Game Thread Dec 23, 2025 07:00PM MT: Memphis Grizzlies @ Utah Jazz

[SoberasHotRod]

My one true Christmas wish is that the 2026/2027 Jazz team is capable of getting defensive stops.

 

[Rubashov]

Credit to Jock for taking advantage of the situation, but truth be known, our defense makes everyone look great.

True that, just happy for the dude, he's a beast for Australia at FIBA ball. He signed a terrible contract with the Rockets and had some difficult years there, Memphis is looking like a good situation for him.

 

[Handlogten's Heros]

He might be the worst non Love/Nurkic defender on the team in space.

It’s the “will he ever get his athleticism back” talk that gets me. Y’all have the patience and vision of a toddler. His processing is horrible. It’s getting slightly better though. It will continue to get better with reps.

Go get some apple juice and watch a couple Bluey episodes and it will be time. Patience children.

 

[NUMBERICA]

It’s the “will he ever get his athleticism back” talk that gets me. Y’all have the patience and vision of a toddler. His processing is horrible. It’s getting slightly better though. It will continue to get better with reps.

Go get some apple juice and watch a couple Bluey episodes and it will be time. Patience children.

He also put on a bunch of weight. His injury was also significant but not catastrophic. He will be fine but that will take some time to resolve both issues.

I agree that if he isn’t the defensive playmaker he was projected to be then he probably isn’t an NBA player. So I hope he’s starting to focus on that part more.

 

[Saint Cy of JFC]

It’s the “will he ever get his athleticism back” talk that gets me. Y’all have the patience and vision of a toddler. His processing is horrible. It’s getting slightly better though. It will continue to get better with reps.

Go get some apple juice and watch a couple Bluey episodes and it will be time. Patience children.

I mean we just don't have a huge sample of players who had the severity of injury Taylor had.

 

[NUMBERICA]

I mean we just don't have a huge sample of players who had the severity of injury Taylor had.

It was a fibula (probably the least-important bone in a person’s leg) fracture and dislocation. The injury itself should not have any long term ramifications besides the developmental disruption (that part is definitely real).

 

[KqWIN]

Such a bozo take. Situations do matter.

So force feeding the young guys minutes and tanking hard for two years must have been the secret to OKC’s development right?

Situations do matter. I lean towards going guys the freedom to play through mistakes. When I look around the league there sure seems to be a lot of teams with “losing culture” that ended up just fine. But the idea that it’s super important one way or another is ridiculous.

The best development teams are really just the teams who identify and acquire talent the best.

 

[NUMBERICA]

So force feeding the young guys minutes and tanking hard for two years must have been the secret to OKC’s development right?

Situations do matter. I lean towards going guys the freedom to play through mistakes. When I look around the league there sure seems to be a lot of teams with “losing culture” that ended up just fine. But the idea that it’s super important one way or another is ridiculous.

The best development teams are really just the teams who identify and acquire talent the best.

And/or teams that have infinity chances to take swings in the draft because they set themselves up.

 

[framer]

So force feeding the young guys minutes and tanking hard for two years must have been the secret to OKC’s development right?

Situations do matter. I lean towards going guys the freedom to play through mistakes. When I look around the league there sure seems to be a lot of teams with “losing culture” that ended up just fine. But the idea that it’s super important one way or another is ridiculous.

The best development teams are really just the teams who identify and acquire talent the best.

There are also teams that have losing culture and then continue to lose. In fact, it is a long damn list.

 

[fishonjazz]

There are also teams that have losing culture and then continue to lose. In fact, it is a long damn list.

The question there is are they losing because of culture or lack of talent. You didn't name any teams but lets just assume you are talking about brooklyn (or insert whatever franchise). If said franchise tanks and gets the first pick and drafts lebron james do they continue to lose due to their culture? I think the answer is no.
On the other hand there are other ways than the draft to acquire talent so the argument is there that if these teams would have just stopped tanking a long time ago or never tanked to begin with then maybe they would have been making moves to make the roster better all along and they wouldn't suck. Either way, I think the sucking is due to decisions made (to tank and to not make trades and free agency moves to improve) and bad luck (busts or bad lottery luck) rather than culture. No way to be sure though. I could be wrong.

Or, as it pertains to the jazz, if the jazz win 31 games this year and give their pick to OKC does that winning culture boost make them better next season than they would be if they won 21 games this season and got Boozer, AJ, or Peterson? I think the answer is once again, no.

 

[framer]

The question there is are they losing because of culture or lack of talent. You didn't name any teams but lets just assume you are talking about brooklyn (or insert whatever franchise). If said franchise tanks and gets the first pick and drafts lebron james do they continue to lose due to their culture? I think the answer is no.
On the other hand there are other ways than the draft to acquire talent so the argument is there that if these teams would have just stopped tanking a long time ago or never tanked to begin with then maybe they would have been making moves to make the roster better all along and they wouldn't suck. Either way, I think the sucking is due to decisions made (to tank and to not make trades and free agency moves to improve) and bad luck (busts or bad lottery luck) rather than culture. No way to be sure though. I could be wrong.

Or, as it pertains to the jazz, if the jazz win 31 games this year and give their pick to OKC does that winning culture boost make them better next season than they would be if they won 21 games this season and got Boozer, AJ, or Peterson? I think the answer is once again, no.

I'm thinking of New Orleans, Sacramento, Chicago, Charlotte, Portland, and to some extent, the Clippers. Atlanta is bordering there too. Brooklyn and Memphis's culture look pretty broken as well. All of those teams have talent.

Some of it might be coaching. A great coach probably isn't going to fall all over himself to move to any of these teams. Kevin Young saw the line outside his door and bailed to BYU. In that way the Jazz are ahead of the game because I think Will is a great coach who wanted this situation.

 

[framer]

I guess the question is, if the Jazz got a mandate to make the playoffs today, and could even use some assets, do you think they could do it? I would assume yes, because of all of the loser *** teams floating around in the league. We should try to not be one of those teams, and that is a fine line to walk.

 

[KqWIN]

There are also teams that have losing culture and then continue to lose. In fact, it is a long damn list.

So what's the conclusion when you have teams that have losing culture that get better and losing culture that stay bad?

It's completely arbitrary to label teams as winning or losing culture btw. Like the majority of teams you listed as losing culture are teams that do not tank. Seems like you're just assigning that label after the fact, which is my point. I don't think playing Poku and Maledon, or running Sochan is winning culture....but having the good players is!

 

[fishonjazz]

I'm thinking of New Orleans, Sacramento, Chicago, Charlotte, Portland, and to some extent, the Clippers. Atlanta is bordering there too. Brooklyn and Memphis's culture look pretty broken as well. All of those teams have talent.

Some of it might be coaching. A great coach probably isn't going to fall all over himself to move to any of these teams. Kevin Young saw the line outside his door and bailed to BYU. In that way the Jazz are ahead of the game because I think Will is a great coach who wanted this situation.

I think the clippers is the best team to point at losing culture. That roster should be much better. I think most of those other teams dont have much talent. Their rosters suck and they need more talent either via tanking or making trades/ free agency acquisitions. I dont look at chicago, portland, charlotte, kings, new orleans, atlanta, memphis, brooklyn and see a bunch of dudes I wish the jazz would trade for.
Like I think if you put Jokic and anthony edwards on pretty much all those teams you listed then they would instantly be really good despite the losing culture. It would be an interesting experiment.

 

[fishonjazz]

I guess the question is, if the Jazz got a mandate to make the playoffs today, and could even use some assets, do you think they could do it? I would assume yes, because of all of the loser *** teams floating around in the league. We should try to not be one of those teams, and that is a fine line to walk.

Fair enough. I can dig that. You are probably right that we should not try to be one of those teams.

But the jazz obviously have the plan to tank right now. So as a fan of the jazz, I want them to be successful at what they are trying to do. Right now that is to keep their pick and get a special talent in the upcoming draft. I want them to achieve that goal. So I want them to lose.
If next season they play all their best players the most minutes and pick up good players in free agency and make trades to get better etc then that would indicate that the jazz want to win and again I would want the jazz to be successful at their goal and would flip the switch (very happily) back to wanting to win every single game.

 

[framer]

I think the clippers is the best team to point at losing culture. That roster should be much better. I think most of those other teams dont have much talent. Their rosters suck and they need more talent either via tanking or making trades/ free agency acquisitions. I dont look at chicago, portland, charlotte, kings, new orleans, atlanta, memphis, brooklyn and see a bunch of dudes I wish the jazz would trade for.
Like I think if you put Jokic and anthony edwards on pretty much all those teams you listed then they would instantly be really good despite the losing culture. It would be an interesting experiment.

I'm not even talking about this year. All of those teams have underperformed at some level for quite a while. Some of it is ownership, and by extension coaching. Like I said, there are some situations a good coach with options will not touch. Another piece is fan apathy.

The thing is, I can see players on these teams that I WOULD want on the Jazz, or at least I see how they would have been developed differently. I see a lot of turnover and impatience and "mid-star" chasing.

I think the Jazz have put a lot of stock into "throwing the switch!" next year. What if we try that and we are Portland? I'd like to think that we have been built better, but you never know. I don't know what that looks like if it persists 2 or 3 years after the tank. I don't believe the market is such that it can withstand a solid decade of losing. My fandom would probably not survive.

I look over at New York and I wonder if being a treadmill team with assets was always the better play.

 

[KqWIN]

Pretty much every team @framer has listed as a losing culture team is a team that tried to win but isn't good at it. Seems like "winning culture" doesn't have anything to do with the choice to give more minutes to the young guys, developing young guys around vets, or tanking.

 

[fishonjazz]

I'm not even talking about this year. All of those teams have underperformed at some level for quite a while. Some of it is ownership, and by extension coaching. Like I said, there are some situations a good coach with options will not touch. Another piece is fan apathy.

The thing is, I can see players on these teams that I WOULD want on the Jazz, or at least I see how they would have been developed differently. I see a lot of turnover and impatience and "mid-star" chasing.

I think the Jazz have put a lot of stock into "throwing the switch!" next year. What if we try that and we are Portland? I'd like to think that we have been built better, but you never know. I don't know what that looks like if it persists 2 or 3 years after the tank. I don't believe the market is such that it can withstand a solid decade of losing. My fandom would probably not survive.

I look over at New York and I wonder if being a treadmill team with assets was always the better play.

I think getting a big time talent in this draft is a big part of not being Portland to be honest.

I do think that I would prefer to not have blown up the team back when we had gobert and Mitchell and kept trying to win but we are where we are now. Makes sense to me to tank this one more year.

If we try to be good after this year and still suck forever then that will suck.

But I don't think winning a few more games this season and giving away our pick will be the thing that catapults us to not sucking.