Look ahead: Who should the Utah Jazz try to avoid in the playoffs?

Houston Rockets

The Utah Jazz are all too familiar with this squad from Space City. In the past two seasons, the Jazz have stormed back from a slow start to finish the season as one of the league’s hottest teams. But what ended both of those seasons was no other than the Houston Rockets.

The Rockets’ defense swarmed Mitchell and gave him no room to go off offensively. In 2019 in particular, he got his teammates involved to try to help him, but their wide open shots refused to hit the bottom of the net.

This time around the Utah Jazz are a different team. They can rely on Bojan Bogdanovic or Jordan Clarkson to get a bucket and take pressure off of Donovan Mitchell. The hope is that Mike Conley will be able to do the same in the coming weeks.

Houston can no longer zero in on one Jazz player to stop them from scoring. They have to worry about four guys that can shoot the lights out from long distance, as well as one of the best rim rollers in the game.

The only problem is that Daryl Morey has also shaken things up with his roster as well. They traded Clint Capela and Nenê at the trade deadline – their only two reliable centers. They will play 6-foot-5 forward PJ Tucker as their center the vast majority of the time.

They doubled down on the small ball lineups that made the Jazz clueless on defense a couple weeks ago. They also opened up a lot more space for Russell Westbrook to attack the paint. Unlike most NBA players, Russ doesn’t fear Rudy Gobert when the two meet at the rim.

In fact, Westbrook’s percentage at the rim versus Rudy Gobert makes Rudy look like a below average NBA player.

These small ball lineups and constant harassment of Westbrook going at Gobert will make the Rockets a team the Jazz wish to avoid during the playoffs. I realize the Jazz beat the Rockets on their home floor just a week ago off an exciting buzzer beater.

But the reality is if Bogey’s shot was altered by just a couple of inches we would be looking at a tough loss and tiebreaker gone down the drain to Houston.

If James Harden shot anywhere close to his normal averages from the three point line (he shot 2 of 13 in the last game against the Jazz), that narrow one point win could have easily been a 10 point loss.

I’d have to pick the Rockets to win a series in seven games against the Jazz.