Salt City Seven: Opportuniy Knocks, Trade Season Looms, Kessler Swats & More

Fontecchio scores a game-winning dunk. (Rick Bowmer via sltrib.com)

Every Monday during the regular season here at SCH begins with the Salt City Seven, with 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 dissection of a big-picture topic or burning question relevant to the week in Jazzland.

When it rains it pours, the saying goes, and lately a monsoon of injuries seemingly hit the Jazz all at once. But the one happy byproduct of being down several guys is that they’re getting a nice progress check with some of their deep bench pieces.

The Jazz took a mostly healthy squad to Portland for an upset win back on November 19, but the effort cost them nearly a month’s worth of Mike Conley Jr. He’d exit that game early and miss 10 of the next 11. The Jazz were 3-8 over that stretch. Also in that span, top scorer Lauri Markkanen fell ill, Collin Sexton pulled a hamstring, and a hip contusion took Jordan Clarkson out of the lineup for the first time all season on Saturday.

That those four — essentially Utah’s best scorers and creators — all missed time during this span left an interesting void for coach Will Hardy to figure out. And in particular it meant guys getting promoted up the depth chart, especially at guard. We’ve learned a bit about some perimeter players who have seen more opportunities as a result of the Jazz’s recent imitation of a M*A*S*H unit.

Nickeil Alexander-Walker has gotten a lot of chances to run the offense on nights when multiple ball handlers have been out. He played 25 minutes or more in just one of the Jazz’s first 26 games, but now has done it for three straight.

The biggest revelation for the fourth-year guard has been his sudden can’t-miss stroke from deep, especially the corners. He has made five is his last seven corner treys, which brings his overall 3-point percentage to 41.3% after a 4-for-13 start. A 46-shot sample is nothing in the scheme of things, but if that number gets sustained over a steady shot diet, that could change Alexander-Walker’s NBA reality to a degree. He’s already a pesky defender with a 6-foot-6 frame and a 6-foot-9 wingspan, but the shooting had held him back. He had never topped 35% from three or 52% true shooting for a season. Right now he’s well above both marks.

A 6’6″ combo guard with ball skills, annoying defense AND an outside shot is suddenly a much more interesting prospect. He’s still just 24.

Mark Russell Pereira already said a bunch about what Simone Fontecchio has shown, and that was even before his 5-game stretch where he averaged 8.6 points (20.5 per 36 minutes) on 53% outside shooting. As Mark pointed out, the allure behind Fontecchio is less about his stats in scant minutes and more about his feel for where to be, when to cut, and all of the other micro decisions that belie his intellectual readiness for the NBA game.

There’s a super imaginable pathway there to being a rotation piece on a winning team. That obviously starts with his shooting, especially as awareness grows about just how shot-ready he is at any moment. It’s unlikely he’s ever be at the top of the scouting report, but he can be one of those guys like Garrison Matthews or Matt Ryan whom coaches circle on the whiteboard next to big, bold writing: “don’t effing let him get open off a screen!” For those guys, that’s basically the whole reason they exist on a basketball court. Fontecchio looks like he could probably offer something beyond that with his all-around court vision.

It may just take some time. Fontecchio’s own ankle turn — coupled with Rudy Gay’s return from a hand issue — could mean we’ll see less of the Italian wing in the immediate term. 

Ochai Agbaji has finally seen some run, his first meaningful minutes since a 3-game stint where Hardy used him in the rotation in Gay’s place. He’s further off from being a rotation piece than we all thought, but that doesn’t mean the Jazz have soured on him. They knew he would be a project, and their minimum of 6-7 years of team control give them a nice runway to figure things out.

But yeah, this is the writer who not all that long ago dubbed Agbaji the fourth most likely current Jazzman to be part of the team’s long-term future. So sure, I’m relieved to see him actually, you know, play basketball.

Saturday’s game was the most alert he has looked to these eyes, as he generally did the right things with and without the ball, but still struggled on a 2-for-8 night. With raw rookies, it’s actually kind of fun when we first get to them stop being afraid to impact the game. He took a couple of ill-advised corkscrew jumpers and got stripped on another drive, but watching him get out there and try stuff is weirdly an important step. He needs to defend more consistently and he almost literally never passes (one assist in 104 minutes to date). But again, at this point with Agbaji you’re looking for signs of progress, not anything close to a finished product.

Even Leandro Bolmaro got a season-high 17 minutes on Saturday. He was frisky on some defensive trips, but still looks completely unwilling to shoot the basketball — just two threes taken (and missed) in 40 minutes, and he’s 2-for-8 from the field this season. Modern guards just can’t be that afraid to shoot, so eventually he’ll have to convince himself he’s allowed to look at the basket.

Those experimental minutes have so far been a function of injuries along the depth chart. As the Jazz drift further from their 10-3 peak, maybe the Jazz will spend more game time checking progress of guys like these four. This season is mostly about gathering information about the future, after all. NAW has perhaps given folks the most reason to rethink their definition of him, but all of these guys are likely to get more chances as the season goes along.

Key stats that tell the story of the Jazz’s week

1.48

The Jazz are leading the NBA this season in points scored after a steal, with 1.48 per possession. The problem is that they’re below average at forcing turnovers (22nd) and they’re much less prolific at running after live rebounds (11th).

45.5%

At 45.5%, Kelly Olynyk is the NBA’s ninth best 3-point shooter so far this season, and second among centers behind Boston’s Al Horford (46.6%). At the other end the spectrum is Talen Horton-Tucker, whose 23.8% from downtown is the worst figure by any NBA player with at least 80 attempts this season. THT has made just three of his last 25 from distance.

11.2

So far this season, the Jazz are +4.3 per 100 possessions any time at least one of Markkanen/Conley is on the court, per Cleaning the Glass. They are -6.9 when both are sitting, an 11.2-point spread.

53.6%

We’ve talked a lot about Markkanen’s surprising rim defense numbers this season (he’s still holding guys to 56.4% at the rim, by the way), but how about Walker Kessler? The rookie has now contested more shots there than Markkanen and is limiting foes to 53.6%. Only Brook Lopez, Ivica Zubac, and Nic Claxton can match Kessler on volume and percentage.

29th

Through their 10-3 start, the Jazz were defending right at league average in halfcourt situations: 14th place with 94.5 per 100 halfcourt defensive possessions. During the 5-11 stretch since then, they are allowing 119.0, 29th in the league over that span.

In the words of Jazz players/people

“What I always default to is what is in the best interest of the Jazz organization, and that means having a sustainable winning product. But it’s also with higher goals of being on a competitive road to a title, not just to have a nice little team that everyone can clap for and make the playoffs and be on that treadmill of being in the middle. So those decisions can be tough sometimes.”

-GM Justin Zanik, via The Ringer

This Wednesday marks the unofficial start of the NBA’s trade season, because the majority of players who were signed over the offseason become trade eligible. That makes this an interesting time to hear directly from Zanik, whose Jazz have a lot of flexibility in terms of directions they could go with in-season deals.

“I like having a lot of balls in the air,” Zanik added. “It means that there’s a lot of optionality.”

Utah’s draft asset cache is as impressive as any team’s, especially when looking at the number of guaranteed-to-convey selections. They also have easily matchable salaries attached to (in most cases) really useful NBA players. They could become buyers if someone on their radar becomes available. On the other hand, if they can get something of value for a player who’s unlikely to be part of the future anyway, doing so could clear the way for more information-gathering opportunities with the young guys.

With all of that “optionality” Zanik refers to, it’s likely that Utah will be mentioned often in the rumor mill between this Thursday and the February 9 trade deadline. 

Projecting the Jazz’s place in the bigger picture

Let’s continue to prep for trade rumor season by looking at the financial parameters involved in trading Utah’s 15 main roster players.

The most and least the Jazz could receive back in a 1-for-X trade for each player.

As far as likelihood to be moved, the best guess here is you can go ahead and leave Markkanen out of your trade checker musings. Smart folks still insist that the Finnish forward was a real target for the Jazz in their summer trades, not just some ancillary asset to be flipped along the way.

The Jazz also have a minimum of 6-7 years of team control when it comes to Agbaji’s and Walker Kessler’s futures, and Sexton has a 4-year deal and a lot of career in front of him. The Jazz still believe there’s a chance Clarkson could commit past his current contract, and at 30 years old, there’s a better-than-zero chance he’ll still be able to contribute meaningfully when the Jazz are once again ready to compete for stuff.

Beasley, Jarred Vanderbilt, Horton-Tucker, Alexander-Walker and Fontecchio are all young but have short contracts, so the Jazz have to weigh their projected basketball value against the likelihood of them re-upping. Conley, Olynyk and Gay will all be 33 or older when their current contracts are up. Bolmaro and Udoka Azubuike likely have the least trade value on their own.

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

The Italian gets the lone game ball after a 1-2 week, but a couple of guards had nice nights in losing efforts.

Jazz 124, Warriors 123: Simone Fontecchio. Fontecchio was the people’s choice by a wide margin. I personally think this was a close call between a few guys. Clarkson has 22-9-4, Kessler got a double-double and five blocks in his first NBA start, and Beasley scored the penultimate shot and assisted the last one. But I get it: a career high is a career high, and a game winner is a game winner. Per Stathead, he became the 11th player this season to score a go-ahead bucket with :02 or less remaining in the 4th or OT. He was also just the third rookie to do it, and the first person to score a go-ahead dunk under those circumstances. Molto benne.

Strong in Defeat:

• Jazz 108, Wolves 118: Malik Beasley. Conley’s 17 (and 6 assists) in 24 minutes after a lengthy absence made for a heck of a “welcome back,” but this had to be Beasley. He wasn’t just on fire from outside in this one, he also got into the paint, had success in the midrange, grabbed two steals and seemed to hit a big shot whenever the Jazz needed it. He and Clarkson combined for 16 of the Jazz’s points in a 33-21 third quarter. The other former Wolf, Vanderbilt, had 12 and 10.
• Jazz 110, Nuggets 115: Nickeil Alexander-Walker. This was such an easy call. NAW had a great shooting night on the way to his best scoring night as a Jazzman (27). Olynyk had a nice 18-7-3 line, and did a decent enough job turning Nikola Jokic into a passer — it’s just that all the other Nuggets were making those shots. Beasley had 19, and Talen Horton-Tucker managed a 19-7-4 line despite being ice cold from deep.

Looking ahead to the next seven nights of Jazz action

The Jazz finally get a lighter week with only three games and no back-to-backs, but the opponent slate is brutal.

Tuesday 12/13, Jazz vs. Pelicans: Don’t look now, but Zion Williamson is coming. He has scored 25-plus in his last six games, the second-longest streak of his career. The Pels won all those games plus his prior 23-pointer for a total win streak of seven, including two straight against the Suns, whom they have now overtaken as the West’s best team. They have the fifth best offense and third best defense, and they’re a dominant +16.5 per 100 when Williamson, CJ McCollum and Brandon Ingram share the floor. They quite simply are playing very good basketball. (Ingram has missed the last seven, however.) All of this is despite the fact that McCollum is off to a pretty rough start by his standards: 48.7% true shooting in his first 22 games.

Thursday 12/15, Jazz vs. Pelicans: More on the surprisingly potent Pels: Cleaning the Glass says they get to the rim the third most. They also allow the fifth most threes, which in theory should play into Utah’s strengths in these two games, except that they limit opponents to the fourth lowest percentage on those threes. The Jazz stunned the Pels in their third game of the season when Olynyk slipped a hand-off action and drove for a layup, but that only came after the Jazz blew a late double-digit lead. This will be the first season series the Jazz will conclude, as they won’t see the Pelicans again after Thursday night.

Saturday 12/17, Jazz @ Bucks: None of the data on this year’s Bucks is super reliable yet, given the revolving list of injured players. For example, 3-time All-Star Khris Middleton didn’t debut until December, and then the Bucks got a nice little 4-game winning streak going before Middleton twisted his ankle during Milwaukee’s shocking loss to hapless Houston. Jrue Holiday, Wesley Matthews and Pat Connaughton have all missed stretches, and beloved former Jazzman Joe Ingles has yet to play. And yet they have the second-best record in basketball thanks to the dominant Giannis Antetokounmpo. Before his off night in Houston, Giannis was averaging 35-10-6 (!!) in his previous nine. He, Jayson Tatum and Luka Doncic are essentially co-favorites for league MVP at the moment.

Random stuff from the Jazz community

Seeing Jazz icon Rudy Gobert step into Vivint Arena in another jersey was a bit surreal, but it’s great that fans gave him the right kind of welcome back.

This used to be the space where we’d chronicle all the unique players the big fella has blocked in his career. His visit prompted me to go check where he’s at, and he needs just seven new customers to reach 500. He left Utah having turned away 486 different NBA players, and he has added seven new ones this season. 

People have been asking me — some jokingly, others not — when I’m going to start the block list graphics for Kessler, whose 8.8% block percentage would be best in the league if he had enough minutes to quality for the leaderboard. The answer is… not yet.

Kessler is at 47 career blocks, and that’s way too early to start giving him Gobert treatment with the full-on graphics and whatnot. But Gobert’s visit and Kessler continued strong presence inside did make me curious just where Kessler is.

• Kessler has blocked 47 shots in his first <2 months as a pro. Gobert obviously came into a very different situation in terms of playing time, but he blocked 41 shots in his entire first season.
• So far, 42 different players have been turned away by Kessler. Gobert didn’t claim his 42nd victim until more than a year after his NBA debut, when he stuffed Anderson Varejao in November of his second NBA season.
• Kessler has the most blocked so far on Detroit’s Hamidou Diallo, whom he rejected three times. The only other repeat customers are Kevon Looney, Jordan Poole and Shaedon Sharpe (twice each).
• Some of his notable blockees so far include 11 All-Stars: 9-time All-Star Russell Westbrook, along with Anthony Davis, John Wall, Nikola Jokic, Draymond Green, Tray Young, Andrew Wiggins, Goran Dragic, Julius Randle, Zion Williamson, and of course Gobert himself, a 3-time All-Star. 

My guess is there many more to come — maybe even 493 if he stays healthy.

That wraps another Salt City Seven.