I have been cursed by a witch to repeatedly travel back through time to relive every NBA draft. Fortunately, her spell sends me directly to the Utah Jazz war room on draft night and all the executives magically know I’m from the future and will do whatever I say. Unfortunately, the curse prevents me from seeing how my advice altered the future, as I am sent back to the previous year as soon as draft night ends.
June 27, 2013 – Barclays Center, New York
Previous season:
The 2012-13 season was extremely frustrating for the Jazz. Brand new general manager Dennis Lindsey inherited a hodgepodge roster filled with guys who seemed decent individually, but didn’t really work well together. Or were just too old and injury-prone to contribute in a meaningful way (see Mo Williams, Jamaal Tinsley and Earl Watson). Compounding these problems was coach Tyrone Corbin, who suffered from a lack of imagination and a bias against younger players. The ill-matched front court of Al Jefferson and Paul Millsap stifled the development of Derrick Favors and Enes Kanter. And Marvin Williams inexplicably got more playing time than DeMarre Carroll. The one bright spot of the season was Gordon Hayward, who had blossomed into the team’s third-leading scorer. But that wasn’t enough to save the Jazz from the doldrums of mediocrity. Utah finished the year with a 43-39 record, missing the playoffs by two games.
The draft:
Lindsey sought to make a splash with his first draft and address Utah’s most glaring weakness at point guard. He traded the 14th pick and the 21st pick (which the Jazz had acquired in the Deron Williams trade of 2011) to Minnesota for the ninth pick, which he used on Michigan guard Trey Burke. The Timberwolves used their new picks on Shabazz Muhammad from UCLA and Gorgui Dieng from Senegal.
Lindsey then made a slightly surprising trade to get back into the first round, sending the 46th pick and some cash to Denver for the 27th pick. Utah drafted a big man from France named Rudy Gobert and the Nuggets picked a point guard from Virginia Tech named Erick Green.
And in his last trade of the night, Lindsey gave Atlanta a 2015 second-round pick for Brazilian point guard Raul Neto, who was drafted at No. 47.
Analysis:
Trading up for Trey Burke was the smart thing to do. The move was universally praised, even by me on this very blog. He was an incredibly accomplished player in college, but in the NBA … he just wasn’t that good. And the Jazz gave him a fair shot. He started all but two of the games he played as a rookie, but took a step back in his second year and regressed even more in his third, until he was eventually traded away for a mere second-round pick. He then bounced around the league quite a bit, never finding a true home. All in all, a rather disappointing pick at No. 9.
Could the Jazz have gotten someone better with that pick? Absolutely. But I don’t see the need to trade it in the first place. The best player of this draft — by far, no questions asked — was available for Utah at No. 14. And no, I’m not talking about Shabazz Muhammad, who only had two marginally productive years in his short-lived NBA career. I’m talking about two-time MVP and Finals MVP Giannis Antetokounmpo. I know Jazz fans would have crucified Lindsey for not drafting a point guard, but I would explain to the new GM that he’d be much, much better off finding a guard in free agency and building everything around Giannis.
So what to do with the 21st pick, if we’re not sending it to Minnesota? Just grab Gobert. Apart from Giannis, he’s the only other guaranteed Hall of Famer in this draft. And although Gorgui Dieng has put up a couple of decent seasons, he’s nowhere near the three-time Defensive Player of the Year Gobert is. Of course, of course, many Jazz fans would have spontaneously combusted at the sight of a brand-new GM drafting two “project” big men from overseas to add to a roster that already had a young Derrick Favors and Enes Kanter and exactly zero point guards. And I fully acknowledge that pairing Giannis and Gobert on the same roster as rookies (especially under the inept coaching of Tyrone Corbin) could lead to disaster for their development. But I want to risk it anyway. I firmly believe in drafting the best players available, and when you have a chance to add two Hall of Famers to your roster, you take it and figure out the rest later.
Since I’ve told the Jazz to keep the 21st pick, there’s no point in trading for the 27th. I say save the cash and use the 46th pick on a point guard. Just not Erick Green, who, ironically did end up playing six games with the Jazz, after his career in Denver fizzled out after 46 games. And I wouldn’t even bother trading for Raul Neto, either. He didn’t join the Jazz until 2015, and although he lasted a few years as a dependable backup, he was never anything remarkable. So I’m going to recommend Seth Curry from Duke. He’s nowhere near as talented as his older brother, Steph, but he has worked his way up to being one of the best 3-point shooters in the league.
My advice:
1. Keep the 14th pick and use it on Giannis Antetokounmpo.
2. Keep the 21st pick and use it on Rudy Gobert.
3. Keep the 46th pick and use it on Seth Curry.
4. Don’t trade for Raul Neto.
I just gave Dennis Lindsey either the greatest draft of all time or the worst. It’s so hard to predict how players will develop in drastically different situations. In real life, Gobert didn’t become a defensive lockdown force until Quinn Snyder became head coach and helped him realize his full potential. But I don’t even know if Snyder will ever be the coach of the Jazz in this new reality I’ve just created, because the witch’s curse only allows me to spend one night in each year. I’m now being whisked away to 2012, which is a far less interesting draft for the Jazz.
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