The Utah Jazz have been lambasted for their tanking approach this season. It's not like it's unearned by any means, but as valid as the criticism has been, many are forgetting that when the Lauri Markkanen era came into full swing, Utah did not intend to go the tanking route.
After the Jazz blew it up in 2022, many understandably believed tanking was next on the agenda, but Markkanen had other ideas, as every Jazz fan knows. He became a great story in Utah, from making his first All-Star team to winning the league's Most Improved Player award and getting them within inches of the play-in.
Yes, Utah traded away some of the guys once it realized the team's ceiling rounded out at just mediocre, but it was clear the Jazz had something with Markkanen. That's why Utah's first instinct was to build a good team around him.
We forget that while Boston may have constructed their next championship team by adding Kristaps Porzingis and Jrue Holiday, it also got in the way of Utah's plans that summer in the process. Had the Celtics not traded for Porzingis, it's likely the Jazz would have signed him. Had Holiday not told Utah he wouldn't commit to them long-term, he may have become a Jazzman.
Those two were clearly integral parts of the Jazz's plan to vault them back to NBA relevance, but fate intervened. Utah didn't come away from the offseason completely empty-handed, as they got John Collins for nothing, but they soon realized there was a reason for that.
Between the Jazz not getting much out of the trade or free agency markets, it was clear by the following year that only one option remained to get them back on track.
They tanked because there weren't better options
The Jazz earnestly tried to do right by Markkanen by building a win-now team, but they just couldn't get the win-now guys they wanted. Combined with growing fan criticism that they couldn't pick a direction, Utah had no choice but to start tanking.
What Utah didn't want more than anything was to be a treadmill team, and they only had so long before the fans would get restless. Fans don't like watching their team intentionally lose, but they understand why they do it, so as painful as it can all be, it's also for the greater good. What fans hate more than losing is when a team is stuck in no-man's land with no way to get better, which was why the Jazz started over in the first place.
To summarize, the Jazz did this because they felt they had to, since the route they wanted simply wasn't there. It's a shame that these years of Markkanen's prime have been wasted, but as long as there are no injuries next season, those days are coming to an end next season.
People can argue that the ends won't justify the means for how far the Jazz could get starting next season, but they did their best with the cards they were dealt. Even if it took a while, they could wind up with a royal flush.