Utah Jazz: Exum, Sefolosha, Neto remain out at least another week

The Utah Jazz will be without Thabo Sefolosha, Raul Neto and Dante Exum for at least another week, and quite possibly longer.

In a trend that’s been typical of the Utah Jazz in recent seasons, the injury bug struck in a major way earlier this month. And while the formerly injured Ricky Rubio returned to action on Monday against Portland, the rest of the team’s beleaguered players are still quite a ways out.

Both Thabo Sefolosha and Raul Neto were re-evaluated on Tuesday, and rather than receive encouraging news about their returns, it was announced that they will remain out of action to be evaluated yet again in another week. That means that the earliest they could return would be for the contest on Wednesday, January 30, which is Utah’s final contest of the regular season against the Portland Trail Blazers.

Even that seems unrealistic, however, considering that since their re-evaluation date will be the day before, it would take a miraculous recovery for them to be ready to go with such a short turn-around. Coaches and training staffs typically like to see their players get some practice under their belt so they can return to some semblance of game shape before making a full return.

Meanwhile, Dante Exum was not re-evaluated at the same time as Neto and Sefolosha as it was announced previously that his re-evaluation date wouldn’t be until a week after theirs. This now means that all three will be evaluated on Tuesday the 29th. With such being the case, Exum falls into the same boat as his two battered colleagues and it’s unlikely he’ll be back in time for the contest in Portland.

Then again, Rubio was able to make a speedy return after his evaluation despite being listed as questionable for Monday’s most recent contest against the Blazers, so perhaps one or more of his injured teammates will be able to follow suit. If any of them are unable to go on the 30th against Portland, their next chance for activity will come on Friday, February 1 in a home bout against Atlanta.

Allowing those players returning from injury to have that game against a lackluster opponent to get back up to speed would be a nice opportunity, especially with a challenging contest against the Houston Rockets looming the next night. Or, perhaps with those two games coming as a back-to-back, the recently injured players will be able to sit out the game against the Hawks for one more day of recovery, then come back fresh and ready to take on the Rockets.

Ideally the scenario will work out in one of those convenient fashions, but as of right now, this is of course all speculation. It’s entirely possible that after next Tuesday’s re-evaluation, we could simply learn that all three players will simply be out longer yet again.

Let’s hope that’s not the case. The Jazz had their six-game winning streak stopped short in a disappointing loss to the Blazers in which lack of depth definitely reared its ugly head in a dismal third quarter. Utah could definitely use getting back to full strength as quickly as possible if they are to get back to their winning ways and continue to surge up the standings.