Once the Utah Jazz acquired Jaren Jackson Jr., it became pretty clear that their tank would end in 2026. The last four years had been pretty grueling to watch, but at least the end was near. The only problem was knowing who among their youth was going to stick around, as they had built up quite a collection of young talent over the past four years.
Then-Jazz reporter Sarah Todd raised this concern last year, as she confronted the elephant in the room ahead of time by mentioning that Utah couldn't keep all of their youngsters with their rookie contracts all set to expire at some point.
Luckily, the Jazz also got ahead of this by starting with the JJJ trade. Not only did they give up the best of their draft capital to get him, but they also traded Taylor Hendricks and Walter Clayton Jr., two youngsters whose development was better served on a team starting over rather than a team about to finish its rebuild.
Doing so gave the Jazz fewer young mouths to feed with playing time. Instead of developing two young players that could turn into something worthwhile down the line, they exchanged them for a player who fit their needs better than most of the players in the entire NBA.
Trading for Josh Green also cut down on their youth
While the JJJ trade helped the Jazz shrink their youth movement a tad, it was going to be a problem again when they added whoever they got from the 2026 NBA Draft. Getting a golden prospect like Darryn Peterson was too good for them to pass up, but it also meant more of their youth had to go.
Utah confronted this elephant in the room by trading Cody Williams for Josh Green. Williams' potential is still somewhat exciting, but his progress was still going at a snail's pace and it was still ambiguous as to what his ceiling was as a player.
Because the Jazz want to win now and hence didn't want to wait for Williams to sprout, he was the next one to hit the cutting room floor. They may wind up regretting that long-term, but Williams simply didn't fit their current vision.
The Jazz still have five youngsters whose best days are ahead of them - Ace Bailey, Darryn Peterson, Kyle Filipowski, Brice Sensabaugh, and Isaiah Collier - which is still a hefty number, but at least they are not overflowing with them like they were at this time last year.
Even then, there's no telling if the Jazz plan to keep all five of those players long-term, but at least having to pick and choose won't be as hard now as it was seven months ago.
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