Fans of the Utah Jazz have grown accustomed to having an elite rim protector and rebounder on the court for about 30 to 34 minutes per contest with Rudy Gobert. With the team’s offseason addition of Hassan Whiteside, they’ll be hoping that number looks closer to 40 to 44.
Salt Lake City fans are not strangers to their squad rostering two quality bigs, as Derrick Favors, save for the beginning of his career in New Jersey and a brief 2019-20 stint in the Big Easy, spent the majority of a decade as a member of the Utah Jazz. However, Head Coach Quin Snyder, either out of preference or necessity, frequently ran lineups featuring both Favors and Gobert sharing the front court in twin tower formations during his tenure with the club.
Nobody should be expecting the Utah Jazz to run Whiteside at the 4 alongside Gobert. Favors’ solid midrange touch at least provided some justification for those units: Gobert and Whiteside are both unequivocally centers. In a sense, that makes Whiteside the best backup 5 Snyder has had at his disposal in the Gobert era.
All of which is not to say that there are no avenues for Whiteside to improve upon his 2020-21 performance with the Sacramento Kings. In fact, there are several.
Here are 3 goals the veteran big should strive to achieve as a member of the Utah Jazz in the 2021-22 season.
Hassan Whiteside of the Utah Jazz (Kyle Terada-USA TODAY Sports)
Utah Jazz center Hassan Whiteside 2021-22 Goal #1: Improve Defensive Rating
Hassan Whiteside’s reputation as a defender has been, to say the least, complicated. Undeniably, he’s a shot blocking machine, sporting a career average of 2.3 blocks per game (including a career best 3.7 per contest in 2015-16 with the Miami Heat).
Those are gaudy numbers, however, the advanced metrics paint a more complicated picture. Whiteside has graded out as an elite defender several times in his career according to Defensive Rating, as he posted a remarkable figure of 95 during that same 2015-16 season, and has clocked in below 100 on several occasions.
Unfortunately, the last couple of seasons have not seen the big man perform as well by that metric. Last season, he posted a subpar 111 Defensive Rating, which was his apparent answer to a mediocre 107 rating the season before.
Whiteside is trending in the wrong direction on defense, and he should aim to address that for the Utah Jazz heading into the 2021-22 season.
He’ll block shots, because he’s always blocked shots. However, he has garnered a bit of a reputation for “chasing blocks”, meaning that sometimes he has a habit of seeking to erase an opponent’s field goal attempt at the expense of proper defensive positioning.
Whiteside could actually stand to learn a lot from newfound teammate Rudy Gobert in that regard. Despite his reputation as the NBA’s best rim protector, Gobert has never actually swatted away attempts with the same volume as Whiteside. His career high in blocks per game is 2.6, a whole 1.1 less than Whiteside’s high water mark. Yet, your average NBA observer would willingly recognize that Rudy Gobert is a better rim protector than Hassan Whiteside.
That’s because the Utah Jazz star is constantly in proper position, and would prefer to stifle field goal attempts and collect rebounds rather than send them flying into the stands. Whiteside has the length, mobility and timing to do the same, if he can only absorb some of Gobert’s focus.
Hassan Whiteside has posted a Defensive Rating under 100 several times in his career. He should aim to do the same in 2021-22, or at least make a substantial leap in the right direction from his 2020-21 mark.
Utah Jazz center Hassan Whiteside 2021-22 Goal #2: Lead the team in rebounds per 36 minutes
Rudy Gobert is an undeniably better rim protector than Whiteside, but when it comes to gobbling up boards, the margins are narrow between the two veteran big men. Last season, Gobert collected 15.8 rebounds per 36 minutes. For his part, Whiteside collected 14.2. That’s an impressive mark, but it pails in comparison to the 16.2 and 17.6 (!) rebounds he grabbed per 36 minutes in his previous two seasons.
The last goal we set for the newfound member of the Utah Jazz was practically a necessity, whereas this one is something closer to a luxury. Ultimately, Quin Snyder will have an elite rebounder on the floor for the bulk of every game, and whether Whiteside is grabbing 14 or 16 per 36 minutes is fairly inconsequential.
He should make it a goal to lead the team in rebounds per 36 minutes anyway.
The justification for that position is pretty simple. More rebounds = better. Across the NBA, many teams have veered away from ponying up big contracts for rebounding specialists, instead opting to have big men box out so that their primary playmakers can collect the board. The strategy makes sense: the sooner the ball is in the hands of your best offensive player, the better.
The Utah Jazz should feel comfortable bucking that trend. Last season, they managed the third best Offensive Rating in the NBA (115.1) despite playing at just the league’s 16th fastest pace (100.8). They typically thrived by having Gobert secure the glass, get the rock to one of Donovan Mitchell, Mike Conley or Jordan Clarkson, and then setting up one of Quin Snyder’s sophisticated offensive sets to generate a quality shot.
To borrow one of the more morbid colloquialisms in the English language, there are several ways to skin a cat. The Jazz should not endeavour to fix something that isn’t broken, and likewise, Hassan Whiteside should aim to collect as many rebounds as humanly possible.
Setting a goal for himself to lead the Utah Jazz in rebounds per 36 minutes could be useful for him in that regard.
Utah Jazz center Hassan Whiteside 2021-22 Goal #3: A True Shooting % north of 60%
This should be an achievable goal for Whiteside, by virtue of his role if nothing else. The vast majority of his field goal attempts figure to be dunks and floaters, as 99.4% of his field goals attempted last season were from two-point range.
Looking at Whiteside’s career, he absolutely has the capacity to hit this mark, although it’s far from a certainty. On the one hand, he’s only surpassed a 60 True Shooting % (TS%) three times out of his nine seasons in the NBA. Obviously, it’s not a threshold he’s typically surpassed. On the other hand, his career 59.7 TS% is indicative of a player who has generally at least flirted with it.
Spacing might be the NBA’s hottest commodity. Last season, the Utah Jazz optimized theirs by featuring a highly efficient roll man at the 5 spot in Gobert (68.3 TS%), surrounded by four three-point threats at almost every juncture of every game. While the Utah Jazz won’t regularly feature five-out spacing (short of small-ball formations with Rudy Gay or Eric Paschall manning the middle), vertical spacing has its own value.
Gobert achieves vertical space with his remarkable 7’9 wingspan. Whiteside’s 7’7 reach isn’t quite as impressive, but he is able to compensate with a superior vertical leap. He should subsist on a heavy diet of dunks and layups within Quin Snyder’s offense, maximizing both the team’s and his own efficiency in the process.
Hassan Whiteside’s first season as a member of the Utah Jazz will be fascinating to watch. He has been an effective-but-flawed player throughout the course of his strange NBA journey. Hopefully, he can achieve each of the three goals outlined in this article over the 2020-21 season, and provide the club with more of his effectiveness than his flaws.