Utah Jazz: 300-1
It seems just like the Utah Jazz, now entering their fourth full season because the Deron Williams trade altered the roster’s frame, should have obtained the proverbial next step by now.
Derrick Favors should have morphed into a elite warden of this paint, Enes Kanter must have turned into a consistent starter and Gordon Hayward–he of this hefty four-year, $63 million contract–ought to be rapping on stardom’s doorway. Instead, the advancements are marginal, the progress fraught with setbacks.
As luck would have it, a different wave of talent is ready to overtake the one that showed up shortly after the Williams deal. Frenchman Rudy Gobert will turn into the next Roy Hibbert, also Dante Exum could be the next celebrity of Utah.
Or, both might struggle through the suits and starts as Favors, Kanter and Hayward. You can never be certain.
1 reassuring certainty: Alec Burks is a man that is bad. And I am scared by also a second: Quin Snyder.
If Tyrone Corbin was hindering progress, maybe his dismissal will alter matters. New head coach Quin Snyder has shown some innovative touches throughout the preseason, and the Jazz are getting better looks. Even though they’re still shooting about 19 threes per game (right around the number they shot last year)they rank sixth among all preseason squads in long-distance accuracy with a cool 37.1 percent.
The wave of this youth movement begins this season. There will be no title talk, and the drama are a pipe dream. But there is no shortage of potential.
