Grayson Allen shines in Utah Jazz debut, makes case for playing time

Although his minutes were sparse, rookie Grayson Allen looked good in his regular season debut with the Utah Jazz on Monday night.

Not a lot went right on Monday night for the Utah Jazz as they fell to the Memphis Grizzlies in horrendously ugly fashion. Not only did they only muster a meager 84 points in the eight-point loss to the Grizzlies, but their shooting was painfully bad all night long. They finished shooting just 35.4 percent from the field and 25 percent from deep.

However, while we certainly aren’t in the business of moral victories, there was one nice takeaway from the evening. On a night where no Jazzman could buy a bucket and Quin Snyder felt starved for offense, rookie Grayson Allen finally got a chance to suit up for a regular season NBA game.

Allen was inserted into the game late in the third quarter and went on to log 10.5 minutes of play. In those meager minutes, he went a perfect 2-of-2 from the field, which was comprised of a thrilling dunk and a splashed 3-pointer. He was also perfect from the charity stripe on two attempts to finish with seven points.

Not only that, but Allen was one of only two Jazzmen (the other was Joe Ingles) to finish the contest in the positive in terms of plus/minus at a mark of plus-six. While his opportunity was limited and his shots were few, Grayson most definitely made the most out of the chance he was given.

Interestingly enough, Alec Burks, who had played decently well in preseason and the first regular season contest, only logged five minutes against Memphis. Burks had displayed better shot selection and decision-making until last Friday’s bout against Golden State wherein he finished just 1-of-7 from the field. It only took one ill-advised miss on Monday for Coach Snyder to seemingly lose trust in him once again and pull Alec from the game.

There was a lot of debate during preseason over who would win the backup shooting guard spot between Allen and Burks. Burks obviously initially won that nod, but considering his spotty place in rotations past under head coach Quin Snyder, and Allen’s solid performance on Monday, one can’t help but wonder if we’ll see a change in the guard moving forward.

Aside from questionable shot selection at times, the other factor that has prevented Burks from having a steady spot in the rotation (excluding injuries, of course) has been his unreliable defense. Snyder has made it clear that players that aren’t committed and disciplined on the defensive end likely won’t see playing time, and that had prevented Burks before.

Likewise, prior to the start of the year, Quin made it clear that if Grayson Allen didn’t improve defensively, specifically on his transition defense, then he wasn’t going to see the floor. Perhaps he changed that mentality on Monday when he saw that none of his players could score and hoped that Allen could inject some life (which he certainly did to some extent), or maybe Grayson has shown improvements in that regard.

Whatever the case, there’s no denying that Allen was a nice spark on Monday and showed by both his hustle and solid shooting (though on an admittedly small sample size) that he can indeed contribute to this Jazz team and may very well deserve a consistent spot in Utah’s rotation moving forward. The fact that his mere presence can help stretch the floor and open things up for the Jazz offense could very well play to his favor as well.

The Jazz have a lot to figure out before they face the battle-hardened Houston Rockets on Wednesday night if they’re to start turning their poor start to the season around. Adding Grayson Allen into the rotation could very well be one of those adjustments that we see.

Whether that ends up being the case on Wednesday or not, I’d imagine that by season’s end, we’ll see plenty of Allen in action for his electrifying 3-point touch if nothing else. And regardless what decisions Quin makes with his young rookie, I’m confident the Jazz will start quickly turning things around such that they can live up to the expectation of being a force in the Western Conference sooner rather than later.