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Has Danny Ainge made Utah a mainstream team?

Thee Idiotic Minivan K said:
I see nba guys talking up the jazz all the time on pods and YouTube a **** ton. Do you know how many times I’ve heard ESPN TNT or Fox sports talk about the jazz? Maybe 0.00000000000000000001% of all the sports news watching I’ve seen and most of it is Steven A saying they don’t matter or something close to that. You aren’t relevant until ESPN talks about you.
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Actually Windhorst talks about us a lot.
 
Also I always envisioned numberica as more of a subtle punkish look than a hipster.
 
Since the rise of Stockton and Malone, Jazz fans have always cared way too much about how the team and the market are perceived nationally, which has led to a massive inferiority complex.

I can certainly admit that I carried that complex growing up as a Jazz fan. I was too sensitive to what the media was or wasn’t saying about our team and city but what really stung me was how we were perceived by NBA players. I remember being absolutely crushed by the Derek Harper and Ronnie Seikaly situations.

Now that I’m older, age has either smartened me up, or I’ve become extremely jaded, but I just don’t see the Utah Jazz ever becoming consistently important in the eyes of the national media and Deron Williams and Donovan Mitchell have certainly provided us with recent examples that NBA stars haven’t changed their tune in regards to living and playing in SLC. If we‘re being honest with ourselves, there’s always gonna be hang-ups that prevent the Utah Jazz from becoming a national brand with media members and players alike.

I’ve come to accept the fact that the only way the Utah Jazz ever win an NBA title is having a Warriors like run in the NBA draft in which we draft our own Steph/Draymond/Thompson and that our own picks mature fast enough to contend for an NBA title while still under team control.

The bad news is that that scenario is extremely tough to pull off. The good news is that apparently Ainge and Co. seem to believe in that philosophy as well because it certainly looks like that is what this team is at least trying to pull off.
 
And any team gets talked about by him that is as heavily involved in gig blockbuster trade rumors and such. Obviously he’s going to talk about us but on talk shows like first take or get up you won’t hear a peep unless it’s to report trades or rumors of trades. Nothing more.
 
We have been in more headlines, but there is a logical explanation that feels too obvious when mentioned:

Everybody loves an underdog. (especially one who plays entertaining brand of ball)
 
I watch Sportcenter every morning while I jog and nothing's changed. We've been mentioned occasionally because we've defied expectations, but that's only by talking heads. Zero national games, and our highlights, even in really good games, are almost always squeezed in at the tail end of the show if they're shown at all. And if it's against a "popular" team, i.e., Celtics, Lakers, Bucks, Suns, etc, even if we win the highlights are dominated by the other team. What other explanation can you give for D Mitchell blowing up this year right as he gets to a different market (cesspool that it is) in ways he never was here? Same player, only slightly better numbers, but way more publicity. Unless we win multiple championships, a la the Spurs, we will never generate more popular interest than the Charlotte Hornets.
 
Saint Cy of JFC said:
The Jazz have had zero national TV games I'm pretty sure. That's probably the best measure of "mainstream" appeal.
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This pretty much sums it up. It's hard to argue you're mainstream when you're the only team in the NBA without a single national TV game this year.
 
Jingled said:
This pretty much sums it up. It's hard to argue you're mainstream when you're the only team in the NBA without a single national TV game this year.
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We won’t have one all year? Does this happen every year where teams go an entire 82 game season with no nat televised games? Are you sure we won’t have even one little game on nat tv? Ya… stars are going to break down doors to sign here next year. Lol
 
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