The guys from Upper Bowl Perspective are back for Season 3 of Upper Bowl Perspective! An unofficial off-season Utah Jazz podcast dedicated to showing you the fans in the nose bleeds know just as much as those sitting courtside.
We discuss the state of the Utah Jazz, offseason moves, hypotheticals, and above all: the NBA draft.
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Episodes drop every Sunday during the off season. Until they don’t.
6 Comments
Have no comment. Plug these draft picks in this year and tank.
Need more teams in NBA.
I already commented on your last video about how I don't believe Lauri is on his ceiling yet (which I could sense even in that video that you disagreed on 😃) but I want to add some more on to that.
With Lauri, he has had a complicated journey after he got to the NBA. I'm not gonna write a book about it to here (since I know this will be long comment anyway 😁😅) but if you go on deep dive there (and maybe understand a Finnish people nature some too) you can see that this was kinda natural progression for him. He just lost his way in the middle a bit. I'm not saying that there weren't things going pretty perfectly for him: getting joy of playing basketball back with Cavs and then suddenly being traded night before Eurobasket and him having that chip on his shoulder which lead him going off there and carrying the momentum to the NBA season where he for once got opportunity to just be himself.
BUT I totally believe that since he has coach in Hardy who believes in him, he will just keep going (even if fiba world cup might not be similar success for him this year since Finland ended up in a very tough group to even get past first round) and with his work ethic he will get better. Like he kept getting better the whole season this season. He totally wasn't same player in fifth game and 65th game of the season. He might not make a huge leap in this offseason because of military but he should be able to improve a little at least. He has said that he is working on his handles and iso stuff in summer. He has also said that he can see the passes on the court but doesn't have the ability to make them yet. So that should make Jazz fans excited, since I think it's lot harder to learn court vision than it is to learn better handles. So there is one way he can make "easily" a big improvement by getting two skills by learning one new.
This all is to say that I don't think there is anything, barring some nasty injury, that would make him regress next season. Even during the trade deadline I still believed he might regress next season if Jazz were to get top 10 player next to him. I thought he might get submissive for a player who he sees as a better one but nowadays I believe more on how he sees himself and that he's ready to have tough conversations with coaches if he would ever be relegated back to the corner again. Now I think he would be able to play together with better player for the best of the team as long as the other one would be somewhat receptive to that too and not just having huge ego.
Also I don't think Markkanen will ever be classical iso superstar even if he gets better at it. If that's only way he can be number one in championship team then he probably won't be. But I dare you to try and find other (star)player who had at least 49 in a game without any isolation plays and without being ballhandler in any pick and rolls and without any post up possessions. I don't think you will find many easily. So I think Lauri, if he will be number one in playoff team, will be unique number one same way that for example Jokic is unique number one (by being point guard center who can shoot but is best when he doesn't) or Dirk was in his time (as a big who did stuff big "wasn't supposed to"). I'm not saying Lauri will necessarily be player of a caliber of those two but that he is rare type of his own like those players are.
Oh and in other train of thoughts: by rumors Jazz have had interview in combine with Brandon Miller and now had workout in Utah with Cam Whitmore. So I'm not so sure they aren't looking to move up with at least one of their picks 😃
Thanks guys for your thoughts. I think we could be happy if Lauri continues top ten scoring, almost 26 points this season. He did it in many ways, threes, dunks, coast to coast, midrange. Of course he has things to develop. I think Lauri can put similar numbers next season. We also should give Jazz team time to grow and develop with the picks and add 1 or two veteran top 20 players.
hes young i see him improve
id like to hear a take on the workouts that are happening right now , Grady Dick has worked out with the jazz and so has Kai Sotto ect