Utah Jazz: Available players that could be pursued in a trade

Kent Bazemore

In the Adrian Wojnarowski piece, Kent Bazemore is listed as being pursued by other teams along with the likes of Alec Burks and DeMarre Carroll. While I suppose it’s possible that each of those three guys are being pursued, I find it somewhat hard to believe that any are in too great of demand considering that they’re all in relatively unfriendly contracts.

Speaking purely in terms of what he brings to the basketball court, I really like Kent Bazemore and honestly think he could be a nice fit for the Jazz in terms of his energy, effort and 3-and-D potential. He’s shooting a respectable 38.8 percent from deep, which is a career high, and on a better team could very well flourish as an effective role player.

However, I don’t know that a guy that’s averaging just 12.4 points per game on 41.5 percent shooting from the field is really worth the substantial amount of money that Bazemore is owed over the next few seasons. He’s scheduled to make $16.9 million this season and that increases to $19.2 million by the 2019-20 season. As I said, I like Bazemore and I think the Jazz could maximize his talent, but that’s still a heck of risk to take on far from a sure thing.

The Hawks, who are in clear rebuild mode, may very well be interested in shedding Bazemore’s contract and taking on some of Utah’s expiring deals to clear space for themselves in the near future as they look to bring in young assets for a promising future. In that regard, I could definitely see them getting a deal done.

Nevertheless, in spite of all of Bazemore’s positives, I don’t know that he’s quite what the Jazz are looking for and his contract would likely scare them off from doing a deal.