Jazz Are Making a Big Mistake with Rookie Taylor Hendricks
The Utah Jazz's loss to the Cleveland Cavaliers on Wednesday night marked one of the team's lower points of the season. After winning three of their previous four games, the Jazz faced a Cavs squad that was without All-NBA guard Donovan Mitchell, All-Star guard Darius Garland, and Defensive Player of the Year contender Evan Mobley.
Going into the evening, it seemed like a very winnable game for the Jazz. Instead, Utah allowed 124 points, including 65 off the bench, to the star-studded trio of Caris Lavert, Georges Niang, and Utah State’s own Sam Merril.
There were certainly some positives, such as Lauri Markkanen scoring a 26-point double-double and Collin Sexton extending his streak of scoring 20-plus points to six games. However, there were just too many negatives for the Jazz on the road once again.
The loss drops the Jazz to 10-18 on the season, good for 12th in the West, with the Memphis Grizzlies now lurking behind them. While every team is going to have a bad loss at some point, one of the more concerning parts of the game was that after playing in the previous eight games, Taylor Hendricks didn’t see the court.
The rookie out of UCF whom Utah drafted earlier this year had given fans glimpses of why he was a top-10 pick just a few months ago. It seemed like Hendricks was getting more and more comfortable with each minute he received. To not even touch the floor is a disappointment for a team that’s going nowhere this season.
The Jazz entered the year with playoff aspirations. With nearly a third of the season in the books, the team sits 4.5 games out of the final play-in spot. It seems very unrealistic that the Jazz are going to make a run at a top-eight seed in the conference.
With his frontcourt healthy again, head coach Will Hardy opted to play Markkanen, Walker Kessler, Simone Fontecchio, Kelly Olynyk, and John Collins. You can see why; that’s a two-deep rotation at each position.
The problem is that Hendricks’ development is one of the most important things that can happen for the Jazz this season. If Hardy can’t find him minutes, it’s up to the front office to force the issue.
As we round the corner and head into a new year, plenty of playoff-caliber teams will be looking for veteran help. Hopefully, the Jazz jump at the opportunity to open up more minutes for the personnel pieces that are so key to their future.
Those pieces are Hendricks, Keyonte George, Walker Kessler, Ochai Agbaji, and Brice Sensabaugh, all of whom are in either their first or second year in the league. Despite their youth, each of these guys can flat-out play.
Giving these young players the runway to develop now will hopefully speed up the rebuild for this team. It’s going to take some patience as the Jazz work through their growing pains, but watching your young talent develop is what a rebuild is all about.
Watching their growth while getting excited about the future of the team is more appealing than watching a group of veterans play sub-.500 basketball, and get beaten night after night.
Bottom Line
It’s very likely that the Jazz are just trying to bump up the trade stock for their veterans as teams scan the market. After all, it’s hard to increase your value if you’re not on the court.
At the end of the day, the Jazz have to reassess what their goals for this season truly are and try to achieve them. In so doing, the hope is that the Jazz choose a direction that prioritizes their future instead of delaying the inevitable in exchange for zero short-term gains.
This season has been a disappointment, but the Jazz's future appears to be bright. Let us see how bright it might be.
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