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Jazz Notes: Gobert, Clarkson, Game 7, Mitchell

September 2nd, 2020 at 1:58pm CST by Arthur Hill

We shared the news earlier today that the Jazz plan to offer a maximum extension to Donovan Mitchell, but the team is also facing an important decision on Rudy Gobert in what could become the most expensive offseason the franchise has ever seen, writes Bobby Marks of ESPN.

Gobert, whose contract expires after next season, is eligible for a five-year, $221MM super-max deal. Marks doesn’t expect Utah to give Gobert that kind of money, but he is in line for a substantial raise as one of the league’s top interior defenders. Marks notes that the Jazz can offer several other options, including a four-year, $133MM extension, a five-year, $189.9MM extension, or a full super-max for the first year with an 8% decrease every subsequent season, resulting in a five-year, $160MM package.

Marks adds that if Utah allows Gobert to hit the open market next summer and the salary cap remains at $109MM, at least 12 teams will have a minimum of $30MM in cap room to pursue him.

There’s more on the Jazz:

Another priority will be re-signing Jordan Clarkson, who will be unrestricted when free agency begins, Marks notes in the same piece. After being acquired from the Cavaliers in late December, Clarkson provided some scoring punch to a reserve unit that had been near the bottom of the league in producing points. The Jazz hold Bird rights on Clarkson and will face a weak market where only 10 teams have money to spend apart from their mid-level exceptions.
Utah overcame a lot of adversity just to reach Game 7, notes Joe Vardon of The Athletic. Gobert’s positive coronavirus test in March led to the league shutdown and created a split with Mitchell. The Jazz also lost an important part of their offense when Bojan Bogdanovic underwent season-ending wrist injury. “Being here has been a challenge in a lot of ways, but I don’t think it’s dampened our enthusiasm for the game,” coach Quinn Snyder said before Tuesday’s game. “So to whatever extent that’s there, certainly you have to fight it, but there’s always things that creep in.”
Any lingering rift between Mitchell and Gobert was healed by the experience in Orlando, according to Tony Jones of The Athletic, who states that the team was galvanized by the restart. Mitchell also proved to the organization that he can take on the scoring load in the playoffs. “Donovan, that kid is tough,” Clarkson said. “He’s a scorer, makes plays. One of the best guards in the league, one of the best guards that I’ve played with.”

Jazz Will Give Maximum Extension To Donovan Mitchell

September 2nd, 2020 at 10:52am CST by Arthur Hill

Donovan Mitchell, one of the stars of this year’s playoffs despite Utah’s first-round loss, will receive a maximum extension when free agency begins, sources tell Chris Haynes of Yahoo Sports.

The total value of the five-year deal, which would go into effect in 2021/22, is projected to be about $170MM. The actual value will depend on where the salary cap lands for the ’21/22 season and whether Mitchell meets the Rose rule criteria.

Mitchell, 23, averaged 36.3 points, 5.0 rebounds and 4.9 assists per game in the series against the Nuggets and shot 52% from 3-point range. He set a playoff record by making 33 three-pointers in a series.

Haynes notes that Mitchell was among several young stars who were reluctant to participate in the restart because of the risk of an injury that might affect future earnings. Mitchell explained his position on a Zoom call with other players set up by Kyrie Irving in June, but said talking to his teammates convinced him to play.

“Once my teammates told me they wanted to play, then I was all in. I couldn’t make it all about myself,” Mitchell said. “There are younger guys who aren’t established in this league and needed this time to show their value. It would have been selfish of me to stand in the way of that. I couldn’t let my contract get in the way of the bigger picture. I had to rely on God. If I got hurt, it was God’s will. But I put my trust in Him and didn’t worry about potentially getting injured. That allowed me to go out there and play. My faith was in God.”

Mitchell took Tuesday’s loss especially hard, Haynes adds. He collapsed to the court when Mike Conley‘s potential game-winning shot at the buzzer bounced out, then fought back tears in a post-game session with the media. Afterward, he fell into the arms of assistant coach Johnnie Bryant – who is headed to the Knicks to join Tom Thibodeau’s coaching staff – and sobbed uncontrollably.

“I’m going to get right back to work,” Mitchell told reporters. “I’m not done. The Utah Jazz aren’t done.”

Doncic, Porzingis, SGA Among Players Out For Monday’s Games

August 10th, 2020 at 11:09am CST by Luke Adams

Mavericks stars Luka Doncic and Kristaps Porzingis won’t play in Monday’s game against Utah, according to the league’s official injury report. Dallas will also be without starting forward Dorian Finney-Smith.

Doncic and Porzingis are both listed out due to “injury recovery” — right ankle for Doncic and left knee for Porzingis. Finney-Smith, meanwhile, is dealing with a left hip strain.

At 42-30, the No. 7 Mavericks are two games behind the sixth-seeded Jazz (43-27), so today’s game has seeding implications. If the Mavs lose, they’ll be locked into the No. 7 seed in the West. Utah, just a half-game behind the No. 5 Thunder, could still move up a spot or two in the standings, though the team may prefer to remain at No. 6 if it means avoiding the Rockets in the first round. Houston has eliminated the Jazz in the postseason in each of the last two years.

Donovan Mitchell has also been downgraded from questionable to out for today’s game due to a left lower leg peroneal strain, according to the Jazz (via Twitter).

Meanwhile, per the league’s injury report, the Thunder will be without Shai Gilgeous-Alexander (right calf contusion), Steven Adams (left lower leg contusion), Danilo Gallinari (left ankle injury maintenance), and Nerlens Noel (right ankle sprain), in addition to missing Dennis Schröder, who remains out for personal reasons after attending the birth of his child.

Those absences bode well for the Suns, who will need to remain undefeated in the bubble in order to keep pace in the race for the Western Conference’s final playoff spot. As we detailed earlier today, Phoenix won’t technically be eliminated from postseason contention with a loss, but it would make the path to a play-in spot a whole lot more difficult.

Jazz Stars Sitting Out Friday’s Game With Spurs

August 6th, 2020 at 8:39pm CST by Dana Gauruder

The Jazz will play the Spurs on Friday but they will look like a totally different team. They’ll go without all of their star players due to injury or, in one case, rest, according to an ESPN report.

The starting backcourt of Donovan Mitchell (left peroneal strain) and Mike Conley (right knee soreness) will sit out, as will center Rudy Gobert. Coach Quin Snyder is resting his defensive stalwart in the first game of a back-to-back. Utah plays Denver on Saturday.

Another key player, forward Royce O’Neale (right calf soreness), is also taking the night off, as well as guard Nigel Williams-Goss (left ankle sprain).

None of the injuries appear to be long-term, so it’s quite possible most or all of those players could return for the Denver game. The Nuggets have been playing shorthanded during the restart and are missing four starters — Jamal Murray, Gary Harris, Will Barton and Paul Millsap — in their game against Portland on Thursday.

Utah is trying to hold onto the fourth seed in the Western Conference and is also within striking distance of the third-place Nuggets.

Northwest Notes: Nuggets, Lillard, Jazz, Wolves

July 27th, 2020 at 5:00pm CST by Luke Adams

The Nuggets have been one of the most short-handed teams at the NBA’s campus so far, having been limited to just eight players in each of their first two scrimmages this summer. However, reinforcements are on the way for Monday’s game against Orlando.

Nuggets head coach Michael Malone told reporters this afternoon that Jamal Murray, Will Barton, Michael Porter Jr., and Keita Bates-Diop will all be available to play in tonight’s game, increasing the team’s roster count to 12 (Twitter link via Kendra Andrews of The Athletic).

While he won’t be active tonight, Nuggets guard Monte Morris moved one step closer to getting back on the court as well, having cleared quarantine, as Mike Singer of The Denver Post tweets. He seems likely to be ready by the time Denver plays its first seeding game vs. Miami on Saturday.

Let’s round up a few more Northwest items…

Trail Blazers guard Damian Lillard missed Sunday’s scrimmage against Toronto due to inflammation in his left foot, but head coach Terry Stotts said the club doesn’t expect it to be “a long-term thing,” writes Tim Bontemps of ESPN.com.
Sarah Todd of The Deseret News takes a deep dive into the Jazz‘s ability to retain both Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert long term, exploring the odds of the team doing so and speculating about what their contracts might look like.
University of Denver guard Ade Murkey, a Minnesota native, has interviewed with his hometown Timberwolves during the pre-draft process, according to Darren Wolfson of 5 Eyewitness News (Twitter link). Murkey averaged 18.6 PPG and 6.3 RPG with a .481/.400/.731 shooting line as a senior.

Western Notes: G. Harris, Craig, Kings, Mitchell

July 21st, 2020 at 8:30pm CST by Luke Adams

The official Nuggets summer roster, announced on Monday by the NBA, features 17 names, the maximum allowed by the league. However, a number of those players didn’t arrive at the Orlando campus with the rest of the team earlier this month and have been slowly trickling in.

Two key players traveled to the campus on Sunday, as Ohm Youngmisuk of ESPN details, with Gary Harris and Torrey Craig reporting for their quarantine period. Mike Singer of The Denver Post provided an update on Harris and Craig today, tweeting that they’ve now cleared their quarantine period. The two Nuggets didn’t practice today because they also must complete cardiac testing before being fully cleared.

With Harris and Craig nearly ready to start practicing, the Nuggets are a little closer to being whole, but that won’t happen in time for the team’s first inter-squad scrimmage on Wednesday. Earlier this week, head coach Mike Malone said that he expects to have only nine players available for that exhibition game (Twitter link via Chris Dempsey of Altitude Sports). Fans who tune in can expect to see some unusual lineups for Denver, including the possibility of Bol Bol at small forward.

Here’s more from around the Western Conference:

De’Aaron Fox, who is recovering from an ankle sprain, returned to practice for the Kings today and took part in non-contact drills, per Jason Anderson of The Sacramento Bee. Richaun Holmes also participated in his first practice since clearing his extended quarantine.
In addition to improving as a player, Jazz guard Donovan Mitchell also wants to improve as a teammate, writes Eric Walden of The Salt Lake Tribune. As Walden relays, head coach Quin Snyder has been impressed by Mitchell’s development in both areas. “That maturation process has been going on,” Snyder said. “And some of it you guys don’t see as much. Some of it we see on the floor, some of it we see in the locker room, some of it we see during video (review). … There’s an awareness and a care factor there that has manifested itself in even more leadership.”
John Hollinger of The Athletic questions whether the Warriors really need to prioritize acquiring a center this offseason and explores how the Timberwolves might address their shooting guard and forward spots.

Latest On Rudy Gobert/Donovan Mitchell Relationship

July 7th, 2020 at 9:49am CST by Luke Adams

The tension between Jazz stars Rudy Gobert and Donovan Mitchell, the first two NBA players known to have tested positive for the coronavirus in March, has been a simmering subplot since the league suspended its season nearly four months ago. In his latest piece, Tim MacMahon of ESPN takes a deep dive into the subject, writing that there were some issues between Gobert and Mitchell even before the COVID-19 situation.

As MacMahon details, a high-ranking Jazz source described the pre-coronavirus tension between the two All-Stars as “a two out of 10 on the NBA drama scale.” That situation worsened a little in March because Mitchell blamed Gobert for infecting him with COVID-19, sources tell ESPN.

The two players didn’t talk for several weeks following their positive tests, despite Gobert’s efforts to reach out. When the Jazz wanted to start virtual meetings and workouts in early April, Gobert told teammates that he didn’t feel comfortable participating in them until he and Mitchell had talked. The two finally touched base about a month into the hiatus, writes MacMahon.

“We told each other what we had to say to each other,” Gobert said. “We are both on the same page. We both want to win. We both think that we have a great opportunity, and we know that we need each other. We talked about a lot of things, but the main thing was that we are on the same page and the fact that our team needs us. We can win together. That’s the most important thing.”

MacMahon’s story is packed with interesting details on the Jazz and the relationship between the team’s two stars. It’s worth checking out in full, but here are some of the highlights:

The pre-pandemic issues between Gobert and Mitchell often revolved around touches on offense, since Mitchell sometimes try to do too much, while Gobert has a habit of letting teammates know if they didn’t pass to him when he felt he was open. As MacMahon notes, Mitchell has heard the brunt of those gripes, since he has the ball in his hands the most. “Rudy has to pick his spots, and Donovan can’t react to everything,” one team source told ESPN.
Gobert acknowledged that he shouldn’t be airing his on-court frustration quite so much, per MacMahon. “I understand that I’m annoying. I can be very annoying,” said the two-time Defensive Player of the Year. “I think maybe because (Mitchell) was really good really early, I’ve been very demanding and maybe in not always a positive way. Sometimes you don’t realize it. … It’s pretty much, I’m the a–hole.”
A pair of All-Star snubs prior to this season bothered Gobert, and MacMahon suggests that some people in the Jazz organization thought the big man may have started focusing too much on his scoring statistics in the hopes of earning more recognition. Gobert, who told ESPN that “every single player in the NBA thinks about his stats,” admitted that was a fair concern.
Still, Gobert insists he’s happy to let Mitchell be the face of the franchise, as MacMahon relays. “Donovan has a very bright personality and all that, and the way he plays, he’s more fun to watch than me,” Gobert said. “If I was 12 years old… I wouldn’t want to watch Rudy Gobert get dunks and alter shots. I’d want to watch Donovan Mitchell cross people up and do crazy layups, crazy dunks, of course. I totally understand how it works, and I’m fine with it.”
The occasional issues between Gobert and Mitchell aren’t expected to lead to a break-up. The Jazz want to keep both players, and they’ve each expressed interest in remaining in Utah long-term. According to MacMahon, a max-salary extension offer for Mitchell is a no-brainer, though negotiations with Gobert may be trickier — he’ll be eligible for an extension worth up to 35% of the cap, compared to 25% for Mitchell.
There’s hope within the organization that the pre- and post-coronavirus issues between the two stars may push them to have more productive conversations with one another and grow closer, says MacMahon. “When adversity comes, it can pull the group together or it can push them away,” a team source told ESPN. “That’s the reality of the situation. It’s up to them.”

Western Notes: Mitchell, Thunder, Williamson, Burke

July 2nd, 2020 at 6:46pm CST by Dana Gauruder

Jazz teammates Donovan Mitchell and Rudy Gobert appear to be patching up their relationship, Sarah Todd of the Deseret News writes. “Right now we’re good,” Mitchell said in a Zoom conference with the media. “We’re going out there ready to hoop.” In the wake of his positive test for COVID-19 in March, Mitchell was said to be frustrated with Gobert. the first NBA player to test positive. The situation reportedly remained tense even after Mitchell recovered from the virus.

We have more from the Western Conference:

While 25 players around the NBA have tested positive for the novel coronavirus since June 23, there have been no positive tests among Thunder players and staff members, Joe Mussatto of The Oklahoman reports. All players have returned to Oklahoma City for mandatory individual workouts and the team will fly to Orlando next week.
Pelicans coach Alvin Gentry is confident rookie star Zion Williamson will continue to make a big impact once plays resumes, he indicated in a interview with William Guillory of The Athletic. “I think he’s worked extremely hard during the time away,” Gentry said. “I think, to some degree, you’ll see everybody a little rusty when we come back because we’ve been away for so long. But he’ll get himself right, and I don’t see any reason why he wouldn’t pick up right where he left off. “
The Mavericks felt they had enough depth up front to replace Willie Cauley-Stein, which is why they signed point guard Trey Burke as a substitute player, according to Eddie Sefko of Mavs.com. Dallas also had a need in the backcourt with Jalen Brunson and Courtney Lee injured. “As we looked at the profile of the team, we felt there was more of a need at that backup (guard spot), scoring off the bench,” president of basketball operations Donnie Nelson said. Cauley-Stein was one of the players who opted out of the restart.

Northwest Notes: Hood, Craig, Timberwolves, Jazz

June 18th, 2020 at 8:47pm CST by Alex Kirschenbaum

After tearing his left Achilles on December 6, Trail Blazers wing Rodney Hood began pondering his life after the league and joined a small support group of fellow NBA players currently on or recently off the rehab trail from the injury, according to ESPN’s Eric Woodyard.

“I reach out to Kevin Durant or Wesley Matthews, DeMarcus Cousins,” Hood said. “The guys who have been through it, and I just get confident more and more every day.”

With the encouragement of his wife Richa, a fellow Duke alum, Hood re-enrolled in school to complete his undergraduate degree: “I want to do something special… And getting a degree from Duke is special, especially coming from where I come from.” Prior to his injury, the 6’8″ southpaw sported a slash line of 11.0 PPG/3.4 RPG/1.5 APG across 21 games in 2019. He connected on 50.6% of his shots from the floor, a whopping 49.3% on 3.4 three-point attempts, and 77.8% from the charity stripe.

Here’s more from around the Northwest Division:

Nuggets forward and 2020 restricted free agent Torrey Craig could parlay his play in Orlando into a big contract when the NBA resumes its season this summer, according to The Athletic’s Nick Kosmider. Craig, a two-way threat in spot minutes on a deep Denver squad whose counting stats belie his skills, is currently a steal as he wraps up a two-year, $4MM contract.
Due to the financial impact caused by COVID-19 closures, Glen Taylor and the ownership group behind the Timberwolves, Lynx, and Iowa Wolves has laid off 18 members of their full-time staff and reduced pay for employees making $70K or more, per a statement cited by The Athletic’s Jon Krawczynski (Twitter link). ESPN echoes the news.
Jazz All-Star Donovan Mitchell has been conducting workouts with teammates Royce O’Neale, Jordan Clarkson, Rayjon Tucker and Miye Oni at the Sports Academy in Newbury Park, California, according to Sarah Todd of the Deseret News. Mitchell, 23, has been having a breakout season in Utah, setting career highs in scoring, rebounding, field goal percentage and three-point percentage. The Jazz are 41-23, the No. 4 seed in the West, thanks especially to the sterling offense of Mitchell and the stellar defense of center Rudy Gobert.

More Details Emerge From Friday’s Conference Call

June 13th, 2020 at 5:30pm CST by Arthur Hill

We relayed details last night about a conference call regarding player objections to the plan to restart the NBA season in Orlando. More information on that call, which involved in excess of 80 players, has been released by Shams Charania of The Athletic.

Charania confirms that Kyrie Irving was the leader of the effort to make players reconsider their support of finishing the season. He spoke first and offered a direct message to his peers, telling them, “I don’t support going into Orlando. I’m not with the systematic racism and the bull–. … Something smells a little fishy. Whether we want to admit it or not, we are targeted as black men every day we wake up.”

Avery Bradley, who was outspoken throughout the conversation, was the first player to follow Irving’s comments. He encouraged the players to take a stand and to use the opportunity to “play chess, not checkers.” Other prominent names on the call included union president Chris Paul, Kevin Durant, Carmelo Anthony, Dwight Howard and Donovan Mitchell.

Players have been involved in conversations for the past two weeks, sources tell Charania, expressing concerns about the games in Orlando and the restrictive conditions that are rumored to be part of the bubble environment. The opposition began among “rank-and-file” players, with Irving and Durant providing prominent voices.

Sources offered Charania a few more tidbits from the conference call:

Anthony emphasized the need for player unity and the importance of conveying a single message. He also urged all 80 players on the call to donate $25K to a cause of their choice.
CJ McCollum told players they have to be prepared for financial setbacks if they choose not to play and the possibility that owners will nullify the current Collective Bargaining Agreement.
Howard warned that resuming the season will distract from the social justice issues the country is focused on. He encouraged players to use the moment as a catalyst for change.
Mitchell talked about players “being behind the 8-ball” by being forced into a competitive environment after being idle for so long. “We’re taking a big injury risk,” he told his fellow players.
NBPA leadership doesn’t expect fans to be allowed into games at any point during the 2020/21 season, which would result in another huge revenue loss for the league.