The issue is Bogey and the other starters/key players. We don't have enough defense, it's really that simple. To address that issue, you have change personnel or see internal improvement. Otherwise you're just hoping the same team has better results. To be fair, the Jazz have been so bad defensively it's difficult to be that bad again....but the same could be said after the DEN series and we all know what happened. We have seen any improvement schematically and hardly any improvement from individuals as well. It could happen. Better health from Conley and Mitchell will health, but I can't use health as an excuse when the Clippers were down an all time playoff performer like Kawhi.
The whole point about the minutes thing is that a player's impact scales with the minutes they play. I feel like that's pretty straightforward. If you're playing 6 minutes, your impact is limited. But if you're playing 25 that's obviously much more important. Depth does matter, but in the playoffs your best lineup and best players are going to matter much more than it did in the regular season. The same guys don't have to close every game, but having realistic options does make your best better. If you're playing 6 minutes, which could easily be picked up by Ingles/Clarkson, and aren't a realistic alternative to close games and provide the most value....your value is limited. But if we're talking about an 24 minute upgrade on the Ingles/Clarkson minutes...yeah I think that's pretty significant too. Those two just don't have much trade value if any at all.
I think the playoff data overwhelming supports a defense for offense trade. The regular season data does too. We've never really seen the "main" lineup in the playoffs besides the MEM series...and it did do well. I'm not going to throw that series out of my consideration, but to me it's clear that was a low level of competition compared to what the goals are. We also had a 115 defensive rating in that series, which would have been 29th in the league last season. So even though that series was a clear win, it didn't really do much for my concerns defensively. The main lineup in particular was not good defensively, even they though they played incredibly on offense.
But beyond the MEM series, we have two series where we were missing Bogey/Conley. Both are great offensive players, but we still managed to produce elite level offense. As concerned as I am about the defense, I have an extreme confidence in the offense. When it comes down to it, I'm confident that Don will get the job done. This backs the trend that goes back years in the regular season where we hardly miss a beat when someone has been out. The offensive talent we have on this roster is massive and adding a player like Rudy Gay has only added to that stockpile. So no, I don't think it's a certainty that we can't get better by moving Bogey. If Roco or Kyle Anderson played Bogey's minutes instead of more Ingles/Clarkson minutes it's not the same thing and maybe the offense would tank, but worse case scenario we can role with the same man-down team that has played at an elite level on offense. The upside is that you can play one of these guys and upgrade the defense while still playing the same high level of offense. Maybe that can only happen if they're playing instead of Royce, but right now we don't have other options.
If you want to talk about diminishing returns, we have to talk about the returns on stocking almost the entire team with offense first players. There's a limit to just how good you can be on offense and the Jazz are pretty close to approaching that in the playoffs even when down significant talent. The upper limit being the Jazz opponents of course. We have the talent to sustain our elite offense, this team has proven that. What we don't have is the talent on defense to play average defense, especially when adjustments get made later in the series. The problems in the playoffs are really clear to me. It's definitely not the offense. It's the defense and it could not be more lopsided. If we had Bogey against DEN or Conley versus the Clippers we might have been able to sneak away with the series win by outscoring the other team like we did with MEM. Those are really good players but don't address the weakness. With this lopsided roster, defensive talent is going to carry so much more weight. It really is the reverse of the teams that lost to HOU where it could not be more obvious that offense was the issue and that talent reflected those issues.
Put it this way...if we didn't have Bogey right now, would we thinking that Bogey is the exact type of player we need? I don't think we would. I think we'd be playing great offense, we'd consider him a great luxury to have, but our biggest need would still be a defender. That's why I'm willing to move Bogey for defense. I get the argument that we are unlikely to get a similar level player with a different skillset. Trades are difficult and trades that aren't young for old or financial moves are extremely rare to begin with. The trade market could be so barren that sitting on what we got might be the best option....but we should have been looking for this move. Nothing that's happened during this season has taught us much, so I'm not expecting a trade now after not making a trade in the summer when there were significantly more options. Although I do wonder if the FO is regretting not pulling the trigger on whatever the Ingles deal was. I think an Ingles/JC deal is more likely and I'd be in favor of that. I like our chances if we could move Bogey/Ingles/Clarkson for a decent defensive player.