Clunky offense, poor shooting
In last season’s playoff matchup against the Houston Rockets, the Utah Jazz were absolutely derailed by the fact that they simply couldn’t hit open shots. After a shaky start to the series, the Jazz got their defense in place and played absolutely well enough on that end to win. But their offense was just so horrific at finding the bottom of the net that they didn’t stand a chance.
It was largely because of that poor showing that the Jazz made major revamps this offseason to add the likes of Mike Conley and Bojan Bogdanovic in hopes that their offense could get on track. And while those two and the group as a whole has shown flashes of brilliance, their offense has been far from prolific.
Those woes were on full display on Friday in Memphis as the Jazz had deja vu from the three-point line, shooting an abysmal 26.5 percent. Their 40.2 percent clip from the field wasn’t pretty either. A lot of these looks were good ones that just didn’t go down, as we saw all too often in last year’s postseason, but others were just poor decisions.
Ironically, that’s pretty indicative of how off-kilter Utah’s offense has been all year. They normally shoot better from three than that as they are tenth in the league at 36.3 percent, but abysmal off shooting nights such as Friday haven’t been uncommon at all. And the issues go well beyond the shooting as Utah is 25th in the NBA in offensive efficiency at just 104.4 points per 100 possessions and 18th in the league in turnovers at 16.3 giveaways per contest.
In other words, what was supposed to be a much-enhanced offense hasn’t been anywhere close. It sunk the Jazz against the Grizzlies and has kept them from even approaching their ceiling this entire season. We’ve all heard about how complex Quin Snyder’s offensive system and terminology are, but the fact remains that for the Jazz to be a true force, they’ll need to right the ship there sooner rather than later.