Utah Jazz news: Clarkson’s future, Mitchell robbed, Markkanen cut
By Jared Koch
Jazz All-Star Lauri Markkanen has a new look entering the offseason.
The All-Star forward announced a few weeks ago his plans to carry out his military requirement in Finland, serving time in the country’s military this summer. With this, Markkanen seems to have been required to buzz his head.
Lauri shared a picture to Instagram earlier today to show off the new look.
This isn’t a look we haven’t seen from Markkanen before. Lauri’s spent some time sporting the short hair in his earlier days with the Chicago Bulls. In recent years, we’ve seen him sport the longer, curly hair more often than not, but it seems like this time he didn’t get much of a choice.
While he seems to be rocking the buzz cut with pride now, he did caption the picture by saying his curls will be back soon. We’ll have to wait until October to see what Markkanen decides to open the season with.
Utah Jazz secure the 16th pick in the 2023 NBA Draft.
While this may not be the best outcome Jazz fans would hope for, we now have an answer for where the Jazz will be selecting one of their picks. Utah was waiting on the results of the Timberwolves’ fate in the play-in to be able to have a solid answer.
Had the Timberwolves lost their play-in game on Friday vs. the Thunder, the Jazz would’ve secured a second lottery pick in this year’s draft. The Wolves put a stop to that though, easily taking down the Thunder to secure the 8-seed in the West.
The Jazz now have set positioning at pick 16 and pick 27 come time for the draft. Utah will now await the lottery in May to see where their projected 9th-overall pick will officially land in the lottery.
In the meantime, we’ll see former Jazzmen Rudy Gobert, Mike Conley, and Nickiel Alexander-Walker all get a chance to upset the reigning MVP Nikola Jokić and the 1-seed Denver Nuggets in the first round. According to FanDuel Sportsbook, the Timberwolves are currently listed as +385 underdogs to the favored -500 Nuggets entering Game 1.