Utah Jazz: What Does the Future Hold for Alec Burks?

With Alec Burks facing another surgery and more missed time due to injury, his role and future with the Utah Jazz are becoming more and more unclear.

In case you missed it, Utah Jazz guard Alec Burks is once again out indefinitely as he underwent yet another surgery on Tuesday. With no timetable for his return, it may be even longer than Jazz fans imagined before a healthy Burks finally takes the floor.

After a questionable play by the Los Angeles Clippers’ Paul Pierce back in December of last year, Burks suffered a fractured fibula for which he underwent surgery on December 29th. This summer he underwent further procedures with an arthroscopic surgery to clear debris from his left knee and ankle.

Hopes were high that Burks would be ready to go by the start of the season, but the prolific guard couldn’t seem to shake the ongoing pain in his leg. Thus it was determined that another surgery was required to “debride” Burks’ left ankle.

According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary entry, debridement is the “surgical removal of lacerated, devitalized, or contaminated tissue.” For those of you who don’t speak medical (like me), essentially it is a procedure that removes dead or damaged tissue to improve the healing potential of the remaining tissue around it.

In Tuesday’s broadcast against the Spurs, Craig Bolerjack and Matt Harpring spoke briefly about Burks’ surgery with optimism, saying that it was a necessary setback that would help make him a better and healthier player in the long run.

Jazz fans can only hope this will be the case. Since signing a 4-year, $42 million extension with the Utah Jazz at the start of the 2014-15 season, Burks has appeared in just 56 games of a possible 167 (he appeared in two games in the 2014-15 season before signing the extension and has also missed the first five so far this year).

His extended absence particularly hurt the Jazz the past two seasons when they dealt with several injuries and had a severe lack of depth in the second unit.

This season, the Utah Jazz are enjoying significantly more depth and are off to a formidable 3-2 start despite the tough slate of opponents they have faced. While Alec Burks was certainly projected to be a part of this team over the long haul, his almost constant absence has forced the Jazz to grow accustomed to playing without him.

“You feel bad for Alec and everything he’s been through to try to get healthy. Obviously he was a player we had plans for when we put the team together.” – Quin Snyder

And if this season’s start is any indication of what the Jazz will be capable of, then there’s a good chance that they may very well be fine despite his extended absence.

Nevertheless, Burks is a dynamic and versatile offensive player that would add an incredible edge to this Jazz team’s second unit. He’s certainly an upgrade off the bench over Shelvin Mack and was considered by some to be a strong Sixth Man of the Year candidate once it was established that Hood would be the starter at the two.

In a perfect world, Burks would make a speedy recovery, come back to the Jazz rotation with a significant amount of the season still left and serve as an effective back-up that pushed the Jazz bench and team as a whole to a new level. Utah’s extension in 2014 would look like a genius move and they would keep the prolific Burks as part of their core for years to come along with all of his current teammates.

But unfortunately this is not a perfect world.

Sure, maybe the first part will come to fruition and Burks will finish out the year strong and healthy. If not, the Jazz will have the misfortune of continuing to overpay for a player who has been unable to produce.

But regardless of what Burks is able to do this season, the tricky part comes with deciding what to do with him amidst all the expiring contracts the Jazz will have to address in upcoming years.

The Jazz didn’t waste any time in extending center Rudy Gobert who recently inked a 4-year $102 million extension. Based on current salaries, it will also make Gobert the highest-paid Jazzman beginning with the 2017-18 season.

But that’s not likely to last long. Enter Gordon Hayward‘s player option for next season.

It was already “big news” (it actually wasn’t that big of news) this offseason that Hayward is expected to opt-out of the final year of his contract and become a free agent. While that doesn’t necessarily mean that he will be leaving the Jazz after this season, it does mean wherever he ends up, he’s going to get paid big time.

Hayward will more than likely demand a max contract which will put him at a starting salary right around $30 million, nearly double what he’s making now with the Jazz.

Add that to the fact that George Hill is currently on an extremely affordable contract that ends at the conclusion of this season, Derrick Favors’ contract expires at the end of next year, and assuming the Jazz extend qualifying offers to Rodney Hood and Dante Exum (which they are almost guaranteed to do), they will both be restricted free agents at the end of the next season as well, and the Jazz have some figuring to do.

There were already reports of extension talks with Derrick Favors this summer and they’ve begun more recently with George Hill. With the Jazz currently sitting about $14 million below the salary cap, they do have some wiggle room to begin contract reconstruction this season.

However, if the Jazz are able to reach agreements to extend Favors and Hill, then re-sign Hayward after this season to a max deal, they could find themselves quickly flirting with that salary cap limit in 2017-18. The good news is that the cap is projected to rise next season from about $94 million to around $103 million but even then the Jazz will be stretching the checkbook to maintain their core.

Then once Exum and Hood become restricted free agents at the conclusion of the 2017-18 season, depending on the offers coming in from other teams, the Jazz could find themselves hard-pressed to match and keep each one of them.

And this doesn’t even consider the contracts of important role players such as Joe Johnson, Joe Ingles and Shelvin Mack. And you thought Dennis Lindsey’s job was easy.

Along with all this, Alec Burks is owed roughly $10 to $11.5 million in each of the next three seasons, a relatively modest amount compared to some of the contracts that were doled out this offseason, but also an extremely high spend when considering that he has hardly seen the court since his extension.

Thus the Jazz are faced with several tough decisions regarding Burks based on what we see from him in the upcoming season or two.

If he continues to struggle with health and doesn’t prove to be a consistent producer on the court, it’s not likely that any team will want to trade for him and the Jazz will be stuck with his salary through the 2018-19 season, potentially costing them the ability to hold on to another key guy such as Hood or Exum.

If he comes back healthy and becomes a key part of Utah’s success, then there will likely be suitors around the league willing to trade for him, but will the Jazz be willing to part with one of their key guys? Or will retaining Burks then be worth the risk of losing another player? Looking at his injury history makes this question all the more difficult.

The silver lining to these tough questions is that no decision has to be made right now. While I’m certain Jazz brass has thought about Alec Burks’ future, I guarantee even they likely aren’t sure how they’ll deal with this and some other salary issues in the near future. A lot of it depends on how the Jazz are playing as a team when he returns and what kind of impact he has once he’s back.

Some of it also depends on how contract negotiations go with other players on the team. For all we know, Gordon Hayward could bolt to another team next year, then Burks’ salary would hardly make a dent in the remaining cap space.

I know, Jazz fans, I shouldn’t talk that way and definitely don’t want it to happen, but it is a plausible hypothetical situation that could drastically change the outlook of the Burks dilemma.

In my opinion, given what we know now, I think that of all the guys I’ve mentioned that the Jazz need to hold onto, Burks is likely the least important. Securing the likes of Hayward, Favors, Hood, Exum and even the newcomer Hill who has looked incredible so far should be a higher priority.

Retaining Burks should be viewed as either a back-up plan or as a bonus if the chips fall right and Utah is comfortably able to do so from a financial standpoint.

But that brings us to the dilemma that I brought up earlier. If Burks plays well, it may be hard to want to trade him. If he’s not playing or isn’t contributing enough, then it will be hard to get much of value for him in a trade and his salary is guaranteed for three more years.

Nevertheless, if he isn’t performing well or is injured, even if the Jazz had to do a salary dump type of move, it would be worth it to trade him in order to keep the other more important and consistent members of this Jazz team together. And if Burks is playing well, I still think that the others have proven to be more consistent and valuable and Utah should take advantage of the trade value he builds if they can’t afford to keep him.

While he has been solid at times, his lack of time on the floor coupled with his less than impressive career stats of 10.6 points and less than two assists per game make him more of a liability than the guys the Jazz should fight to keep.

So with Burks undergoing another surgery and the wait for his healthy return delayed once again, Jazz fans have to wonder just how bright and long-lasting his future with this team really will be. Once Gordon Hayward returns and Derrick Favors gets fully healthy, if the team is playing superb basketball, then Jazz brass will have to take a long, hard look at both their key players’ salary demands and the actual value of Alec Burks.

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And who knows, maybe Dennis Lindsey will be able to work some money magic and keep the whole band together. But we’ll still need to see some marked improvement and production from Burks if that is going to be a smart decision.

Because unless we see something incredible from him in the coming months, I have a hunch that as contract negotiations continue with his other teammates that the Jazz hope to retain, Alec Burks may find himself as the odd man out.

All stats courtesy of NBA.com. All payroll figures courtesy of basketballinsiders.com