Utah Jazz Notes: Exum injury still unclear, Super Rudy Block and more

With the start of the regular season looming, there has been plenty of exciting Utah Jazz news over the course of the past few days.

Well, my friends, we have officially entered the calm before the storm – the roughly week-long period between NBA preseason and the start of the brand new 2017-18 regular season campaign. This summer’s offseason was one of the craziest in NBA history, the long months without basketball were hard, preseason was fun, but now we’ve almost reached the light at the end of the tunnel.

NBA action tips off on Tuesday, then the Utah Jazz start out their season the day after as they’ll host the Denver Nuggets. Although we have a few days yet, this brief break in action has been filled with plenty of tidbits of Utah Jazz news to help pass the time, so let’s dive right in!

Dante Exum injury timeline still unclear

In a somewhat odd turn of events, the amount of time that Dante Exum will miss due to the purportedly severe left shoulder injury he suffered has yet to be announced. My memory is far from perfect, but I don’t know that I can remember a time that it has taken this long for an NBA player’s recovery timeline to become public knowledge.

When Dante first went down and news broke that he had suffered a separated shoulder and ligament damage, there were initially reports that he could be out for the entire season. Now, however, the only update is that Exum is continuing to speak with doctors, apparently exploring every option.

Ideally, it isn’t something that will require surgery and Exum will be back on the floor sooner rather than later. However, as tempting as it would be to rush him back, at the end of the day he needs to do what will be best for his long-term career. In a recent ESPN article, Quin Snyder was quoted saying the following about Dante:

"“I know they are in the process of evaluating him and planning a course of action, but we’ll get him back as soon as we can.”"

That sounds somewhat promising, but our best course of action for now is to simply sit tight and be patient.

Super Rudy Block

In case you missed it, the Utah Jazz had fans on edge on Twitter on Wednesday as they began tweeting out mysterious images along with trivia questions regarding Rudy Gobert. I even got in on the action with a bit of a fun response myself:

The anticipation heated up dramatically when Utah Jazz team president Steve Starks tweeted out that Jazz fans would want to keep an eye on Jazz Twitter. At that point, speculation went rampant. Would it be the new jersey? A Hood extension? Confirmation on streaming options?

https://twitter.com/StevenStarks/status/918177753324699648

But, alas, none of those were even in the same ballpark. Instead the Jazz revealed a fun game entitled Super Rudy Block, featuring our very own Rudy Gobert. The game consists of trying to move Rudy and time his jumps to swat as many shots in a row as possible against opponents with hilarious names such as Rookie Ralph, Crossover Carl, Jumper Jimmy and…

Well, I’d tell you more but I’m not very good at the game and am stuck on Jumper Jimmy. If you have any tips for me, please let me know ASAP.

The high scores are posted and let me say… Wow. Major props to the guy at the top of the list for getting nearly ten times my score.

Haven’t tried the game out yet? Give it a go by visiting the link in the tweet below:

Jazz waive Torian Graham

On Monday my J-Notes colleague Ryan Aston wrote about the Jazz’s decision to sign former Arizona State Sun Devil Torian Graham. However, his tenure with the team was extremely short as he made no appearances and it was announced Thursday that he had been waived.

Confused? This snippet from a Deseret News piece should shed some light on the Jazz’s train of thought on the signing and ensuing waiving:

"Given that Utah signed and released him so quickly, it is likely Graham has been designated as an “affiliate player,” which means he would join the G League’s Salt Lake City Stars if he opts to sign a G League contract. NBA teams can designate up to four affiliate players, all of whom will remain NBA free agents, meaning any of the league’s 30 teams could sign them."

Even though it would be a stretch to really consider him a “Jazzman”, hopefully he gets some run with the Salt Lake City Stars. To learn a little more about him, be sure to check out Ryan’s piece below:

Deron Williams developments

Remember when Deron Williams had a major fallout with the Utah Jazz and pretty much turned every Jazz fan against him? Well, it turns out that perhaps said fallout wasn’t actually as poorly handled by Williams as many might think, especially when comparing it to situations in the current NBA landscape that pale in comparison.

In a recent Ballers and Brawlers podcast, Deron Williams stated that he “might have” given the Jazz reason to trade him and that he “might have” said he wasn’t going to re-sign. Those “might haves” make it pretty clear that D-Will and the Jazz both knew that if they let him stay until the offseason, he was going to bounce on them.

Therefore, the haul that the Jazz were able to bring in for Williams (which was already pretty solid) seems even better now knowing that alternative was surely to lose him for nothing. If you recall, the Jazz traded Williams for Derrick Favors, Devin Harris and future picks, one of which by way of a handful of trades has turned into Ricky Rubio.

Consider Gordon Hayward, spurning the Jazz in frustrating fashion and leaving the Jazz empty-handed. Or even a situation like Paul George, where he let the team know that he wanted to leave, but his agent also let the entire league know, which greatly restricted what the Indiana Pacers could do. Compared to those, Williams’ handling of the situation truly appears as if he were doing the Jazz a major favor as they made out with a hefty return after losing their All-Star.

Joe Ingles is super awesome

Last of all, in case you missed this, Joe Ingles and his wife are the absolute coolest. As you can see in the tweet below, Joe and his wife Renae donated “JP Strong” shirts to all of the kids at JP Gibson’s elementary school.

Next: Utah Jazz injury update: Rodney Hood participates in practice

It really is hard to picture this Jazz team being any cooler of a group of guys. And I can’t wait to see them in action together in meaningful play beginning this Wednesday.