Tuesday, January 5, 2010

Jazzland


It's been a rough ten days in Jazzland.
  • Our boys continue to suck on the road and in the second half of back-to-back games. Could the despised shootaround be the problem? The NY Times thinks so, and reports on research that finds an extra couple of hours of sleep for NBA teams is much better than getting them out of bed in the morning for a half-hearted practice. I agree. The shootaround makes no sense. 82 games a year is brutal, not to mention the travel that goes along with it. You're going to spend all that money on chartered planes, trainers, healthy diets, and weight rooms and then mandate that your players get five hours of sleep a night every time they go on the road? Unfortunately this is likely an example of something Jerry will never change. . . he's old school, even when the evidence indicates it's probably hurting his team's record.
  • Greg Miller is getting active on Twitter and his blog. Here are his thoughts today on the Jazz. In general he has some good things to say. The short summary is, "We are over the cap and not that good, and we need to do something about it. Just because we aren't making trades doesn't mean we aren't pursuing them and you might just see us pull one off soon." He is a bit loose with his language, writing things like, "I'm not ready to throw in the towel yet," as if in a year or two he might be. But overall it's refreshing to see an owner communicating honestly and transparently about his team.
  • In an extremely unfortunate development, the Jazz are four games better than the Knicks right now. Although it's unlikely, there's an outside chance our own pick could be better than their pick at the end of the year. Let us pray for the selfishness and ridiculousness that has plauged that organization lasts one more season.

4 comments:

Tucker McCann said...

Yeah, I have been watching the Knicks slowly start to win games. My analysis: If the Knicks end up winning 35 - 45 games, then I will be convinced that the Basketball Gods do not love us.

Ryan said...

With the knicks improving, I'm not all that opposed to including their pick in a trade (along with Boozer) if we can get a good young player for it.

Orlando said...

Pasty, give me a shout out for predicting the Knicks success. With no reason to tank, you knew they'd start to get some wins. Playoff team?

Pasty Gangsta said...

Let's see how the Knicks finish -- they're still trying to make moves and they don't have a lot of talent to go around. If they trade Harrington or someone else who is actually good, they'll be in trouble.