2011-12 Utah Jazz Season Overview
The Utah Jazz are definitely a rebuilding squad at this time and they are no longer fighting for a postseason spot as they’re fighting for ping pong balls in the draft lottery. Gone are the Stockton and Malone title contending groups, and the Boozer and Deron Williams competitive teams as well.
The Jazz have a lot of question marks heading into the season. They lost Jerry Sloan, one of the best head coaches in NBA history, to retirement. Right after, they lost Deron Williams in a trade that sent him to New Jersey in basically causing his way out of Utah.
The team finished with a 39-43 record, but they weren’t the same after Williams left. They went on a terrible 12-29 record in the final 41 games of their season en route to a disastrous finish. They ranked 14th in scoring with 99.4 points while permitting 101.3 points good for 19th in the league in scoring defense. Though they passed the ball amazingly well going for 23.4 dimes and ranking 4th in the league, they’re an abysmal 26 th in rebounding with just 39.5 rebounds a game.
Utah drafted 3rd overall draft pick Enes Kanter and No. 12th pick Alec Burks. These are actually NBA ready players and can step in and certainly contribute right away.
Although letting go of back up PG Ronnie Price will hurt, they managed to re-sign Earl Watson to play the backup point guard role in Utah. They also signed Josh Howard away from the Washington Wizards. Though Howard is obviously on the fall, a healthy Howard can definitely offer a welcome spark of the bench offensively. The small forward has put up 15.1 points and 5.9 boards in his career.
Their starting guards will be made of PG Devin Harris and SG Raja Bell. Harris put up 15.2 points and 7.1 dimes between the Nets and the Jazz last season, but he’s definitely a major downgrade over Williams. Bell is still to be a good defender, but he has actually become a spot up shooter offensively as he has gotten older. Watson and Jamaal Tinsley, signed as a free agent, will back up Harris. Second-year man Gordon Hayward and Burks will fight for the reserve role behind Bell.
The starting frontcourt is composed of C Al Jefferson who averaged 18.6 points, 9.7 rebounds and 1.9 blocks, PF Paul Millsap who averaged 17.3 points and 7.6 rebounds and SF C.J. Miles scoring 12.8 points a game. Jefferson and Millsap are 2 of the more underrated players in the league, but they’re both a little small. Derrick Favors will back up Millsap, Kanter and Mehmet Okur will look for playing time behind Jefferson, and Jeremy Evans will try to take some minutes away from Miles.
Western Conference Pick: 5th Northwest Division – Our NBA predictions show with the departure of Deron Williams, look for Utah to struggle to win many games as they used to be a 12-29 team without him down the stretch. Williams ‘ impact to this team was massive, and they are going to have a hard time attempting to duplicate his production going forward.
Though the Jazz did get some nice pieces in the trade and they have stockpiled plenty of young talent they will need time to grow and gel together as a team. Kanter, Burks, Favors and Hayward will be good players along the line, but as of this season, Utah will have the excellence of being the worst team in the Northwest Division in 2012.
If you’d like to beat the NBA spreads this season then enroll in the NBA picks offered by our specialists.