3 reasons the Utah Jazz are built to counter the Los Angeles Lakers

The Los Angeles Lakers will field a star-studded roster in the 2021-22 NBA season. The Utah Jazz still have a chance to be the better team. 

The Utah Jazz have had a meaningful-but-understated offseason to date, adding quality rotation pieces in Rudy Gay, Hassan Whiteside and Eric Paschall while retaining veteran floor general Mike Conley Jr. None of these moves necessarily broke the internet, however, each represents a logical addition to a squad that finished the 2020-21 NBA regular season a league best 52-20.

The Los Angeles Lakers, by contrast, had arguably the most eventful off-season in the NBA. They acquired Malik Monk, Kendrick Nunn, Carmelo Anthony, Wayne Ellington, Kent Bazemore, Dwight Howard, Trevor Ariza, and most significantly, former MVP Russell Westbrook.

Pairing Westbrook with LeBron James is akin to a black hole sucking an entire galaxy up and spitting it out on top of another one. Will they collide and explode upon each other, or, will they merge into a new, more powerful super galaxy?

You’d have to ask a theoretical physicist, and frankly, it may take a genius to predict whether James and Westbrook can effectively play together too. However, it is a little easier to foresee that the Utah Jazz will enter the 2021-22 season with plenty of optimism surrounding their ability to succeed against these substantially starrier Lakers.

Here are three reasons the Utah Jazz are designed to counter the Los Angeles Lakers.