Salt City Seven: Holy Trades, Batman!

Every week during the regular season begins here at SCH with the Salt City Seven, a septet of recurring features that let us relive the biggest moments, key performances and hot issues in Jazzland from various angles. Check in every week for the quotes, stats, plays and performances that tell the stories from the last 168 hours in the world of the Jazz. 

The Jazz have been involved in three of the last four NBA trades: a pick shuffle with the Suns, a salary-driven Clippers deal, and then they played the role of facilitator in perhaps the most shocking in-season superstar trade ever. Despite there being no indication that Luka Doncic was even remotely on the market, the Mavs surreptitiously put together a deal that would put their MVP candidate in Forum Blue & Gold.

Doncic finished third in MVP voting last year, and has been first-team All-NBA for five straight seasons. Players like that almost never get dealt at all, much less in the middle of a season in which their team is a defending conference champion.

We already broke down the Jazz-Suns draft deal in last week’s Salt City Seven, so let’s just open here with some knee-jerk analysis on the other two deals.

Utah gets an unconditional 2nd for helping Clippers dodge tax

After a season of estrangement with veteran forward PJ Tucker, the Clippers finally found a way to move on from him and get under the luxury tax line, at the cost of the second-rounder.

The Jazz took Tucker and Mo Bamba ($13.6M combined cap number) off their hands and sent them Drew Eubanks and Patty Mills ($7.1M), who might actually contribute on the court as well. The reward was a Clippers 2030 2nd for which the Jazz already had swap rights from last summer’s Kris Dunn sign-and-trade, so really what they netted here was whichever is least favorable out of LAC’s and Utah’s own 2nds that year. It’s still an extra second-rounder, but not quite as valuable since they already had rights to whichever is the better of the two that year.

It makes total sense why Utah would do this. It’s just also not the type of trade that gets anybody’s heart aflutter. Eubanks and Mills were 11th and 15th, respectively, in total minute played, and they’d be ranked even lower if Taylor Hendricks or Cody Williams were healthy. They’re both good locker room guys, but they are in no way long-term pieces, nor would either guy fetch an unencumbered 2nd on his own. On the flip side, the two “incoming” guys won’t ever touch the court in Utah. This was purely a play to get a decent second-round asset by helping a team with their books.

The real cash impact here was about $2.7M for Utah, because Tucker had $4.7M remaining as of the time of the trade, and Eubanks $2M. (Mills and Bamba were a wash.) Utah also got $852K from the Clippers here, per Eric Pincus, which means that as it stands right now, Utah essentially paid $1.85M for an extra second-rounder. That may even come down more if Tucker takes a buyout to join another team, which seems pretty likely. If he were waived now and signed a rest-of-season contract immediately after clearing waivers, he’d earn about $1.3M, which could be a guide for the type of discount the Jazz would expect for granting him his free agency.

So in the end, Utah having the ability to help LAC here might yield them something pretty close to a free 2nd.

But let’s move on to the big one.

Utah facilitates Mavs-Lakers swap, gets two 2nds and a look at a recent first-rounder

The Lakers were able to take Doncic into Anthony Davis’ salary slot, but Max Christie’s salary wasn’t enough to enable them to take back Maxi Kleber because of the new apron rules. They had to include Jalen Hood-Schifino in the deal to be able to bring back Kleber, but had the Mavs taken JHS, they would have ended the deal over the tax. Hence the phone call to the Jazz, who could absorb the JHS salary figure because they still hadn’t used their Room Mid-Level Exception.

Utah got 2025 2nds from both the Lakers (via LAC) and Mavs (subject to a swap, but will surely be their own) for helping the deal go through. They had to put something outgoing in the deal, so they contributed the minimum amount of cash ($110K) required to satisfy league trade rules.

Hood-Schifino was a mid-first round pick just two drafts ago, so theoretically worth at least a look. But he’s been unplayable for the Lakers, seeing just 14 garbage time minutes this season. The Lakers were unimpressed to the degree that they declined his 2025-26 team option. The Jazz will have his Early Bird rights this summer to be able to keep him if he pops, but the chances of him turning around his career to the point where it requires more than the minimum to re-sign him are slim anyway. It’s pretty hard for a guard to succeed in the modern NBA if he just can’t shoot at all. He’ll have two months (or less) to make his case, but I don’t think the Jazz made this deal for him.

This was, again, about the draft capital. Right now, those picks are on track to be around #44 and #51, in a draft where Utah already owns two firsts. It’s extremely unlikely the Jazz add four rookies to next year’s roster, but extra picks could theoretically help them in a move-up scenario. Or they could defer the seconds, sell them, draft-and-stash, whatever. The point is they got these picks essentially for free.

They also had to waive the recently acquired Bamba to be able to take Hood-Schifino. We hardly knew ye.

The main concern I’ve seen Jazz fans voice is that the real cost of helping the Lakers acquire Doncic is that it will deteriorate the value of the 2027 LAL 1st (top 4 protected) that Utah already owns from the Russell Westbrook salary dump. Maybe it does. My sense is that the Jazz always regarded that pick as being of moderate value relative to some of their own picks and the incoming Minny/Cleveland/Phoenix ones because, as someone quipped to me last year, “the Lakers don’t really bottom out that often.” Also, it’s still too early to know for sure if Doncic will stay past his 2026 player option decision, or if he’ll be healthy in a given year. LeBron James will be 42 when that pick conveys.

The only players whose destinies the Lakers control for the 2026-27 season are Jarred Vanderbilt, Dalton Knecht, Shake Milton and Bronny James. So there’s still plenty of outcome variability regarding that pick.

More coming?

Somehow, the Jazz made three trades in the past two weeks and still have all of the much-rumored John Collins, Jordan Clarkson and Collin Sexton on their roster. Maybe that means those three will make it past the trade deadline without having to call movers. Or maybe the Jazz have more stuff coming in the next 72 hours.

The trade deadline is Thursday at 1 p.m. Mountain time. This writer suggests keeping an eye out.

 

“It’s something that I try not to think about because I would get lost in it. And that’s why I just say I’m just happy that I found a nice group of guys here who can talk me through all of the trade rumors… Because this is not an easy thing mentally, to think about whether, it might be a better situation or worse situation, and whatever situation is out there, it’s not my current one.

“So it’s hard for me to think about that and focus. So I just really try not to think about it, and try to be the best pro I can. Because I really have no control over (it).”

-Collins, to the Tribune’s Andy Larsen

It’s extremely tough to be an NBA player at this time of year. The security of guaranteed long-term contracts is great, but it means that you constantly live in fear that your phone will ring and you’ll be off to a completely different basketball situation. And, as Collins spells out here, while you’re thinking through that, you’re also expected to continue to perform at a high level in your current role and team.

This is all very salient for John at the moment. A Sacramento-area radio host went so far as to publicly state that the Kings “had a deal worked out” for Collins that was close enough to being consummated that the front office had started to tell its players. For whatever reason — perhaps the Kings sudden pivot to focusing on a De’Aaron Fox deal, which they reached on Sunday evening — the deal fell apart, per the rumor.

Whether that’s exactly true or not (Collins, for his part, says he heard nothing), that’s illustrative of what guys deal with at this time of year. While there hasn’t been a rumor that specific for Clarkson or Sexton, both are frequently referenced in the rumor mill. Walker Kessler’s name comes up a lot, although word is it would take a lot for the Jazz to even think about dealing him.

In the meantime, basketball rolls on for these guys. Collins, for his part, has made four of five 3-point attempts and averaged 17.5 points a game since coming back from his latest absence. So while the noise is surely affecting him, you wouldn’t know it necessarily by his on-court performance.

“I want to handle it when I get to that bridge, if I get there,” Collins added.

 

16-0

The Jazz hung close with the Bucks despite Giannis Antetokounmpo’s brilliance, until a 16-0 third quarter run erased the hope.

<14

The Jazz are 3-22 when they fail to make 14 3-pointers in a game, like they did in San Francisco on Tuesday night. It was actually their lowest number of made threes (8) since Halloween, and was tied for the lowest number of attempts in a game this season.

3

They followed that up with a season-low performance on the offensive glass: just three O-boards against Minnesota, as they suffered their eighth straight loss. But mostly, this was a defensive loss: it’s hard to win games with a 21-point deficit from the 3-point line, especially when the opponent also bests you on paint points, 46-44.

36.7%

And then the Magic were just a mess. Paolo Banchero and Franz Wagner are back, but they’re still down a starting point guard and just looked extremely unorganized. Per Cleaning the Glass, their non-heave eFG% (.367) was in the bottom 1% of all NBA games this year, and Banchero was 4-for-19.

15

When Brice Sensabaugh started Tuesday’s game, he became that 15th Jazz player to start this year. That tied Golden State for most in the NBA, though since then Quinten Post became the Warriors’ 16th starter to break the tie again. (The Sixers and the Hornets also since joined the Jazz with 15.)

 

We went long up above, so let’s just have a quick gander at some of Isaiah Collier’s best assists from the week.

Like these three from the Orlando game: all three are fast-break dishes to a trailing big, and in all three cases it’s Collins.

Or here are three interior passes from earlier in the week where you almost have to go frame-by-frame to figure out how he planted these in the narrowest of windows.

The angle on that bounce pass to Lauri Markkanen is ridiculous. It keeps the ball where three converging defenders can’t get it, and guides the Finnisher right to the rim. But somehow that paint handoff to Kyle Filipowski feels even more daring. There are three guys right there! And somehow Collier just places it in his outstretched arms.

The creativity is something. He’s averaging 7.8 assists per game over his last 15.

 

A skid-busting win deserves our first Game Ball in a while, plus we’ll recognize the best from Utah’s three losses this week.

Jazz 113, Magic 99: Collin Sexton. I got votes for Collier and Collins, but this pretty much had to be Sexton: 22-5-8, a game-best +24, and was involved centrally in every pivotal run. For example, the game was largely decided after Orlando pulled to within four and Utah uncorked a 20-7 run, after which their lead never fell below double digits again. In that stretch, Sexton made two freebies, ran for a layup, drove for an and-1, drew another FT trip, set up a Kessler alley-oop, and knocked down two more free throws. Collins was probably the runner-up here with his 8-for-9 night. Collier was nice again, but it’s hard to give this out for 12-4-6 and +6 when Young Bull had 22-5-8 and +24. Markkanen logged a double-double.

Strong in defeat:

• Jazz 110, Bucks 125: Collin Sexton. There’s enough Sexton in this section that I tried to find an excuse to give this one to someone else, but nobody else had a rock-solid case. Clarkson’s return from a 10-game absence was a bigger story, but he didn’t score at all until the fourth when the game was well out of reach. Markkanen matched Sexton’s scoring (19) but less efficiently. Sensabaugh was good but only in a short burst (17 points in 15 minutes). Collier also had a quiet start but wound up with 12 and 8. Collin’s 19-5-4 was legitimately probably the best thing about this one, too.
• Jazz 103, Warriors 114: Collin Sexton. Much less to ponder here, as Sexton went for 30. He almost brought the Jazz all the way back in the fourth, along with Sensabaugh (who didn’t make a shot until the late third) and Collier. Keyonte Goerge got to the line a ton to rack up 12-6-6 despite an off shooting night, and Collier had 12-9-6. But 30 is 30.
• Jazz 113, Wolves 138: Keyonte George. Longtime readers know that whenever there’s a big cluster of similar performers, I tend to put more weight on efficiency and who contributed most when the game was in the balance. For those reasons, Key (7-for-7 for the night, leading scorer through three quarters) was the favorite for this even before separating himself with another couple of garbage time buckets. In all, he scored 23, got to the line eight times, and never missed from the field. 

 

The Jazz continue to have nothing for .500-and-above opponents on their schedule until well after the All-Star break.

• Monday, February 3: Jazz vs. Pacers. The Pacers are 11-2 in the new year, and Tyrese Haliburton is hitting close to 45% of his threes in that span. But mostly they’ve been feeding on .500-and-below teams, with the lone exception being a win at Cleveland in which they defanged the mighty Cavs offense behind a big night from their bench. Pascal Siakam just made his third All-Star team and is having his best outside shooting year (41.8%).
• Wednesday, February 5: Jazz vs. Warriors. Steph Curry is having his lowest scoring season in more than a decade, and Draymond Green has missed the last seven games (and 14 total). But do you know who is a surprising bellwether for the .500 Warriors? The team is 8-15 in Buddy Hield’s lowest scoring games, and undefeated in the 10 games where the bench sniper has notched at least 18. It’s a career year for Jonathan Kuminga, but he too has missed nearly all of January.
• Friday, February 7: Jazz @ Suns. Phoenix continues to be mired in mediocrity, despite being fairy healthy now. Lotto-bound Portland beat them on Saturday, despite Devin Booker’s ninth 30-point game in the last 14. (He had just seven in the entire season before then.) They’re 10-9 since Christman, with Bradley Beal is caught in the trade drama limbo: he’d have to be included in any deal that brings Jimmy Butler to Phoenix, but he has veto power on deals. By Friday, that will be sorted out.
• Saturday, February 8: Jazz @ Clippers. The Jazz don’t have to wait long for a reunion with Eubanks and Mills. The Clippers had been playing better, at 8-2 in Kawhi Leonard’s first 10 games back, but then they dropped one to the struggling Raptors on Sunday, with Kawhi being held to 6-of-18 shooting. James Harden just made his 11th All-Star team, and is averaging 23-10-6 over his last eight.

 

There’s no better time than trade deadline week for a refresher on Jazz trade history. Here is the list of Utah’s most frequent trade partners since the franchise moved up from Louisiana.

Atlanta’s the most frequent customer. The Lakers and Mavs both moved to six total trades involving the Utah Jazz when the Doncic trade was finalized.

The Charlotte trade is weird: in actuality, that’s the franchise that morphed into today’s New Orleans, so it could be argued that the Jazz have never dealt with the franchise currently residing in North Carolina. But technically, the new expansion franchise in Charlotte inherited the prior history of the Pelicans’ franchise. So it’s up for debate whether that counts as the only Jazz-Hornets trade or as one of three trades with the New Orleans club.

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Are three trades enough or do the Jazz have more cooking? We’ll find out soon.