The Utah Jazz continue to be disrespected on preseason power rankings

The Utah Jazz can’t catch a break with preseason power rankings.

If the Utah Jazz spent all of the 2022-2023 season struggling, fully healthy, not constantly overhauling its roster every few weeks and didn’t make the playoffs by a large margin, we can understand why so many preseason power rankings don’t give the Jazz a break. But they didn’t struggle in 2022-2023 until the team started trading off massive chunks of their roster, and started dealing with injuries.

Then they nearly miss the play-in game by a handful of games, all while resting their best player, Lauri Markkanen. So even without any offseason additions, you would think they’d be given at least a Top 20 slot just based on what they’re bringing back.

That’s without any additions, but with the arrival of John Collins, Taylor Hendricks, Keyonte George, Brice Sensabaugh, and Omer Yurtseven. With those five new names, you’d think the Jazz could crack the Top 15 at least, if not the Top 20 for sure.

Well, apparently Yardbarker isn’t on board with the idea. They’ve ranked the Jazz No. 23 in the NBA’s preseason power rankings. Not only did they lowball the Jazz, but they claimed that not trading Jordan Clarkson was a bad move. Clarkson is likely to be traded if the team struggles, but if the team succeeds, it will be in part due to him.

Clarkson remaining on the team should actually help raise the profile of the team and help elevate them up the power ranking standings, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Despite that, they do give credit to the team for drafting George, who credits his Summer League outings as a reason to be excited for him.

So at least they got that right.

The Jazz admittedly have a lot to prove in 2023-2024 but it should be noted that the team is better today than they were at the end of the prior season, and with a deeper roster to boot. Despite the lingering questions, that alone should elevate them.