Sarah Todd of The Deseret News wonders what’s next for Jazz guard Trent Forrest. The 23-year-old spent the past two seasons on a two-way deal with Utah after going undrafted out of Florida State, but his contract was converted to a standard deal on the last day of the regular season.
Although that technically made him eligible for the playoffs, Forrest was dealing with a left midfoot sprain, so the conversion was mostly ceremonial. The front office deferred to coach Quin Snyder‘s preference for the 15th roster spot, and Forrest was rewarded after earning the trust of Snyder, sources tell Todd.
As of last week, Forrest was still experiencing pain while rehabbing the injury and had yet to resume on-court work, but it’s not a long-term concern, Todd writes. Forrest will be a restricted free agent this summer if the team tenders him a qualifying offer worth just over $2MM.
Although he’s considered a strong defender, he knows he needs to work on his shot to have lasting success in the NBA.
“This summer is going to be a lot of the same thing,” Forrest said. “I don’t need much pick-and-roll or things like that. A lot of (my work) is just gonna be a lot of left hand finishing and working on my shot.”
Here’s more from the Northwest:
- In a mailbag column about how the Jazz should approach their offseason, Tony Jones of The Athletic says he believes Utah should keep both Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert and surround them with “bigger, longer, more athletic” players who are significantly better defensively. Juancho Hernangomez and Danuel House — two players who were on the verge of being out of the league — both made a big impact on the club due to their length, athleticism and competitive defense, and Jones thinks the Jazz need several more players in that mold. If he were part of the front office, he says he’d try to trade for a second-round pick in the draft and use the taxpayer mid-level exception (projected to be $6.4MM) to acquire players who meet that criteria. Utah does not own a pick at the moment.
- After recent rumors that Timberwolves minority owner Alex Rodriguez might be interested in purchasing the Miami Marlins, his PR representative denied the claim. “Alex Rodriguez is 100 percent focused on owning the Minnesota Timberwolves and Minnesota Lynx. Any report of him having interest in also buying the Miami Marlins or any other MLB team is entirely false,” said Ron Berkowitz of Berk Communications (via Twitter). A-Rod and co-owner Marc Lore are set to become majority shareholders of the Wolves in 2023/24.
- Darren Wolfson of 5 Eyewitness News reports that the Timberwolves worked out several draft prospects on Thursday and Friday, including UCLA’s Johnny Juzang, Maryland’s Fatts Russell, Alabama’s Keon Ellis, North Carolina’s Kerwin Walton, and Richmond’s Jacob Gilyard (all Twitter links here).
Give you Tisse for Royce
Who do we think gets Gobert and who gets Mitchell?
Donovan Mitchell Next Team Odds
Team Odds
Utah Jazz -115
Miami Heat +400
New York Knicks +475
Boston Celtics +750
The Field +450
Rudy Gobert Next Team Odds
Team Odds
Utah Jazz -115
Toronto Raptors +450
Brooklyn Nets +500
Golden State Warriors +750
The Field +400
Id take a field bet on Rudy for +400
Not sure where but Mitchell is Gone and Rudy stays.
I think, in the end, UTH will conclude that a purchased 2nd round pick and the Tx-MLE aren’t sufficient assets to upgrade the team into a bigger, longer, more athletic and better defensive one. At that point, I think they’ll open to trading any or all of Gobert, Conley, Bogo and/or Clarkson. Not Mitchell, unless he requests it.
Should Mitchell request a trade, the Knicks will be involved, but I doubt they’ll make the market for the guy. The FO knows and likes Mitchell, and he’s a local. But they are focused on building a contender, and won’t deplete their asset base for a single player. At least until they think they’re a single player away from contention.
The one thing the Knicks have going for them is that they own all of their picks. But the bad thing, they really aren’t valuable picks if they keep them bc the odds of landing an impact player at the end of the lottery are lower. They also have over 50M in expiring contracts which they could use to build a better team and acquire additional draft capital. But they also have two negative contracts in Randle and Fournier.
Trading for Mitchell and keeping RJ would boost their odds of competing. And he’s under contract for several years so it’s not a 1 player away move. But they need to make more moves than just getting Mitchell.
As long as their 1st round picks project to lottery picks (which I imagine they do), they have value, even with minor protection. McCollum was moved for a single contingent 5-14 NOP pick with only a year to vest. The problem is some stars will require multiple picks even from a possible lottery team, and a team gets one bullet like that every few years, and it’s stupid to use it in a deal for a single star without the other pieces of a championship team in place. To date, the teams that have traded a depleting pick package at least believed they were a player away.
Fournier and Randle aren’t bad contracts, in the sense that either couldn’t be traded without attaching other assets and/or for dead money. Both are in their prime and paid consistent with the FA market for their current production. Randle may have become too high maintenance off the court to trade right now on a 4 year deal, but there’s really no urgency (except from some elements of the fanbase) to move him.
Seems Tony and I are on the same page about players, but not the approach. Can’t be conservative this off-season. That’s what got them here.
Trent Forrest is a big question mark for me. I love his aggression but that also tends to get him hurt. If he was an aggressive midrange jump shooter, like DeRozan, that would help him a ton at staying healthy.
Also, he’s not big enough to be a great rebounder so why stand in the paint and get hit by Gobert, for example? Bob and weave then get out of the paint. Lol
I’d also recommend bulking up with lots of muscle. How many big muscular players get hurt very often?
Muscle adds protection, power, energy, and endurance. High endurance can be the difference between a turnover and a great play.
Landing on your gluteus maximus is way better than trying to catch yourself with your arm. Just watch film on Karl Malone. He hardly ever was injured because of how he landed after hard fouls, fast breaks, etc.
Plus, he still was very fast. Look at how fast he sprinted on fast breaks. That amazing Finals fast break play doesn’t happen if he wasn’t already doing that every game. Both Malone and Stockton have connected on that play countless times every year.