Why the Jazz were so bad defensively?

[jazznik]

We’ve drafted 6 or more rookies over the last two years, and the jazz got serious about tanking for a full season. Other than Sexton the vets hardly played most the season. Also of all the tanking teams we had the least amount of established players and were the youngest or second youngest team of all the tanking teams. It was just a perfect storm.

All of this would make made sense if the Jazz finished with the worst-ever-defense for just the last season. But they did the same in 2023-2024: this season is currently the second worst defensive season all time and the DRTG for it was almost as bad as in the 2024-25.

In 2023-2024 the Jazz did not tank their entire season. Their top 7 players by minutes played were Sexton (vet), Keyonte (rookie), Collins (vet), Markkanen (vet), Clarkson (vet), Kessler (defensively strong 2nd year player) and Dunn (vet, defensive specialist). The next 3 players by minutes were all vets too: Fontecchio, Olynyk, THT. And, still, they were the worst ever.

The data suggest that the reasons something is wrong with the Jazz defense go beyond tanking and playing too many young players.

 

[HermanG]

All of this would make made sense if the Jazz finished with the worst-ever-defense for just the last season. But they did the same in 2023-2024: this season is currently the second worst defensive season all time and the DRTG for it was almost as bad as in the 2024-25.

In 2023-2024 the Jazz did not tank their entire season. Their top 7 players by minutes played were Sexton (vet), Keyonte (rookie), Collins (vet), Markkanen (vet), Clarkson (vet), Kessler (defensively strong 2nd year player) and Dunn (vet, defensive specialist). The next 3 players by minutes were all vets too: Fontecchio, Olynyk, THT. And, still, they were the worst ever.

The data suggest that the reasons something is wrong with the Jazz defense go beyond tanking and playing too many young players.

Data absolutely does not suggest what you imply. You just dont know how to read it with the color of glasses you are wearing.

At 2024 trade deadline Jazz DRTG was 117.9, which is not great but it was merely 25th in the league and about the same Mavs had, who made the finals (around 2.5 points better than the currently good defensive team Pistons had for instance). And that includes a porous start to the season when Kessler was injured and we were in shambles defensively, giving up 130+ on multiple occasions (150+ even). Following that trade DL the end of that season was the most blatant tank run of this regime where Keyonte, Brice, Hendricks, Bazley, Lofton, THT etc got big minutes and we went like 2-20 or something...

You could maybe see these things if you werent so hell bent on pushing your agenda. Its simply wrong.

 

[KqWIN]

Hanging onto 25th best defense for half a season as gotcha (as in we’re not as bad as you think) shows just how bad the state of our defense is.

 

[HermanG]

Hanging onto 25th best defense for half a season as gotcha (as in we’re not as bad as you think) shows just how bad the state of our defense is.

Supporting a resident drama queen who misuses statistics out of context to support his smear campaign against Hardy, Lauri, Ainge and pretty much everyone.... is.... something.

Anyone with half a brain knows we havent been good defensively.

 

[KqWIN]

Supporting a resident drama queen who misuses statistics out of context to support his smear campaign against Hardy, Lauri, Ainge and pretty much everyone.... is.... something.

Anyone with half a brain knows we havent been good defensively.

I'm not supporting anyone, but would it be better if I was blind homer? All I said is that your post does a great job of showing just how awful our defense is.

There's a lot of answers to OP's question, most of them are right (even though it's obvious that some of the options are leading statements). Being hung up on one reason or the other is the only wrong answer IMO. Looking at the poll results, I'd probably disagree that the top answers are what they are. If this team were to try to win as many games as possible, they'd probably still be really bad at defense. Defense requires talent and skill, it's not just a matter of deciding to play good defense. But I don't think it's important to think about the complexion of your team when you're this far away. This is something to think about when you're actually trying to win.

 

[HermanG]

I'm not supporting anyone, but would it be better if I was blind homer? All I said is that your post does a great job of showing just how awful our defense is.

There's a lot of answers to OP's question, most of them are right (even though it's obvious that some of the options are leading statements). Being hung up on one reason or the other is the only wrong answer IMO. Looking at the poll results, I'd probably disagree that the top answers are what they are. If this team were to try to win as many games as possible, they'd probably still be really bad at defense. Defense requires talent and skill, it's not just a matter of deciding to play good defense. But I don't think it's important to think about the complexion of your team when you're this far away. This is something to think about when you're actually trying to win.

His post that I replied to excused this season but stated that there was no excuse for our bad defense in 2023-24.

I assume you agree? We tried our best in 2023-24 season but simply couldnt, right?

 

[KqWIN]

His post that I replied to excused this season but stated that there was no excuse for our bad defense in 2023-24.

I assume you agree? We tried our best in 2023-24 season but simply couldnt, right?

I don't think he stated that there was no excuse. He said that the 23/24 season went beyond tanking and playing young players, which is something I find hard to disagree with. I don't care who said it, that something that feels true to me. The Jazz sucked on defense when they were not tanking and mostly playing vet (I guess that depends on how highly you think of the 25th best defense). That result came from poor veteran defensive personnel and decisions made by Hardy which weren't tanking related. I definitely don't think Hardy was getting the most out of what talent we did have. We may have gained something else in other areas, but he also said defense wasn't his priority in the end of season interview.

 

[jazznik]

Data absolutely does not suggest what you imply. You just dont know how to read it with the color of glasses you are wearing.

At 2024 trade deadline Jazz DRTG was 117.9, which is not great but it was merely 25th in the league and about the same Mavs had, who made the finals (around 2.5 points better than the currently good defensive team Pistons had for instance)...

You could maybe see these things if you werent so hell bent on pushing your agenda. Its simply wrong.

I don't know, I think I did a pretty fair comparison after being repeatedly told that the Jazz defensive problems are mostly due to tanking and young players playing a lot of minutes. I compared the Jazz defense in the year when the Jazz were competing for most of the year and in the year when they played almost exclusively vets + Kessler (who is supposedly a good defender for a young player): the results were the same.

Instead of the full year data, you are for some reason doing selective comparisons for specific dates and against a very specific team that dramatically changed its roster at the trade deadline (i.e. no way the pre-deadline Mavs would go to the Finals). But your 2024 trade deadline stats tell the same story: the Jazz, while trying to win the games and playing their vets, were the 25th on defense. I do not have the deadline DRTG stats for other teams but I am pretty sure that by that date the teams below defensively were mostly or exclusively the desperately tanking teams like the Hornets, Wizards and Pistons. If you think that tanking/playing vets affect the defensive rating then you need to compare the non-tanking Jazz to other non-tanking vet teams, right? How many of them were worse in 2023-24?

I think that the 2 year sample shows that when the Jazz tank their defense is worse compared to other tankers, and when they compete/play vets their defense is worse than that of other teams stacked with vets and competing. When something like that happens it points to other factors affecting the team defense, regardless of the player experience or the level of tanking. I think it is fair to discuss what those factors could be because I, personally, do not know.

 

[jazznik]

Supporting a resident drama queen who misuses statistics out of context to support his smear campaign against Hardy, Lauri, Ainge and pretty much everyone.... is.... something.

Anyone with half a brain knows we havent been good defensively.

Why do you need to get all personal and catty? You know, people may simply have different opinions and perspectives.

 

[jazznik]

Oh, I finally found the DRTG by month on nba.com. There is some interesting stuff in there. The poll result indicate the tanking and playing young players huge minutes as the main drivers of the Jazz defensive woes. However, in March the Jazz, while playing almost exclusively young players and tanking to the 1-16 result, had only the 25th worst defense , and in February - the 23th worst.

The worst defensive stretches of the season for the Jazz (for the full months) happened early, in November (29th) and December (29th), when the team was led mostly by veterans and tanked much less (4-10 in November, 3-9 in December). Young players indeed lost a lot of games for the Jazz but that was mostly because of their horrible offense - their defense was on par or better than the defense of quite a few teams.

 

[Step-Back Lauri]

This isn't very hard. Already mentioned earlier the sad fact of either small or just very bad defenders running point (Sexton, JC, George). Their ball security isn't very good..Lots of turnovers creates transition buckets. Add the fact how guys like JC or George mostly haven't even tried to stop transition offenses in many games. I don't feel shocked about it... Jazz has been undermining anything good the team has had going on.

There's also another thing: Jazz has been going quite strongly to offensive boards. Guess what that creates? More transition changes for opponents. Which, given defensive capabilities of the backcourt isn't good for numbers, if two maybe even three of Jazz bigs go after offensive boards and the backcourt sleeps to run back.

 

[stitches]

Watching all those playoff games and wondering - how many of our current players can you imagine getting minutes in games like those? Be honest... 2? Do we have more than 2?

 

[KqWIN]

Watching all those playoff games and wondering - how many of our current players can you imagine getting minutes in games like those? Be honest... 2? Do we have more than 2?

Lauri for sure. Kessler could be vital or situational depending on the matchup, but he’s in every rotation.Collins is probably yes as a rotation piece. Sexton is in some of the rotations, but is either not in or cut quickly in others.

 

[The Thriller]

Young players, most without starter nba talent.
Poor shot selection and too many turnovers.

 

[jazznik]

This isn't very hard. Already mentioned earlier the sad fact of either small or just very bad defenders running point (Sexton, JC, George). Their ball security isn't very good. Lots of turnovers creates transition buckets. Add the fact how guys like JC or George mostly haven't even tried to stop transition offenses in many games. I don't feel shocked about it... Jazz has been undermining anything good the team has had going on.

That actually makes a lot of sense. Sexton, JC, and George played a bulk of guard minutes in both 2023-24 and 2024-25, which explains why the Jazz were equally bad in them. Also, late in the 2024-25 season, in February and March Utah started sitting them down and replacing with Collier, Juzang, Coby and even Svi - and the Jazz quickly became horrible on offense, but their defense noticeable improved - despite Kessler and other experienced bigs missing quite a few games.

I also looked at other teams trying to find any where all three leading guards were bad on defense and could not find any: the Jazz seem to be unique with that type of backcourt construction.

 

[jazznik]

Watching all those playoff games and wondering - how many of our current players can you imagine getting minutes in games like those? Be honest... 2? Do we have more than 2?

That is simply because the Jazz had all those players and then traded them away/not resigned: NAW, Beasley, Dunn, Agbaji, Olynyk...

 

[Douchebag K]

Dunno why anyone is so fussed about what we were like defensively. We weren't trying to win, it's a moot point

 

[jazznik]

Dunno why anyone is so fussed about what we were like defensively. We weren't trying to win, it's a moot point

What is interesting that throughout the season there was a lot of fussing about the offensive production of each individual player and the team as a whole. And nobody was saying "why bother talking about the lack of passing or the low FG% of this or that guy - we are not trying to win!" I wonder why.

 

[cctrackstar]

our entire team is comprised of players drafted in the mid to late first or second, with incomplete games. if you have weaknesses, your best chance to make it in the league anyway is to focus entirely on offence and hope you get noticed by someone. i used to think that good defense is just effort, but i am starting to think that it is instinctual, the deep desire to shut a guy down and break his will. that is more than just effort. if someone is focusing entirely on offence in an effort to stay in the league, they aren't going to have the time or energy to develop that instinct.

 

[HermanG]

I don't know, I think I did a pretty fair comparison after being repeatedly told that the Jazz defensive problems are mostly due to tanking and young players playing a lot of minutes. I compared the Jazz defense in the year when the Jazz were competing for most of the year and in the year when they played almost exclusively vets + Kessler (who is supposedly a good defender for a young player): the results were the same.

Instead of the full year data, you are for some reason doing selective comparisons for specific dates and against a very specific team that dramatically changed its roster at the trade deadline (i.e. no way the pre-deadline Mavs would go to the Finals). But your 2024 trade deadline stats tell the same story: the Jazz, while trying to win the games and playing their vets, were the 25th on defense. I do not have the deadline DRTG stats for other teams but I am pretty sure that by that date the teams below defensively were mostly or exclusively the desperately tanking teams like the Hornets, Wizards and Pistons. If you think that tanking/playing vets affect the defensive rating then you need to compare the non-tanking Jazz to other non-tanking vet teams, right? How many of them were worse in 2023-24?

I think that the 2 year sample shows that when the Jazz tank their defense is worse compared to other tankers, and when they compete/play vets their defense is worse than that of other teams stacked with vets and competing. When something like that happens it points to other factors affecting the team defense, regardless of the player experience or the level of tanking. I think it is fair to discuss what those factors could be because I, personally, do not know.

Just stick your data points where ever and do actual analysis for once. I can give you short and concise points that anyone who watched the actual games should know:

• "Hunger games" and how our guards performed to start the season
• Kessler injury that he tried to play through (also he had a down year altogether)
• Dunn wasnt even in the rotation until January
• Tech wasnt in the rotation to start the season, and the first time he topped 20+ minutes was 22nd of November
• Collins was so slow to learn Hardy schemes that even the FO compained about it to our beat writers
• Collins also couldnt play with Kessler out of the gate, because he was so hardwired to play like a stretch 5

Your whole "we played vets big minutes" is not even analysis. Doesnt matter who you play if your rotations are broken. Hardy was playing who he was supposed to be playing but the team just didnt function as a unit. THT was maybe our second best performing guard early season but ironically we started doing much better only after he got permanently benched. Thats because we had WAY too many guards crammed in the rotation and the best fit with almost every other guard we had was Dunn, who wasnt in the rotation because of the logjam. But THT, Keyonte, Sexton were all young and Hardy had to play them. JC also wasnt a guy who you can just easily bench even though he played like trash quite often.