all the more stark by contrast with his deeply flawed teammates. In Nash’s earlier years, his critics could point to Amar’e Stoudemire’s athleticism or Joe Johnson’s dead-eye shooting as explanations for his astounding assist statistics. But instead of exposing Nash with their departures, Nash’s former teammates exposed their considerable offensive detriments. Most statistical measurements of Stoudemire, Joe Johnson, Shawn Marion, Jason Richardson or any of his other early teammates would show a distinct drop-off after their exodus from the vicinity of Nash’s contagious skill set.

Ironically, it was not until after their departures that we could see the true value in Nash as a basketball player. With this more recent motley crew as Nash’s collective sidekick, we saw Nash’s brilliance truly unleashed. Without the restriction of talented but entitled teammates demanding the ball, Nash achieved an even more transcendent level of statistical success. Not that his statistics were any better (though they weren’t worse), but that they remained static, even when saddled with the likes of Robin Lopez. Nash raised absolute nobodies to temporary levels of greatness. Nobodies like Marcin Gortat, Jared Dudley, and yes, even Channing Frye. Unlike other elite point guards like Rajon Rondo and Russell Westbrook, Nash did not need to be surrounded with blue-chippers in order to access his unadulterated genius. If anything, players of that talent level did and would detract from Nash’s accomplishments. Sad as it may have been to watch Nash direct his world-class symphonies with a high school orchestra, it was Nash’s true calling to do so. Steve Nash could make the most inexperienced violinist produce auditory gold and he could inspire even the sloppiest of cellists to play for stretches of clear, mistake-free beauty. In Phoenix, Nash received that opportunity, and every once in a while, we would get so caught up in the beauty of his performances that we would almost forget he was doing it with an inferior set of musicians. That such a thing was possible, that Nash could shine more brightly than he ever had before with players like this, proved his abilities in a way that being on a contender never could.

Now to the original point. Maybe Nash does deserve to move to a contender for a chance at that elusive grail, and maybe he does deserve better than this. Personally, I would love to see him playing in the postseason again. But whatever is decided about Nash’s future, Nash’s past should remain untouched by regret and his career should not be defined by a championship. Certainly championships are one form of success, but they are not the only form. At least in the case of Steve Nash, success was much more rewarding than a walk to a podium and a handshake with the President. In fact, in the case of Steve Nash, success was the rare unbridled expression of sincere brilliance, and that is what Nash deserves above all else: a standing ovation.

Tom Smart / Deseret News

Over the past two weeks, the Western playoff hunt has gone from a five-team chase for the last three spots to a two-team chase for the eighth spot. Thankfully (eat your heart out, tankers), the Jazz are one of them, with only the Phoenix Suns standing in the way of postseason bliss (and by “bliss” I mean a very entertaining five-game series with a few fleeting moments of memorable fight). Of all the teams to be pitted against in a battle of wills, Phoenix seems like the natural choice. After all, they are the anti-Jazz in every conceivable way. For the Suns, this is one final blaze of glory to commemorate their dynasty of style on the eve of its downfall. For the Jazz, this is a golden opportunity to show the world that a future contender is already on the horizon.

For Jazz fans with decent memories–or possibly a poor capacity for coping–the poetic irony in all of this is not hard to see. It wasn’t so long ago that Steve Nash’s young and promising Dallas Mavericks dismissed the Jazz from the playoffs in 2001 after resiliently overcoming a 2-0 series deficit for Utah’s first first-round exit since 1995. For me, that might have been the most devastating defeat of my entire fandom. After the 1998 Finals I was crushed, but confident my guys would win the following year. In 2001, it was inescapably clear to everyone watching that the window of opportunity had closed for the Stockton-Malone era and sure enough, they never won another playoff series together. As painful as it was, even then I recognized that Dallas had a certain hopeful fire and relentlessness that the Jazz simply couldn’t match. That Mavs team is much less repugnant in hindsight, knowing the price they would pay to finally get their title. I’m sure that Suns fans (or Rockets fans; especially Rockets fans) find the Jazz to be similarly detestable right now. After all, this collection of players dominantly in their 20s, without any individual claims to significant NBA success, shows an astounding amount of entitlement in their expectation to reach the postseason. This, too, will likely be more forgivable a few years down the road.

The problem for the 2001 Jazz and, by association, the 2012 Suns, is that Dallas should have won that first-round series. History suggests that energetic, hopeful up-and-comers generally deserve the win over the past-their-prime giants. It’s a sad reality, but only in the short-term view of things. Of course I hate the way Apollo Creed’s storyline ended in Rocky IV as much as everyone else, and generally I want my heroes to have their dramatic ride into the sunset, but the Local Natives are right when they sing (in a music video that should really have more than 34K views) that “the bad feels so bad to make the good so good.”

That’s why the Jazz are going to make the playoffs. Time always pushes the envelope, and it’s flying toward the era when Phoenix pays its cyclical dues before becoming relevant again. It’s also pushing toward that future moment when Utah is recognized for what it fundamentally is- a fresh, synergized, and legitimate challenger to the NBA throne.