Utah Jazz Editorial: Let’s not kid ourselves, this continuity plan isn’t working

The Utah Jazz were supposed to pick up where they left off last year with a continuity that was second to none. Instead, thus far they’ve looked more like a jumbled mess.

Go back in time with me to April 27, 2018. The Utah Jazz had just defeated the Oklahoma City Thunder in Game 6 of the the first round of the playoffs. Many called it a surprise. Several called it an upset. Those who had been paying attention to what the Utah Jazz had done to close out the year 29-6 simply called it business as usual. Between coaching, execution, efficiency, shooting and depth, the Jazz were simply the better team and they arose victorious because of it.

Fast forward from there to May 8, 2018. That’s the day that the Utah Jazz were easily dispatched by the Houston Rockets in five games. Fans went from believing that the Jazz were a near championship contender to being harshly reminded that the team still suffered from many shortcomings if they hoped to keep pace with the elite in the West.

Then we enter the offseason of 2018. A lot happened across the NBA, but things were pretty quiet on the Jazz front. Derrick Favors, Dante Exum and Raul Neto were retained. Jonas Jerebko was let go in favor of extending an official contract to Georges Niang. And Grayson Allen was drafted to take the roster spot of David Stockton.

It was a quiet summer indeed. However, considering that the Jazz had just gone 29-6 to close out the year, had toppled the Oklahoma City Thunder and even showed some nice moments against the Houston Rockets, including a Game 2 win, it certainly seemed like the right play at the time. Rather than look to rock the boat by adding unfamiliar faces or restricting financial flexibility by making risky moves, the Jazz decided to bank on one thing for the 2018-19 season.

Continuity.

We heard it all offseason long. The team got off to a rocky start in 2017-18, but once they got healthy and familiar with one another, they were able to turn it around in a big way. It was believed that the latter trend – the big turnaround that produced a first-round playoff win – would be the one that would continue into 2018-19.

Unfortunately, so far such couldn’t be further from the case.

Coming off the worst loss since the Jazz organization has been in the state of Utah, a 50-point pounding at the hands of the lowly Dallas Mavericks, and sitting at a pedestrian 7-7 on the season, to say it’s been a disappointing start to the year would be a major understatement. And while the pathetic bout against the Mavs is what’s most fresh on our minds, the Jazz have simply played poorly all season long in both wins and losses alike.

The lopsided loss and a small sample size of just 14 games doesn’t help things, but the woeful numbers alone do a pretty good job of showing just how bad Utah’s start has been. They’re currently 20th in the league in offensive rating at 106.7, 19th in defensive rating at 108.5 and 21st in net rating at -1.9.

Utah’s offensive struggles aren’t that surprising. We’ve known of issues there for years now, which are magnified when Donovan Mitchell isn’t performing well (more on that in a second). However, what’s really been discouraging is not just their poor defensive execution, but their straight-up apathy on that end of the court. The Jazz don’t look engaged on defense. They don’t even look like they care half the time. And it’s starting to cost them mightily.

But let’s not act like things are anywhere close to rosy on offense either. Utah’s shooting has been nothing short of atrocious. They’re a so-so 15th in the league in field goal percentage (thanks, Rudy Gobert for boosting that figure!) at 45.4 percent and a chilling 24th in 3-point percentage at 33.3 percent.

Their dismal guard play is largely to blame for that. Ricky Rubio is the principal culprit, as he’s putting up a career-low 33.3 percent from the field and an ugly 26.7 percent from deep. That 3-point mark is nearly the worst of his career, second only to the season in which he appeared in just 22 games and shot an appalling 25.5 percent. He’s also at a career-worst mark for turnovers at 3.3 per game.

Apparently that continuity thing hasn’t exactly panned out so well for Rubio, who once again looks like a lost newcomer on an unfamiliar team. His poor decision making has been harmful to the Jazz and the fact that opposing defenses are simply ignoring him is limiting every other player on the Jazz roster.

Then there’s Donovan Mitchell. Yes, he’s still putting up over 20 points per game, so you can’t really fault him there. However, he’s actually at a slightly lower average than a season ago, and his shooting percentages have taken significant steps backwards thus far. That’s bad news for a player who already had inefficiency as one of his most glaring weaknesses. He’s down to just 41.4 percent from the field and 30.3 percent from deep.

Next there’s the second round of guards, Dante Exum and Alec Burks. Unfortunately, Exum hasn’t been much more effective (if at all) than Rubio. He’s shooting just 40 percent from the field and 26.7 percent from deep and has no mid-range game. At least his turnovers per game are less than Rubio’s. However, with Raul Neto set to make a return sooner than later, don’t be surprised if Exum’s poor shooting leads to him being bumped from the rotation.

Believe it or not, Burks has actually been the most efficient of this bunch so far. But he could very well be going the wrong way in a hurry. In his last three games, AB is just 6-of-22 (27.3 percent) from the field and 2-of-8 (25 percent) from 3-point land. Burks has shown brilliant moments this season, but his issue is that he’s never been able to maintain consistency in terms of shooting, defense or decision making. It appears a revert to the unfortunate norm is in order for him.

All of this (and other disappointing aspects that I’ll spare you the trouble of having to read) have brought the Jazz to a mediocre 7-7 record on the season. Not awful, sure, but not anywhere close to where fans hoped and expected they’d be.

Sure, we knew they were facing a daunting schedule to start out the year and that there was a very good chance that they’d only be around .500 by the end of the calendar year. But if you had them losing in disappointing fashion to some of the teams that they have, putting forth a sometimes non-existent effort on defense, not having any semblance of the chemistry they had last year or losing to the Dallas Mavericks by 50, then you need to go buy a lottery ticket, my friend.

And I’m sure that several of you while reading this may have rolled your eyes uttering things like, “It’s just one game,” or “It’s way too early in the season to be worried,” or “Calm down, we all know the Jazz are going to turn this around.”

Guess what? I actually agree with those statements. It is early. There is plenty of time. The Jazz are more than capable of turning this thing around.

But here’s my point – this year’s Jazz team was never meant to have to undergo a ‘turnaround’. Due to Utah’s supposed superior continuity, we were supposed to see a team that came out humming, looked in sync and played well together as a unit. Along with all that, we expected to see development and improvement out of an organization that’s known for those. However, set the 7-7 record to one side entirely for a second and tell me, have the Jazz looked like that team?

Honestly, as I just mentioned, the 7-7 record isn’t what bothered me as we knew the schedule to start the season would be tough. It’s HOW the Jazz have arrived at 7-7 that has me feeling concerned. We expected this team to already be gelled, play well together and look like a force in the Western Conference. So far, they’ve played one good half all year, and it came against the Golden State Warriors in what would ultimately wind up as a loss.

So my question, once again, is, what happened to continuity? Why are we expecting the Jazz to turn things around, when that turnaround was supposed to have already occurred last year, then been built upon this year as a familiar team simply continued to climb the ranks together.

Instead, Ricky looks like he’s gotten ten times worse. Donovan has failed to show improvement. The Derrick Favors – Rudy Gobert fit is back to feeling as clunky as ever. Dante is struggling to prove he’s worth his contract. In short, it’s been an ugly 14 games, a type of ugly that was supposed to never have been, due to Utah opting to stay the course with an already intact and ‘proven’ core.

Unfortunately, they’re looking far less than proven so far. And I think questions about the upward trajectory of this team are completely justified. Yes, it’s early. Yes, they can turn things around, but this hasn’t been the Jazz team we expected thus far.

Which brings to me to my final point about continuity. We all knew this summer that the Utah Jazz needed to add shooting and play-making if they were to improve and be able to compete with the likes of Golden State and at the time (as of now, still TBD) the Houston Rockets. So what did they do this summer? They added absolutely no shooting or play-making.

Nevertheless, I think all of us fans got so caught up in the 29-6 run and the pleasing concept of keeping the band together, that we simply believed that internal development and – yes that buzzword again – continuity would mitigate that issue and save the day.

But here we are 14 games in, and it’s clear the Jazz still need shooting and still need play-making. And it’s also questionable whether or not any of the guys Utah opted to retain – Favors, Exum or Neto – will end up worth the price come season’s end. Meanwhile, while a ‘good’ Jazz team decided to stay ‘good’ by relying on continuity this offseason, several other teams in the West went out on a limb and tried to become ‘great’ by making improvements.

Of course, some of those risks will blow up in teams’ faces (looking at you Carmelo Anthony), but others may pay large dividends. And no matter how you look at it, the West got better this offseason while the Jazz largely stood pat. And it’s going to take much more than mere continuity for them to keep pace.

Especially when it appears that there may not even be all that much continuity to begin with.

So let’s not kid ourselves. The fact that we’re already talking about the Jazz needing to ‘turn things around’ is proof in and of itself that this continuity plan isn’t quite working as hoped. That said, perhaps it will lead to a smoother transition from a struggling team to a dominant one. Maybe the Jazz will get it figured out sooner than last year. Perhaps the daunting foe they were to end last season is still within them somewhere.

But due to what was executed and planned this summer, the simple fact of the matter is that it’s a shame that the Jazz are already going through this sluggish start and effort for a second straight year. Let’s hope their highly-touted continuity can pull them out of it before it becomes far too late.