Five Questions As the Jazz Head Down the Stretch

Mitchell and Conley prepare to lead the Jazz down the stretch. (via Utahjazz.com)

The Utah Jazz’s season so far could be broken up into three distinct chunks:

• The 4-4 start. The team showed signs of a revamped offense, but back-to-back losses to Brooklyn (without Kevin Durant) and New York gave fans real concerns.
• The 20-1 run. Everything is awesome.
• The current 10-4 stretch, starting with a 3-2 limp to the All-Star game and 2-2 start after the break, before starting a new 5-0 winning streak. Especially at 5-4 on either side of the All-Star break, the Jazz suddenly felt mortal again after an unbelievable run. There were signs of fatigue and low effort.

These three recent wins may have been what the team needed to get their mojo back.

They’re still the top seed in the league. They have the best Net Rating, as well as the second best defense and third best offense, per Cleaning the Glass. They’re on pace to have one of the best records in franchise history and their personnel is poised to contend for a bunch of awards, which is great. Now we face the latter half of the season and playoffs approach.

Here are some of the top things to watch as the Jazz head into the home stretch with the trade deadline behind them.

1. How do the trade deadline and buyout market shift the playoff race?

The trade deadline has passed and the buyout market begins. The Jazz already made a free agent move with the signing of veteran Ersan Ilyasova, then traded for Matt Thomas just before Thursday’s deadline for in-season trades. Both are insurance players, which is unsurprising given Utah’s situation. The Jazz could still go after another free agent, especially should an impactful player secure a buyout, but with 15 on their regular roster, they would have to waive another player. Rudy Gay or Otto Porter Jr. would be excellent additions, but chances of either securing a buyout are unclear, and both should have strong interest from every contender. It’s more likely that the roster is set for the season.

The Blazers made something between a lateral move and slight improvement with their addition of Norm Powell. The Clippers swapped Lou Williams for Rajon Rondo. The Mavericks added JJ Redick. The rising Nuggets made the biggest improvement, adding Aaron Gordon and Javale McGee. Perhaps most significant is the move that didn’t happen: Kyle Lowry is staying in Toronto Tampa Bay rather than joining the Lakers via trade.

The Lakers still made an addition on the buyout market, as the rumored destination for former All-Star Andre Drummond. LaMarcus Alridge chose Brooklyn instead.

The bottom line is that there are some shifts around the conference, but nothing earth-shattering, which is a net positive for the top team in the West.

2. Do the Jazz play a healthy Lakers team?

LeBron James is reportedly out for at least 3–4 weeks. That happens to line up around mid-April, when the Jazz will play the Lakers back-to-back. Anthony Davis’ timetable is also still uncertain, so we have no idea what those matchups will look like. One one hand, a pair of easier wins is good for seeding. But it would be valuable to see how the full-strength teams stack up. Utah purposefully brought in Derrick Favors to match LA’s size (though recent acquisitions Marc Gasol and Montrezl Harrell play differently than 2019-20 Lakers Dwight Howard and Javale McGee). We’ll see what impact the Drummond buyout has.

The Jazz had Gobert help on LeBron to great success in a convincing 114-89 victory last month. But Davis missed that game, and he may be one of Utah’s greatest matchup problems in a hypothetical Jazz-Lakers series. It would be useful to get some tape to watch if a future playoff matchup happens.

3. Does Mitchell make the All-NBA team?

With Davis missing time to injury, Rudy Gobert is a good bet to repeat as the All-NBA 3rd team center behind top MVP candidates in Nikola Jokic and Joel Embiid.

A bigger story however, is whether Donovan Mitchell makes the team. Doing so would trigger an additional $8 million per year for the rest of his 5-year extension. This has huge implications on team building for the next half decade — about the same impact of Rudy earning the regular max vs. the supermax, which was much discussed.

The first and second team guards are likely some combination of Steph Curry, Damian Lillard, James Harden, and Luka Doncic. Donovan’s competition for a third-team slot includes Ben Simmons, Bradley Beal, Chris Paul, Devin Booker, Jaylen Brown, Kyrie Irving, and possibly other guards that finish strong. At this point you could make a case for any of this group. That Donovan has to beat out at least 6 of those 7 may feel daunting, but the margins are small, and finishing in the No. 1 seed could hold a lot of weight.

4. Do the Jazz finish in 1st place?

The Jazz currently have a 3 game lead on Suns for the top seed in the West, and and 1.5 game lead on the 76ers for best record in the league. FiveThirtyEight projects them to finish 53-19, a 60-win pace adjusted to an 82 game schedule.

They have the fourth easiest remaining strength of schedule, but two of their toughest games may be against a depleted Lakers team. In contrast, the Suns and Lakers have the sixth and seventh hardest remaining schedules, respectively.

The Clippers, Nuggets, and Blazers aren’t too far behind, but would need a lot of things to go their way to catch up. We’ll see if their trade deadline moves boost them enough to make a jump.

So yes, the Jazz are on place to finish in first place. Who could’ve predicted this before the season started? The Jazz should easily finish the best record since the Stockton and Malone era. They would have to finish with 57 wins (so only lose 4 games the rest of the way) to have the best record in franchise history. I’ll be plenty happy with a No. 1 seed at any record.

This is a good segue into the final question:

5. How does playoff seeding shake out?

As is the perennial story for the West: it’s going to be a wild finish. There are two good pieces of news. First, if the Jazz are focused on top seed, they don’t need to worry too much about jockeying for position. They can simply focus on winning as much as possible and let the chips fall how they will. And second, Dan Clayton will keep the playoff picture updated each week in the Salt City Seven.

Here are rapid-fire thoughts on the top teams based on recent moves and trends:

1. Jazz: on course for the top seed
2. Suns: a tough remaining schedule, but a good chance of finishing in the 2/3 bracket
3. Clippers: we’ll see how much they rest their stars, but will compete with the Suns for the 2/3 bracket
4. Lakers: missing on Lowry and injured stars could cause them to fall anywhere from 5th to the play-in tournament. Jazz fans will root for them to finish 6th or 7th where they’d likely wind up across from the Clippers before either team reached the Jazz. The healthy Lakers finishing 8th (after the NBA’s 2-game play-in) would be a disaster.
5. Nuggets: a bolstered roster and easy schedule could see the Nuggets compete for the 2/3 bracket, but 4th or 5th is probably their floor at this point. A second round Jazz-Nuggets rematch is a decent possibility.
6. Blazers: CJ McCollum is back and Jusuf Nurkic is thought to be close. Those returning stars, plus the addition of Powell, put them in a similar position with the Nuggets. We’ll see if they can catch the Lakers and jump into the 4/5 bracket.

The Mavericks, Spurs, Grizzlies, Warriors, and possibly the Pelicans and Kings should continue their fight for the 7th and 8th spots, which ultimately will be decided by a play-in tournament involving the teams ranked seven through 10 at the close of the regular season. I feel good about Utah’s chances with any of these teams, but I’d rather avoid Luka and Steph.

It’s going to be a fun finish!