The Utah Jazz have two deserving All-Star candidates for the Sunday classic in February. While Gobert has been deserving of the honor for years, it will be Mitchell that gets in first.
The Utah Jazz have built their roster around the core of two stars, those obviously being Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert.
Over the course of his first three seasons in the league, Rudy proved he is a star and cornerstone to what the Jazz are building. The Jazz front office made a significant find in the late first round of what was otherwise known as a dismal 2013 draft class.
Initially buried behind Enes Kanter and Derrick Favors on the depth chart early in his career, Gobert had to spend lots of time in the then D-League and work his way up the ladder. He worked hard to add muscle to his frame and refinement to his raw game, and it showed in the 2014 FIBA tournament where he went toe-to-toe with Marc Gasol and the Spaniards.
The Jazz finished the 2013-14 season with the second worst defense in the league, but that would change with the hiring of a rookie head coach and the increased opportunity for Gobert. By the turn of the year into 2015, it was clear that Gobert was the center of the future for the Jazz. He was permanently inserted in the starting lineup on February 20th following the Jazz trading Kanter away for future assets.
Utah hasn’t looked back ever since, having three (soon to be four) consecutive playoff appearances and a top-notch defense.
As for Mitchell, his ascent into stardom was much less subtle than that of his French teammate. He was the third Jazz player to break 20 points per game threshold since (gasp!) Karl Malone! To make it more impressive he did it as a 21 year old rookie, won the dunk contest on All-Star weekend, all despite being passed on by 12 teams on NBA draft night.
He filled the hole in Jazz fans’ heart that was left vacant by Gordon Hayward, and has only gotten better since.
For the first time since the early 2000s, the Utah Jazz have a legitimate chance at sending not one, but two All-Stars to the Sunday classic game in Chicago. Those two were Carlos Boozer and Mehmet Okur, and the only times it happened before that was John Stockton and Karl Malone’s several appearances in the 1990s.
While I would be ecstatic to have two players representing the Utah Jazz in the first All-Star game of the decade, here is why I think only Donovan Mitchell will get the honor this time around.
Mitchell will win popular vote
Early results from the fan’s All-Star poll weren’t encouraging for Jazz fans. Here are some names that received more votes than Donovan Mitchell:
Well that sounds bad, his case wasn’t nearly as bad as Gobert’s. Rudy failed to crack the top 10 in the frontcourt voting for the Western Conference. The NBA fans sent the message that they would rather have Kristaps Porzingis, Brandon Ingram, and Dwight Howard get the honor of being an All-Star than Rudy Gobert.
For comparison, Howard is playing less than 20 minutes a game as a backup center. Porzingis started the season playing awful after recovering from knee surgery, and while Ingram has been the best player on his team this year, the Pelicans sit at 14th in the Western Conference.
Fortunately the fans don’t have total control of who gets in the game. A panel of media members as well as NBA players will account for 50 percent of the vote for All-Star game starters. This could help Mitchell out as an underdog to oust James Harden for the backcourt spot in the starting lineup.
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Mitchell has shown in less than three years as a pro that he can make friends with other NBA players. In addition to being an awesome teammate and having the support of his former teammates across the league (take Favors and Ricky Rubio buying his D.O.N shoes for example), Mitchell has connections through his Team USA experiences, college ball, and AAU tournaments.
He grew up with Eric Paschall and played on the same high school team as Devonte’ Graham, and you can tell that both of those guys have a lot of respect for Mitchell. After the final buzzer sounds, you can often catch Mitchell lingering on the court having a conversation with players of the opposing team (such as Karl-Anthony Towns and Trae Young this season).
These kinds of connections are things that Gobert doesn’t have as strongly as his third year teammate. Since Rudy grew up in France (67 million people) instead of the United States (327 million), he doesn’t have as much of an influence among the American NBA fans. He doesn’t have NCAA and AAU connections with NBA players the same way Mitchell does, because Gobert never played in either of those leagues.
To top it all off, Mitchell’s game is easier to fall in love with than Gobert’s. The All-Star game is notoriously known for having no defense played, allowing for players to show off dunks and impressive dribble moves for the fans.
Mitchell became so popular rather quickly because of his offensive prowess. As a spectator, would you be more likely to jump out of your seat from A) a killer cross-over with broken ankles, or B) a contested layup attempt that ends in a miss and defensive rebound?
Would you rather watch A) an electrifying dunk from a 6-foot-1 guard, or B) a wide open jumpshot created from a big man setting a good screen for his teammate?
This describes the play of Mitchell versus Gobert’s. Rudy has constantly been a league leader in rim protection and screen assists. He’s terrific for the Jazz on both sides of the ball, and the most unselfish player on the Jazz. He deserves the honor of being an All-Star to add to his resume, but the problem is that style of play isn’t what most casual fans pay to see on the court.
Through no fault of his own, Gobert will lose the popular vote of the fans, players and media. Mitchell most likely will too, but he has a better shot than Gobert.
Gobert will lose favor of NBA coaches
After the starting five is picked for the All-Star team, the NBA coaches are left to select five players off the bench (three frontcourt, two backcourt) and two reserves (any position). They choose players from their respective conference that aren’t on their own team.
For the past two seasons, the coaches of the Western Conference have completely botched a deserving star from entering the game. See the video below where Locke calls the emission of Gobert in the All-Star game “a complete travesty”.
Locke has some excellent points that make a convincing case for Rudy Gobert to not only make the game, but to start. But unfortunately even the 14 other coaches in the Western Conference seem to fall in love with scoring and perimeter players over the Stifle Tower.
In 2019, the coaches picked LaMarcus Aldridge, Anthony Davis, and Nikola Jokic for their three frontcourt choices. I can see the reasoning behind choosing Davis over Gobert, and picking between Jokic and Rudy was a toss up at that point.
What I can’t agree with is the reasoning (or lack of) behind putting Aldridge in over Gobert. Yes, the Spurs did have a better record (31-22) at the time the coaches voted than the Jazz (29-23), and yes, Aldridge was and still is the better scorer of the two.
What the coaches neglected was the fact that Rudy Gobert changes the way teams play offense, eliminating what would otherwise be a ton of easy layup and dunk attempts. That kind of presence allows his four other teammates to play more aggressively and put pressure on their opponents.
As David Locke said in the video, only five or so players in the league have such a presence that change the way teams play against them. Gobert is one of those players and instantly makes the Jazz a top team defensively.
On top of that, the coaches put Klay Thompson and Karl-Anthony Towns in as the position-less reserves, and the league selected Dirk Notwitzki as a “special roster addition”, basically giving him one more All-Star game before his retirement.
This year, my feeling is that Gobert will be left out once again from both the three frontcourt spots and the two reserve spots on the All-Star roster. Donovan Mitchell and Chris Paul should be shoo-ins for the backcourt spots off the bench, and the three frontcourt spots will be taken by Nikola Jokic, Paul George, and either Brandon Ingram or Karl-Anthony Towns.
As for the remaining two spots, there remains the fact that the point guard position is so talented in today’s NBA. We haven’t even put Russell Westbrook or Damian Lillard in there yet, and I can see those two and even Devin Booker skipping ahead of Gobert in that line. Traditionally the defensive-first guys tend to get left out, and I think it will sadly happen again this year.
As for Mitchell, he’s had some help this season from his counterparts. Both Stephen Curry and Klay Thompson are out for the foreseeable future, and on top of that Donovan has clearly shown he is a rung above CJ McCollum, Jamal Murray, and even Devin Booker.
Mountains and Plateaus
At 27 years old, Rudy is close to his peak if he hasn’t attained it already. We basically know what we can expect out of Gobert every night for the next five years. He could try to add a reliable post move or extend his range to the three point line to raise his ceiling, but as it already stands Gobert is a positive on offense.
He works in Quin Snyder’s system as a screen and roll specialist, once again a leader in screen assists (first since 2016-17) and percentile as a rolling man (93rd percentile last season). The most effective thing Gobert could add to improve his offense immediately is to make more of his free throw attempts.
As for Mitchell, he is only 23 years old and still on a rookie contract. His development trajectory is climbing and showing no signs of stopping anytime soon.
He hasn’t changed his shot chart the way we would’ve liked him to, but he’s also added a dangerous mid-range arsenal so it’s hard to complain. Things like ball handling, shooting, and conditioning are something a perimeter player like Mitchell can always work on.
Assuming Donovan continues to work on those things in addition to the game slowing down for him, he can easily surpass Gobert as the better Jazz player. That is though, if he hasn’t surpassed Gobert already.
On the KIA MVP ladder on NBA.com, it is Mitchell that is listed in the top 10 for most likely to win the award. Quin Snyder has chosen all season to stagger Mitchell’s minutes with the second unit, as evidenced by Donovan having the slight edge in minutes per game (34.4) over Gobert (34.2).
They are awfully close right now, and it’s a toss up right now for who is the better player. But regardless of who is better right now, both are super valuable to the Utah Jazz. A big reason why the Jazz got off to slow starts the past couple seasons is because of knee injuries to Gobert (fall of 2017) and a foot injury to Mitchell (fall of 2018).
Now that the Jazz finally had both of their star players available for all but two games this season, they are off to their best start in the Quin Snyder era and currently on pace to win 56 games.
Gobert may hold the edge on All-NBA team selections, but to me it appears that Mitchell will get the first All-Star selection of the duo.