Keyonte George must fix this fatal flaw for Jazz to reach promised land

Keyonte George has been the most impressive player on the Utah Jazz this season. He has been so good that there's a fair case that he was the NBA's biggest All-Star snub. There's no denying how good he has been, but with the Jazz planning to be back in the playoff hunt, there's one area George must improve on: his defense.

There's no doubt that pairing up Jaren Jackson Jr. and Walker Kessler should make the Jazz's defense more impenetrable, which has been their most glaring weakness for the past four years, much more intimidating, but it goes without saying that it will take more than them, as it will take effort from everyone to form an elite defense.

That definitely includes George, who, as it turns out, is one of the NBA's worst defenders. No, we're not exaggerating.

Not to be the fly in the ointment, but this is bad. To be fair, part of this can be attributed to the Jazz's overall paltry defense, but what would help his numbers be more defensible here is if there were more Jazzmen on this list besides him and Brice Sensabaugh.

George has proven above all else that he is the guard of the future for Utah. Not only is he the Donovan Mitchell replacement Utah has been looking for, but he should make their offense more dynamic. He has guided one of the most resilient individual seasons in Jazz franchise history, but the next step will be defense.

He doesn't have to be elite, but just not a negative

Defense wins championships, as they say. JJJ and Kessler are game-changers both on the perimeter and in the post, but playoff contenders always single out the weakness and exploit it as much as possible. If George does not improve, they will pick on him and pick at it until the Jazz have no choice but to take him out.

Players like Stephen Curry and James Harden were offensive phenomenons who were also not exactly renowned for what they could do on the offensive end. When they realized their teams wouldn't go anywhere if they didn't get better, they made their own efforts to improve.

Did they get to the point where they were NBA All-Defense candidates? Nope, but they weren't sieves on that end of the floor when they got serious. George will enter Year 4, and it's very possible that even when he starts trying harder on defense, Utah won't see progress from him right away.

That's okay, as they will have time to see it through. No matter what, they should not act like this won't be an issue, because if they want to win, they will have to mitigate it one way or the other.