Well, I have returned from a weekend in hell working rides at Cedar Point (more on that in the Dallas Mavericks write up) and come back with a strange amount of excitement to present my top 10. After fighting through 20 teams whose window really is nothing more than the first round of the playoffs, I now enter into a group of 10 teams whose ceiling could be Conference finals (teams 7-10), NBA Finals (4-6), and NBA Champions (1-3). As the teams get better I hope the writing will get better too and leave you excited for this season to finally begin.
If I could change one thing in the sports world for someone that I have never actually met I would choose to somehow give an NBA Championship to Jerry Sloan. The fact that this man is yet to win a title at the tender age of 68 is one of the biggest tragedies in all of sports. How does Jerry Sloan rank amongst the great NBA coaches of all time? Probably top 15. How does he rank amongst those who haven’t won a title? Number one.
I never appreciated Michael Jordan growing up because I was a die-hard Utah Jazz fan. John Stockton, Karl Malone, Jeff Hornacek, Greg Ostertag, they were the ultimate team filled with the ultimate batch of good guys. While Jordan endorsed things like Nike, Gatorade, his own brand of shoes, Karl Malone endorsed Rogaine for hair loss. While the rest of the league was following the trend of baggy, knee length shorts, Stockton hiked his shorts up even further, blinding his point guard opponents with his pasty white thighs. The only problem with this team is that they didn’t come 10 years later in NBA history.
Think about it, the Jazz were an elite team from the end of the 80’s to the end of the 90’s. Imagine if they had started toward the end of the 90’s and continued on until around 2007-2008. I fully believe they would have won the four titles that the San Antonio Spurs gathered during this time. I’m not saying they would have beaten the 2000-2003 Lakers or the 2004 Pistons, but those years in between when the Spurs slinked in and grabbed titles, those would have been Jerry Sloan’s. If the history said Jerry Sloan, Karl Malone, John Stockton, four time NBA champions, there would be a greater sense of balance in the universe. Instead, current players like LeBron, Melo, Chris Paul are deathly afraid of ending up without an NBA title because then they are put into a category with Malone and Stockton. Players should be honored to be put alongside the Great Pick and Roll and should never see it as a failed career. And so help me if Erik Spoelstra ends up with 10 NBA titles by age 50 while Sloan retires from the game with zero I may question everything that I believe in.
Problem is I don’t see how this current Jazz team could possibly win a title in the next decade. The Lakers will be the best team out west for at least two more years, possibly four. Then comes the reign of Durant mixed in with the rise of the Portland Trailblazers. And even if they have a miraculous year that propels them to the NBA finals they will still have to deal with the Celtics, Heat, Magic, or Bulls who aren’t going anywhere anytime soon (even when the Big 3 in Boston retire they will still have one of the league’s best point guards, Rondo, and a legitimate defensive center, Perkins, to rebuild around). This Utah Jazz team is a good team. They have one of the league’s best point guards, a coaching legend, tons of depth on their roster, but yet this Utah Jazz team at best could make a run to the Western Conference Finals and sadly that may be the way things are for the rest of Williams and Sloan’s career.
Point Guard
I put Derron Williams as the #2 point guard in the NBA. Maybe I did get a little carried away with putting Rondo at #1 but it’s hard to think otherwise after the 2010 playoffs, but even then, I guess Williams could very well be the best point guard in the league. The Williams/Boozer combo was like a Meijer brand version of Stockton/Malone and worked well for 5 + years. Sadly that era is over and the Williams/Jefferson era begins?
Shooting Guard
Start Raja Bell here, let him show why he chose to join the Jazz and defend Kobe rather than help defend Kobe’s quest to six rings. Raja Bell’s got something to prove, and this will be sure to be… the least interesting personal quest of the year.
Small Forward
AK-47. Hidden behind the Tiger Woods/Elin marriage collapse and all other celebrity marriage fiascos is the beauty of the Kirilenko/ Masha Lopatov marriage:
Kirilenko's wife, Masha Lopatova, once a pop star in the couple's native Russia, is quoted in the current issue of ESPN The Magazine as saying she allows her husband to have sex with another woman one night a year. "When this article comes out, girls will be lining up outside his hotel door," she told the magazine. "When I'm aware and I let him do it, it's not cheating." Kirilenko's response: "I'm not planning to do anything. But she said if you want to do it, you can do it."
That’s love.
Big Guys
Believe it or not, I think the Utah Jazz will actually be better at the post than they were at the end of last season. Now this doesn’t mean that Al Jefferson is better than Carlos Boozer or that any one of their posts are even close to Boozer for that matter, but with Okur (aka Bogut) returning from injury mixed in with the steady improvement of Milsap and Fesenko, the Jazz may have the second best depth at the post trailing only behind the Celtics. It’s hard to put these four guys into a traditional power forward and center spots, but here’s a look at the Utah Jazz big men.
Kyrylo Fesenko- 7’1, 300 lbs, 23 years old. I think slowly but surely Fesenko will replace Mehmet Okur as the token 7 foot Eastern European center. Watch for him to get even more minutes this season and both points and rebounds rise.
Francisco Elson- A seven foot black Dutchman. Intriguing.
Paul Millsap- Start him at power forward and he will be a 15 ppg 10 rpg guy.
Mehmet Okur- I would trade him for a shooting guard/small forward or high draft pick while he still has value and build around the Fesenko, Elson, Milsap, Jefferson core.
Al Jefferson- Jefferson played on bad Celtics teams and even worse T’Wolves team but quietly was a 20 and 10 type of guy. Look for him to fill a lot of the gaps left by Carlos Boozer.
Gordan Hayward?
His run at Butler almost ended in a national title on what would have been a historic half court shot ending replayed again and again next to the Christian Laetner turn around top of the key play. Hayward is the next great white hope and I think he has potential to be the next Jeff Hornacek. It’s going to take awhile though, but still look for him to hit 3’s off the bench this season to fill the previous Kyle Korver role.
Verdict
Utah will be the 6 seed in the Western Conference and depending on who they play will determine whether or not their run ends there. That last sentence sounds really obvious but here’s what I mean:
If they play the Thunder or Trailblazers their season is over. But if the West ends up with the Mavericks as the three seed and say the Spurs come in as a 7 seed and upset the 2 seed Thunder, then the Jazz could very well beat the Mavs then beat the Spurs and find their season end with a 4-1 series Western Conference finals loss against the Los Angeles Lakers.
I think they will play a 3 seed Thunder and lost in 5 or 6 games.
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