FNG wrote:AbeVigodaLive wrote:FNG wrote:Camden wrote:The 39-13 Utah Jazz currently own the best record in basketball. The Jazz are also complete morons for continuing to play Donovan Mitchell, Jordan Clarkson, and Bojan Bogdanovi? when the team clearly performs better when they're off the court, according to their on/off data. If only Quin Snyder would wake up and realize this.
The Jazz are an interesting team, Cam, because they have three players who may end up being all-NBA defense...Gobert, Conley and O'Neale. Mitchell on the other hand is a disaster on defense, and his defensive deficiencies hurt the Jazz...even in the midst of a nice offensive season. I'm not surprised Utah is so good this year with their lock-down defense, and it's going to be interesting to see what Snyder does in the playoffs where the importance of defense is elevated. O'Neale is extraordinary and is called on to defend the opponent's best player 2-4 every night. I wouldn't be surprised to see Snyder playing a lot of Niang/O'Neale/Ingles 2-4 in the playoffs when they are protecting leads. Mitchell is a great volume scorer but not particularly efficient with his eFG% of only 52%. When inefficient scoring is combined with horrible defense, it's not difficult to see why he's a team-worst -9. Allocating minutes is going to be a challenge for Quin in the playoffs.
If the prior three seasons are an indication... Mitchell will be playing more minutes in the playoffs.
He's averaged 34 mpg in each of the past three regular seasons... and 38 mpg in each of the past three playoffs.
True, but read a few local articles about what Utah fans and analysts are saying about his defense this year...it's fallen off a cliff, and there are a lot of concerns about it. I actually thought he was at least average in previous years, but he's a different player this year. Maybe he's coasting and saving it for the playoffs...if not, there are some reasons for Jazz fans to be concerned.
Maybe. The Jazz are still 4th in the NBA for defense even though the player with the most on-court minutes has fallen off a cliff on defense.