Redrafting the Jazz: 2002

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 26, 2002 – Madison Square Garden, New York City

Previous season:

With Utah’s core of Karl Malone, John Stockton and Bryon Russell past their prime, the Jazz limped along to a 44-38 record in 2001-02, before losing to Sacramento in four games in the first round of the playoffs (it was a best-of-five series back then). The roster had quite a bit of dead weight on it, with the only bright spots being rookies Andrei Kirilenko and Jarron Collins. Well, mostly Kirilenko, but Collins did prove he could be a dependable role player.

The draft:

General Manager Kevin O’Connor spent both of Utah’s picks on big men — No. 19 on Ryan Humphrey from Notre Dame and No. 47 on Jamaal Sampson from Cal. O’Connor then immediately traded those two picks to Orlando for the 18th pick, Stanford’s Curtis Borchardt.

Analysis:

Trading two draft picks to move up just one spot is a pretty stupid thing to do. But apparently the Jazz were quite enamored with Borchardt and believed he had slipped in the draft, despite the injury concerns surrounding the 7-footer. Turns out the teams that passed on him made the right choice. Borchardt had extensive feet problems and even had to have screws implanted in his foot. He sat out his entire rookie season, played only 16 games the next, and 67 in what became his final year in the NBA. Luckily, the Jazz didn’t miss out too much on Humphrey and Sampson. They both had extremely subpar careers that lasted 85 and 72 games, respectively.

Watching the draft live as an impressionable youth, I was shocked the Jazz didn’t take Carlos Boozer. I had followed the power forward’s career at Duke and felt he could conceivably be the next Karl Malone. Utah obviously didn’t think that — at first — but following a strong start in Cleveland (and a sudden need to rebuild on the fly), they offered Boozer quite a bit of money to take Malone’s place. True, he did fall quite short of the Hall of Famer’s standards, but Boozer was an All-Star and helped take the Jazz to the Western Conference Finals one year. I think having him start his career in Utah and learning directly from the Mailman himself could have helped Boozer maximize his potential.

Obviously, I want to keep that second-round pick, but I don’t have that many decent options to choose from. So I’m going to go with Rasual Butler, who had an unremarkable, but productive 14-year career. He wasn’t too bad of a shooter, and maybe Jerry Sloan could have taught him to be the next Bryon Russell.

My advice:

1. Keep the 19th pick and use it on Carlos Boozer.

2. Keep the 47th pick and use it on Rasual Butler.

I was frustrated by Boozer’s many injuries and apparent lack of effort during his stay in Utah. But I like to imagine that an aging Karl Malone could have taken a young rookie under his wing and molded him into something truly great. Maybe. Truthfully, I mainly picked Boozer because he was best player available. And sometimes, that’s all it comes down to.