Salt City Seven: Hendricks & Rookie Watch, Picks & More

Hendricks is showing growth and versatility with more minutes. (Bethany Baker, The Salt Lake Tribune)

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. 

A quick look at the big, burning question of the moment in Jazzland

The Jazz remain in freefall, and frankly it’s not entirely clear where their next win will come from. Their final seven games are all against winning teams, and over half of them are against top-10 teams. It also sounds like they’ll be playing all or most of those without Lauri Markkanen, whose two-week timetable on a shoulder reaggravation puts his status in doubt for the rest of the season.

So with no “gimmes” left and with Markkanen, Jordan Clarkson and John Collins ailing, Utah’s losing streak — currently at nine in a row — could get worse. This scribe has been saying since December that Jazz fans might consider pinning their enjoyment to things other than game outcomes, and these last seven games might be more about learning things than focusing on the scoreboard.

Of course, the Jazz have plenty to learn with Markkanen on the floor. There’s some very relevant information still to be gathered about how he can amplify some of the other guys, and vice versa. Oh well. But lacking that, the first player I thought of when I saw Markkanen’s injury news was Taylor Hendricks, who will continue to be featured more over the next two weeks.

Hendricks remains ridiculously interesting, with defensive versatility and potential that honestly reminds you why he was a top-10 draft selection, seven picks ahead of even their precocious rookie guard. (Keyonte George is struggling right now, but we’ll come back to him.)

For evidence that Hendricks can be a wild card on defense, look no further than this past week, when he was the primary defender on elite on-ball creator Luka Freaking Doncic one night, and then the very next game he was guarding star rookie big Victor Ohmygosh Wembanyama.

And he defended them both credibly! NBA.com’s tracking data says that Luka shot 6-for-14 while guarded by Hendricks, and Wemby shot 1-for-6.

When you dive into the film on those matchups, the first thing you notice is his length altering shots on the perimeter. Both Doncic and Wemby think they have room to shoot and then see that space get swallowed up by Hendricks’ length.

That’s impressive enough against Doncic, a known stepback threat; the fact that he was able to affect the impossibly long Wembanyama is honestly a little silly.

Will Hardy has mentioned that while he’d like to see Hendricks get better at staying in front, his length enables him to stay in the play even when he gets behind or to the side of his guy initially.

Other times, though, he does a good job moving his hips and feet and containing the guy he’s guarding. (The second one here is a Luka made jumper, but the defensive technique is sound, and the Jazz will live with him taking this type of shot over Hendricks’ 8-foot-11 standing reach.)

We’ve even seen him do some limited banging as a post defender:

Luka did get better over the course of the game, making 3-of-4 against him in the second half after a 3-of-10 start. Star players are capable of solving different defensive challenges, so that’s not a super worrying development. And when Hendricks guarded Luka just four days earlier, the Slovenian star made 4-for-6 against him before intermission, but went 0-for-5 after.

In Wemby’s case, he didn’t officially take any shots against Hendricks in the second half, mostly preferring to pass out of that matchup or just wait for a switch to shoot, but also he and Hendricks didn’t spend as much time lined up that way in the second half.

At the very least, this is really intriguing that Hendricks is also looking like a multi-positional defender, and someone who can guard not just different positions but entirely different player types.

He honestly has a bit to go before he’s a major piece on a contending team, but the early signs are positive, especially on that end. On offense, all he really has to do be viable at this stage is knock down a decent percentage on catch-and-shoot threes, and occasionally put the ball on the deck against closeouts. He’s at 36% on catch-and-shoot threes as of this writing.

In short, his development is intriguing. These reps really mean something — he’s learning how to guard (and not guard) some of the league’s biggest names. He also spent time this week guarding Jalen Green, Harrison Barnes, Keegan Murray — meaning he has legitimately guarded 1 through 5 just in the past seven nights.

A couple of quick-hitting thoughts on Utah’s other rookies:

• Brice Sensabaugh is also starting to look like a real basketball player. When he started to get rotation minutes, Hardy mentioned that he wasn’t concerned with his shooting or scoring outcomes, but with seeing his attention to the other aspects of the game. He’s rebounding pretty well for a 2/3, and his passing seemingly gets better week to week. That said, he is starting to experience some of the roller coaster phenomenon that George felt when he first started to get major minutes: such as his “0-fer” game on Saturday immediately followed by a career night.
• I’m not that worried yet about George. He’s down to 32% from the field during this losing streak and 19% from three, but the context for those stats is also very different from night to night. He’s arriving at the gym to find out whether his roll man will be Markkanen, or Collins, or neither, whether his backcourt mate will be Clarkson or Kris Dunn (essentially the polar opposite of Clarkson), etc. All of that makes me want to give George the benefit of the doubt at this stage.
• The number that I keep coming back to as an important marker for Key’s ceiling is his off-the-bounce shooting, which has been really good at times. Now it’s back down to 33%. If the hope for George’s ceiling is that he can be a lead guard on a great team (and it doesn’t have to happen all at once), the guys who match that description usually have elite on-ball scoring chops in one way or another. They are either Ja Morant-like guys who can get on top of the rim whenever they want to (and George is not that), or they’re some level of off-the-bounce threats. Elite guards who aren’t rim attackers usually shoot at least in the high 30s on pull-up 3s; George isn’t too far off.
• More than George’s shooting or scoring, I’m watching how he manages the offense in broader terms. Hardy has spoken about wanting the guards to get the play going earlier, and George has too many plays where he dribbles away half the shot clock out front. If you start the action at :15ish and the play dead ends (which happens against NBA defenses), you still have time to run some second-side stuff or reset with a high pick-and-roll. When you don’t really get into the play until 12, 11, 10 seconds left, you’re putting a lot of pressure on that first action. Similarly, there are times like this, where they run a really great action to give him an advantage, and he pulls it back instead of using all this empty space in front of him to put pressure on the defense:

(He walks it up and dribbles alone at nearly midcourt until :15 on the shot clock. There’s :07 left when he gives the ball to someone standing 40 feet from the basket after not leveraging the advantage the flare action created for him.)

With seven tough games left and some vets ailing, we’re going to be doing a lot of rookie-watching. Hendricks’ defense in different situations might be my favorite thing to watch for right now, but Sensabaugh and George also have an important opportunity over these last two weeks.

Projecting the Jazz’s place in the broader picture

The Jazz are now officially out of the playoff/play-in race, which means we can now continue our pick-focused standings watch with no compunction whatsoever.

Teams within 5 games of all three Utah picks.

The good news for pick-watchers is that the Jazz, Thunder and Wizards all have the toughest scheduled among the teams right around them. Brooklyn also has no reason to tank, since they owe their pick to Houston, although I don’t see the Jazz having a realistic chance at catching Memphis.

The best realistic scenario for the OKC pick is probably 27 at this point. And even that will be tricky since Minny and Denver still face each other once. B-Ref and Playoffstatus.com both have the #1 seed being OKC’s most likely outcome, which means that pick might not get better than its current #29.

The Wizards’ second rounder could be uniquely valuable with the NBA moving the latter half of the draft to a second day. After pick 30, teams are going to have an opportunity to reset their draft boards, and the teams sitting at 31 and 32 will have an entire day to field phone calls about their picks. That’s a fun little wrinkle. Both Detroit and Washington owe their second rounders, and both are virtually ensured an equal 14% chance in the lottery, so neither team has a ton of motivation to manipulate their place in the standings.

Telling or interesting words from Jazz people

“They’re all learning on the fly, and this league is unforgiving… They play hard and their intent is good: they want to do the right thing.”

-Hardy on his trio of rookies, all getting heavy minutes

The Jazz’s let season youth movement is in full swing, and most nights at least a half of Hardy’s rotation is made of first or second year players and/or two-way contract guys. There’s a clear cost to that, as it has turned the games into something of a laboratory. But Hardy also sees a lot of progress.

“We’re trying to build habits,” the coach continued. “I want them to feel good about the elements of their games where they are improving.”

Sunday’s game in Sacramento featured the youngest starting five in Jazz history, with an average age of 21 years and 299 days among Utah’s five starters. Collin Sexton was effectively a babysitter with a group that included all three of Utah’s first-round rookies, plus second-year big man Walker Kessler. Johnny Juzang has also logged rotation minutes in 11 of Utah’s last 14 games.

Stats that tell the story of the week

33

Markkanen has made his last 33 free throws, and 79 of his last 82 (96.3%) dating back to late January. Unfortunately, his streak of 33 straight freebies might be on hold until next year since his reevaluation date falls right before Utah’s final game of the season.

40

Forty of the Spurs’ 44 baskets against the Jazz on Wednesday were assisted, which is pretty remarkable. Of the remaining four, three were putbacks and the other one was a Devin Vassell runout after a transition steal. That’s a pretty efficient way to build a shot diet, so it’s no surprise their eFG% was over 60 for the game, complicating the task for the Jazz.

24.5%

The defense was better against Houston, as neither team could really shoot early on. The two teams combined for 12-of-49 shooting in the first quarter, or 24.5%. They also combined for 9.1% from deep. Oof.

11

He needed a late bucket to do it, but Sexton kept his 20-point game streak active: now 11 straight reaching that threshold. Since Karl Malone retired, the only Jazz players with double-digit streaks of 20-plus points are Donovan Mitchell (4 streaks, longest was 16 games), Markkanen (2 streaks, longest was 20), Gordon Hayward (one streak of 10) and now Sexton (11 straight).

29

That super young starting lineup on Sunday evening in Sacramento was also the Jazz’s 29th starting lineup of the year. The only teams with more version of their starting five this year are improvising Memphis (46), rudderless Portland (40), injury-riddled Miami (35), cellar-dwelling Detroit (34), trade-happy Dallas (33), banged-up Philly (31) and youth-movement Charlotte (30).

23-2

That was Sacramento’s run on Sunday night after Sensabaugh pulled the Jazz even at 58-all.

Recognizing the best (or most memorable) performances from each Jazz win

The Game Ball department took another week off, but there will still some nice performances in Utah’s four losses from the last seven nights.

Strong in defeat:

• Jazz 105, Mavs 115: Lauri Markkanen. The Finnisher had 33 points through three quarters, and Dallas never pulled away until precisely when Markkanen took a 1:59 rest in the fourth. Their 7-0 run while the All-Star sat marked the first time they led by more than four points. The game probably goes differently if the Jazz had gotten him more than a single attempt in the fourth quarter (his only point in the final frame was on a technical foul), but c’est la vie. He was superb, and the Jazz essentially played the Mavs even (-2) in his minutes. Collins (21 and 11) and Sexton (20 and 6) were distant runners-up. 
• Jazz 111, Spurs 118: Collin Sexton. Sexton (26 and 9) just edges out Markkanen (25 and 6) here, but this one is a little bit of an eye-of-the-beholder exercise. Markkanen was slightly more efficient, but Sexton having a role in 48 of the Jazz’s 111 feels relevant, as does the fact that they lightly won his minutes (+1), meaning they lost by eight while he said. I wouldn’t be offended with either choice on this one, but I had Sexton by a nose in my personal ledger.
• Jazz 100, Rockets 101: John Collins. Collins’ 30 (on 14 shots!) marked his Jazz career high and his highest output in more than 27 months. He also grabbed 11 rebounds, blocked a couple of shots, and missed just one of five 3-point attempts. He and Sexton (29-6-5) had very similar quarter-by-quarter scoring, but John’s scoring just seemed to come more naturally and effortlessly throughout the game, where Sexton might have been more representative of the Jazz’s night overall: an uneven, sloppy start that eventually got better. So we’ll go Collins on a hyper-efficient, season-high night.
• Jazz 106, Kings 127: Brice Sensabaugh. There were two rookie career highs to choose from, but Sensabaugh’s 5-triple night was pretty important. His back-to-back threes to open the second half tied things up before Sacramento went nuts with a 23-2 run, but I still think 22 from the rook is worthy of memorializing. Hendricks’ 18 (4-of-6 from three) were also nice, although he had kind of a weird defensive night as it looked like the Jazz were trying something different with him that sort of backfired. So we’ll go Brice over Taylor. Sexton overcame an 0-for-3 start to score 22, and George had 18 but struggled with efficiency again. All Jazz players with at least eight points were also double-digit negative in plus-minus.

Looking ahead to the next seven nights of action

No gimmes left on the Jazz’s schedule, as all of their remaining opponents have winning records.

• Tuesday 4/2: Jazz vs. Cavs. Last time Donovan Mitchell was in town, he dropped a cool 46 on his former team in a thrilling game. Former Cav Sexton missed that game, so this will be his first home game against Cleveland, although he did have 20 in a Jazz loss earlier this year. (Fellow former Cav Markkanen will miss this one, but is averaging 25 and 11 against his old team since his 2022 trade to Utah.)
• Friday 4/5: Jazz @ Clippers. Somehow the Jazz still have two road games left against the Clippers, against whom they split a pair of home dates early in the season. The Clippers are finally fully healthy, but have somehow split their record in their last dozen games, and are at some risk of falling out of a homecourt spot as #5 Dallas surges behind them.
• Sunday 4/7: Jazz @ Warriors. Utah also has to pay two visits to Steph Curry and his squad, after losing twice at home just before the All-Star break. The Dubs are 13-8 since reworking their starting lineup (Klay Thompson is coming off the bench now, although he has started some games due to injury), and they’ve won their last four as they try to hold off a furious bid by Houston to steal their play-in spot.

Random stuff from the Jazz community

This isn’t exactly “fun,” but we try to reserve this space for stories and things on the more human side of basketball, and there’s nothing more human than what Jazz GM Justin Zanik and his family are going through. It was really heartwarming to hear that multiple Jazz personnel were lining up to offer their support.

The Utah Jazz send our full support to Jazz GM Justin Zanik as he takes the next step in his treatment plan for polycystic kidney disease (PKD).

Learn more about his journey. pic.twitter.com/YzO5dxVKxt

— Utah Jazz (@utahjazz) April 1, 2024

Here are some lines and insights from ESPN’s story about Zanik’s health journey that should make fans feel pretty good about the organization and the people running it.

• Hardy on Zanik: “He’s the guy who lets everyone else be the star despite having the title of NBA GM. He’s one of the least insecure people I’ve met in a business full of insecure people.”
• Smith said of Zanik’s situation, “[W]e’re all-in on our people. I made sure Justin knew: Whatever he needed, we had his back.”
• Zanik himself: “I fixed a lot of s—. I’m the one who’s supposed to help. I’m the one who’s supposed to take care of everything. I really didn’t know how to ask for help, but I had to get over it.”
• Cavs president Koby Altman, which whom Zanik has dealt on multiple occasions including the Jazz’s acquisition of Markkanen and Sexton, calls Zanik “brilliant” and applauds his motor. “And you can trust Justin. You talk about sensitive topics with him, you show your hand a little bit in negotiations, and you know that’s never going anywhere beyond you and him. And a lot of the time, you end up talking with him about everything in the world but basketball.”

I’ll add to those by saying that Zanik is authentic, smart, unpretentious and perhaps most importantly just legitimately nice. I join a great many people in the NBA community in wishing for the best for Zanik and his family.

Just seven more games left… and nothing easy left on the schedule for the skidding Jazz.