Second Unit Play
As with the starting five, it’s difficult to evaluate bench play because of injury problems. Of Utah’s second unit crew, six players have been forced to start a combined 23 games while regular starters have sat with illness or injury. This has made it pretty hard for Coach Quin Snyder to capitalize on the depth added over the summer.
Joe Johnson and Trey Lyles have been the best bench performers to this point. However, Dante Exum has shown some exciting flashes of his potential after losing all of last season to an ACL tear. On the year, he’s averaging just under seven points per contest to go with 2.4 rebounds and 1.5 assists in 21.4 minutes per game.
Once again, though, the Jazz have been put in a position where they have to rob Peter to pay Paul. Injuries to the starting five (and the fact that Alec Burks has yet to play a single game) have caused major lineup shuffling and, in turn, a lack of depth on the back-end. Frankly, it’s been tough to watch at times.
The second unit numbers are especially ugly. Utah ranks 26th out of the league’s 30 teams in bench scoring at just 28.4 points per game. Meanwhile, Utah’s reserves are shooting just 40.9 percent from the field and under 29 percent from three-point range.
Some of that is due to pace of play, but the lack of bodies and general under-performance on the Jazz bench has been key.
The grade here will go up as the Jazz get healthy, but right now, there’s not a lot to get excited about.
Bench Grade: C-
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