While many fans agree with the tank the Utah Jazz put together, it still needs to be made clear that losing on purpose is not the way to develop a winning team or culture in the NBA. It’s one thing if you have a group of young players and you decide to focus on getting rookies, it’s another when you have a Top 20 NBA player on your roster. If the Jazz’s best players were Walker Kessler and Keyonte George, then yeah, tank.
This is not the case, however, as the team’s best players are Collin Sexton and NBA All-Star Lauri Markkanen. Markkanen is doing his best to keep a brave face, but it’s now been two seasons in as many seasons with the Jazz that he’s had a promising team, only to have it snatched away for a top draft spot.
It’s not the best idea to upset its star, in the eyes of some, unnecessary tanking. Markkanen seems to have gotten over it, but it really upset him. It’s bad enough that he told a Finnish media outlet how upset he was by the decision to tank. Speaking to Finnish news agency Yle (and help from Google Translate), Markkanen explained in detail what he thought about professions and
Original Finnish
“Urheilijana yrittää tehdä parhaansa, ketä tahansa rinnalla sitten on. Itseluottamus on sillä tasolla, että voi vitetaa joka ilta. Tässä kohtaa uraa on tottunut siihen bisnespuoleen, että kavereita voi lähteä rinnalta. Se toki harmittaa, kun heihin on eh tiny tutustuman.
“Ymmärrän pidemmän kaavan, ja meille on tullut paljoa nuoria kavereita. Kilpailijana haluan voirtaa nyt, joten se turhautti hetkellisesti, Markkanen myöntää.”
Google Translated
“As an athlete, you try to do your best no matter who is next to you. The self-confidence is at a level where you can win every night. At this point, the career is used to the side commercial, where you “You can leave your friends. Of course, it’s sad when we had time to know them.”
“I understand the longer format and we had a lot of young guys. As a competitor I want to win now, so it was momentarily frustrating,” admitted Markkanen.
This reflects what he said in February to desert newswhere he lamented the trade of several close teammates.
“It’s part of the job and we experience it every year. But I don’t think you get used to it. You’re good friends with these guys and you obviously want the best for them and their careers, but at the same time you want to spend as much time with them as possible.
With Markkanen in his prime and on a team that isn’t worried about him at all, it seems to me and others that a divorce is imminent. If the goal is not to take steps this offseason to make the playoffs, then the call to trade Markkanen must be made. He is young, only 26 years old but he will be 27 years old in a few months. This is its peak. That’s when he’s supposed to go into the playoffs and show up and show up.
It makes no sense to ask him to wait two or three more years while you continue to chase rookies, only for him to be out of his prime by the time you want to compete and no longer have the same commercial value. The Jazz can’t continue to farm draft picks and keep Markkanen happy. Ultimately, you will have to choose one or the other.
