In Wake of Rudy Gobert’s Injury, Utah Jazz Now Need Derrick Favors More Than Ever

With Rudy Gobert going down with a knee sprain in the first seconds of his playoff debut, the Utah Jazz have to rely on Derrick Favors more than ever.

Well, this sucks. There’s just no other way to describe it.

Just when the Utah Jazz were getting fully healthy and ready for the playoffs, just when playoff basketball was returning to Salt Lake City for the fist time in half a decade and just when the Jazz were beginning to take the next step towards championship contention, the unthinkable happened.

A fresh SEVENTEEN seconds into the Jazz’s playoff opener, Rudy Gobert, Utah’s most important player, set a screen on Los Angeles Clippers forward Luc Mbah a Moute, and the two collided their left knees together. Gordon Hayward was freed up space from Gobert’s pick, but when he went to throw the ball to what he thought would be a rolling Gobert open at the basket, he saw his French teammate crumbled to the floor in pain.

Gobert had to be helped off the floor and into the locker room by teammates, and was unofficially diagnosed with a knee sprain. *(Update: it’s a hyper-extended knee and bone bruise with no structural damage to the knee)

Jazz fans everywhere (including myself) began to take their frustrations to Twitter, and whether their initial emotions were overreactions or not, they definitely described the feeling of shock that swept over Jazz nation.

Spence Checketts tweeted out “anybody but Rudy”, The J Notes’ very own Taylor Griffin said “My three year old keeps asking me where Rudy Gobert is, breaking my heart even more”, and Lucas Falk sent out the most ominous thought that I was thinking but was too afraid to say out loud —

It’s unclear how serious this injury is and how it will impact Gobert’s play if he is somehow able to return this series, but there is no doubt that Gobert’s absence could give a huge advantage to the Clippers in the middle, particularly in the mismatch of DeAndre Jordan going up against Jeff Withey.

The Jazz were considered underdogs before this series started (our very own Jared Woodcox predicted the Clippers win the series in six games), but now without Gobert, winning a playoff series will be a Herculean task for the ever unlucky Jazz.

As Sporting News’ Matt Ellentuck put it —

"Without Gobert, the Jazz will have slim hope of knocking off a Clippers team stacked with talent capable of scoring on the inside. Gobert’s presence as a rim-protecting, shot-altering big earns his $102 million contract. Without him, Utah will be exposed on the inside with DeAndre Jordan and Blake Griffin ready to capitalize."

Thankfully the Jazz made it a point to get the whole team (especially Derrick Favors and Rodney Hood) healthy and ready for the playoffs.

Favors looked excellent in limited minutes after sitting out a month of action, going for 13 points (including four dunks) and five rebounds in 17 minutes against the Minnesota Timberwolves on April 7. Favors rested in the Jazz’s win over Golden State, but returned for the regular season finale against the Spurs, going for eight points and five rebounds in 20 minutes of action, showing aggressiveness and explosiveness that he has sorely lacked this season.

For the Jazz to have any chance of treading water without Gobert, they will need everybody on the roster to step up and fill in the massive hole (both literally and figuratively) left by Gobert, but the one individual who is most capable of filling Gobert’s role is Favors.

Before Favors had to deal with nagging knee injuries this season, he was a beast. He was once considered an elite interior defender, able to protect the rim at a high level and hold his own when switching onto smaller guards on the pick and roll. He was also once a big-time finisher when rolling to the rim, and would often times out-muscle opponents in the low post for devastating dunks.

I know this has been said all season long, but if the Jazz can get that version of Derrick Favors back for the playoffs, it could be the missing link in the Jazz morphing from a good NBA team to a great one that can contend for a title.

Jazz fans can also hope that the Clippers keep up their reputation as the infamous choke artists of the NBA playoffs. Here’s a list of L.A’s playoff meltdowns in the Lob City era —

• In 2012, they beat the Grizzlies in the first round, but got swept by the Spurs in the semi-finals, blowing a 24-point lead in Game 3 and, despite leading for much of the fourth quarter, losing in Game 4.
• In 2013, Russell Westbrook tore his right meniscus in the first round, leaving the door wide open for another team to step in and challenge for the Western Conference title. The Clippers took a commanding 2-0 series lead over the Grizzlies, but never won a game after that, being eliminated in the first round, leading to the firing of coach Vinny del Negro.
• In 2014, the Clippers were pushed to a seven game series in the opening round by a young Warriors team, but eventually prevailed. In the semi-finals they were then knocked out by the Oklahoma City Thunder, and blew a double-digit lead in Game 6.
• In 2015, the Clippers had more athleticism than the Spurs could handle, winning the first round in seven games. In the semi-finals however, the Clippers built up a 3-1 series lead on the Houston Rockets, only to get blown out in Game 5, after which they blew a 19-point lead in Game 6, and then failed to put the series away in Game 7. Epic failure.

Last year, the Clippers were busted by the Portland Trail Blazers in the first round, but I wouldn’t call that a choke, mainly because Chris Paul and Blake Griffin ended up getting injured and knocked out of the series.

This year, the Clippers were supposed  to make the leap into the same tier as the Spurs, and be the challenger to the Golden State Warriors; instead it was the Houston Rockets who did so.

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• 3 Utah Jazz players who have the most to gain or lose this season
• Former Utah Jazz forward Rudy Gay is a free agent still and it shouldn’t surprise anyone

So between the Jazz embracing the “next man up mentality”, and the Clippers being experts at choking in the playoffs, Jazz fans don’t have to assume this season is lost. Yes, losing Gobert is a brutal blow, but there’s still a chance that Utah can overcome it with Derrick Favors being Derrick Favors.

The fact that the Jazz were able to scrap for a victory in Game 1 without their star player, and with Hayward having a mediocre shooting night, testifies that the Jazz are not dead. As the saying goes “when the going gets tough, the tough get going.” The Jazz may already be better equipped to deal with adversity than the Clippers, and the team that prevails in this series will definitely feel better about their team not being broken up this offseason.

*(Unless otherwise noted, all stats a courtesy of basketball-reference.com)