Are the Jazz in a Funk or Just Needing Focus?

The Jazz have lost three of four, but Tyler Crandall points out that there’s no one flaw in how they’ve played. (Joe Murphy via espn.com)

The Jazz have lost two straight games and three of their last four, though if you were to guess by judging the current sentiment on Jazz Twitter, you’d probably think the Jazz were lottery bound and on a 10-game losing streak. There would probably be even more concern about the recent downturn had the attention of Jazz Twitter not been taken by the dispute between Russell Westbrook and a Jazz “fan” (the so-called “fan” was permanently banned from attending Jazz games, but this won’t be discussed here) and the resulting aftermath. 

Despite the mini-funk, there’s little reason to  be concerned about the Jazz missing the playoffs. In fact, it’s almost safe to say the Jazz will be in the playoffs as there are very few mathematical scenarios in which the Jazz would miss out. If they somehow did, we’d be talking about a lot of other things because frankly there’d be much more serious issues with this team. The most likely scenarios at this point have the Jazz as the 6th seed playing Denver at the 3rd. That doesn’t sound fun, but does anyone in Utah really want to watch the Jazz play the Oklahoma City Thunder this year? Sure, it would be sweet to see them pull out another win like last season, but this is not the same OKC team. The Thunder just completed a season series sweep over Utah and will want revenge for last year’s first-round defeat. So a matchup with Denver is preferable. 

But before they worry about playoff oppponents, the Jazz will need to take care of business in their remaining games and figure out what has been plaguing them. 

There may not be any real issue other than focus…

That said, it’s hard to pinpoint exactly what the problem is in those past four games as the way the Jazz lost and won was actually not that consistent. In both their loss to OKC and their win against the Pelicans, the Jazz played sloppy, but so did the opponents. The opposition had 16 and 17 turnovers, respectively, and assists totals below 20. That sounds good for the Jazz so far. Their defensive rating was 100.6 and 97.6, both of which are really impressive marks. However, both of those games highlighted very subpar three-point shooting and FT shooting for Utah. The Jazz offense was held to a rating of 91.4 against OKC. 

In the loss to Memphis, on the other hand, the Jazz scored well, despite a slow pace. They had an offensive rating of 110.2. But they couldn’t stop the Grizzlies who put up an offensive rating of 120.8, the 6th highest rating against the Jazz all season. Honestly, it seems like JB Bickerstaff of the Grizzlies had an incredible and effective plan against the Jazz to which his counterpart Quin Snyder had no answer.

And since the Jazz won’t play them again this season or in the playoffs, hopefully this one is just an anomaly. OKC, on the other hand, could wind up being a Jazz playoff opponent in the first or even second round. It could just be that the Jazz experienced a couple of bad games and will return to form against the Phoenix Suns. But even that won’t be easy: the Suns are hot, having just won in Golden State. 

Perhaps it’s not a coincidence that Ricky Rubio has been absent or below 100% in these games. Or perhaps it’s simply the lack of a primary ball-handler other than Donovan Mitchell. Thankfully, the Jazz have Dante Exum back in action and Rubio and Raul Neto will likely be joining again soon and will give  Snyder more options on the guard line.

Any help they can get would be ideal, as the Jazz simply need wins.