Does anyone still like this team?
- Thread starter Ineptimusprime
- Start date
How did this team fall apart like this?
LoPo
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Donovan Bitchell
LoPo
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Funny how the quote is about Rudy Gay who has been planted on the bench ever since he publicly commented on how we play normal switching basketball when Gobert is out and we play some different version of defense that he hasn't adapted to yet when Gobert is in.
But hey, let's blame everything on Donovan. Ukraine? Donovan's "loaded" tweets led to that. Inflation? Definitely Don. Cy's tiny pecker? Donovan's fault for sure.
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homeytennis
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Quin has lost the team.
LogGrad98
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He's checked out. After the smooth-running machine of the Spurs this must feel like a Jr. High school locker room, complete with wedgies.
I was wondering about this too. I think it started with the 1st half vs dallas, I thought we played good D without Gobert. we were switching . then after the game Rudy gay said the comments then 2 games DNP? I don't think Quin is resting him for playoffs
LoPo
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I think there are ton of things going on right now. Clarkson alluded to it. He said that the guys said things that needed to be said which I think is good.
Gay being DNP'd a couple times after his Rudy comments is very interesting.
Most people around here want to boil it down to Donovan being a diva when it's much more than that. I think there have been some personality issues involving numerous players within this team for quite some time.
LogGrad98
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You read that way different than I did. I ready Gay's comments as a slam on the rest of the team, not Rudy. He basically pointed out that with Rudy out, and when they have to, they are capable of defending the way they should, but for some reason when he is back, they stop doing what they should on defense. If benching Gay is a message about anyone, it is about Donovan. Coach and FO have shown repeatedly they don't care what Rudy says or thinks. They absolutely do care what DM says and thinks. Donovan is the one being placated here, not Rudy.
LoPo
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He literally said we play a different style of defense when Rudy is on the floor. He made it seem like it's a style/method of defense that he hasn't adapted to.
At no point in time was it a shot at anybody else on the team. It was either a shot at Quin or a shot at Rudy.
You guys and your lame *** attempts to take shots at Donovan Mitchell.
LogGrad98
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LOL
In no way was it a shot at Rudy. You really think Rudy dictates anything on the court? So Rudy is demanding everyone changes their "style" of play to suit him, all while constantly publicly calling the team out for not playing D? Yeah, sounds right. If it is anything it is a shot at the rest of the team, or Quin, if Quin is dictating a change in defensive strategy when Rudy is in. But realistically the rest of the team kicks back on D when Rudy is in and expects him to clean up their **** and Quin at the very least tacitly supports that by not demanding they play D and holding players accountable.
You and your lame *** attempts to take shots at Rudy Gobert.
LoPo
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I'm at work so I can't look up the Rudy Gay quote. Post it and we can analyze it.
As for your "Rudy dictating anything on the court" comment - our team is built around Rudy Gobert. Our offense and our defense. C'mon man are you seriously going to question that?
I don't think it's easy to pull any true understanding from what Gay said:
It's easy to read into that what you want to see, though.
LoPo
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Rudy Gay literally says we play a switching defense without Gobert and a different defense with Gobert. I don't see Gay's comment being a shot at Gobert but more of a shot at Quin which is why Gay has probably been benched.
What Rudy Gay clearly shows is that we play two styles of defense.
LogGrad98
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Who built the team? Who is constantly calling them out for not playing D? Who remains silent about that last bit?
The answers are Quin, Rudy, and Quin.
Of course the offense and defense are built around Rudy, he is our most impactful player by a mile. Would be stupid to not take his gravity into account when building the playing system.
But to say that means Rudy "dictates" what happens on the court is a false equivalency, and intellectually dishonest. It is very obvious that Mitchell is the one being catered to. He is the de facto leader on the court. He has the ball in his hands. He makes all of the decisions. It is up to him how things flow, and that image of him ignoring Rudy in the post was just one single tiny example of a much larger problem. And that Quin refuses to hold anyone accountable to anything.
Quin built the strategy around our strongest player, but he defers to our other max player more often. That is the reason we are in the *****er this year. If Quin held people accountable, first and foremost Mitchell, to actually playing D and to playing the offense the way it is intended, to generate the absolute best shot (Gobert has the most dunks in the league, pretty good shot there), we would win a lot more games, but he doesn't. He let's Mitchell do Mitchell things and it has killed us in multiple games. Freezing out Gobert is just one thing he does that hurts us.
Funny thing is Mitchell looks like a superstar when he is racking up 30+ points playing in the flow of the offense as intended through 2.75 quarters, then when he decides to turn on "Mitchell Mode" we fall apart and all that work he did is laid to waste while we lose yet another close one because he refuses to run the offense as intended.
When we are playing the way the system is designed, passing the ball, moving without the ball, the vaunted "blender", we are nigh unstoppable. That is why our bench typically runs the score up, they more often play the style as intended. And when the guys are more connected on D to boot, we are nearly unbeatable. When do we lose all that? When we stray into hero-ball territory. As soon as we stop playing the "system", we start losing. So when we play the game as built around Rudy, we win. When we play the game, centering around Mitchell, we lose. And Quin doesn't do anything to stop the latter and reinforce the former.
This is mostly on Quin, imo. He should be directing the team. But is also on Mitchell, for not sticking with what wins. Why he feels the need to try to "take over" at the end of games when he is so obviously bad at it boggles the mind. This is why many are questioning his BBIQ. You would think he would be focused on making the offense run the best it can, but instead he is more focused on getting his own shots. That is a huge problem that is statistically born out. If you can't see that, then that is on you.
LoPo
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A lot of what you say is true, and I'm not denying it. If we ran everything by the letter of the law around Rudy, we will have success. I believe more season success than playoff success, but yes, the system works in that regard.
HOWEVER....
The end of games and playoffs ask for a different level of execution on both ends. It's like the Tennessee Titans. Yes, we can run Derrick Henry all season and have a good year, but the game changes in the playoffs. Coaching adjusts, lanes are closed, there are more TV timeouts so players recharge, and games must be won in a different manner. Everything must be able to adjust.
Back to the Jazz. I don't believe we have the personnel to do everything you said at the end of games and definitely in the playoffs. We lack the defenders, and really, we lack the offensive players too. Royce has zero confidence and Bojan can get blanketed too easily. Rudy is elite at screening and finishing at the rim, but can't make anything happen. That leaves Don or Mike to make everything happen. I don't believe that Mike is the same player we all expect him to be. He can shoot, but he's not a natural spot up shooter. He can drive, but he struggles with good defenders.
That leaves Don who has been a major disappointment the last couple months. That doesn't mean he hasn't played very well and kept us in games through the first 3 quarters, but he has definitely let us down time and again down the stretch of games recently. He has to improve.
Defensively, we lack a guy who can at least slow down the opposing team's alpha. That's not Rudy's job, and it's beyond the capabilities of anybody else on our roster. That's on the front office, but we have what we have. Blaming it on Donovan is stupid. When Klay is out, people don't blame Steph for his average defense. I'm not saying Don is at the level of Steph, but hopefully you get the point. Doesn't matter how good Rudy or Draymond is if you don't have the right people out there to support them.
So if you actually look at what I write on here, I don't blame any single person for our issues. That's irrational and unfair to anybody. Our FO has severely let this team down and people around here want to bash Donovan. Sorry, but I stand up for people when I feel they are being unfairly attacked.
LogGrad98
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The reason they bash Donovan is not to just beat up on someone but because he is obviously the most important player for the offense at the end of games, and he is sucking at a historic level. It is also his choice to play that way at the end of games. There is no eternal maxim that All Games Shall Revert to Hero Ball In The Waning Minutes. You nailed it, the game asks for a different level of EXECUTION. That is the primary problem for us at the end of games, we stop executing, almost entirely, and on both ends.
We all know the defensive woes, we have gone at that ad nauseum on here, and the FO did nothing to address it, but even still, if we execute, we are incredibly hard to beat. We literally beat ourselves (get your mind out of the gutter @Keefe ) in these games. Losing a 25 point lead is not getting beat, it is just plain giving the game up.
The reason Donovan carries a heavy portion of this is that he is the one more often than not dictating what happens on the floor, and it is a pretty solidly documented fact that when our offense is flowing, our defense runs better. We are different from most other teams in that regard. Most teams jumpstart their offense by getting some stops. More often than not we slow down on offense and then lose all focus on defense. It is a self-defeating cycle. And, right wrong or indifferent, more often than not it is Mitchell with the ball in his hands when things stall out.
We stop moving and passing and start forcing things, we turn the ball over multiple times, then we start losing any semblance of defensive unity, and it all just collapses. And as unfortunate as it might be, that often starts with Mitchell and what he decides to do in those moments. It isn't a coincidence that in a lot of these games our bench players helped us build the lead, then when we bring Mitchell and Royce back from their rest at the end of the 3rd or into the 4th, we start the downhill slide.
I am not saying every single problem we have is 100% on Mitchell, obviously the core problems with team construction, our biggest problems, are on the FO, and how we use the assets we have, or misuse them, is on Quin, and I think that is the lion's share of our issues. But to ignore the fact that Mitchell is the primary catalyst when games are on the line is being willfully ignorant. Of course he isn't the only one to "blame", but he definitely carries his fair share of it, especially in blowing these tight games at the end, where he is historically bad this season.
And frankly, if we are moving one guy, we need to move the guy that has put up terrible crunch-time numbers and not the multiple DPOY winner. That is just a no-brainer.
This was also a game where Whiteside/Azubiuke didn't play, so we couldn't play the normal defense with Gobert out. I haven't seen big changes in the defense (for better or worse) when Whiteside is available.