Salt City Seven: Putting Pressure on the D, Mitchell Making History, Gobert vs. Young Centers & More

Mitchell’s Jazz drove & dished to a 3-1 record. (David Sherman via timberwolves.com)

The Salt City Seven drops every Monday throughout the regular season, with seven regular features meant to relive the week in Jazzland from various angles. Check in every Monday for the quotes, stats, plays and performances that tell the stories from the last 168 hours in the world of the Jazz.

An important quote from Jazz players or personnel during the week.

“Donovan (Mitchell) started to figure out some angles in pick-and-roll. When we attack the rim, all of those things start to open up. “

-Jazz coach Quin Snyder after his team’s offense exploded for 125 points in a road win

The Jazz offense looked really good in Minnesota, especially during a 72-point second half. It wound up being Utah’s third best offensive outing of the season, and in the top 5% of all NBA games this season in terms of points per meaningful possessions (127.6, excluding heaves and garbage time).

Both Mitchell and Ricky Rubio kept applying pressure by breaking the paint with the ball, and Utah’s offense is best when the guards attack, as Snyder stated. Whether on pick-and-roll action or by letting the ball flow away from high pressure, Utah’s ball handlers forced defenses to react to them. That opens things up for roll men and for shooters, creating the advantages that a sometimes shooting-challenged team needs to open up the offense. The same aggressiveness led to a 114 ORtg on meaningful possessions against Denver.

But that’s not always the case, and Utah’s 3-1 week included a couple of offensive clunkers. Against Portland on Monday, the Jazz let the Blazers’ conservative defensive schemes deter them away from the paint and into one of the worst shooting performances of the NBA season, at just 43.4% effective field goal percentage. And on Friday night, the same offense that produced a 125 ORtg through three quarters turned into a 67 when Snyder says his team “didn’t play like a smart team.” Their dud of a fourth quarter dropped their eFG% for the game to 46.3%, also in the bottom sixth of all team performances this season.

They survived the game because of their defense, but only by the skin of their teeth.

So what’s the key to avoiding those offensive letdowns? Snyder answered it above: attacking.

Utah drives more than any other team, at 55.6 drives per game, according to the NBA’s tracking cameras. When you consider that Utah plays at a league-average pace and is one of just three teams to have decided all of its games in regulation, that figure actually represents an even larger chunk of their offense on a per-possession basis. They also pass on a higher percentage of their drives — 44.2% — than any other team. 

That’s an important ingredient to how Utah gets a viable offense even from some of their more spacing-challenged lineups. They lead the league in field goal percentage on shots resulting directly from a paint touch (68.9%), but are only 12th when the driver himself takes the shot. Their ability to collapse defenses also gives them the third-highest number of wide open threes (19.7 per game).

Put pressure on the rim. Surgically exploit the advantages it creates. 

Frankly, that’s why Rubio is so important to the Jazz¹. Mitchell is a dynamic scorer and can create his own shot seemingly out of nowhere. But he can’t be the only player with the ability to puncture the defense.  The Jazz’s offense is currently less efficient when any of Mitchell, Rubio or Exum uses the possession directly off of the drive — the three combine for 17.6 points on the combined 20.2 possessions that those three finish with a driving shot, free throw trip or TO. The value of those drives, at least for now, is in the advantage they create for the team, and the Jazz need Mitchell to be a scorer and not just a table-setter.

Rubio passes on 55% of his drives, the highest figure among Jazz rotation regulars, and in fact the highest of any NBA player with at least 10 drives per game. Regardless of what his stat line says at the end of a particular night, the pressure he applies generally creates productive churn for the Jazz’s offensive machinery.

Stats that tell the story of the week or highlight a timely topic.

24

Mitchell is in the midst of a historic scoring stretch. His 29 against Minnesota stretched his streak of 24-plus outings to 12. That’s the longest such streak by a Jazz player since Karl Malone had 13 in a row in the spring of 1995. The only players to have 12 or more straight 24-plus games in the last two seasons: James Harden (25, and counting), LeBron James (15) and now Mitchell.  And as @TreyToupee pointed out, nobody in the last 40 years — not MJ, not LeBron, not Kevin Durant — has had a streak like this during their first two seasons.

10-3

There’s a whole lot of context behind this number, but it’s somewhat meaningful that Rudy Gobert improved to 10-3 against Karl-Anthony Towns this week, isn’t it? KAT was a 2018 All-Star and is widely considered one of the rising stars at the center position, yet he most often finds himself at the wrong end of his head-to-head matchups with Gobert. In terms of some other up-and-coming centers in the West, Gobert is 6-3 against Nikola Jokic, 7-3 against Anthony Davis and 10-6 against Jusuf Nurkic. For the sake of full disclosure, he’s 12-16 (including playoffs) against Steve Adams.

+27.6

The Jazz are 11-2 over their last 13, and over that span, they’ve gotten really great production from a lineup they only pieced together out of necessity. Mitchell, Joe Ingles, Royce O’Neale, Jae Crowder and Gobert had played just two minutes together before January 4, but since then the quintet has played 50 minutes together and has been the club’s best lineup² with a net rating of +27.6 over that span. If you replace Crowder with Derrick Favors, they’re +13.9 in 67 minutes, or if you replace O’Neale with Rubio, they’re +10.7 in 35. 

Breaking down the Xs and Os behind a Jazz score from the week.

Horns pinch give-and-go

We’ve looked at enough “horns” action in this space that, by now, regular readers know the term applies to a setup with a ball handler dribbling toward two screeners at the upper corners of the paint. There are about a thousand different ways a team can use horns to score, and today we’ll look at one: the pinch post give-and-go.

“Pinch post” is the term for the spot where the free throw line meets the outside edge of the paint. The term is most commonly used when a team runs action on one side of the floor, then brings the ball back to the weakside pinch post for some two-man action on an otherwise empty side of the floor. But the Jazz like to run that basic two-man give-and-go straight out of horns. Rubio in particular likes to get downhill on this pinch post play disguised as horns.

But it’s not always Rubio who benefits from this quick give-and-go. Here are a couple of examples where that basic structure sets up Jazz big men for easy paint looks.

On the first one, the threat of the pitch back to Rubio freezes Andrew Wiggins momentarily. Consequently, he’s slow getting over the screen and Towns has to help. That leaves just Rubio’s defender to decide whether to stay with Gobert or retreat to the 3-point line, and weirdly he does neither. He looks like he’s going to tag Rudy on the roll, but then just moves out of the way at the last second. 

The second one, truth be told, is not really even a pinch post play at all³, but the same basic principle applies here: Rubio uses the high give-and-go to get an advantage on his man and commit the help. Once that help comes, he drops it off to a diving Favors. Dario Saric sees it coming and helps off the perimeter, but he’s not really equipped to stop Favors anyway.

Three buckets, all in the same game and all scored from the same basic action.

After each Jazz win, Twitter helps us decide who was that game’s MVP or most memorable performer.

Jazz 114, Nuggets 108: Donovan Mitchell

Rubio’s first real game back⁴ was magical, and Gobert, Ingles and Crowder were all really good. But let’s not overthink this one. Spida had 35-6-6-2-2, the first Jazz player to post that stat line in a game since Malone’s MVP season. And he played solid defense, including with a late block and two key defensive boards in the final minute.

Jazz 106, Wolves 102: Rudy Gobert

This felt like it was Mitchell’s for most of the game, especially given his first regular season double-double with 24 points and 11 assists. But when the offense sputtered late, Utah needed to rely on the Stifle Tower to lock this one up. Mitchell made just one of his final 11 shots, and that put Utah in a position where they had to win on the defensive end. Gobert had back-to-back blocks on Wiggins in the final five minutes, then stole the ball from him with 90 seconds left and the Jazz up just two. Then on each of the Wolves’ last two trips, it was Gobert protecting the 3-point line on switches, challenging shots by Jerryd Bayless and Anthony Tolliver that could have tied the game or given Minny the lead. He finished with 18 points, 16 boards, four blocks and two steals — and I think he actually got an uncredited block on that last Tolliver attempt.

Jazz 125, Wolves 111: Ricky Rubio

Mitchell is just a walking 25 these days, even when he starts slow. In this one he bounced back to finish with 29-4-5 and some key buckets to help Utah maintain the late cushion. But they had that cushion in the first place because of Rubio and Favors. The latter dealt with Towns for much of the game and got Utah some early buckets when the offense was struggling. Rubio was splendid all game long, and both the offense (128.6) and the defense (100) looked significantly more organized when he was on the court. He had 17 points (on 62% true shooting) and eight assists (producing 36% of teammate buckets when he was on the court), and the Wolves averaged just 19 paint points per 48 minutes with Rubio on the floor. Also, Gobert shot 7-for-8, and Crowder and Korver combined for eight threes.

Tracking the wild Western Conference postseason race and the Jazz’s place in it.

Believe it or not, even after a week of games in the tough Northwest Division, Utah still has the easiest remaining schedule of all Western Conference teams. They’re also tied with the Pelicans for the most home game remaining.

For those reasons, Utah still projects as a top-4 team, despite being currently knotted with San Antonio in a 6th/7th place tie.

The Jazz are a top 3-4 team by just about any model.

A quick look at the Jazz’s next seven nights of action.

The Jazz start their week with something they’ve only experienced twice so far in 2019: consecutive days off. But then it’s right back to it, with two of their three games this week against key Western foes. 

Wednesday: Utah at Portland, 8:30 p.m. MT 

• State of the Blazers: The Blazers have won five of their last six, and will have had three days of rest before the Jazz visit them on Wednesday. They last played on Saturday, also at home.
• Jazz-Blazers: This will wrap the season series for the Jazz and Blazers. Utah’s up 2-1, which means a win clinches the series, an important development in the Western Conference race and also in divisional tiebreaker situations.
• Key for the Jazz: Utah’s lone loss to the Blazers came in a game when they simply couldn’t stop Nurkic. The Jazz were focused on stopping Damian Lillard in pick-and-roll situations, and that led to a 17-point third quarter for Nurk. Utah will have to do a better job accounting for him in their schemes. 

Friday: Atlanta at Utah, 9:00 p.m. MT

• State of the Hawks: Atlanta has been flirting with decency, at 9-10 overall since December 18. Utah will be their fifth stop on a seven-game road trip.
• Jazz-Hawks: The two squads haven’t faced off yet this season, but remember: Atlanta somehow managed to sweep the Jazz last year.
• Key for the Jazz: The Hawks play at the league’s fastest pace, but they sport a bottom-5 offense AND defense. As long as Utah doesn’t let their frenetic style get them out of character, they should be fine.

Saturday: Houston at Utah, 7:00 p.m. MT

• State of the Rockets: James Harden has scored 30 or more points in 23 straight games, and he’s averaging a cool 48 over his last seven. He has allowed them to surge despite myriad injuries: they’re 18-6 since December 11, and just got Chris Paul back on Sunday night.
• Jazz-Rox: Utah scored a pair of double-digit wins over Houston before Harden’s 47 on December 17 gave the Rockets their first win in the season series. Now, Utah has a chance to secure a 3-1 edge in a tiebreaker that could very well wind up deciding homecourt in an opening round Jazz-Rox matchup.
• Key for the Jazz: Right now, it’s simply all about Harden. He’s going to score boatloads, so Utah just has to make it tough on him. Since the new year, Houston is 5-1 when Harden’s effective field goal percentage is 55% or better, 1-5 when it’s not.  

Because after all, we’re here to have fun.

Since games against Minnesota seem to bring out the swattiest version of the Stifle Tower, the two straight feuds with the Wolves reminded me to update Gobert’s block list.

Instead of just throwing the data out, though, I decided to make it a Twitter quiz and see if anyone could guess the right answers to a few block-related trivia questions.

(Caveat, as always: we’re talking about Gobert’s 818 credited regular season blocks. That means preseason and playoff blocks aren’t included here, nor are blocks like Friday’s apparent deflection on Tolliver’s three that wasn’t counted by the official scorers.)

• Gobert has blocked 26 more players this season that weren’t on his list, bringing his total to 328. SCH’s own @RGiss11 came closest with his guess of 24. Some notable additions this year: Andre Iguodala, Draymond Green, Buddy Hield, Jokic, Marcus Smart and former teammate Alec Burks.
• Towns is Gobert’s most frequent victim, with 16 total blocks (including two on Sunday evening). @JordanHansen16 was the first to guess correctly. Lillard follows close behind at 13, followed by Wiggins, Brook Lopez and DeMarcus Cousins, each with 10.
• The team he has blocked the most is still Minnesota, as @jrostler first guessed. He has blocked the Wolves 66 times, the Blazers 60 and the Lakers 46. 
• @JordanHansen16 also correctly guessed the identity of the All-NBA player whom Gobert hadn’t blocked before this season, and then got him four times (and counting): Draymond Green. Gobert has now blocked every player to be named All-NBA during his career except for four: Victor Oladipo, Klay Thompson, Kevin Love and Joakim Noah.
• Gobert only recorded five total blocks against his current teammates before they joined the Jazz: Rubio twice, plus one block on each of Crowder, Korver and Thabo Sefolosha. Nobody got very close on this one; Riley said 10 and everybody else guessed higher.

That does it for this week. Seven more bits of Jazziness come your way next Monday.