It's time for change for the Utah Jazz. After a disappointing 2023-24 season, the team is looking to switch things up and start a rebuild. It's not going to be a quick rebuild, too: the way things are right now for Utah, a hard reset is in order. They'll have to struggle for a few years and regrow their assets.
It makes sense, then, that the Jazz have been active on the trade market, per Jonathan Givony and Jeremy Woo of ESPN. Utah is looking to move up into the middle of the draft by dangling their 29th and 32nd selection in the draft.
“Utah is said to be active in trade talks, both with this pick and potentially looking to package the Nos. 29 and 32 picks to move into the late teens. The Jazz are being mentioned with center and point guard prospects and might be open to moving around some, depending on how the draft evolves.”
The Jazz were one of the worst teams in the league last season. Their 11th place finish is misleading, as they finished ten games back of the final Play-In spot with a 31-51 record. They have a great All-Star piece in Lauri Markannen, as well as a promising coach in Will Hardy. Still, there's a lot of work to be done.
Jazz's reported draft targets
The ESPN mock draft proposes Nikola Topic as the Jazz's 10th pick in the 2024 NBA draft. Topic is an intriguing prospect, to say the least. He's a big guard, similar to Luka Doncic, with playmaking and finishing chops. However, he has a light frame. His three-point shot is also non-existent, which poses a problem in the modern NBA.
To make things more complicated, Topic suffered a knee injury during the NBA combine. That injury was eventually revealed to be an ACL tear, forcing the would-be rookie to miss the entirety of his first year. Despite the prognosis, though, teams are still seemingly interested in Topic. The draft prospect is in America meeting with teams, including the Jazz.
Givony notes that drafting a rookie to “redshirt” isn't uncommon, and that the Jazz might consider that approach too.
“A team picking him will likely need to be comfortable with the idea of a redshirt season next year with long-term thinking in mind, similar to how Chet Holmgren, Joel Embiid, Michael Porter Jr. and Blake Griffin started their NBA careers. Utah might feel a degree of regret for not going more all-in on positioning themselves for draft picks the past two years and could potentially reconsider that strategy at some point.”
Givony also notes a rather interesting strategy for the Jazz, which is to draft 2025 top prospect Cooper Flagg next year. If that is indeed the goal, then drafting a top rookie to redshirt him is the obvious choice. However, it won't be easy given the talent of the team.
“Drafting Topic and trying to make a run at Cooper Flagg next year might not be the worst idea, something that could prove difficult with an All-Star in Lauri Markkanen in the fold and one of the NBA's best young coaches in Will Hardy.”
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