Utah Jazz Player Power Rankings

August 14th, 2023 | by John Keeffer

Where do vets like Markkanen and Sexton fit in the Jazz’s pecking order? (Trent Nelson, The Salt Lake Tribune)

When you start to play around with different lineups that the Utah Jazz have at their disposal, it quickly becomes pretty apparent who the most valuable/impactful players on the roster are going into the 2023-24 season. In particular, it becomes apparent that Utah has a pretty clear number one and number two. From there, it can actually be a real challenge to figure out a solid pecking order. The Jazz have a talented roster, but the hope is that as players understand their place and role on the team, the overall chemistry on the team will benefit.

The Jazz have one established star in Lauri Markannen. From there, the roster is an intriguing mix of young talent looking to prove themselves and established veterans looking to maintain their rotation minutes. It will be extremely interesting to see how Will Hardy’s rotations play out, because some players are going to be left out in the cold. Their are currently 18 players on the roster, and he can’t play them all.

To give us a starting point, here’s an early power ranking of Jazz players!

Honorable Mentions: Luka Samanic, Johnny Juzang, Micah Potter, Joey Hauser

I loved what I saw from Samanic in Summer League as a 6’9″ power forward who has the ability to handle the ball and create off the dribble. If he can become a more consistent three-point threat and at least an average defender, he could demand playing time. But unless injuries open up a door for that, Samanic has a lot of forwards in front of him on the depth chart. As for two-way players Johnny Juzang, Micah Potter and Joey Hauser, they likely will see their playing time come primarily with the SLC Stars, Utah’s G League affiliate.

14. Brice Sensabaugh

13. Omer Yertseven

12. Simone Fontecchio

11. Kris Dunn

Let’s call this group our first up due to injuries group. I like each of these players, but they are not going to see a lot of rotational minutes unless they are forced to do so. Sensabaugh dropped to the late first round of the draft despite being one of the best scoring freshman in the nation. Part of that was due to a knee injury, but another part was because despite his scoring efforts in college, his team at Ohio State wasn’t very good. He was viewed as one of the best three-point shooters in the draft, and the Jazz could use shooting. If injuries open up playing time or the season isn’t going the way Danny Ainge wants it to, he could get a real shot later in the season.

As I spelled out in my Yurtseven profile when he was signed by the Jazz, this is a player who averaged 12.1 points, 12.7 rebounds, and 2.5 assists as a starter while Bam Adebayo was out for three weeks. That included some real incredible performances. He finished with 16 points and 15 rebounds in his first career start, then had a 22 point, 16 rebound game verses Sacramento. In his last start before Bam returned from injury, he had 22 points and 11 rebounds while going head-to-head against Joel Embiid and the Sixers. He can only play center though, and the lack of positional flexibility will limit his paying time on a team with plenty of big bodies.

Fontecchio showed some things early and then had a couple of strong outings to close out his rookie season. When given the opportunity of playing time, he performed well. He only played over 30 minutes three times, but averaged 14.7 points in those games. He did play in the 20-29 minute range 13 times last season, and still averaged 12.1 points in those outtings. Due to the lack of small forwards on the team, he does have a clearer path to potential minutes than Sensabaugh or Yurtseven.

Dunn is similar to Fontecchio in that both players produced encouraging outcomes in small sample sizes late in the year. In the 22 games with the Jazz, he averaged 13.2 points, 4.5 rebounds and 5.6 assist, to go along with intense perimete defense. It was very impressive. However, in the six seasons prior to his 22-game Jazz stint, he averaged just eight points on 29 percent shooting from three. He shot 47 percent from three with the Jazz, but that was on extreme low volume. The biggest change to Dunn’s game that leads me to believe he could maintain those numbers is his ability in the short mid-range, or the “floater” range. More than half of his shot attempts come from that area, and he made them at 50 percent, which is in the 87th percentile. The problem is the Jazz have too many guards ahead of him. He proved a lot last season, enough to be on the roster, but is he going to receive playing time ahead of Jordan Clarkson, Collin Sexton, Keyonte George or even Talen Horton-Tucker? Probably unlikely unless it’s due to an injury or trade.

10. Keyonte George

9. Taylor Hendricks

Just to be clear, I would probably consider these two to be in a tie until we see them play regular season minutes. Keyonte George excited fans with his breakout performance in the Summer League. There is a strong argument for Key to become the starting point guard sooner rather than later, but at this point, he is still a 19-year-old rookie with a lot to prove. The Summer League isn’t the regular season. We’ve seen players dominate the summer league before who ended up not panning out. He’s given Jazz fans a lot of hope for the future, but we’ll still need to see it against actual NBA competition.

Meanwhile, Hendricks is the forgotten rookie in terms of fan excitement. It makes sense, given that he didn’t play during Summer League, but Hendricks was a top-10 pick for a reason. He is a rare 3-and-D power forward. He is a 6’10” elite level athlete, high level defensive player, who also happened to shoot nearly 40 percent from three as a freshman at UCF. When working on the potential lineups we’ll see Hardy use this season, Hendricks kept popping up. Depending on his playmaking ability, he can slot in anywhere from small forward to center, while not sacrificing shooting or defense.

8. Talen Horton-Tucker

I am a fan of THT, and am surprised more people aren’t. He is younger than Ochai Agbaji, and closed the final two months of the season by averaging 18 points, 5 rebounds and 6 assist. If Agbaji had put up those numbers, fans would be ecstactic, but since it was his third season in the league many seem to think it’s less impressive. 

I won’t add much more, because I already made the argument for him to be Utah’s starting point guard here:

7. Ochai Agbaji

I try not to overreact to Summer League, but there are some very specific things that you want to look out for. One is how second-year players perform. If you have a full regular season under your belt, and especially as a player who had a role including starting for the closing stretch of the season, you should look like one of the best players on the court. I would say Agbaji checked the box during his summer league run this off-season. During the Salt Lake City Summer League, he averaged 19 points and 9 rebounds, and then traveled to Vegas where he averaged 17.5 points and 8 rebounds. The rebounding is especially impressive. 

When I did my last article on rotations that Hardy could employ, Agbaji just kept popping up. He fits into almost any lineup and style of play. He is likely going to be tasked with guarding the best perimeter defenders each night, and if he can do so while stretching the floor on the other end, he will receive 25-30 minutes a night whether he starts or not.

6. Collin Sexton

If I were to doing a ranking of the players that I expect most likely to start the season with the Jazz, but end the season on another team, I’d probably pick Sexton. Rumors were already floating around this off-season that the Jazz were open to trading him. While with the Jazz though, I think he is best served in the sixth man role. He is an explosive offensive player who can really score the ball, but he is not a true point guard that is making players around him better. Jordan Clarkson has always been viewed as a score first player, but even he has a higher assist rate than Sexton. One of Sexton and JC should be on the floor the majority of the time, because Utah needs the perimeter scoring and shot creation, and then they can even share the court in some really fun lineups. 

5. Kelly Olynyk

Olynyk is the ultimate glue guy and will often be the unsung hero. His play reminds me a lot of Joe Ingles, where I have to imagine his teammates just love being on the floor with him. He averaged 12.5 points, 6.2 rebounds, and 3.7 assists. When given more playing time, he did even better than his season averages. In the 31 games that he played over 30 minutes, he averaged 15.5 points, 7.2 rebounds and 4.4 assists. As a center, he ranks in the top 10 percent in assist percentage and assist to usage ratio. He will likely move to the bench due to the arrival of John Collins, but his ability to be a lead ballhandler who can run the offense and move the ball on a team that doesn’t have a lot of pass-first players is going to keep him on the floor often, potentially even to close games.

4. John Collins

3. Jordan Clarkson

Number 4 and 3 were maybe the hardest to rank. The argument is which John Collins do we believe the Jazz are getting: the one who averaged 18.5 points and 8.5 rebounds while shooting 38 percent on three-pointers from 2019-2022? Or the player who averaged 13 points and 6.5 rebounds while shooting 29 percent from three last season? If it’s the former, then he has an argument to be ahead of the other JC. 

For Clarkson, not enough people are talking about him having a career year last season. He averaged career highs in points, assists and rebounds, and was one of 34 players who averaged over 20 points, 4 rebounds and 4 asisst last season. When the annual Top 100 player ranking articles start coming out from ESPN, SI and The Ringer though, how high do we think he will be on the list? SI had him as number 100 last season, and he didn’t crack the top 100 the season prior. I’d argue that based on his production in his three year tenure with the Jazz, he is extremely underrated. 

Known as a shoot-first, ask questions later type player, he worked hard to change his game last season and became much more of a willing passer under Hardy. There has been lots of debate over who will be the starting guards for the Jazz, and especially the starting point guard. If he is given the reins as the starting point guard, he could average 20 points and 5 assists per game this season.

2. Walker Kessler

If they Jazz were going to surprise people with a leap into playoff contention, I think Walker Kessler would be the biggest driver of that. Similar to Rudy Gobert, he has the potential to turn the Jazz into an elite level defense all on his own. Kessler was one of the best interior defensive players as rookie last season, averaging 3 blocks per game as a starter in only 28 minutes. On shots defended within six feet, opponents shot just 51.3 percent, which was fourth best in the league behind only Giannis Antetokounmpo, Bismack Biyombo, and Jaren Jackson Jr.

The rumors are that he has added on 15 pounds of muscle, and has been working to expand his offensive game. We’ve seen videos of him consistently knocking down three-pointers with ease, and Hardy has said that he will be allowed to shoot one or two a game. The Jazz don’t really need him to score, he’ll help them win with defense, and being a lob threat and finisher around the basket. The thought of him developing into more of an offensive threat as well though? Expect great things from him this season. Especially after his work on Team USA, as detailed by Steve Godfrey.

1. Lauri Markannen

No real surprise here, but the Utah Jazz season will only go as far as Lauri Markannen can take them. Coming off a monster season where he exploded for a career high 25.6 points and 8.6 rebounds per game, the biggest question for Markkanen might simply be, is it possible for him to top that?

The most impressive thing to his numbers from last season might just be the efficiency in getting his nearly 26 points. He became the first player in NBA history to make 200 or more threes while also dunking the ball over 100 times. Analytically, two of the most valuable abilities in basketball is three-point shooting and dunking, and the Jazz have the rare player who is elite at both. Now that he has broken out, expect many more All-Star seasons to follow.

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